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The Australian Classification Review Board has had a long running feud with the gaming industry as a whole. There is a long running history of games being released abroad with the global equivalent of a “Mature” rating, while getting rejected down under. Some of these banned titles include the likes of every installment in the Grand Theft Auto franchise, the original Manhunt (Rockstar never even bothered attempting to release Manhunt 2), Fallout 3, Blitz: The League, and most recently Left 4 Dead 2. Many of these games were later censored by developers so that they could see release, much to the dismay of the Aussie gaming population.
For this reason, many were alarmed earlier this month, when the console release of Sega’s upcoming Alien vs. Predator game was dealt a similar fate. Refusing to approve the game for an 15+ rating, ultimately killed all chances of the game seeing the light of day, at least in its current state.
Things then went from bad to worse when Jason Kingsley, the CEO of Rebellion (AvP’s developer) went on the record saying the following about the banning:
“The content of AvP is based on some of the most innovative and iconic horror movies, and as such we wanted to create a title that was true to the source material. It is for adults, and it is bloody and frightening, that was our intent.
We will not be releasing a sanitised or cut down version for territories where adults are not considered by their governments to be able to make their own entertainment choices.” — Jason Kingsley via GamesIndustry.biz
So if the game is deemed inappropriate by a country’s government and the developer is refusing to budge on the removal or censoring of objectionable content, that would render hopes of Aliens vs. Predator ever seeing the release moot, right? Well lets just say that the fat lady hadn’t quite sung yet…
In what seemed like a futile attempt to maintain the integrity of the product, Sega filed an appeal with the Australian Classification Review Board, citing that the context of the violence in the game was not being considered. Though this sounds like a flimsy argument at best, it is actually very similar to one used by Warner Bros. Interactive in defense of F.E.A.R 2: Project Origin, when it was banned back in November of 2008. To this date, F.E.A.R 2 was the only title to ever to have its banning overturned in Australia, without having to censor or remove content.
Well it looks as if Sega’s gamble may have payed off. Yesterday news was handed down that on appeal, they too have been granted the coveted 15+ rating, without the need to edit any material. When excitedly addressing the Review Board’s sudden shift in stance, Darren Macbeth, Sega of Australia’s General Manager was quoted as saying:
“It is with great pleasure that we announce the success of our appeal. We are particularly proud that the game will be released in its original entirety, with no content altered or removed whatsoever. This is a big win for Australian gamers. We applaud the Classification Review Board on making a decision that clearly considers the context of the game, and is in line with the modern expectations of reasonable Australians”. — Darren Macbeth via Kotaku.com
To put things very bluntly, this is a dramatically unexpected result, especially given how poorly Left 4 Dead 2’s appeal went earlier this year. Might we finally be seeing a shift in perspective from the previously stingy stances of the Australian Classification Review Board? As a red-blooded American that is a strong support of our First Amendment Right to Free Speech, I hope that this is a sign of a things to come in regards to game ratings in Australia. With two overturned bans in the last 12 months, this might very well be the case.
Posted on December 18th, 2009 at 5:07pm by [email protected] (The Games Are Evil Family)
Filed Under: Alien vs. Predator, News, PC Gaming, Playstation 3, Xbox 360, australia, avp, featured, opinion, rebellion, sega
Filed under: Culture, Game mechanics, Opinion, Academic, Virtual worlds
One of the major problems of a game in which you can do anything is that… well, there’s not necessarily much of a reason to do anything. That’s a Terrible Idea recently had an interesting piece on the difficulty of generating goals and objectives in MMOs, especially in contrast with single-player games where your goals are equally pre-generated. The difference, as the article notes, is that single-player games have individual characters with a large impact on the game world. There’s no issue of making quests compatible with a wide variety of characters of different races and classes, until the individual motivations and goals can no longer fit into the equation. You don’t have anything but the end of content to shoot for.
So what’s the answer? The original post notes that it’s not really possible to reconcile anything but achievement-oriented goals within MMOs due to the fact that the character will still inhabit a static world no matter what you do. Certainly, there are attempts to create larger-scale impacts for individual characters, but so long as every character goes through the same content or has the same opportunities, there’s less of a sense of distinct accomplishment. Player-generated content in games such as City of Heroes offers an opportunity for a different path for each character, but there’s still not much of a difference in the actual process. Procedural generation is also bandied about as a solution to the issue, though it lacks any truly successful implementation at this point. Is there even a solution, or is this simply part of the weakness of the genre?
