“We support policies that foster the enjoyment of video games within the community, strengthen the rapidly-growing video games market, and nurture the local game development industry.”
Promoting a safe and responsible industry
A modern classification scheme for video games
We recognise the vital role that Australia and New Zealand’s classification schemes play to help game players and their parents and carers to make informed choices about what to play. Our industry supports these schemes through strict compliance and dialogue with regulators. However, as these classification laws and policies were design in a pre-digital age, we encourage reforms to modernise how games are classified, including the expanded use of classification tools and a greater role for our responsible industry to take.
Please read our full policy brief on this topic.
Supporting and promoting online safety in video games
Our industry has a track record of making video games that are played in a fun and safe way. Game companies offer a range of tools, controls and settings that empower players and give parents the ability to control what games their children play, when and how they play games, and whether they communicate with others. We support sensible and appropriate online safety laws, and we will continue to work together with Australia’s eSafety Commissioner and New Zealand’s Netsafe on community awareness-raising.
Please read our full policy brief on this topic.
Constructive engagement on digital health
We engage positively in policy and academic dialogue around screen time and digital health. We believe that video games should be enjoyed as part of a balanced lifestyle. Of the two-thirds of Australians and New Zealanders who play video games, the overwhelming majority do so in a healthy and responsible way. To support this goal, our industry has a longstanding history of providing tools that allow game players and their parents and carers to monitor and manage screen time more effectively.
Please read our full policy brief on this topic.
Continuing to fight the stigma around violence
During the 1990s, video games were stigmatised by some politicians, commentators and parts of the media as a cause for real-world violence. Unfortunately, this still happens even today. However, the overwhelming scientific consensus over decades of research is that there is no link between games and real-world violence or aggression. Regardless, we continue to support the role of the Australian and New Zealand classification schemes so that children are not exposed to content that is not age appropriate.
Please read our full policy brief on this topic.
Demystifying in-game spending and loot boxes
Video games use diverse and innovative revenue models to meet the different preferences and budgets of players. Some games, including many successful Australian games, use in-game spending. All gaming platforms provide controls for players and parents to manage in-game spending. Loot boxes (which contain randomised digital items) were reviewed by an Australian Senate Committee in 2018 that found that they were adequately regulated. Regardless, our industry continues to listen and implement new measures to increase the transparency of loot boxes. Further, as our industry naturally evolves, we’re seeing that loot boxes are becoming less common as publishers adopt new and different revenue models.
Please read our full policy brief on this topic.
Responsible management and protection of player data
Video games use diverse and innovative revenue models to meet the different preferences and budgets of players. Some games, including many successful Australian games, use in-game spending. All gaming platforms provide controls for players and parents to manage in-game spending. Loot boxes (which contain randomised digital items) were reviewed by an Australian Senate Committee in 2018 that found that they were adequately regulated. Regardless, our industry continues to listen and implement new measures to increase the transparency of loot boxes. Further, as our industry naturally evolves, we’re seeing that loot boxes are becoming less common as publishers adopt new and different revenue models.
Please read our full policy brief on this topic.
Fighting for support for game development
Building recognition of our high potential industry
Few Australian industries have the potential to create goods with long term value, bring up a generation of versatile tech workers, access billions of consumers, and attract high foreign investment, while also exporting our culture to the world. In fact, we believe video games is the only one. Ours is an advanced, export-based, digital manufacturing sector. With the Federal Government set to introduce a refundable 30% Digital Games Tax Offset (DGTO) from 1 July 2022, we are ushering in a new golden age of Australian game development.
Please read our full policy brief on this topic.
Advocating for grants and tax incentives for game development
Despite being part of the screen production industry, our sector has in the past been excluded from all federal screen funding and incentives, and often limited state and territory support too. For years we fought for a 30% tax offset for game development, something we achieved when the Australian Government announced the introduction of the Digital Games Tax Offset (DGTO), and we continue to fight for the ability of game developers to access Screen Australia funding. We also lobby for strong, cohesive, and effective funding and incentives for game development across the states and territories.
Please read our full policy brief on this topic.
Building a skilled workforce for our industry and Australia
Video game workers are highly trained technology-based creatives with incredibly transferable skills: exactly the kind of workers that not only our industry needs, but a 21st century Australia needs. We support policies that promote STEM in schools and enable higher education institutions with games course to provide the best possible training. We support migration policies that enable our industry to fill skills gaps and, most importantly, bring in the experienced managers and specialists we need to train up our next generation.
