Following up on last week's news of Silent Hill: Homecoming being banned in Australia, Atari says it is still planning to edit the violence in the game to allow for its release in the region, pending the okay with Konami. A confirmation is expected soon. Coinciding with earlier reports, the publisher plans to try to get it out there Q1 2009.

Besides the somewhat general description we told you about before, what exactly did the OFLC have a problem with? Apparently a few scenes were particularly touchy for them, like one where Alex, the main character, was having a drill forced into his right eye socket, which (like it would) caused a lot of blood to spray out. Other scenes included Alex forcing a drill into an enemy's skull, and another in which he is cut in two by an enemy.

IGN, being the good folk they are, point out they don't understand why they were refused permittal, as the chainsaw decapitations in Resident Evil 4 were passed without issue. Was that snuck by the higher-ups at the OFLC, or are they just poor and arbitrary censors? They go on to say 'the time has never been more pressing to push for the long-overdue R18+ rating. Find out more about the issue, including how to petition the government, here.' That report also confirms my previous speculations about the interactivity of video games being irrelevant to whether or not one would repeat things seen in them. Why are lawmakers so often uneducated about the very laws they make? And why do they not listen to the public they claim to want to protect when it knows how to govern itself better?

Also, Australians, don't forget to do hundreds of Internet searches on "eye gouging with drill", "blood spraying", and "video game violence offensive pretty much only to staunchy old executives at ratings boards excercising misplaced authority", and send your history to the OFLC, Atari, and Konami. I'm praying the latter doesn't permit this descecration of the series - it'd be hard to look at it the same way again.