Atkinson successor chosen within two weeks

Last weekend's South Australian state election saw Labor politician Michael Atkinson easily retain his seat of Croydon despite a significant swing, much to the dismay of many gamers who see him as the only person standing in the way of the introduction of an R18+ rating for video games in Australia. That dismay soon turned to cautious optimism quickly, however, with news that Atkinson would be relinquishing his position on the Labor Government's front bench, effectively ending his reign as attorney-general.

Atkinson was the only one of Australia's state and federal attorneys-general to publicly state his opposition to the R18+ rating for games, the introduction of which requires the unanimous agreement of all attorneys-general. With Atkinson now out of his position, attention has now turned to his possible replacement and his replacement's stance on gaming. GameSpot AU contacted the South Australian Attorney-General's office, with a spokesman confirming that Atkinson had indeed relinquished his post. As for the new minister, the spokesman said: "That is for caucus to decide. It will probably be in about a week or two."

"It is true that Michael Atkinson will not run for the Attorney-General cabinet. He won his seat [in Croydon] very comfortably. Mr. Atkinson has made this decision by himself. He wants to spend more time with his family as he has been here for 21 years and he wants to give younger backbenchers a shot in cabinet. He will retire from Parliament in 2014," the spokesman said.

While the Liberal Opposition in South Australia had still not conceded defeat in the weekend's elections, most political pundits are confident that Labor will retain power in the state.

While Atkinson suffered a significant swing of 11.6 percent against him in Croydon, it's unclear how much of that can be attributed to his long-standing feud with the gaming community in Australia. Gamers4Croydon--the political party set up to specifically oppose Atkinson--scored only 3.7 percent of the vote in Atkinson's electorate. While this was more than Family First or the Democrats, Gamers4Croydon's vote was well below Atkinson's, who polled 64.5 percent of total votes after preferences.

GameSpot AU will have more on the South Australian election as news breaks. For more on video game classification in Australia, check out GameSpot AU's Aussie Games Classification FAQ feature.