Cham's Profile
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| Username: | Cham |
| Joined: | 01 Dec 2008 |
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Cham's Recent Forum Posts
Re: Win a Dungeon Siege III prize pack! (1 year ago)
What, no PC version?
Just like anti-R18ers go after the big name brands, so to the pro-R18ers go after the big brands. It's really not that surprising. To those "Christian gamers" I ask, if this article makes you feel attacked because you are a Christian, would comments made by a Christian journalist against gamers make you feel attacked? I specifically mention journalist because there would be a difference with a church leader expressing his opinions and a journalist reporting news, which is what this article aspires to be.
On an off-topic note, to ArcherGrave, I assume then that your comments about a Gears of War 2 country filter are dubious, as they were your first post? Or perhaps sellers should have been very cautious dealing with you when trying to sell their Fable 2, as your post about that was only your second post? Just because someone has never commented before, doesn't mean they have nothing worthwhile to say now.
On an off-topic note, to ArcherGrave, I assume then that your comments about a Gears of War 2 country filter are dubious, as they were your first post? Or perhaps sellers should have been very cautious dealing with you when trying to sell their Fable 2, as your post about that was only your second post? Just because someone has never commented before, doesn't mean they have nothing worthwhile to say now.
An extensive list, but not a very exhaustive list. Unless the other articles are going to just continue to list off banned games.
Re: Portal 2 confirmed (3 years ago)
macca macca wrote
There was a story line to the first one?????
Re: Why EveryonePlays has a different message (3 years ago)
I agree with this post. Ratings have always been about "protecting the children". That is their only purpose in being. They exist solely to educate parents, in a quick, easily identifiable way, as to the suitability of a certain title for their child. An R18+ rating means more information for parents, and therefore more protection for their children. To argue against informing parents better is to argue for bad parenting. It is truly sad that the media likes to pick up sound bites of "gamers want more violence", but would ignore one like "conservatives support more violence for 15yo's".
Heres a fun fact I learned the other day. In the US, the movie and game ratings systems are handled by the industry. What, you ask, how can that be? It's simple. Blame the First Amendment. US government is unable to make a law that would inhibit free speech, except in certain circumstances. This means that a ratings system would be challenged on free speech grounds. That blew my mind when I read it, but a few seconds thought and it made perfect sense. Now, we're not Americans, nor do we have anything like the freedom of speech amendment in our constitution, nor do I want us to become America. But I think a system of rating that was external to government would be quite beneficial. It has the ability to change rapidly, as it doesn't have to go through parliament in order to be changed. Also, because of that it doesn't become a target of political manipulation. It is in the industries best interest to inform their customers correctly about the products they are offering. Heres another fun fact, the ratings systems in the US are voluntary. I'm guessing thats where those "unrated" versions of movies come from. Producers being a bit "risque" and not submitting a version of a film for rating, thus, unrated. This actually creates a whole new level of classification, although what is probably the case with those films is they would have gotten a rating that wasn't as high as the movie maker wanted in order to be "daring".
All that being said, I don't think our system of classification is going anywhere, so we have to work with what we've got.
Heres a fun fact I learned the other day. In the US, the movie and game ratings systems are handled by the industry. What, you ask, how can that be? It's simple. Blame the First Amendment. US government is unable to make a law that would inhibit free speech, except in certain circumstances. This means that a ratings system would be challenged on free speech grounds. That blew my mind when I read it, but a few seconds thought and it made perfect sense. Now, we're not Americans, nor do we have anything like the freedom of speech amendment in our constitution, nor do I want us to become America. But I think a system of rating that was external to government would be quite beneficial. It has the ability to change rapidly, as it doesn't have to go through parliament in order to be changed. Also, because of that it doesn't become a target of political manipulation. It is in the industries best interest to inform their customers correctly about the products they are offering. Heres another fun fact, the ratings systems in the US are voluntary. I'm guessing thats where those "unrated" versions of movies come from. Producers being a bit "risque" and not submitting a version of a film for rating, thus, unrated. This actually creates a whole new level of classification, although what is probably the case with those films is they would have gotten a rating that wasn't as high as the movie maker wanted in order to be "daring".
All that being said, I don't think our system of classification is going anywhere, so we have to work with what we've got.
Re: Aliens Vs. Predator faces extinction in Australia (3 years ago)
Yes, because none of that stuff was present in the AVP movies, which didn't even rate an R18+ rating. Oh wait, yes it was!
Re: Classification Board bans another title (3 years ago)
No, MMO's are not exempt, I thought this was covered way back when people realised that WoW wasn't classified.
I have to say I was a got my hopes up a bit when I read the subtitle. I was hoping this would be a case of a game being banned not for drugs, violence or sex but for real mature adult themes (which crime certainly is, just look at the ratings for crime TV) which would give the R18+ crowd a bit more ammo in saying what they want is not all about drugs, sex and violence.
But alas, no, it's all about the drugs this time.
@defcon420 thats not what SAAG Atkinson thinks, he thinks parent are unable to parent with a ratings system, that they will buy anything their little darlings want. He's probably right. He ignores that this would mean parents are already buying their 15yo's R18 porn, because parents just ignore the ratings. At the same time, he makes the claim that movies in the cinemas are better policed, because obviously the bored uni student behind the counter would give a rats about if he let little Timmy 14yo into an MA15+ film.
