No this is not a joke...although I admit the title may be a little inflammatory in an effort to garner attention.

Technically Fallout 3 has currently been "Refused Classification"

Let me explain:

I have a friend that works for the government body here in Australia that reviews movies, books, music, magazines and...computer games.

The Office of Film and Literature Classification (OFLC) essentially is the watchdog body that picks up games that are to be released for sale in Australia and decides whether they are "suitable" to be sold, and thus played by Australian gamers.

I was told by my friend that Fallout 3 has just very recently gone through the initial review process by the board of the OFLC and has been refused classification.

Why?

Apparently the game includes the use of Morphine by your character. (I assume as some sort of "healthpack" or "stimpack"). By all accounts this did not sit well with the Board as the portrayal of the unregulated use of proscribed substances is a bit of a no no and will damage the fragile minds of Australia's game-playing populace.

The key issue here is that, unlike movies, our computer game classification ratings only go as far as MA 15+.

There is no R 18+ (or X 18+ either for that matter).

The use of the drug Morphine as shown in Fallout 3, if it were in a movie for example, would fall within the R 18+ category and therefore could still be distributed and watched by adults over the age of 18.

But due to our archaic and conservative laws, we don't have a computer game R 18+ rating and thus Fallout 3 and games like it will continue to be Refused Classification.

Now the distributor of Fallout 3 to Australia, Red Ant can (and no doubt will) appeal this decision so all is not lost! I'm sure we will be seeing this awesome piece of software on sale on our shelves some time soon, but I thought it was worth bringing this to the attention of the Australian gaming community.

I for one think it is a little ridiculous that the system can reject Fallout 3 yet passes a game that allows players to beat up prostitutes with a baseball bat (I'm sure you know which hugely popular recently released game I'm talking about) ...

Broken system much?