Promote, incite or instruct in matters of crime or violence.Ĭlassification is mandatory, and games that are refused classification by the ACB are banned for sale, hire or public exhibition, carrying a maximum fine of $275,000 AUD and/or 10 years in prison.

Depict any content in a way that is likely to cause offence to a reasonable adult or a minor who is, or who appears to be, under the age of 18 (whether or not engaged in sexual activity).

Depict very high impact violence and/or contain any type of violence in conjunction with real sexual intercourse (i.e.

Depicts, expresses or otherwise deals with matters of sex, drug misuse or addiction, crime, cruelty, violence or revolting or abhorrent phenomena in such a way that they offend against the standards of morality, decency and propriety generally accepted by reasonable adults to the extent that they should not be classified.

More specifically, games which may be refused classification include content that: Content that contains depictions of sexual violence and the promotion of illegal drug use would still lead to that video game being refused classification. Despite this, video games can still be refused classification if they are deemed to have gone above the R18+ category's criteria. With the R18+ rating in place, this means that many fewer video games would be refused classification. This means many of the previous games refused classification would fit in to the R18+ and if the publisher chooses to pay the reclassification fee, they could get the game re-rated and would be able to sell that video game within Australia. In August 2011 this was changed with all Attorney-Generals agreeing upon the R18+ rating for video games and would be available by the end of 2011.

At the time, the R18+ classification rating could only be given to films, but video games whose content would be deemed fitting for the R18+ rating would be 'Refused Classification' due to it not being available for the medium.

Originally, video games in Australia could not be rated R18+, only up to MA15+.

Manhunt 2 banned