‘South Park’ Was Only Banned Game in Australia from 2013-14

Every year, the Australia conservative classification board reviews the current new releases in video games, and assigns a rating to each, or, in rare cases, flat-out refuses to classify it.

Out of the 458 titles reviewed this year, only one was rejected outright: South Park‘s “The Stick of Truth.” And the offending content has actually been addressed previously by the board, including once already this fiscal year – a revision of a version that also failed to meet the R18+ guidelines last year.

Apparently, Australia is very much against the idea of anally probing a child in any of their content. (The nerve!) Of course this incident has been a major storyline on South Park since its very beginning, with the pilot episode, “Cartman Gets An Anal Probe.”

“While the board acknowledged that the game was satirical in tone and intent, the content exceeded what is able to be accommodated within the R18+ guidelines,” the Classification Review Board said in their annual report.

The decision attracted 51 complaints from Australian gamers jealous & upset that the scene was released uncensored in North America.

However, a third version of the game was finally given a R18+ classification after the aforementioned scene was replaced by a cartoon of a crying koala, along with a “censored” headline and brief text description.

Previously, Saints Row IV and State of Decay were the only games refused classification, but edited versions finally earned them a rating this year.

[via News.com.au]