You’d have to have lived under a big rock without wifi access to not know of the controversy around Australia’s banning of Left 4 Dead 2. It was decided that the game had excessively high levels of violence and gore directed towards the infected (read: zombies) whom the OFLC classified as ‘living humans infected with a rabies-like virus.’ For this reason, they refused classification, effectively banning the game from seeing store shelves. Many gamers have been up in arms regarding this decision–Australia was the only country to place such a ban on the game.
You like what you see? Not if you're in Australia!
Valve recently submitted a modified version of the game for classification by the OFLC. This modified version has a significantly less amount of gore. Decapitation and dismemberment were removed, blood splatter is almost completely non-existent, and the ever-ambiguous ‘piles of dead bodies’ issue has been solved by removing dead zombi-, err, rabies-infected living humans, as soon as they hit the ground.
Word from down under early this morning tells us that the OFLC has given a rating of MA15+ to this modified version of Left 4 Dead 2. This means that the game will see Aussie store shelves. In the Classification Board’s report, they made note that this was made possible by the removal of considerable amounts of gore from the gameplay.
Here’s to hoping you’re not an Australian gamer that enjoys mature violence and gore. Sure, now you’ll be able to buy the game, but in this situation, nobody wins.
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