• Hey, guest user. Hope you're enjoying NeoGAF! Have you considered registering for an account? Come join us and add your take to the daily discourse.

Why gamers complain about their games being taken away |OT| Censorship Controversy Central

Alright ladies and gentlemen, I am of the opinion that discussion about this very interesting topic has been fragmented way too much to make the most out of its discussions, so I propose this thread where we will gather examples of censorship in videogames and look at them in their larger context.

F.A.Q.

B-b-but it isn't censorship if the developers did it / if the government didn't intervene / if I like it that way and feel it's an improvement!
That's a conveniently restrictive definition of censorship that ensures no cuts ever can 'count' since the onset of gaming. "But they can release it elsewhere!" doesn't count either since releasing a torrent isn't a sound way to run a business that can survive. Government bans can be also dismissed as restrictions on illegal content and justified just as easily. But since gaming media already accused Nintendo of "censorship" over regional changes (in the context of a same-sex marriage feature "cut" from the Western versions of Tomodachi Collection, even though it turned out the feature didn't exist to begin with) we can already drop the charade and count all cases of content already produced then cut under pressure, to be "censorship".

I like it that way! It's an improvement! The original "artistic vision" was worthless anyways!
While some games had their engines repurposed for Western markets for completely different games (like a Gundam Wing 2D fighter that became a Power Rangers themed game in the West, or some brawlers and racing games on the PS1), most games in this thread were marketed as direct adaptations of their original version with any mention of the cuts avoided as much as possible. The localization editors are also credited as part of the translation team, instead of co-writers. It is then fair to excuse the disappoinment of fans who expect unaltered versions.
Also, opinions are subjective.

That's just how localization works. You just want a "keikaku means plan" Babelfish translation.
Localization as adapting a language with different grammar that wouldn't translate well, explaining cultural references that would fly over the heads of an overseas audience, and wording it all in a way that sounds enjoyable to a native, is different from "Localization" that's all about cuts and changes to remove everything too foreign or from a different morality system, or 'enhancing' it with the localization editor's political and moral opinions.
As good examples of games that have excellent localizations from the first kind, that completely avoid the second kind of "localization", you can check Atlus's work on Utawarerumono : Mask of Truth, Xseed's Trails in the Sky translations, and Sega's Yakuza (6 and beyond). Persona 5 arguably counts as well as a translation that's very close to the Japanese text without being Babelfish/fansub quality as proponents of this argument would like us to believe.

You're just a weaboo who wants to see some flesh, watch some online porn already.
Censorship also affects Japanese games in their native markets, and Western games in their native markets. This impression can't be explained away by an idealization of the Japanese market, story tropes, and language patterns (honorifics, sound effects, politeness levels...) We'll make sure to point out enough examples supporting this in this thread.
Besides this, censorship extends well beyond sexual, or lewd content. It affects a lot more things, including storylines, characterization and game modes. This thread hopes to shine some light on some examples like these.

[internet scandal group] thread! Dogwhistling! Sealionsplaining! Dickwolfing! Bad faith! Everything is political!
It is my honest intention to dedicate this thread to discussing examples of game censorship, not campaigning against or defending political parties and their internet feuds.
If your dogwhistle sharingan can detect invisible hostile intentions, please make sure as common courtesy, to point out with a direct quote where you saw those political opinions instead of assuming the poster holds them or wants to talk about them.

Standing [for/against] [very unrelated political position] in [current year] is basic human decency, then how could you disagree with me about [this game's] localization, even mention its damned name, you... you [hate crime accusation] [assumed demographic] monster?!!
Lesser computer-generated hostile ad hominems like this would do wonders to elevate this topic's level.
Ad hominems are replies that derail a topic to talk about, insult, and harass the person who dared make the argument, instead of addressing the argument itself... that are a tactic to derail or stop discussions with minimal effort and good will)

How pitiful and miserable do you have to be to care this much about pixels TROLOLOL Cry harder
Computer-generated reply #2 seems to exist because whoever wrote it cares as much as us about the medium and issues like this. A heartfelt welcome is then extended to this topic, no matter how you stand on the topic, as long as you don't post something actionable by moderation here.

With this out of the way, let's talk a bit about game censorship.

History

Why are games censored


We shall make the distinction between different kinds of censorship.

For the sake of simplicity, we'll consider the obvious morality-driven, controversy-averse cuts that developers didn't really plan or wish for in their initial creative vision, as censorship. Games made very easy, missing game modes because the localization team broke the game, won't be considered for this topic (but feel free to start another one for these :) )
We won't count when platform holders reject non-functional executables as censorship of their artistical expression.

Absence of Japanese songs, voice acting and name changes won't be counted if it's a legal licensing restriction. However cases where it was licensed and ready for release and the console holder said no (Sony, Konami, Castlevania Symphony of the Night) will count.
  • Government Ban: Often a thing in third-world countries over political themes, but also in other countries over hate speech and iconography (Germany), child porn (almost everywhere) and other cases. For example, in Japan, fully exposed genitalia makes its content illegal as long as they didn't attempt to censor it (key word being "attempt"), and on the PS2 in Europe there was a game with real beachgoer girls exposing their boobs... and one "forgot" to mention she's underage short of a few months of 18, making the footage illegal. Also China has a lot of guidelines that will get games rejected.
  • Legal Recall: The game has been forcefully recalled by courts over a litigation process. For example: Uniracers (a Pixar/Nintendo lawsuit), Tetris on the JP Megadrive (a Nintendo/Sega lawsuit)...
  • License Owner Conditions: Whether a game is based on something else (movie/comics) must meet a certain rating, or not include specific content. Disney is notorious for this.
  • Platform Holder Conditions: When a game has to avoid some content to be eligible for approval and release on that platform. Game will be reviewed by Sony/Nintendo... for compliance. Obviously not a thing on Android (since side-loading apps is possible) or PC (until Steam/GOG/itch.io came... and then recently on Steam those conditions were relaxed). These conditions often include the existence of a rating board's rating (Japan's CERO, Europe's PEGI and Germany's USK can reject a game), and that it is below a certain rating (ERSB M at most in the US, meaning AO games won't be allowed).
  • Rating Board's Rating: These are advisory in most countries, and supposedly meant for parents and as such would exert market pressure on developers to self-censor until it meets a lower rating and is more marketable. A lot of their power is derived from being associated with platform holder conditions or license holder conditions, and some laws that restrict advertising and promoting games with higher ratings in public, on consumer-facing store shelves, online in the publisher's website, and so on.
  • PR Concerns: Sometimes the publisher decides to issue a recall or cancel an entirely finished game perfectly willingly, fearing consumer backlash or a wider mainstream public relationship disaster that could be exploited to campaign for new laws or damage the company's image. Some platform holders (Nintendo, Sony) have blanket rules that allow them to remove any games at their discretion, though enforcement is a different beast (more on that later). A good example is Thrill Kill on the PS1, cancelled by EA shortly after acquiring the IP over its content.
  • Marketing: When content is focus tested out of games for no real concern over ratings.
  • Personal Translator Preference: This one is actually old, and often an issue conflated in the discussion about whether localization should be about being faithful to the original content or "spicing it up". However in recent years, some quite obvious examples emerged of localization editors bragging about "fixing up problematic Japanese entertainment".
Policies by Platform Holder

