New Zealand has been caught in the crossfire by Australia’s draconian game classification laws. New Zealand gamers normally have a laugh at Australia’s expense due to their lack of an R18 rating for games, but not this time.
It would appear that in the opinion of Australian politicians, gamers are all children. There is no need for an R18 rating because adults don’t play video games. The consequence of this is many games are modified for the Australian market or are just banned outright. Take2, the publishers of the Grand Theft Auto series have been down the Australian censorship road before. To avoid trouble this time they’ve pre-emptively cut some of the more mature content from the game for the Australian market.
This kind of thing doesn’t normally effect New Zealand. We have an R18 rating – because adults play games. However many of the games sold in NZ for economic reasons are the Australian version. As is the case with GTA IV. So thanks to another countries brain-dead game classification laws the game New Zealanders will be playing is censored.
bitshifter 