Thousands of Australians who logged online to advocate the introduction of an R18+ category for computer games in Australia are set to see their submissions handed over to the Australia Federal Government’s Attorney-General’s Department.Grow up Australia, an independent group advocating the introduction of an adults-only rating for games, will hand over 16,055 submissions from people who used their online form.
The bulk of the submissions were collected during a partnership with EB Games during which Grow up Australia posters were displayed in all of EB Games’ 250+ Australian stores. A link to the online submission form was also provided via a banner on the EB Games website during the campaign.
Australia is the only developed nation without an adult rating for video games despite the average Australian gamer being 30
years old. In December 2009, the Attorney-General’s Department released a discussion paper calling for community
feedback on the issue.
Aaron John Percival, Gamer activist and one of the founders of Grow up Australia, said “support for the introduction of the
R18+ rating has been overwhelming with ninety-nine percent of the submissions made through the website in favour of the
change”.
The co-founder of the group, Jake Edwards, added that “with less than a week until the deadline for submissions, there is still opportunity for people who want to get involved to make a submission directly to the Attorney-General’s Department”.
Consumers who want to make a submission to the Attorney-General’s Department, can log on to: http://www.ag.gov.au/gamesclassification
The submissions will be sent tomorrow so that they will be received before the deadline of the 28th of February 2010.