Computers
In the West, games were and are still unrestricted on computers, which remain an open platform, save for government, lawsuit recalls and license owner restrictions. This hasn't changed and acquiring uncut content online within those boundaries is still possible.

If you're talking about Steam, however, there are some restrictions. However it gradually changed.
  • Used to have a curation system. All game submissions are rejected by default. Valve picks and chooses which publishers are reputable and allows them in (a test that Falcom and Treasure failed). As for the rest, the users can vote through a process called Steam Greenlight for some new games, which then Valve will "consider approving".
  • Greenlight is scrapped and regular game submission is approved. Volume of games is much bigger as a result. (Just for the record, Polygon laments this as a negative) However, controversial (political) games are removed, and lewd games are banned but allowed submission as censored, sex-free games with patches hosted elsewhere as a workaround. The messaging about lewd game approval wasn't clear at all, and Steam got stricter and stricter, barring developers from promoting the patches, sticking threads discussing them, and ultimately publishing those games at all. Some developers moved their games to G.O.G. as a form of protest.
  • Steam now allows violent and lewd games, hidden by default but viewable through custom content filters, and with full sexual content (within US law). There was much outrage about this
GOG uses a curation system, however, it has approved some sexual games (with Steam levels of censorship prior to the last policy change however: covered up versions with external patches hosted elsewhere)
itch.io on the other hand has threatened to "BAN" (sic) any developers who would dare to submit problematic games to their platform.

The Japanese side used to be unregulated and allow outright child porn and uncensored porn, relying on the fact that the market is underground and doujin distribution is limited. However, a high-profile serial murder case that was over-the-top in how depraved and disgusting it was, committed by an otaku, quickly threw into motion government regulation for the computer game market and not just console game market (CERO).

Nintendo
Nintendo should be considered from two different angles, as a publisher for their own first party games, and as a platform holder approving third-party games. It should be mentioned that as the former they were afforded to breach their own guidelines as the latter, at many times.

Nintendo started as a platform holder and the only party allowed to release games on their Famicom. As they were unable to meet consumer demand, they started a third party developer licensing program with the likes of Enix (Dragon Quest, Protopia), Namco (Pac-man) and Hudson (Bomberman) welcomed, with more and more developers later.
There were preferential treatment to who gets the bigger cartridge size to fit all game content and biggest shipment to ensure the best sales, and who got to manufacture their special chips (where Enix and Bullet-Proof Software led by the guy who played Go with Yamauchi, given the VIP course, and Squaresoft and Namco getting the short stick which was a major factor why they jumped ship for Sony) and then Nintendo of America came up with even more restrictions like how many games could be released yearly. This leads to some pretty major content cuts but since it was due to corporate politics and not because of the content itself, it won't be the focus here.

As a platform holder approving third party games, they had the following restrictions in Japan:
  • Big restrictions over sexual and "vulgar" content, either visual or textual. Examples: SNES ports of Brandish, Dokyusei II, Dragon Knight IV, Super Variable Geo (entire story mode removed), Metal Slader Glory on NES compared to its prototype scenes (bath scenes) and later SNES port ("examine boob"). This was relaxed in the later days of the SNES but not completely dropped (except for Vivid Dolls on the N64 arcade, an actual pornographic game)
  • Nudity. Nude women will have at least some two-pieces fabric for the Nintendo versions.
In America, though this lightened up as time went on.
Europe mostly followed suit as a NoA subsidary, though they completely ignored it (for non-English translations based on English versions, and later for Terranigma)
  • Nudity: What little was allowed by the Japanese versions was censored further.
  • Alcohol, Bars: even extended to slurred drunken speech patterns.
  • Smoking
  • Drugs. However some games were allowed to mention them in the context of a war on drugs plot (that was also always completely different from the Japanese plot)
  • Blood or Gore, with some notable exceptions. Relaxed as a result of Mortal Kombat bombing on SNES directly because of this policy.
  • Profanity, Saying someone died/was killed... largely dropped by the time the PS1 hit and used that against Nintendo, as Ogre Battle 64 shows.
  • Religion: Includes visual changes, like crosses and pentagrams. Textual as well: no mention of gods in any context (Panic Restaurent had the whole credits removed because of a "MAY GOD BE WITH YOU") while Hudson got away with euphemisms in Faxanadu (1988) Nintendo became much more strict and then dropped it in 1994 with Breath of Fire 2 and then Earthbound. Lots of games used "The Master" instead, and the Jack Bros (SMT) translation was butchered a lot.
  • Political Advocacy. Technically in the list, but doesn't seem to have affected much of anything. Socks The Cat (a game parodying all sides of the US political scene) was a suspected casualty, but the game was cancelled for unrelated reasons even for its Genesis version. Contra/Protectobot and Guevara/Guerilla Wars were changed on other platforms for image issues since the original plot was highly impopular in the target markets (the Nicaragua situation for European markets, and the Cuban situation for the US market)
Nintendo scaled down those policies but not completely (some N64 games were still affected), as rating boards were established by game industry groups to self regulate, and "entrusted" them with regulating the content and how acceptable it is for society at large. All console holders followed suit... until recently with Sony (PS4, 2018 and PSVR, 2018) deciding they have to rate the content as well0
After Nintendo's fall from grace with the PlayStation coming, they largely dropped these policies for third party publishers. However some recent cases need to be pointed out:

