Following a turbulent and frankly amusing couple of weeks, DayZ's Australian ban is no longer official, with the country's Classification Board issuing a new MA15+ classification today.
The new classification is the result of a 'modified' version of the game submitted to the Classification Board. This version is more than likely the one which removes the offending depictions of drug use from the game. The offending content involved the use of marijuana as a health item in the game, and if there's one thing that rubs the board the wrong way, it's incentivized drug use. Weed isn't currently in the official build of the game, though it was set to arrive via DLC. Those plans have been thwarted.
The game is still unavailable to purchase on Steam at the time of writing, though that's likely to change in the coming days.
The board has issued several 'Refused Classification' rulings of late, which means a title is effectively banned in Australia. Of most interest was yesterday's Bonaire, which is an unannounced Rockstar Games project, more than likely an expansion for Red Dead Online. But We Happy Few and Kingdom Come Deliverance have both been banned of late too, due to recent DLC additions.
Cheers, Kotaku.
