Sydney studio Team Bondi is on the verge of declaring bankruptcy, according to a growing number of online sources. Mostly, the rumors are coming from the Neogaf discussion board, and the claims have not been substantiated by an official representative. While an official "statement is forthcoming," Develop claims that an unnamed company representative declined a request to comment.

Australian Content Industry Group spokeswoman Sabiene Heindl pens an editorial in The Australian praising the recent deal between Internet Service providers and content creators in the United States (you know the deal that has basically turned ISP's into Internet traffic cops). Heindl starts out by calling the deal "good news for anyone who has released an album, made a movie, developed a video game or software, or written a book anywhere in the world."

The Australian Christian Lobby has called for games to be banned if they contain violence that is "excessive or gratuitous." The call came as the world digests the bizarre rambling of a 1500-page manifesto written by Norwegian killer Anders Behring Breivik and released online shortly before he killed 76 people in and around Oslo, Norway.

The Australian federal government said yesterday that Breivik committed his crimes because there is "something clearly intrinsically wrong with him", not because he played violent video games.

NSW Greens MP David Shoebridge did say that Modern Warfare 2 should be reviewed to have a more restrictive R18+ rating in the country. It is currently rated MA15+.

Electronic Arts is applauding the Australian government's plans to implement a R18+ game rating in the country. EA Asia Publishing vice president Mark Bradley told GameSpot Australia yesterday that the publisher is encouraged by the Australian federal government decision to bring the country's game rating in line with other countries in Europe and North America.

"Australia needs a rating system that recognises that millions of adults play video games," Bradley said. "The current policy of the Australian government forces an arcane censorship on adults who play games--cuts they would never impose on movies, books or other forms of artistic expression. This year, the American Supreme Court voted overwhelmingly to affirm that game developers deserve the same creative freedom as film makers and authors.

The Australian Christian Lobby has asked classification ministers meeting in Adelaide later this week that they should wait until the Australian Law Reform Commission (ALRC) completes its review of the National Classification Scheme before voting on video game classification reform that would add a new R18+ rating.

ACL spokesman Rob Ward said that news about South Australian Attorney-General John Rau's desire to reclassify existing MA15+ games as R18+ may have some merits, but going doing so independent of other jurisdictions would complicate an already confusing ratings system.

"Mr. Rau’s suggestion wouldn’t address or fix the problems inherent in the existing classification system, such as subjective and ill-defined guidelines," he said. "The system also requires proper enforcement mechanisms and consequences for publishers and retailers who breach the guidelines."

Game Developers Association of Australia predicts that in five year's time Australia will be one of the top game development territories in the world. Tony Reed, CEO of the Game Developers Association of Australia, credits the future benefits of the Australian Government's proposed research and development tax credits.

The new A$1.8 billion ($1.89 billion) research and development tax credit legislation will give developers a 45 percent refundable tax credit. The credit is meant for companies that have a turnover of less than A$20 million, a requirement that many Australian game development studios fall into. Reed says that this new tax credit bill will help the local video game industry become one of the top three game development territories in the world and he hopes this can be achieved in the next five years. Australian studios have to register with the government to apply for the tax credit and are required to show proof of research and development.

The International Game Developers Association (IGDA) has finally made a public comment on Team Bondi, the Sydney, Australia-based development studio contracted to do work on Rockstar Games' LA Noire. Echoing the sentiments of developers and the community worldwide, IGDA said that the horror stories of extensive crunch times and generally poor working conditions at the studio are "absolutely unacceptable."

Games industry professionals and association members have loudly criticized Team Bondi and its founder Brendan McNamara for the studio’s intense crunch time work policy. Brian Robbins, chair of the IGDA Board of Directors, said the group that advocates for developers plans to "fully investigate" the issues raised by former employees of the studio.

The Australian government has passed a $1.9 billion research and development tax bill for the videogame industry this week, according to Develop. The bill, which becomes the law of the land in July, will support various videogame studios under a "digital creative industries" designation. The law will help companies save money on research and development costs for a range of projects, as long as some conditions are met.

