{"id":92415,"date":"2016-05-16T14:05:23","date_gmt":"2016-05-16T12:05:23","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/mygaming.co.za\/news\/?p=92415"},"modified":"2016-05-16T14:06:21","modified_gmt":"2016-05-16T12:06:21","slug":"government-regulation-is-holding-back-the-sa-gaming-industry","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/mygaming.co.za\/news\/business\/92415-government-regulation-is-holding-back-the-sa-gaming-industry","title":{"rendered":"Government regulation is holding back the SA gaming industry"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>Government regulations are holding back the growth of the South African gaming industry, according to\u00a0<strong>Interactive entertainment South Africa<\/strong> (<strong><a href=\"http:\/\/www.iesa.org.za\/\" target=\"_blank\">Iesa<\/a><\/strong>) chairman\u00a0<strong>Nicholas Hall<\/strong>.<\/p>\n<p>Speaking to <strong><a href=\"http:\/\/www.fin24.com\/Tech\/News\/sa-gaming-industry-suffering-under-regulation-20160516\" target=\"_blank\">Fin24<\/a><\/strong>, Hall said the video game entertainment industry is &#8220;the largest entertainment industry in the world,&#8221; and that government regulation is stifling the growth of South African game development.<\/p>\n<p>Hall stated that the problem is exacerbated by the confusing\u00a0regulatory practice\u00a0surrounding game development in South Africa.<\/p>\n<blockquote><p>No-one actually knows how to deal with games. We don\u2019t have protection in terms of the Copyright Act. The fundamental basis of how the assets that we create should be protected is non-existent.<\/p>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<p>The department of trade and industry doesn\u2019t know if they should be looking after us, or if it should be the department of arts and culture. The department of arts and culture also doesn\u2019t know and sports and recreation thinks that they should be there as well because, you know, we\u2019re games.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n<p>This lack of clarity regarding the governing rules of video game development has rendered\u00a0the South African gaming industry unattractive to investors, which drastically limits the growth of the sector.<\/p>\n<p>A key factor\u00a0hindering the growth of the industry is the\u00a0FPB (Film and Productions Board) regulations.<\/p>\n<p>The regulations\u00a0state that all published content must be classified,\u00a0and\u00a0impose heavy\u00a0restrictions on local game developers\u00a0compared\u00a0to the freedom international game developers\u00a0enjoy.<\/p>\n<h3 class=\"my-4\">More gaming news<\/h3>\n<p><strong><a title=\"Permalink to This may be the worst performing game of the generation\" href=\"http:\/\/mygaming.co.za\/news\/pc\/90506-this-may-be-the-worst-performing-game-of-the-generation.html\" rel=\"bookmark\">This may be the worst performing game of the generation<\/a><\/strong><\/p>\n<p><strong><a title=\"Permalink to Games you can play this week \u2013 rebellions and rage\" href=\"http:\/\/mygaming.co.za\/news\/features\/92399-games-you-can-play-this-week-rebellions-and-rage.html\" rel=\"bookmark\">Games you can play this week \u2013 rebellions and rage<\/a><\/strong><\/p>\n<p><strong><a title=\"Permalink to The truth about Nvidia\u2019s upcoming Founders cards\" href=\"http:\/\/mygaming.co.za\/news\/hardware\/91889-the-truth-about-nvidias-upcoming-founders-cards.html\" rel=\"bookmark\">The truth about Nvidia\u2019s upcoming Founders cards<\/a><\/strong><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Government regulations are holding back the growth of the South African gaming industry.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":232,"featured_media":89695,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_sma_x_autopost_status":"idle","_sma_x_autopost_error":"","_sma_x_post_id":"","_sma_x_attempts":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[2,20],"tags":[31,447,2664,18627,18497,5641,2163],"class_list":["post-92415","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-business","category-features","tag-active","tag-development","tag-gaming","tag-government","tag-iesa","tag-nicholas-hall","tag-south-africa"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/mygaming.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/92415","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/mygaming.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/mygaming.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mygaming.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/232"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mygaming.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=92415"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/mygaming.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/92415\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mygaming.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/89695"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/mygaming.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=92415"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mygaming.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=92415"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mygaming.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=92415"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}