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Bohemia Interactive will alter all versions of DayZ worldwide, after the Australian Classification Board ruled that it would be banned from sale for including cannabis in its gameplay (via Kotaku Australia).
DayZ was launched five years ago, but recently it was hit with the Board’s decision to invalidate its existing MA15+ rating. This was because DayZ’s physical sales distributor, Five Star Games, applied for a release and the ACB did not like that a feature found in the physical version would allow players to heal up using a marijuana joint in their inventory. It did not like that at all. According to its listing, the Board considered DayZ to ‘depict, express or otherwise deal 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.’
Quite the statement. The ACB was also making moves to ban the digital version of the game, even though the feature isn’t implemented in that one. Bohemia Interactive had two options: exclude Australia until it and the ACB could find common ground, or change all versions of the game worldwide. It opted for the latter, and stated in an email to Kotaku Australia, ‘We don’t want to separate Australian players from the rest of the world, since many people play cross-region. We love that DayZ is the place to meet with friends and experience the game without dramatic regional lag. We don’t want to change that.’
The developer did not disclose what will be changed in the game to ‘fit into the Board’s requirements’, but the simplest solution would be to just take the upcoming feature out of the physical and digital versions. But, once the update rolls out, I’m sure all parties will be in high spirits.