Ron Curry, CEO of the Interactive Games and Entertainment Association is delighted with the new R&D tax credit. He says that this move by the government "has already attracted the interest of many global game publishers."

Antony Reed, CEO of the Game Developers Association of Australia, also backed the new policy.

The Australian Classification Board said this week that it will rethink the current PG (Parental Guidance) rating for Ubisoft's We Dare, a game which received heavy criticism earlier this year for its adult content and sexually suggestive mini-games. The review will be carried out on June 17 and will be conducted by the Classification Review Board. The re-review is the result of a formal complaint filed by Federal Minister for Home Affairs Brendan O'Connor. Chances are it will result in a higher rating for the title.

In March the board took some heat from the public over its decision to give the Ubisoft-published adult party game for the Wii a PG rating for "mild sexual references." A number of early media reports blamed the board for inappropriately rating the game, because of the trailer, which showed two couples engaged in some saucy and suggestive situations inspired by the game's mini-games.

Professor John Hattie has some free advice for the modern day teacher: shut up, listen to your students, and use video games as a tool to foster engaging educational experiences. While the director of the Melbourne Education Research Institute at the University of Melbourne aimed his comments at teachers in his home country of Australia, the free advice is global and universal in nature. Professor Hattie says teachers need to stop spending 80 percent of their class room talking and start listening to their students.

"When teachers stop talking deep learning takes place,'' said Hattie at conference of educators in Parramatta this week." It's our concept of ourselves as teachers that we have knowledge and we need to impart it."

Australia is an interesting country. On the one hand it has struggled for years to get an adult level video games rating classification (R18+) and on the other it allows a game that has been censored in other countries to be released there with little or no controversy. The game in question is the 3DS tactical fighter Dead or Alive: Dimensions. Several countries have banned the game because it features sexualized depictions of children. The children are three teen characters named Ayane, Koroke and Kasumi who game makers describe as "under 18 years of age."

To be fair, the censoring has been done mostly by Nintendo, based on concerns about child pornography laws in Nordic countries (Sweden, Denmark and Norway) that say it is illegal to show young girls as animated characters in a sexualized way. The concern is mostly with the game's photography mode, which allows players to look up characters' dresses when they are in certain poses.

Forget about the "rent is too damned high" party, gamers down under are getting robbed by retailers, according to a consumer group. Australian consumer rights publication CHOICE has submitted a document to the government's Productivity Commission last week demanding retailers lower the price of games.

The group called on "importers, distributors and retailers to pass some of the savings they are enjoying thanks to the strong Aussie dollar on to Australian consumers." As an example, CHOICE claims that Australian consumers can save about 90 percent on the price of Portal 2 if they purchase it abroad instead of at home.

The Australian dollar is worth about as much as the US dollar, CHOICE says, but the price of video games has not come down in the country.

The Australian Government’s Attorney-General’s Department has posted an online survey to gauge public opinion on the recently released draft guidelines for the R18+ ratings classification released earlier this week.

The survey contains four possible answers showing either support or opposition to the new game classification and a comment section where participants can leave lengthy comments. The survey does not seem to be exclusive to citizens of Australia (though it does require users to leave their name, state, territory and email).

Here are the four choices users can select:

While we have no idea where most Australian politicians stand on yesterday's draft proposal for an R18+ video game classification, the new adult rating is getting some unexpected support from the Catholic Church. According to a GameSpot report, the Australian Catholic Bishops Conference said that they welcomed yesterday's proposed guidelines for adult rating for video games. Unfortunately not all religious groups agree: the Australian Christian Lobby describe the changes as "frightening."

In a press statement, the Conference, which carries the influence of the Catholic Church in Australia, said that it would support the rating because it could not achieve its preference of having adult material banned. A tepid approval for sure, but the church admits that it is better to have such content under a proper ratings system that parents can use.

The Australian Federal Government has released draft guidelines for a new video game classification system which adds an R18+ rating and keeps the MA15+ rating. Some politicians in Australia, like South Australian Attorney General John Rau, have said that in order to add an R18+ rating to the system the MA15+ rating would need to be eliminated from the ratings system.