  • Nintendo used the escape clause about content that makes the platform holder look bad, to reject The Binding of Isaac 3DS port in 2013. Game journalism outrage ensued, and someone at Nintendo in charge for indies vowed to "sort out the situation". That particular version never released. However, a new version exclusive to the new3DS released in 2015.
  • Namco Bandai's Dragon Ball Fusions (3DS, 2017) had all of its swords changed to wooden swords, despite no effect of it on ratings. It was confirmed this was at Nintendo of America's request and affected the EU/US regional versions of these games.
  • Unconfirmed: A cancelled DS game for a tentative 2008 release date about a child escaping from WW2 concentration camps, that Regis Fils-Aimé alluded to in an interview denying games with such content will be ever allowed on a Nintendo console.
Nevertheless, the Switch market is more open than ever, accepting all-ages console versions of PC games as they would be released a decade earlier, and lewd content as long as they don't depict the actual sexual acts and sexual organs. This applies for the European store as well (which has an minimally censored, untranslated AV chat app game sold with the appropriate rating)

As a game publisher, either for their own games or other developers, Nintendo was a bit different, and carried on very similar policies:

  • Alcohol: A weird go-and-forth between allowing it (Tales of Phantasia has an onsen and a beer scene with a sexual dream that were allowed in the European version but toned down in the US version, both by Nintendo) and removing it (Fire Emblem Echoes in all regions though it seems to be at the behest of the Western side, Story of Seasons in Europe only where Nintendo published it)
  • Religious content: Whenever Nintendo of America is given a say (so not thing like the first Xenoblades) it replaces Christianity references in games, with nondescript roman ones (Bravely Default's priestesses are now vestals, and Xenoblades 2's entire mythos underwent a similar process) and in Zelda BOTW, that "the dark world denizens have forsaken religion and lost themselves to darkness" as a negative, and lots of other similar lines in the same game.
  • "Cultural appropriation": Started with Shy-guys in Mario Party Advance 2003 and culminated with Bravely Second's localization cuts of the Tomahawk job. Though it seems Nintendo made a complete 180° on the matter for the Switch with Sombrero Mario (actually a throwback to an 1990 game with even more Mario cultural cosplays), to the relief of Mexican fans.
  • "Fat Shaming": Comments on slender physique were too much in Fire Emblem Fates, as were referring to Queen Zora's predicament as a curse of fatness in Zelda ALBW. However since
  • LGBT Content: Vivian was cut from the English (but not non-English translations) of Paper Mario 2 because it was supposedly an offensive way to portray transgenders. Starting from Fire Emblem Fates, Nintendo started to scrub the dialog clean from any character flaws for any characters belonging to these classes. For example, in SMO, Bowser will insult Mario every single time but will uncharacteristically compliment him and go "you're so beautiful" with the dress. That said, the policy got more relaxed with WarioWare Gold.
  • Nudity and Sexual Content: Fire Emblem Fates had entire conversations, game modes, DLC chapters... completely cut, or rewritten at best. Tokyo Mirage Sessions went a step further, if that wasn't believable enough, with remaking an entire dungeon and asking the Japanese seiyuu to redub the censored lines in Japanese, to fit the new story, and even more ludicrous costume changes (the wedding dress is a classic). Less severely, Fatal Frame V by NoE still had the gravure model in sexual poses and the story to go along with it, but fully clothed her. Xenoblade X removed some boob sliders and problematic characterization. Not even Dragon Quest and its purely textual puff-puff jokes were safe, they were completely cut from the Nintendo-published localizations. That said, Xenoblades 2 made it with zero visual cuts this time around so a policy change may be assumed.
  • "Dark, uncomfortable content" like Henry's backstory in Fire Emblem Awakening, the purged TMS gravure idol chapter, or major sidequests in Bravely Second where alternate endings where everyone dies were completely cut. Again, Nintendo had a 180° turn for this one with Octopath Travelers, and Xenoblades 2 (even though that one beats around the bush quite a lot for some such scenes, but to its credit doesn't completely purge the original message)
  • Political content: A torture scene in Conker, over similarity with real WW2 Imperial Army practices.
Based on the known leaks and facts, it's suggested things went like this:
  • NoA liked to suggest content changes for the sake of it to get more localization budget "needed" for these changes, at least around the period Twilight Princess was being worked on, according to a supposed insider.
  • Nintendo of Europe was restructured around 2001 over low Pokemon sales in Germany, complains about quality, and a lower market performance due to sub-par localizations (either English only, or shitty and delayed). This resulted in NoE gaining more independence and translating directly from Japanese for the non-English scripts, which helped reduce delays. Some minor controversies about censored local scripts compared to English were then swiftly resolved. Sales became better and better.
  • Mario Party 8 has a controversy because a US term used was offensive in Britain. This causes NoE to do their own English localizations, often directly from Japanese and with much less content changes than the American version. Game journalists have complained many times about the existence of these translations, how they're redundant, dry, made for weebs by weebs... and eventually got their way.
  • NoA due to historical reasons has a lot of power over regional releases. They use it to sabotage NCL's efforts to release mature games (Fatal Frame 4/2, Zangeki no Regliev, Pandora's Tower, Xenoblades, The Last Story...) on the Wii, but suffer a PR disaster in the meanwhile, so they announce them. They still sabotage Xenoblade 1. Xseed is allowed to publish two more games (in 2014) and somehow does well, and while on track for the third one (Devil's Third) NoA is angered by this success and decides to renege on the the contract and publish it themselves. Low promotion. Game has a shitty main campaign but a somewhat decent multiplayer, so they announce they will only run the servers for 3 months. Only 420 copies on release date. NoA is vicious. Even Itagaki let out hints about what he really feels about them in interviews later, but fortunately NCL gave him the half-million seller Momotaro Dentetsu to work on for the 3DS to keep the studio afloat.
  • Tomodachi Collection situation happened.
  • NoA notices people are upset by their handling of games compared to European games, not only for English scripts (like the meme-filled Zelda localizations) but also the French and Spanish ones (the French Galaxy localization was so full of slurred street patterns and memes it gained infamy in Quebec and wide coverage on media, and some government officers even called it "an insulting attack on the French language") then their solution was to... interfere with NoE localizations, force them to wait for their Fire Emblem Fates to be finished and release it 8 months later, with the same American English script and European scripts translated faithfully from... the English script, memes included. No care whatsoever was put into ensuring there were no language offensive to the British. For Tokyo Mirage Sessions it was a similar story, only now they forced an English-only release in Europe.
  • Some self-professed ideologues at Nintendo bragged on twitter about being friends with Tumblr blogs writing negative exagerrated translations about all the "rape" in Fire Emblem Fates to pressure Nintendo into censoring it, or about how problematic Japanese games are and "thanks god we can fix it". That said, various peoples coming forward over the years despite Nintendo's secrecy paint a different picture, and that this recent drive wasn't popular. After all, it all begun with a harassment campaign against Treehouse employees over Tomodachi Collection.
  • Fire Emblem Fates' situation, as well as that of Tokyo Mirage Sessions (which had some content cuts compared to prerelease screenshots, some matching NoA's cuts) reaches Japan. It's an instant hot topic. Even game journalists and developers (Nintendo included) comment negatively on it.
  • The content cuts are a PR disaster. NoA actually tries to shift blame to Square Enix (Bravely Second) and Atlus USA (Tokyo Mirage Sessions).
  • Nintendo's Kimishima starts talking about ensuring content changes are discussed during development. However this in fact lead to the policies being relaxed on Switch considering Nintendo of Japan (NCL) WANTED to have adult, lewd, weaboo, etc. games on their system.
Sega

