Hotline Miami Collection has been pulled from the Australian eShop
And just like that, it’s gone.
Early this morning, we reported that, despite Hotline Miami 2 previously receiving a “Refused Classification” rating by the Australian Classification Board (ACB), the Hotline Miami Collection was available for purchase on the Australian Switch eShop. It was revealed during last night’s Indie World showcase, and available shortly after the presentation ended. It is now unavailable for purchase, and has been removed from the eShop, including wishlists, and the webshop.
The collection, which features both Hotline Miami and its sequel, Hotline Miami 2: Wrong Number, was curiously listed as an MA15+ release. This is despite the first game receiving an R18+ rating in 2015, and the second being refused classification twice in the same year. An ACB listing discovered by Vooks revealed that a title referred to as “Hotline Miami” was submitted through the IARC automatic classification system in June of this year, and subsequently was refused classification. It’s unclear if this listing referred to the first game, or was simply a titling error. Either way, according to ACB guidelines, the collection should not have been available for purchase.
It’s currently unknown if the title will return to the eShop, but given the Board’s hardline stance on the classification of games, we expect it won’t. We’ve reached out to Digital Devolver for comment.
Copies of the game bought prior to its removal from the eShop will still be available to download and play.
Told ewes!
Gone within 24 hours.
Lucky I got this morning 🙂
Very sneaky of Devolver for attempting to gauge at least a few sales enthusiasts in Australia before its inevitable removal from the eShop. Surely Nintendo should have been smarter than to allow this to slip through. Surely it must have been deliberate.
I have no interest in the games myself, but I’m glad that [patriotic fanfare]my fellow Australians[/patriotic fanfare] who were interested in the games had the opportunity to buy it. If nothing else, it is completely within Devolver’s right to break up the release and just sell the first game in Australia with its original MA15+ rating, or they could just remove the “offending” rape scene from the second game and call it a day (which is very brief anyway). The ACB allows for more graphic scenes of sexual violence for TV and film at the MA15+ category, but a pixelated depiction of 10 seconds is deemed unsuitable even for adults. Absolute lunacy.