The trouble with goals in MMOs originally appeared on Massively on Sun, 29 Nov 2009 20:00:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.
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Posted on November 29th, 2009 at 8:00pm by Eliot Lefebvre
Filed Under: academic, city-of-heroes, city-of-villains, coh, cov, cox, culture, game-mechanics, opinion, player-generated-content, thats-a-terrible-idea, virtual-worlds
Filed under: New titles, Opinion, Star Trek Online, The Daily Grind
This isn’t often a question we find ourselves asking others when it comes to character creation in an MMO, but, well Star Trek Online is different in this regard. Considering the very specific sort of wish fulfillment Cryptic’s next game offers, do you plan to first create a fictional captain or in-game version of yourself to captain a starship?
You see, we began thinking on this very subject not too long ago and a dilemma struck. While being a Vulcan or some odd new species is undoubtedly a tempting concept, seeing ourselves sitting in the captain’s chair is nearly as exciting. Considering Cryptic’s knack for powerful character creation tools, we’ve no doubt that coming up with a close approximation of our likeness wouldn’t be too difficult.
We know that every Star Trek fan is going to create themselves at some point but your first “main” is so very important. Since creating a Klingon-sided character is unlocked after some initial Federation play, we’re thinking of making ourselves first, and then, wait for it… a Gorn second. Yes!
The Daily Grind: You or not you, in Star Trek Online? originally appeared on Massively on Sat, 21 Nov 2009 08:00:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.
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Posted on November 21st, 2009 at 8:00am by Kyle Horner
Filed Under: atari, cryptic, cryptic-studios, federation, klingon, klingons, opinion, star-trek, star-trek-online, sto, the-daily-grind
Where did you buy your last MMO and where will you buy your next? Chances are you’ll be getting it on Steam or so the story goes according to Brad Wardell, head honcho over at Stardock. We’re inclined to agree with his assertion that Valve’s digital distribution platform holds roughly 70% of the PC market as many of us here at Massively have been buying our MMOs — and PC games in general — on the service for some time now.
So is it a good thing or a bad thing for MMO players? Our experience with purchasing games like Aion and Champions Online through the service has been positive, and so long as no complications arise via patches or other client issues we see no reason to stop utilizing the service unless better offers appear.
The only real MMO-related issue we can see is with collector’s editions. Some games offer a different set of bonus material for people who opt out of the physical copy and go for the digital, but certain items like art books, mouse pads and other bric-a-brac can’t be delivered through a wire… at least, not until sometime in the far flung future.
Now, as far as the Steamworks integration issue goes… Well, that’s a whole other sack of fishes.
Filed under: MMO industry, News items, Opinion
Steam estimated at selling to 70% of PC market originally appeared on Massively on Fri, 20 Nov 2009 20:00:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.
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Posted on November 20th, 2009 at 8:00pm by Kyle Horner
Filed Under: aion, atari, brad-wardell, champions, champions-online, digital-distribution, eurogamer, impulse, ncsoft, opinion, stardock, steam, valve
This week, Linden Lab announced that it was going to start charging listing fees and minimum commissions on its Second Life Xstreet Web-shopping adjunct in the near future. Within hours, vendors took down thousands of products, many abandoning the service entirely in favor of alternative services.
It’s unclear just how many vendors have abandoned the Xstreet SL system, but it apparently was enough to temporarily overload the Web-sites of third-party sites such as Slapt.
Continue reading Linden Lab to raise Xstreet fees, loses vendors, products
Filed under: Business models, Culture, Economy, News items, Opinion, Second Life, Virtual worlds
Linden Lab to raise Xstreet fees, loses vendors, products originally appeared on Massively on Fri, 20 Nov 2009 17:00:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.
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Posted on November 20th, 2009 at 5:00pm by Tateru Nino
Filed Under: business-models, culture, economy, linden-dollars, linden-lab, opinion, second-life, sl-policy, slapt, virtual-worlds, xstreet, xstreet-sl