The new 16-page draft proposal (found here in PDF format) released by home minister Brendan O'Connor simply adds an R18+ classification and defines the descriptors for sex, drug and alcohol use, and violence in detail.

In an article in The Australian Queensland University of Technology professor Bill Caelli says that Sony should keep the PlayStation Network and other services that were compromised by hackers in April offline until governments around the world are satisfied that the company has put enough security in place to protect customers.

Caelli, who the publication calls a "security expert," thinks the Japanese government has the right idea in putting Sony's services on hold while it verifies the strength and depth of new security measures.

"Why is it that in the IT industry enterprises certify themselves?" he said, adding that the general public has "no way of assessing the assurances given by the owners of the system themselves."

One Australian MP who supported the idea of a national R18+ ratings category for video games has stepped down, to the chagrin of gamers across the country. Tasmanian Attorney-General David Bartlett announced today that he was resigning, saying he had lost his passion for the job.

"[F]or the past two to three weeks … I have had to question whether or not I still have the passion and commitment that is required," said Bartlett.

Bartlett also said he wanted to spend more time with his family.

Bartlett was of the most outspoken advocates of the R18+ rating for Australia. Or perhaps he simply listened to the general public, who generally support a ratings category meant for adults. Either way, he pushed hard for lawmakers in the country to join him in voting for it at most of the SCAG meetings where the topic came up. To introduce an R18+ video games rating in Australia, each state’s Attorney-General has to reach a consensus.

According to a report in newspaper WA Today, the Australian government announced plans to create a law forcing companies to disclose privacy breaches to the public. Newspaper WA Today reports that 1,560,791 Australian accounts were affected as a result of the attack on Sony’s PlayStation Network, along with 280,000 credit card details. A timeline for the introduction of this proposal was not revealed, but the government seems to be serious about it. In addition to planning a new law to deal with events like Sony's, the government has criticized the company over the way it has handled its security problems.

Privacy minister Brendan O'Connor recently said that he is "very concerned" over the data loss, but Sony isn't the only company he is concerned about when it comes to security and privacy issues.

According to an ABC News report, an Adelaide, Australia man is the first official victim of credit card fraud related to Sony’s PlayStation Network security breach. Another report on PS3 hacking site PSX-Scene also alleges that some underground web sites that sell credit card information are trying to sell around 2.2 million credit cards from Europe - which includes user information, credit card numbers, CV numbers and expiration dates. The latter is anecdotal at the moment and has not been confirmed by law enforcement or Sony.

South Australian Attorney-General John Rau says that he will support a measure that introduces the R18+ classification for games in the region, and replaces the MA15+ rating. Under Rau's new version of video games classification system, the ratings would be "G," "PG," "M" and "R18+." M15+ would be completely eliminated. Rau hopes that his new system will be adopted by all of Australia, but he's certainly willing for his region to "go it alone."

"At the moment, the MA15+ classification is like a crossover point between what is acceptable and what is unacceptable," Rau said to ABC News. "We want that to be a very clear gap. We will have a new classification R18+ and the MA15+ will disappear."

Barbara Biggins, CEO of the children's advocacy group the Australian Council on Children and the Media, is ratcheting up the rhetoric against gamers in the fight to keep Australia from getting an adult ratings classification. She has accused Australian gamers of "using propaganda" in the very public debate over changing the ratings system.

In an article that appeared on The Drum Unleashed, Biggins alleges that the rhetoric used by those that want an expanded ratings system has changed recently, and now downplays the negative side effects:

"Over the past year ... the pro-R18+ lobby has argued that having such a category would provide better protection for children," she wrote. "The push became propaganda."

Her argument is that allowing games into the country that have adult content in them won't keep them out of the hands of children, who will find a way to get them.

Responding to public comments from Australian Home Affairs Minister Brendan O'Connor about the desire to have a consensus about an R18+ game classification at July's SCAG meeting, the Australian Christian Lobby (ACL) has come out swinging. The ACL issued a statement saying that the ban on games that require a classification higher than the current rating of R15 should continue as it is.