Sega tried to compete with Nintendo, and game censorship was one aspect of their feuds. Howard Lincoln would try to embarrass Sega claiming mature games like Night Trap would never be on a Nintendo console, and Sega would allow an uncensored Mortal Kombat port making the Genesis the cool kids' console overnight (and it's no coincidence ex-Sega of America people who joined Sony continued a similar strategy with gratuitous profanity in their own games).

Sega of America had third parties cut the following:
  • References to religion, including crosses, "God", pentagrams, and so on (only Sega of America)
  • Nudity and Sexual content, though much more relaxed than for Nintendo. The shading in some fully nude shots in Lunar was changed so only the silhouette is made out without the details (though 2's opening while altered got away with quite a lot), a monster with exposed cleavage got some vines covering her bust, summer clothes in some Sega first party games were covered up and some characters were removed from Street of Rage 3 (though interestingly, this was reportedly suggested by Sega's marketing team). The Shining series has a lot of panty jokes written out for example.
  • Pornographic magazines (Dark Savior on Saturn, Shining Force 2)
  • Blood, only initially
  • Drugs
  • Alcohol
Sega of America under the tenure of Bernie Stolar became much more averse to games with Japanese voice acting, and 2D games. That changed however for the DreamCast, albeit too late.

Sega of Japan stuck to just nudity and sexual acts, but in a stunning reversal decided to allow that on the Saturn for a very short window of time (actual adult only games, though privates and some words were still not allowed), then banned it again.

NEC

Here we'll mention NEC's short lived attempts for console gaming, not their computers (PC-88, PC-98 that they didn't regulate). They are the PC Engine (TurboGrafx-16) and its CD add-on, as well as the PC-FX that was a massive failure. NEC didn't put the minimum work to be ahead of the curve (they would develop hardware already outdated by that year's standards, then delay it 2 years without adding anything to that concept) and banked on the FMV gaming fad, which meant their demise.

PC Engine wasn't very successful at first, but it became a hit with the CD expansion. Games that had voice acting and anime sequences were the most popular. So NEC took a hands-off approach.
Games had politically incorrect speech patterns (that had to be redacted from their later releases in Japanese, though to be fair that happened with other games from the same period Final Fantasy included), gratuitous gore, and blood.

There were some direct ports of erotic games (the Dragon Knight games) that kept the descriptions of the act in text form, or sometimes voice acted with appropriate performance. The visuals however had nudity slightly covered up, and no depiction of the visual act (or in the case of Steam Heart, stills from the uncensored computer version cutscene). Those erotic games were published by NEC themselves. Later for the PC-FX, even the visuals in full fidelity became allowed.

But, aside from the half-hearted attempt by NEC to tell developers to cover up nudity in their games, they had a very real ban on any game that wasn't "anime-esque" enough for the PC-FX, as anime cutscenes were deemed to showcase the hardware. That didn't... go well for them.
 
Microsoft

While allowing a bunch of uncensored versions of multiplatform games, Microsoft engaged in the practice of their own either as a platform holder (a cancelled Japanese port for the JP-exclusive Gal Guns 1 unless I'm misremembering?) or a publisher (Conker's remake). I don't have many details.

