God of War creator says Australia's age ratings system is “utter BS”
Hot on the heels of the Australian government’s decision to ban Sega’s Aliens vs. Predator from sale in the territory – and the subsequent statement of protest from developer Rebellion – God of War creator David Jaffe has slammed the country’s ratings structure.
“There's a government board and if they say it's too offensive, in that case there's no fight to fight — it is what it is,” he told IGN at the Game Connect conference in Melbourne.
“There's not much you can do if you're making games aimed at a mature audience. We never like to cut it, but what are you going to do? You're dealing with governments.
”There's absolutely an inconsistency in the consciousness about video games. The reality is people still see a lot of these things as kids' toys. It's utter BS.”
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As a parent of a young (14 year old) teenager, I am sick and tired of industry bods complaining about ratings and censorship! Although this David Jaffe maintains that they are aiming at a "mature audience" he knows, as well as I do, that it's mainly kids who want to play these games. Therefore, they act responsibly and cut games and adhere to censorship or else they get together and ensure that games are certificated appropriately and not available to youngsters. With online sales, etc, it is so easy for underage kids to get hold of any games and this needs to be addressed and rectified. Despite all the hype condoning a lot of these violent games, it seems pretty obvious to me that it's not particularly healthy for a young teenage kid to be sat alone, staring at a screen, in control of a "virtual" weapon, excitedly blowing creatures/humans to bits!
I don't think you've read the article properly. It's about ratings in Australia where basically if it is an 18+ game then it doesn't get released at all.
Not even the adults can buy the game. That's the dumb thing. They can't play the 18+ rated game that is a licence of 18+ rated films that is allowed to be shown in that country.
Game developers do a good job of self censoring and adhering to ratings. Pretty much everywhere, games have ratings on them and shops aren't allowed to sell them to kids. If a kid does get ahold of such a game the finger of blame usually points at the parents who don't watch over their kids properly.
