The 18 certificate is issued by the British Board of Film Classification (BBFC), to state that in its opinion, a film, video recording, or game is suitable only for persons aged 18 years and over. It recommends that no one below that age should be admitted to view a film with an 18 certificate in a cinema, and that 18-rated video recordings should not be sold or rented to anyone below that age. As with other British film certificates, the 18 certificate theoretically only has advisory power for films shown in public cinemas, with the ultimate say being held by local authorities. In practice, the local authorities tend to follow BBFC rulings in all but a few exceptional cases. For video and game sales, the BBFC rulings have statutory power, as under the terms of the 1984 Video Recordings Act all videos sold or distributed within the UK must be classified by the BBFC, unless they fall into one of a number of exempt categories. Unclassified recordings which are not exempt cannot legally be sold, regardless of content. The 18 certificate is also issued by the Irish Film Classification Office. History The 18 certificate was created in 1982 as the successor of the previous X certificate, which in turn was the successor of the H certificate (with H standing for "horror"). See History of British Film Certificates for more details. Typical reasons for restricting films to the 18 category have included hard drug use, supernatural horror, sexually explicit scenes, graphic violence, sadistic violence and sexual violence — the latter two of which have in the past led to a certificate not being issued at all, in effect banning the film in the UK. It was only around the start of the 21st century that the censors passed films with explicit ('hardcore') sexual acts despite the 18 certificate (and the more restrictive R18 certificate) existing for many years. Sex and the 18 certificate Until recently, works at 18 could not contain the depiction of actual sex acts, which more recently could only appear in films with an R18 certificate (when created in 1982 only simulated acts could be shown under an R18, but this was relaxed after legal challenges in 2000). Although the BBFC allowed the depiction of simulated sex scenes in 18 certificate films, actual sexual acts were still not allowed to be depicted in 18 certificate films until around