Sony

Saving the best for the last... Sony tried to cultivate their image, and how you can find on their systems content Nintendo and Sega would never allow... As it turns out however:

  • Has the least permissive policy out of all competitors during the PS1 (N64/Saturn/DreamCast) and PS2 (GameCube/Xbox) eras, regarding sexual content (JP/US). Examples include: Advanced V.G., Policenauts, Snatcher, BM XXX, Twisted Metal Black...
  • Similar to the above, but for violent content. For example: Linda Cube (uncensored on Saturn). (JP)
  • Some games can be rejected if deemed "not a good enough use of the hardware". That may extend to entire genres, and is determined at the pure discretion of Sony. 2D games were rejected in masse in the PS1 era and Japanese developers had to pull strings to have them approved (US), lot of vertical shumps were Xbox 360 exclusive because they didn't deserve to exist in the 16:9 age (JP, US), Ganbare Goemon PS2 was cancelled overseas over poor polygons (US), The Uncharted Vita game had to add double touch screen and IR camera gimmicks to be approved them those same features caused it to be blacklisted from PS-TV (US, JP), the Monster Hunter PSP-PS3 port made for English audiences that SCEA rejected because the models are too poor for a console game (US)...
  • According to SCEA, visual novels are not real games. This got a bunch of Sakura Taisen games cancelled.
  • How you can depict PS2 hardware in games (other platform holders have similar policies, but Sony's is the most restrictive)
  • If it's a Japanese game localized to Western markets, it can't have exclusively Japanese voice acting. This meant some games had to record an alternate shitty English dub by publisher's relatives just to be able to release it in the West.
  • Lewd or vulgar language. Applied selectively (Alundra PS1 got rejected then resubmitted, while Western games are allowed. Persona 5 has cut lines about prostitution replaced with euphemisms even in its Japanese version)
  • Whether it harms Sony's PR image. A blanket clause that was has started to see a lot of use recently.
Sony has a separate, more extensive set of guidelines for their indie program, but I don't have the full details about that or notorious cases where they got enforced.

Recently, there were very interesting developments.

  • PS VR launched in Japan, however some localization plans (for Namco's English Learning game) were cancelled, and devs mentioned conditions about restricted camera control by Sony.
  • After some internal restructuring, the HQ moved to a certain region in the US. Shortly after, some policy changes were immediately put into motion in the US AND Japan.
  • Super Seducer was approved and released. It passed Sony's approval checks, got a low enough rating, and was devoid by itself of any encouragement for "politically incorrect" actions, as they would lead to a game over, or any kind of sexual imagery. However, directly in response to gaming media complaining about the existence of a pick-up artist game in 2018 (as they should dating and self-help books should be made illegal, apparently) Sony retroactively pulled the game from its store after one day.
  • Omega Labyrinth Z: While rejected in a couple of European countries, its cancelled PS4 Western version was cleared by legal authorities in the US and approved by PEGI and ERSB for mature, not adult-only ratings. The decision is confirmed to come from Sony, the Western publisher is looking for ways to port it to Steam or other platforms, and the Japanese publisher is doing the next game in the series exclusively on Switch.
  • Nekopara Vol.1: Delayed indefinitely in the West for PS4 the same week as Omega Labyrinth Z. Already available on Steam. Fate of Volume 2 (announced for PS4 and Switch) unknown.
  • Senran Kagura Burst Re-Newal: Cleared by ERSB/PEGI, rejected by Sony who asked for specific parts of the game to be cut. Steam version unaffected. The cut content was allowed before.
  • Million Arthur VR: Shortly delayed to remove head patting
  • Happy Manager VR: Delayed for half a year, major changes from pre-release, most interactions with girls you meet releguated to a gallery mode that shows functional but not interactive VR, with some scenes in fixed camera.
  • Nora to Oujo to Noraneko Heart: A visual novel uncut on PC, covered with towels just enough to avoid frontal nudity for Switch, and covered with huge beams of light only leaving the head visible for the PS4/PSV versions.
  • Sugar Daddy, a homoerotic visual novel, was on the other hand approved by Sony.
It seems there are multiple takes from this:
  • the rating boards are useless, now Sony is going to have their own ruleset for content violation just like Nintendo used to do when there were no rating boards
  • the ruleset has double standards, and isn't as predictable as in the PS1/2 days. It's not enforced in the same way on some Western developers for example
  • PS VR now disallows not only unrestricted camera (a CERO thing too) but a wide range of interactions with virtual obviously adult ladies (a rule unique to Sony that third parties are expected to get without clear messaging and act upon it... or just give up a certain genre or theme or consumer base)
  • All of the above is utterly meaningless when 5 or more game journalists start to write articles how your game shouldn't exist, then if Sony thinks you're disposable they will delist it without so much as a second thought, and all your expenses on that port go down the drain.
Overall, exciting times ahead.
If you have more examples of game censorship, present or past, please share.
 

Mr Hyde

Member
The intro to Resident Evil was censored quite heavily here in the EU. I don´t know about the US though but I think it got off the hook as well as the JP-version. Either way, the intro was pretty graphic for its time with the FMV-scene blowing up with the Playstation. I was so angry when I later learned that much of it was cut in the PAL-region.
 

Breakage

Member
A last gen example: Ninja Gaiden Sigma 2 replacing the [enemy] blood splatter from the original Xbox 360 game with a purple mist.

But the blood splatter returned in the PS Vita version of Sigma 2.
 
Last edited:

Thurible

Member
In link's awakening, while doing the trading quest Link comes upon a mermaid. The mermaid asks link to find her bracelet and return it to her. In the japanese version the Mermaid drops her bra and link has to find that.

I can understand why they changed it, but I find the bra bit a tad more amusing.
 

Danjin44

The nicest person on this forum
I'm still baffled by some of the censorship in Tokyo Mirage Session.
lBBM3nd.png
 
I'm still baffled by some of the censorship in Tokyo Mirage Session.
lBBM3nd.png
And the thing is, those censorship efforts cost money, too. When the game is already niche as it was, pissing off the small pool of consumers who were interested in the game was not a great idea.

OT: I like the idea of having a thread dedicated towards video game censorship.
 

Vlaphor

Member
Yeah, the xenoblade x, FFV, #fe debacles got me to buy a Japanese Wii U. Bloody ridiculous but it had to be done.

There a modded uncut English version of Tokyo Mirage Sessions. Has to be run on a modded Wii U, though I think it'll run on Cemu now.
 

