Now we just gotta wait for Germany

Its not going to be released anywhere until it starts making it more acceptable.

Germany will ban it by the end of the day, more than likely. Either that, or tommorow. Or maybe, just maybe, they'll release it, who knows.

Medium level violence??? LOL what does it take to get a high level of violence there??

well I guess some got to push the button and rockstar and take two did but lets see what card they play next

I wonder if it'll be banned in Canada or not.

"Classifacation"?? Is that just a preety word for "Censorship"???

[...] Manhunt 2 - Not for Nintendo Nor Sony - PC? 21 06 2007 Manhunt 2 received an AO (Adults Only) rating the other day from the ESRB (Entertainment Software Ratings Board) and was also banned in the United Kingdom and Australia and was rejected by both Nintendo and Sony for inclusion on Nintendo Wii and the PlayStation console. So what will Rockstar do if they can’t release the game on consoles? Spend additional money to change the game and get it back down to a M (Mature) rating, cancel the entire project altogether or release a PC port instead? According to GamePolitics, Rockstar / Take Two can avoid the licensing issues with Nintendo and Sony by producing a PC version, like the PC version of Manhunt 1 that was released about 5 months after the PS2 version. But still, they would face issues because major retailers such as Wal-Mart refuse to sell games with an Adults Only rating. [...]

@Terrible Tom
The AO rating was created to prevent M from being the highest rating. If M was the highest rating, stores wouldn't want to carry it. Although, now that there is so many it probably wouldn't matter.

"Daryl Williams has moved on but Michael Atkinson is still the Attorney-General of South Australia, so if it was proposed again it might still be stopped."

In addition to this, in some of the other States and Territories of Australia there are new people in the position of Attorney-General and I don't know where they stand on the issue.

And in other news, Australia has also banned alcohol and porn for the Aborigines.

http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20070621/ap_on_re_au_an/australia_aborigines;...

Australia may be a great country, but with stories like these sometimes I have to question their government's policy on how they decide what their people can and cannot watch/play/do.

Knowing how many games Australia banned so far, this doesn't surprise me in the least. I wonder how those lazy Germans weren't the first to ban it though.

@Terrible Tom:

Sorry, I guess I misconstrued some of your comments on earlier threads, my apologies. I too, agree that much of the blame must be laid at the retailers' feet. I have no beef with the ESRB, however.

The funny thing is that video game violence really isn't a big public issue over here ...

One of our "current affair" style shows tried to run a feature on it a while ago, and completely failed to generate the level of controversy that they wanted (AFAIK).

And yet despite that, the OFLC certainly bans a lot of games. Going on what happened in other countries, this was pretty much a given.

@black manta

You have to understand that most aborigines in the communities you are talking about spend all their money on alcohol and Aboriginal elders themselves have stated 'it is ruining their culture/community'. Porn was banned because of a study that said the majority of aboriginal children have been sexually abused, with acts involving children as young as 3. This isn't even necessarily abuse from adults but other children - who were abused by elder children also. The ban is to try and prevent this cycle continuing (no porn maybe no thought to commit these acts).

You can't just say 'Look at that' without at least having a look at the reasons. Admittedly that little bastard Howard isn't the biggest supporter of aboriginal equality and freedom... The government does have to ban some things. Porn and alcohol (prohibition anyone...) are fairly (*underline, bold*) different to video games also. The ultimate question with these things are, if it doesn't assist the cause the bans in question should be lifted.

Oops. I meant to say R18+ rating for movies and not games O_O Also the site cut off my I love Australia despite the OFLC comment. :)

It does seem like people are finding reasons to complain here imo. From reading about the bans in the UK, here and in Germany, it's painting a picture of people saying "RockStar, this time...you've gone a bit too far and we're not going to put up with it". As Pyrrhus said, only about 15 games have been banned and of those 7 have be released or re-released with minor changes made. That doesn't scream government censorship to me, that screams of the OFLC looking out for the interests of Aussies in general when it comes to games with content that people wouldn't consider appropriate.

I haven't heard of a single person any of these bans have affected, there may be some out there but the ban is based on sales. You cannot sell these games in Australia but you can own them and get them in the mail (which leads to buying the games overseas and importing them into Australia). I'm sure people have done that with games on the banned list even before now so those who avidly want to play will just buy Manhunt 2 online and get it shipped in.

Freedom of Speech aside since it doesn't apply here, I think my local EB and Harvey Norman could do without having this particular game sitting on the shelf. The Suffering (another quite violent and quite psychological horror game) was rated M in the States, here it was rated MA 15+ (only suitable for those 15 and older), a two year drop compared to what the ESRB considers appropriate for the American public. Manhunt 2 looks like it's going to get the US AO kiss of death, and here it's going to be banned.

Taking a look at the last sentence of that paragraph....aren't we just being more honest about our feelings towards this game? Word is, we're saying No outright to RockStar, and the UK has too. Looks to me like the ESRB is saying No but not wanting to hurt feelings or have people scream Freedom of Speech at them. It's a different kind of censorship but censorship all the same.

*shrug* I prefer to live in a country where someone who isn't looking at the money that a game's able to generate is looking at the content and whether they feel it's appropriate in the society here. If it's one of the few where they say no, I say good on 'em for having standards.

@Pyrhhus
Well, it depends on what you call a "lot" in this context. I'm not trying to imply that they ban, say, 10 games a year, or something like that. Maybe I should have been more specific.

@Juggernautz
No, actually ... I didn't even no about that one! The one I am thinking of was a lot broader. It was a few years ago now though. But I'll never forget the reporter trying to get parents angry, and the parents just going "meh ... it's not too bad".

FUCK YOU!!!!

this is crap.
Australia shouldn't ban this game just because its violent, what about all the boxing and wrestling games?
they're violent too.
this is absolute bull$#!%.
your all a bunch of f#@%ed up pussy's

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