If you haven’t heard, Watch Dogs had its rating revised to R18+ after being previously classified as MA15+. They noted that the game had “references to sexual violence and sex scenes”. We asked the Classification Board for the full decision. However, at the time, they said that they could not release the decision for “commercial reasons” – until today. We just got the report from the board.
According to the decision report, they increased the rating because the game’s storyline had “instances of human trafficking which include female non-playing characters being sold at a human auction.”
“During a semi-interactive scene which requires the playable character to infiltrate the auction room, several breast nude females are depicted… A male character inspects one of the women, touching her and spreading her legs before he grabs the hand of the female sitting next to her and pulls her into a nearby room,” the report says.
“Both females appear scared during these interactions. The scene is immediately followed by a post-action visual which depicts the woman… huddled on a bed hugging her knees towards her chest as she sobs… on-screen text identifies the woman as a nineteen year-old, Romanian immigrant.”
The board concluded that while the game does not contain actual or implied sexual violence, it contains post-action visuals that relate to sexual violence. It also notes that this was the modification that have pushed it to an R18+ rating.
The full three-page report is below. If you can’t see it, we have uploaded it to Scribd for you to view.