Danjin44

The nicest person on this forum
They just made her skin white (literally). Couldn't they have added clothing to her, or would that have been impossible to do?
Here is another one and funny thing about this is that they just censored the cutscene, when you fight her she has her original look.
359444-fire%20tits.jpg

LU9fUmG.jpg

Which make me think why even do this? TMS just has very bizarre censorship.
 
Last edited:

Graciaus

Member
There is a YouTube channel called censoredgaming that talks about all the new releases and what is censored. They also do old anime and other things.

Censorship is terrible just put everything on Steam now. If you are bothered by something just don't buy it. People are way to big of babies these days.
 

dottme

Member
I'm still baffled by some of the censorship in Tokyo Mirage Session.
lBBM3nd.png
The rest of the censoring in this game was not great. But if I was not aware of it, I might not have noticed it.
But this seen was horrible. It looks like they wanted to modify the dress but they run out of money to do anything good.
 
Here is another one and funny thing about this is that they just censored the cutscene, when you fight her she has her original look.
359444-fire%20tits.jpg

LU9fUmG.jpg

Which make me think why even do this? TMS just has very bizarre censorship.

To be fair, it does look like the cutscene outfit was showing more skin than the in-game outfit. Did they change both?

Pot Meet Kettle Pot Meet Kettle If you didn't know already, there's an entire you tube channel devoted to this topic, and they do a good job of explaining the differences. Here's a random recent example that saw changes to both sexual aspects and magic references. They also do videos on the changes US games make when released in Japan and other countries, and other topics associated with censorship and localization.

 

CatCouch

Member
Excellent write-up! I guess we will have some crazy times ahead if journalists can get a platform holder to ban games by complaining about them. I think we'll hear a lot more about Sony censorship if it affects a western release.

The first game that really bothered me with censorship in recent times was Fatal Frame Maiden of Black Water. Nintendo replaced the sexy outfits, which did have some story relevance. I remember questioning it because some place, I can't recall which site, it might have been Kotaku, claimed the Japanese were angry and rejecting the game for being "too sexualized". That was one of the points when I realized the gaming press could lie to me, lol. I don't believe many Japanese players were upset by sexy outfits in Fatal Frame. ^^
 
The intro to Resident Evil was censored quite heavily here in the EU. I don´t know about the US though but I think it got off the hook as well as the JP-version. Either way, the intro was pretty graphic for its time with the FMV-scene blowing up with the Playstation. I was so angry when I later learned that much of it was cut in the PAL-region.
To be fair, that was also due to image concerns in Europe. It seems that around the same period, there were some murder cases in the UK that meant undead children in Silent Hill had to go, making the US version the most complete released version (it still had more gory/creepy alternate designs for the hospital area that were cut before release, there's a mod to restore that beta content somewhere).

There a modded uncut English version of Tokyo Mirage Sessions. Has to be run on a modded Wii U, though I think it'll run on Cemu now.
It doesn't seem the DLC is translated either. Sure enough that retranslation begun as a legitimate translation of the Japanese version's text then they found it easier to port to the English version and fix all kinds of cut content, but they never fixed the dummied DLC hooks in particular.
Man, were the Fire Emblem localizations a shitshow. For Fates, they didn't even bother localizing all of the story DLC content, which actually makes the fan retranslation the superior version since it covered those and DLC isn't region cross-compatible.

Excellent write-up! I guess we will have some crazy times ahead if journalists can get a platform holder to ban games by complaining about them. I think we'll hear a lot more about Sony censorship if it affects a western release.

The first game that really bothered me with censorship in recent times was Fatal Frame Maiden of Black Water. Nintendo replaced the sexy outfits, which did have some story relevance. I remember questioning it because some place, I can't recall which site, it might have been Kotaku, claimed the Japanese were angry and rejecting the game for being "too sexualized". That was one of the points when I realized the gaming press could lie to me, lol. I don't believe many Japanese players were upset by sexy outfits in Fatal Frame. ^^

Thanks for the interest! I stitched together some information I had laying around across the years, since there's no real place to discuss them.
Other mainstream wikias will never allow anything mentioning those policies in negative light unless they align with some politics (or use terms like "culturally adjusted" "enhanced" "improved" "localized" and include a justification for the practice and why it's right), that's a fact.
To be honest, I also care more about the textual and story changes than nudity, and feel that discussion gets overshadowed even the rare times it happens.

Kotaku is the website that imports fanservice games that are never meant to come out of Japan and complain about them, in case any Western publisher dares thinking about them. It attacks fan translation groups as well and loves to assume sinister political associations for anyone who won't give them an interview (more self-inflicted sabotage)...

I always die a bit inside when they run an interview with some of those excited well-meaning fans, that Kotaku always makes sure to mention real names, ages, gender, employment, location, website and then "we reached to Nintendo/Square for comment" to seal the deal and ensure the company has no legal escape and HAS to press charges... then when called out, they say the fan artist SHOULD BE GRATEFUL TO THEM FOR THE EXPOSURE and that he was on borrowed time anyways. And did you check their post-mortem about the Final Fantasy Type-0 project? Shit was a real full-blown character assassination. "Why you shouldn't have sympathy for this modder being sued".
But then, that's to be expected when you see what they tried to do with legitimate developers (George Kamitani from Vanillaware, whom they insulted over character designs and accused him of sexism, then when he defended himself with male fanservice examples they doubled-down and accused him of implying the writer is gay thus homophobia... what about Patrice Desilet one of their writers wrote about his experience stalking her in E3 corridors and smelling her perfume?)

Misinformation from them is the least of your worries.

