A week after Korea’s Game Rating and Administration Committee gave Star Wars Outlaws a 19+ rating, Australia has also published their rating for the game.
As shared on reddit by user BlackChamber007, Australian Classification gave the game a rating of M. It also mentions that the title has “Online Interactivity” and “Science Fiction Violence.”
So, the interesting thing here is Australia is way more tolerant of Star Wars Outlaws than Korea is. Australia’s M rating is closer to the ESRB’s Teen rating than their M rating. Australia’s M rating allows the content for all gamers except those aged 15 and younger.
Unlike the ESRB, Australia has a special MA + 15 rating, which means it is mature content, and children from 15 years old upwards need to be accompanied or guided by an adult when they consume this content. And then after that, they have an R 18+ rating.
We can see here how Australia’s rating system reflects a different set of cultural values and mores, but their rating also reflects their differences to the Korean system and culture as well. The Game Rating and Administration Committee was harsher in their rating because Star Wars Outlaws includes gambling as a key game mechanic / side game.
Gambling is generally disallowed in Korea, and they only have very limited exceptions, which the country also highly controls. While each country certainly have some degree of regulation for this activity, Korea happens to frown heavily upon it, as a government, and also in terms of Korea as a country with its own culture.
So it makes sense that they are sensitive to even portraying fictional gambling, where no real financial stakes are found. At least, as far as we know Ubisoft doesn’t plan to add some form of gambling with real money in this title for now.
In any case, these ratings coming out with no pushback or attempt to hide them obviously indicates that Ubisoft is planning to release the game very soon. Both Australia and Korea received versions of the game that are complete enough to give a rating, if they weren’t the exact same versions gamers will get to play themselves.
The only real question is how long it will take before Ubisoft actually reveals a release date. The company may simply be running down the clock on the end of this financial year (March 31, 2024), or they may be looking at other factors the public simply doesn’t know. So even they may not have decided yet, but it likely doesn’t have to take that long for them to pull the trigger.
Star Wars Outlaws is releasing in 2024 on PlayStation 5, Xbox Series X|S, and Windows, exclusively on Ubisoft Connect.
