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Michael Atkinson's replacement, John Rau, is said to support the introduction of an R18+ rating. Gamers4Croydon party president Chris Prior recently spoke with South Australia's new Attorney General when attending an election forum in John's electorate.

John indicated to Chris that "the lack of an R18+ for games seemed absurd, and that it was really just common sense to introduce it, considering the vast majority of adult content is already available under the MA15+ classification."

Further discussion of an R18+ rating for games is scheduled for the next meeting of attorneys-general in late April....

If you still haven't picked up Star Trek Online but had planned to, right now might be an idea worth looking in to. For a 'limited time' you'll get 33% off your purchase - both standard and deluxe editions.

Oh, and if you're just in the mood for some bargain hunting, most Quake games are 50% on Steam right now too!...

We've been accepting donations and running cash drives for many years, which has all helped greatly with the costs involved with running Gamers-Underground.com - web hosting, software licensing, hardware and games servers. Lately, we've been thinking of ways to give you personally something back for contribution, even if only small. Examples include the GU store where you can now make a purchase, essentially a donation, and receive merchandise in return. From a service perspective, Korny and Lothar are now funding and running GU branded Bad Company 2 servers to show their support.

This morning we kicked off a paid subscription option for forum members. We took on board the pricing deemed acceptable by you in previous discussion, as well as some of the perks you said would be neat in return. By subscribing for $4 a month you'll be able to make regular contributions, hassle free. As a bit of an added incentive, 3 of the first 10 subscribers will be randomly selected and have a Steam game of their choice gifted to them......

Over at the Electronics Arts UK forums, a DICE representative has produced a long, long list of issues hampering Bad Company 2 at present. Astonishingly, every single one of these issues has also been responded to with a 'status' to give those concerned a genuine idea of when or how it's going to be fixed. In some cases, though, there's acknowledgment and dismissal - which is most unfortunate......

Just when we thought the industry giant was making a change for the better, we're told Electronic Arts want to start charging for demos - and then not discount the full game for purchasers of these demos. There's no denying that in mere months EA has improved its brand image dramatically - delivering high calibre titles and promising more, with a shift from quantity to quality. It seems though that they can't escape the trap of embarrassing, money-grabbing ideas quite yet.......

Thanks to the kind contribution of Lothar, we now have a 4th server in operation. It's currently setup to run Squad Deathmatch (16 player), so that those of you wanting to try it out will have the opportunity to do so. Also note that server #3 has been changed from Hardcore Conquest to Rush. The reason for this is that our Rush server is continually full - as it is now and has been throughout the night - while our Conquest server (#1) is only full off-and-on....

It's election time in South Australia, and Gamers4Croydon are running against Attorney General Michael Atkinson. For those living under a rock for the past 6 months, this was to contest Atkinson's anti R18+ classification stance, which was forcing adult content into Australia's MA15+ classification, and thus into the hands of 15 year old gamers.

In this period, Atkinson delivered some controversial statements - calling gamers criminals, and more dangerous than biker gangs. It was also revealed that he funded a study claiming that the link between gaming and violence was stronger than the link between smoking and cancer.

Thankfully, his reign of ignorance in a position of such power is over. A number of community members have sent word that Michael Atkinson has abruptly stepped down, citing that it's so he can attend all of his son's soccer matches. I can't help but think there's more to it than that, especially considering the timing - and if there is, whichever person or persons putting pressure on him to call it a day deserves a round of applause....

You know what was awesome? Ashes 2009 from Transmission was awesome. Except on the PC, where it was junk, because there were deal-breaker bugs that never got addressed after the studio went bust. But aside from that, it was awesome.

I guess that's why Codemasters has now announced International Cricket 2010, but it's not being released on the PC. Being developed by Australia's Trickstar games, who apparently have key members from the aforementioned but now disbanded studio, we can expect the game later this year on Xbox 360 and PlayStation 3. Press release after the jump......

The creator of Counter-Strike, Minh Le, has a new game on the way. For those that haven't yet heard, it's called Tactical Intervention - and believe it or not, it looks a lot like Counter-Strike. For your shot at beta access, the process is simple: write something on Minh's Tactical Intervention Facebook wall. It's really that simple, apparently....