Please read our full policy brief on this topic.
Enhancing opportunities in digital trade and exports
Video games are the perfect export for Australia: weightless, high-tech, green, and IP-based with long-term revenue potential. We support export policies that strengthen the opportunities for Australian game developers to grow their existing export markets and to create new ones. We also advocate for international trade agreements and arrangements that encourage foreign investment, promote the open trade of digital goods and services, support the free flow of data, and take practical approaches to IP and data protection.
Please read our full policy brief on this topic.
Telling Australian stories for new audiences at home and abroad
Video gaming is arguably the largest, and certainly the fastest-growing, cultural medium in the world. Games are not only popular, but they are beautiful, complex, and narrative-driven, and many are deservedly celebrated as pieces of art. Video games are also giving a voice to a new generation of Australian story-tellers, and Australian-made games are irresistibly filled with our tones, values, voices, and humour. More so than perhaps any other Australian creative medium, Australian-made games have been quickly embraced by the world, and many are already among Australia’s most impactful cultural exports ever.
Please read our full policy brief on this topic.
Creating opportunities for serious games in government
Video games are no longer just being used for enjoyment and entertainment. Serious games and gamified technologies are finding diverse uses in education, health, policing, defence, and social services, as well as in the business and community sectors. While the serious games sector is still an emerging part of our broader industry, many Australian game developers have significant experience in ‘gamification’ and we remind governments about how games can be used innovatively to deliver policies, programs, and projects.
Please read our full policy brief on this topic.
Driving continued industry growth and innovation
Constructive and consultative approach to intellectual property
Video games constitute some of the most renowned, innovative, valuable, and complex IP in the world. Locally made video games help to bring in export revenue that can last years. At the same time, games remain vulnerable to copyright infringement and IP theft. Noting the breadth of issues and diversity of views across the Australian and New Zealand creative sectors on IP policy, and particularly around copyright, our position is that where there is a need for reform, we support an approach that is considered, constructive, and consultative.
Please read our full policy brief on this topic.
Supporting a strong, accessible and neutral internet
One of the most important pieces of infrastructure to support a futureproofed economy and connected society is strong and reliable internet, both fixed and wireless. Specifically, we support continued government investment into broadband and wireless networks and a competitive market of service providers to ensure that internet is accessible and affordable for all Australians and New Zealanders. It is also essential that wholesale and retail internet service providers should not and do not discriminate against video game content and data.
Please read our full policy brief on this topic.
Practical and common-sense competition and consumer policy
The video games sector is an ecosystem of many consoles, platforms, storefronts, publishers, and developers all operating under significant competitive tension. There is fierce competition for players, as evidenced by game prices remaining steady over the decades, even as inflation and development costs balloon. Video game companies are committed to building trust, loyalty, and consumer satisfaction, with gamers having greater choice than ever. We advocate for competition and consumer laws that are modern, practical, sensible, and compatible with the digital economy.
Please read our full policy brief on this topic.
Advocating for a fair tax system that encourages innovation
Our industry, like all sectors, should rightly pay its fair share of taxes. In addition to corporate income and other taxes, GST in both Australia and New Zealand is collected on digital sales including in-game purchases, unlike in many other countries. Australia’s export-focused game developers have also brought in significant taxes – generating more tax revenue than arguably any other creative sector. We advocate for tax policies that support SMEs, and incentives that drive innovation, like R&D tax incentives. Dialogue around tax reform and digital industries should be based on achieving global consensus.
Please read our full policy brief on this topic.
Reducing our current and future environmental impacts
While our sector, being mostly digital, is greener than most, we know we must keep working hard to further reduce our environmental impacts. Our members are investing into improving their technologies and designs to achieve environmental and carbon reduction outcomes, while still improving their products. We are fully engaged in green policy discussions, such as goals for phasing out hard-to-recycle plastics, practical packaging reduction targets, and improving access to repair. We also support government policies that help to address climate change and increase the availability of renewable power.
Please read our full policy brief on this topic.
Developing a vibrant and innovative esports scene
Australia and New Zealand have developed burgeoning esports scenes that are rapidly growing and attracting significant investment from traditional sports. To support this growth sustainably and responsibly, we seek to ensure that esports is enjoyed fairly, safely, and positively. We encourage federal, state, and local government attention on esports as contemporary levers for boosting tourism activity and infrastructure investment, as well as harnessing new opportunities for youth engagement and community cohesion, such as through school-based and grassroots esports programs.
Please read our full policy brief on this topic.
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