I have to say I was a got my hopes up a bit when I read the subtitle. I was hoping this would be a case of a game being banned not for drugs, violence or sex but for real mature adult themes (which crime certainly is, just look at the ratings for crime TV) which would give the R18+ crowd a bit more ammo in saying what they want is not all about drugs, sex and violence.
But alas, no, it's all about the drugs this time.
@defcon420 thats not what SAAG Atkinson thinks, he thinks parent are unable to parent with a ratings system, that they will buy anything their little darlings want. He's probably right. He ignores that this would mean parents are already buying their 15yo's R18 porn, because parents just ignore the ratings. At the same time, he makes the claim that movies in the cinemas are better policed, because obviously the bored uni student behind the counter would give a rats about if he let little Timmy 14yo into an MA15+ film.
My partner if fine with my gaming, so long as im playing with moderation. In the dark days of WoW for 6 hours a night, there were unhappy times at home, but now that im more moderate in my gaming habbits, its all good.
Still working on converting her into a gamer.
Still working on converting her into a gamer.
Re: The PALGN Podcast, Episode 53 (4 years ago)
So, erm, is this EVER going to hit iTunes? Also, and this is probably being greedy, but I thought you guys wanted to do these things weekly?
Re: Classification finally for Australian online games? (4 years ago)
This all started with a blog post by Tateru Nino on Massively.com, a website dedicated to all things MMO. Thats who the Herald credited with the original story idea anyway.
To be honest I was surprised myself to find out that WoW wasn't rated, I had always just assumed it was. The best explanation I found was that somehow, the game development community got the idea that online only games did not require classification in Australia, and this was then passed around until everyone "knew" it but nobody could actually point to a source of that information. Kind of like how everyone knows to drive on the left side of the road, but nearly nobody would be able to say "yeah, I read that in the law books". Except the Devs got it wrong. The Massively.com article (http://www.massively.com/2009/01/28/mmogs-defy-classification-in-australia/) hints at that it could have been the Classification Board who, possibly unofficially, told developers that no classification was required.
The point about the ESRB is an interesting one. I can find no evidence that user-created content, that gets an additional warning from the ESRB, is accounted for at all in the Classification Act. Another sign that our Classification Act is lacking in its ability to properly classify games.
One thing I did find on the OFLC website was this little snippet
Now, the section refers to Accounting, which would imply the keeping of business records and the like, however the term "accounts" is never defined in the act to mean that, and given that the game which is sold is merely there to give you the key that is used to verify your ACCOUNT, you can see where the confusion could come in.
To be honest I was surprised myself to find out that WoW wasn't rated, I had always just assumed it was. The best explanation I found was that somehow, the game development community got the idea that online only games did not require classification in Australia, and this was then passed around until everyone "knew" it but nobody could actually point to a source of that information. Kind of like how everyone knows to drive on the left side of the road, but nearly nobody would be able to say "yeah, I read that in the law books". Except the Devs got it wrong. The Massively.com article (http://www.massively.com/2009/01/28/mmogs-defy-classification-in-australia/) hints at that it could have been the Classification Board who, possibly unofficially, told developers that no classification was required.
The point about the ESRB is an interesting one. I can find no evidence that user-created content, that gets an additional warning from the ESRB, is accounted for at all in the Classification Act. Another sign that our Classification Act is lacking in its ability to properly classify games.
One thing I did find on the OFLC website was this little snippet
OFLC Website wrote
Software for use in the keeping or verification of accounts
Re: MadWorld passes classifications with flying colour (4 years ago)
Multiplatform because Classifcation Board is lazy, if they decide to port it to PC at some later stage (for example), they don't have to redo the classification if there aren't major changes.
"vulnerable adults"? Seriously? If the mental ill are unable to keep their violent gaming from spreading into the real world, then perhaps those people need a decent mental health care system to look after them. Games and movies are different. People continually notice that a movie that has X scene in it gets rating Y, but a game with the same or similar X scene in it gets rating Z or refused. Why? The explanation I hear most often is screen time, a fleeting 30 second scene in a movie is nothing, but a repeated 60 times scene in a game is a totally different thing. Atkinson says that R18+ would have a small effect on the games, but I disagree, I think many games currently classified as MA15+ or possibly even lower would be put in the R18+ rating. At least, if it was done properly they should be. The differences between the banned versions of games and the censored versions we get here in Australia are very small, leading me to suspect that the reviewers make sacrifices to allow the games in. This dilution of the ratings system is the problem, as well as its direct comparrison to the movie ratings. Parents who are not educated in games will allow their children to have games totally not suitable for them, just as there are parents who would let a 6yo watch an R rated Japanese anime, simply because "it's just a cartoon". The problem there isn't the rating system, it is doing its job in providing information about the title that a parent can use to judge its suitability for the child, however when the parent doesn't understand or ignores the information given then problems start occuring.
Re: POTW: What do you think of graphics? (4 years ago)
I'd have to say gameplay is important, but graphics is often a deciding factor for me. I recently got all nostalgic when they announced Diablo 3 so I installed Diablo 2, I did so love my necromancers army of minions. After a few hours the 800 x 600 resolution was unbearable, even in windowed mode, so it was promptly uninstalled. So the gameplay is why I want to play the game, but the graphics make me able to play it without wanting to tear my own eyes out 
I usually avoid my family at all times, Christmas is no different although I do see my mum for brekkie. My partners family won't be doing anything until dinner, and probably a late dinner at that, so tonnes of time to play games.