And yes, game journalists now do indeed try to explicitly get games banned. Some very recent examples:
  • Leisure Suit Larry vs Eurogamer: The announcement coverage. "We gave the last game a 2/10 review but it doesn't seem they got the message. LSL has no place in this day and age."
  • Super Seducer vs Polygon: After the game was banned from PS4, Polygon actually went to Steam and asked them why do they endorse the messages in the game (game actually discourages any aggressive dating moves) and why is it still on the store. Since that's the only place left for the small developer to publish the game, we assume they wanted both the game and developer to disappear entirely right that instant.
  • Giant Bomb vs DOAX3: "As long as an English version of this filth exists at all, I will make sure to import it and mock its existence."
  • Polygon vs Berserk: The Casca costume was a pre-order bonus already announced for the West, but was cancelled after game journalists asked for its disappearance.
  • Kingdom Come Deliverance: Tried to get the head developer fired, to get the publisher to drop them, then to deny them coverage or give it as much negative coverage as possible talk about a massive unplayable bugfest (that claim was very exagerated, and that's an understatement)
 
Last edited:

petran79

Banned
Since you mention Sega, there was an exclusive JP Saturn port of Phantasmagoria (Phantasm in JP), dubbed to Japanese. Largest game in the console with 8 cds. Dos version had 7.
it is a mystery why it was not released in the US. Still it had the edited parts of the Dos version with filter on.
Games and movies should be like books, without ratings.
 

Paracelsus

Member
A last gen example: Ninja Gaiden Sigma 2 replacing the [enemy] blood splatter from the original Xbox 360 game with a purple mist.

But the blood splatter returned in the PS Vita version of Sigma 2.

To be fair, this was a convenient excuse because the PS3 hardware sucked balls, so they couldn't render polygons (limbs are offensive!) and alpha effects (blood splatter all over the place). They made the best with what little they had. Sigma 2 plus runs at sub 30fps with very harsh drops, that's the kicker.
 
And yes, game journalists now do indeed try to explicitly get games banned. Some very recent examples:
  • Leisure Suit Larry vs Eurogamer: The announcement coverage. "We gave the last game a 2/10 review but it doesn't seem they got the message. LSL has no place in this day and age."

Eurogamer started much much earlier

This is from their review of Neptunia in 2011

The wearying effect of the witless writing is exacerbated by the plain sexism on show in almost every one of the garrulous cut-scenes. The camera lingers longingly over stills of each girl's crotch (and, as the cast of Hyperdimension Neptunia is exclusively female, that's a lot of crotch), while characters make lewd comments with all the awkwardness of a children's TV presenter telling a dirty joke.

...

In one of the earliest acts of the game, your character arrives at a busty barely-legal nurse's home only to have her scratched, suddenly-naked body bandaged to a soundtrack of squeals of delight.

Some will claim the game is playing on established anime conventions. True. It's playing on conventions of plain old ugly Japanese sexism, and while the Carry On tone ensures the game stops short of titillation, the innuendo leaves a bad taste in the mouth. Not because its innuendo - we love a bit of innuendo, especially in your mum's pretty mouth - but because it's dull and stupid and essentially based around girls made to look and sound like schoolchildren.

....

Even the most ardent JRPG fan will baulk at the roughshod simplicity of the game's systems, restricting the game's audience to Japanophile anime fans who can overlook the experiences shortcomings as a videogame and approach it as a cultural curio. That is, a sexist, senseless and ultimately stupid cultural curio.

https://www.eurogamer.net/articles/2011-03-08-hyperdimension-neptunia-review?page=2
 

CatCouch

Member
I always die a bit inside when they run an interview with some of those excited well-meaning fans, that Kotaku always makes sure to mention real names, ages, gender, employment, location, website and then "we reached to Nintendo/Square for comment" to seal the deal and ensure the company has no legal escape and HAS to press charges... then when called out, they say the fan artist SHOULD BE GRATEFUL TO THEM FOR THE EXPOSURE and that he was on borrowed time anyways. And did you check their post-mortem about the Final Fantasy Type-0 project? Shit was a real full-blown character assassination. "Why you shouldn't have sympathy for this modder being sued".
But then, that's to be expected when you see what they tried to do with legitimate developers (George Kamitani from Vanillaware, whom they insulted over character designs and accused him of sexism, then when he defended himself with male fanservice examples they doubled-down and accused him of implying the writer is gay thus homophobia... what about Patrice Desilet one of their writers wrote about his experience stalking her in E3 corridors and smelling her perfume?)
This makes me wonder if Nintendo of America issuing DMCA's to adult fan artists on Tumblr was due to Kotaku. I remember Kotaku writing an article about the porn art around Overwatch while nudging Blizzard to do something about it. Luckily, they didn't but I first heard about artists getting DMCA notices from Nintendo around that time, summer 2016. Most wrote it off as a troll doing it. Then in October '16 I got hit and had two pieces of fan art removed from Tumblr. I wrote about it on my Deviant art here.

I received this in an email:

"Hi,

We've received a notification of alleged copyright infringement on one of your blogs. Here are the details of the content in question:

Copyright holder: Nintendo of America In
"Description: We are contacting you because Nintendo's Characters on the profile are being used in a way harmful to the brand and without Nintendo’s consent. The use of Nintendo’s trademark and Characters may confuse consumers into thinking the content is sponsored or endorsed by Nintendo. The profiles offensive content may further lead consumers to have a negative or weak opinion of Nintendo and the Mark and Characters.

The content has since been removed, in accordance with US law and Tumblr's own copyright policies. "


I assume it's connected to the constant hostility around anything sexy and Nintendo being in full censorship mode at the time. Sounds to me like Sony is doing something similar now. Pretty scary.
 
Another one, from an excellent article by Nichegamer
https://nichegamer.com/2018/10/27/n...ese-developers-to-censor-themselves-in-japan/

Silverio Trinity (visual novel by developer light), planned for a December 2018 Japan-only release on PS4, is denied release by Sony.
The game is complete. The ban is over sexual themes.
They are considering a Steam release (which is possible since Polygon's request for curation to be brought back wasn't heard by Valve) just to be able to serve their home market.

Furthermore, Sony recently started to DEMAND all application forms must now be submitted exclusively in English. (EDIT: DURING WORKING CALIFORNIA, US HOURS. For reference: 12:00 PM Saturday, in Pacific Time is 4:00 AM Sunday, in Tokyo, Japan)
Japanese developers were used to filling them in Japanese, and don't have staff fluent enough in the language.
This should make it very clear beyond any reasonable doubt who is behind this policy change and why.