First, let's look at what Brendan O'Connor said to ABC Australia:

No Mortal Kombat for you, Australia. An appeal by publisher Warner Bros. Interactive to overturn an earlier decision by Australia's Classification Review Board to deny classification has also been denied. That means that the forthcoming Mortal Kombat reboot has been permanently refused classification in Australia, banning the title from official retail release. In an official statement, Warner Bros. Interactive praised fans in Australia and expressed disappointment in the classification board's decision:

"We're obviously extremely disappointed that the refused classification decision has been upheld by the Classification Review Board. We want to thank the thousands of Mortal Kombat fans in Australia and around the world who have voiced their support during the appeal process."

Mortal Kombat's  reboot will still arrive next month in other territories so you can expect fans that want the game bad enough will simply import it from those regions.

Are you busy every single second at work?

Caroline Beinke isn’t.  A staffer for Australian MP Victor Dominello, she submitted a request for “extended internet access” so she could play Bejeweled Blitz on her PC at work.  "When I have long conversations on the phone to constituents it is my version of doodling, a mental chewing gum of sorts," she said.

Can you guess how Dominello responded to the request?  Well, if you read the title of this story it’s unlikely anything’s going to come as a surprise to you but here goes:

"My staff work very very hard.  If they are sitting at their desk on hold to a department for 15 minutes, I do not have a problem with it.  I have no difficulty with this request provided it is acceptable to the Clerk/Speaker.”

TorrentFreak says that a new report about the costs of piracy to various industries is overblown and in some cases an outright manipulation of numbers. Reports on piracy do tend to be overblown, or at the very least hard to substantiate because they tend to contain a lot of industry estimates. In other words, it is a lot harder to track the activities of pirates and file-sharers than it is to track sales. Hell, the games industry cannot even accurately track digital sales because it doesn't have the full access it needs (they are at least working on it, according to NPD and UKIE).

According to multiple reports, THQ Studio Australia has cut around 14 from its art department. Develop reports that these workers are not being given the option to find positions elsewhere in the either. With this round of layoffs, the studio's headcount is right around 60 employees. This may be the result of THQ saying earlier this year that it was going to be less reliant of licensed children's properties, which the studio had focused a lot of energy on in the past.

"We have let 14 employees go at our THQ Australia studio. In the normal course of business, we expect to adjust our workforce both up and down as required by project needs," read a company statement.

We wish all those affected good luck in finding new positions elsewhere in the region.

Source: Develop

According to a report on Kotaku Australia Mortal Kombat has been refused classification in Australia. Warner Bros. Interactive Entertainment issued the following statement to the media:

This is good news or bad news depending on your perspective and if you live in Australia: the Federal Court of Australia dismissed a case this week brought by the movie industry about the role of internet service providers in the fight against copyright infringement. This report on Ars Technica details the drama leading up to the court battle. Lawyers for industry argued that ISPs in the country must take action against file-sharers who are accused of infringement by copyright holders. The case was against ISP iiNet, and was an appeal of the original judgment in the matter, which also went against rightsholders. The appeal was heard by a three-judge panel.

Australian Federal Minister for Home Affairs Brendan O'Connor wants to introduce the R18+ for games by mid-2011 and said today that he plans to push state and territory attorneys-general to accept the proposed guidelines and finally approve the adult classification. Or at least, that's what he is telling GameSpot.au.

O'Connor told GameSpot AU that he wants this issue resolved by July. A vote could have been possible in March if New South Wales Attorney-General John Hatzistergos did not have to skip the March SCAG meeting in March due to reelection activities.

Australians hoping that the R18+ issue would be resolved at a March Standing Committee of Attorneys-General (SCAG) meeting had their hopes dashed once again as the government pushes the issue back to deal with local elections. New South Wales attorney-general John Hatzistergos confirmed that, because he would not be able to attend the March SCAG meeting, any decision or further discussion on R18+ would have to wait until after his re-election campaign. In order to approve the R18+ rating, all state and territory attorneys-general have to agree to it.

Australians expected to see progress on this issue at the March 4 SCAG meeting in Wellington, New Zealand.