The latest episode of Street Talk is now available over at GameArena – Sally Arnott takes to the streets and asks the average consumer about their thoughts on an R rating for video games.

Make sure you head over and check it out.

Electronic Frontiers Australia have compiled a draft submission paper for the R18+ classification system. The paper has been developed to put across a strong argument towards the government, they are also seeking help from the public to add comments or suggestions to the draft.


The public consultation on the introduction of an R18+ for computer games closes at the end of the month. Jessi Citizen, on behalf of EFA and in conjunction with Ausgamers, has prepared a draft response to the consultation that sets out our understanding of the issues and our arguments.

The main points that we are trying to stress in this discussion paper are really quite simple:

* Gamers are adults; games, like films, tell expressive stories, not all of which are suitable for children. Banning everything that is not suitable for children amounts to unacceptable censorship of legitimate expression.
* Gamers are parents; as responsible parents, we take care to monitor what media our children consume, and can take responsibility for those decisions.
* An R18+ rating is about empowerment; the goal of Australia’s classification is to empower adults, protect children, protect people from accidental exposure to offensive material, and to take into account community concerns about particularly offensive content. An R18+ allows adults to choose what is suitable for themselves and for their children.
* An R18+ rating will be more likely to decrease rather than increase the exposure of children to inappropriate content, because it sends a clear message to parents that certain material is not appropriate for children; the lack of an R18+ for games, particularly when one exists for films, only causes confusion and lessens the ability of parents to take responsibility.

*Australia’s system is out of step with the rest of the world; games that are clearly not designed for children are being released with an MA15+ rating, and games that are suitable for adults are being banned. Our research shows that of the 47 games that were rated by the Australian Classification Board, the US ESRB, the UK BBFC, the EU PEGI, and the NZ OFLC, more than 50 per cent of titles that were rated MA15+ in Australia were given an adult rating overseas. The Australian system is demonstrably less effective in warning parents and gamers about the content of video games than our international counterparts. Introducing an R18+ rating will address some of this disparity and enable Australians to make more informed choices about what games they play or allow their children to play.

This submission paper is a fantastic idea with a lot of good information in it. If you would like read the draft, or even make a contribution please visit the EFA website.

I would just like to say thanks to everyone that showed up on Saturday to help spread the word about the Australian video game classification system.
We had a great turn out for the day with about 12 people making the trip very early at 9am to get things going. In total over 25 gamers helped during the day, handing out over 1500 pamphlets, while also getting over 80 people to complete submission template; This was a fantastic effort to all involved.

To the 30+ news sites that posted about the event to help spread the word, without you guys i would not have got all the amazing help that i did.

A few people i would really like to specifically thank.

- Jeremy Samoc, Chris Baguley, Martin Pham, Matt Kors, Andrew Starks, “Indigo_Dingo”.
- James Cottee from Games On Net
- James Kozanecki from GameSpot AU
- Aaron Percival from Grow Up Australia
- Ben Mansill from Byteside
- Benny & Richie from The Benny & Richie Show

- To Matt & Yug, plus all of the guys over at Australian Gamer
- My good friends Jason Leong, Heath Dickson and Joab Gilroy from The GAP, also to all of our listeners of the show.
- Thanks to my amazing girlfriend Tenielle Jordan for also supporting me with this cause, helping out on the day, and working very hard behind the scene getting things organised.
- And finally an extremely very special thanks to Joab Gilroy from GameArena, he stepped up in a huge way on the day and for that i owe him many beers.

I know there was many more of you and i apologise if i have forgotten to list you, contact me if you would like your name up there.

The day was a great success and it does look like that there may be more of these type of events happening very soon in other cites around Australia. Keep posted on here for more details.

The Commonwealth Government has released a discussion paper which briefly summarises the key arguments for and against an R18+ classification for video games. Censorship Ministers have considered the issue of an adult classification for computer games on several occasions. However, they have not undertaken public consultation on this issue.

We will be hitting the streets of Sydney to try and make some sort of impact, our goal is to make the public aware of the outdated classification system by handing out information sheets about video games and the proposed classification changes. Also on the day we also want to see how many people we can get to fill out the submission template that the government has asked for.

Date:    Saturday, January 9, 2010
Time:   From  9:00am
Location:  Outside Queen Victoria Building
Street:   Corner George st & Druitt st
City:   Sydney

If you would like to show support for this event please join the Facebook group, alternatively if you would like to help out in anyway possible please contact luke@r18gamesaustralia.com