Australia, what are you doing?

There are two countries that come to my mind when I think of silly laws when it comes to video games and they are Australia and Germany.

Big news story of the moment is coming out of Australia this time with yet another game being refused classification and therefore being made unavailable within the country.  However this time, people have a reason to be slightly more pissed off than usual.

Ya' see, this isn't the first time games have been censored or banned in Australia.  Things that pop into my head are Manhunt being banned and Left4Dead 2 being censored in the Australian version.  But from January 1st of this year, a new age rating was introduced of R18+ for the purpose of being able to give violent video games a proper classification.  This has worked for certain games like Ninja Gaiden 3, but not for this one.

So what's the problem with Saints Row 4?  Well apparently the classification board doesn't like all the drug use flying around the game.  This, coupled with all the rampant sex and violence means that the classification board have deemed it far too bad for Australian consumption and therefore it can not be sold.

So first of all, what is the point if having the R18+ classification if it doesn't cover this shit?  Why bother going to the trouble of introducing that thing in January if you're just going to ignore it's existence a couple of months down the line.  I'm pretty sure a rating of 18+ covers the games content just fine, it's not so bad that even adults shouldn't be allowed to see it, I'm sure the developers aren't that depraved.

The other thing is that if someone is going to take drugs after playing Saints Row, I'm pretty sure it's because they were on drugs anyway.  It's not like someone is going to come away after a session and think "you know what! I really need to go do some meth!".  I'm pretty sure the Australian people aren't that easily swayed into illegal activities.

I'm not Australian and I don't even like Saints Row all that much, but this is just stupid.  The Australian ratings board needs to sort their life out and they should stop being so sensitive over tongue in cheek open world GTA clones for fucks sake.  It's adults buying these games after all, and if kids do get a hold of it then you have a problem with shit parents, not violent video games, idiots.