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[jax]

Australia seems like a weird, alternate version of America. Like if America was censored everywhere. A friend traveled there and was turned away from businesses because of her tattoos. What a weird place.

 

[Bosman]

Not sure if people are aware, but "Target" in Australia has nothing to do with the US version of Target. They're completely separate companies. The Australian company completely copied the aesthetic of the US Target, but they can't be taken to court reliably under Australian law, so the US Target just leaves them alone.

I find this extremely funny. Has this happened to other companies or just to Target?

 

[NewGame]

Aha yes! I love this. It's no different than those random stock boxarts EB (Our GameStop) puts out to represent some game they don't have the box for.

Plus I don't have to look at the trash box art that typically accompany them. batmanGOTY.jpeg

 

[Northeastmonk]

They make them look like porn magazines at book stores with green or whatever bars underneath the title.

They've had R rated films with proper covers? Why do video games need them to take extra precautions? What a censored world we live in.

 

[Vlaphor]

The big thing I remember about the Target GTAV thing was an article that Polygon ran where someone from Austraila said something like "In Austraila, we understand that some freedoms of speech can be harmful" and being chilled to the bone that someone in a non-fascist dictatorship would ever say that.

 

[Koppai]

It looks like a piece of paper was just put over the box art.

 

[Trojan]

I find this extremely funny. Has this happened to other companies or just to Target?

Only Target that I know of specifically, but I think this is more rampant in China. I used to work for Target and this is the only reason I knew they were a separate company.

 

[MrBS]

Wiki says that Target Australia own the rights to the name while random internet article says they don't. Who to believe

 

[Cilla]

How embarrassing.

 

[CLEEK]

I find this extremely funny. Has this happened to other companies or just to Target?

Trademarks are per-country thing. They protect you from other companies in your country using the same name or branding (logos, slogans etc).

If you want to start operating in another country, you'd have to get your name/branding trademarked there. If there's already another company with that name, you then have to either try to negotiate licensing the name from them, or have to pick another name for that country.

Burger King in Australia is called Hungry Jacks, because when the US chain started operating in Australia there was already one burger place in Adelaide that had that name. The owner wouldn't licence/sell the name to the US giant.

 

[plufim]

I don't get why this is a big deal - a private company can choose to sell what they want for any dang reason. That's not censorship, its capitalism.

The games are freely available elsewhere in Australia. Target's game section is tiny anyway, and 75% of the space is dedicated to toys to life stuff.