#buildingthelist
 
Last edited:
The suggestion that Sony has become more censorship-happy because of the politics of the state where the Playstation HQ is located has become more and more robust.

Meanwhile, my view of Sony has gotten substantially worse in only a matter of a few weeks.
 

DunDunDunpachi

Patient MembeR
The suggestion that Sony has become more censorship-happy because of the politics of the state where the Playstation HQ is located has become more and more robust.

Meanwhile, my view of Sony has gotten substantially worse in only a matter of a few weeks.
Same here. Sony was the champion of indies at the onset of this generation. What the heck happened? I'm honestly confused.

They were the first to pick up certain controversial indie games like Hotline Miami 1 and 2. The Playstation brand became the new home for the Senran Kagura series including an exclusive spin-off (below).

5fUqcNt.gif


There just doesn't seem to be any rhyme or reason. Are they imposing similar restrictions on Western devs?
 

kunonabi

Member
Same here. Sony was the champion of indies at the onset of this generation. What the heck happened? I'm honestly confused.

They were the first to pick up certain controversial indie games like Hotline Miami 1 and 2. The Playstation brand became the new home for the Senran Kagura series including an exclusive spin-off (below).

5fUqcNt.gif


There just doesn't seem to be any rhyme or reason. Are they imposing similar restrictions on Western devs?

Super seducer got banned so probably as long as they're smaller publishers. Sony isnt going to pull this shit with the Ubisofts or EAs of the world if they ever decided to get a bit cheeky.
This English requirement during CA business hours is completely unacceptable to see a company like Sony pull. It's a calculated, vindictive measure to be sure.
 

Hudo

Member
Same here. Sony was the champion of indies at the onset of this generation. What the heck happened? I'm honestly confused.

They were the first to pick up certain controversial indie games like Hotline Miami 1 and 2. The Playstation brand became the new home for the Senran Kagura series including an exclusive spin-off (below).

5fUqcNt.gif


There just doesn't seem to be any rhyme or reason. Are they imposing similar restrictions on Western devs?
Basically, Sony used indies to fill in for the first 2 years after the PS4's launch because there were no games ready (I think there were even third parties outright admitting that they were hesitant, because they didn't know how the new gen would play out). Then, after Sony got their pipeline in order, they dropped indies fairly harshly, IMHO.

Not sure why Sony management didn't just say "why can't we have both?" and continued support for indies and being "AAA" friendly. I know one German indie dev and last time they spoke to me, they were saying that Nintendo are the easiest to deal with nowadays (But Microsoft still appear to have a better toolchain, if you like their ecosystem).
 

DunDunDunpachi

Patient MembeR
Basically, Sony used indies to fill in for the first 2 years after the PS4's launch because there were no games ready (I think there were even third parties outright admitting that they were hesitant, because they didn't know how the new gen would play out). Then, after Sony got their pipeline in order, they dropped indies fairly harshly, IMHO.

Not sure why Sony management didn't just say "why can't we have both?" and continued support for indies and being "AAA" friendly. I know one German indie dev and last time they spoke to me, they were saying that Nintendo are the easiest to deal with nowadays (But Microsoft still appear to have a better toolchain, if you like their ecosystem).
It's very shortsighted on their part. Indies require so little investment yet many of our breakout hits from the last decade have been indies.
 
Super seducer got banned so probably as long as they're smaller publishers. Sony isnt going to pull this shit with the Ubisofts or EAs of the world if they ever decided to get a bit cheeky.
This English requirement during CA business hours is completely unacceptable to see a company like Sony pull. It's a calculated, vindictive measure to be sure.
In SJW terms, you may call this measure colonialist or imperialist :messenger_winking:
 

Zambatoh

Member
Is Sony even still a Japanese company at this point? It seems to me they've been heavily Americanized in recent years.
 

CatCouch

Member
Super seducer got banned so probably as long as they're smaller publishers. Sony isnt going to pull this shit with the Ubisofts or EAs of the world if they ever decided to get a bit cheeky.
This English requirement during CA business hours is completely unacceptable to see a company like Sony pull. It's a calculated, vindictive measure to be sure.
This just seems malicious. No way this doesn't backfire and blow up in their faces~
 

Mattyp

Gold Member
Just wanted to say amazing write up, best I've seen to date about the issue. Will comment when I have more time on the issues on a whole.
 
There's the bizarre case of Warriors Orochi 4 that has non-working bust jiggle physics for ALL released versions, except the Switch version. Some damage control effort is put, as those physics only work at 30 FPS, the speed at which the Switch version runs natively and work only on the PC version if it's modded to work at 30 FPS, but the fact remains that the game shipped with the 60 FPS no physics mode with no option to change it, on the PS4, and I have a hunch any bugfix for that won't be approved any time soon by Sony.

Are they imposing similar restrictions on Western devs?
Sugar Daddy just got promoted by their official channels recently, which implies an approval. So much for no double standards for "no sexual themes" or "no touching" policy.

Leaving game approvals to a service not fluent in Japanese (or remotely interested) that has in the past enforced a blanket ban on visual novels that were not considered "real games", until their success on the Nintendo DS, sounds like a genius idea to help their situation in Japan.
There were some signs that went ignored of this shift. Notice how Sony completely abandoned first-party JRPG development?

  • Last high-profile game was White Knight Chronicles, Level-5 has since said Sony is why there's no Dark Cloud 3 yet
  • Sony made a bunch of JRPGs for the PSP and Vita and they went either unlocalized or had a sabotaged release (Oreshika 2)
  • When their Popolocrois and Wild Arms series made a comeback, it was on mobile (not as gasha spinoffs but full featured games) instead of the Vita or PS4. One game was even 3DS exclusive (the Popolocrois x Story of Seasons crossover).
Sony was the champion of indies at the onset of this generation. What the heck happened? I'm honestly confused.
They no longer needed them and their PR push. So they cast them aside.

In contrast, Nintendo's treatment of indies was somewhat consistent across the 3DS, Wii U and Switch console life cycles, and they even gave some long-time partners marketing pushes (in Smash Bros) or privileged early access to their software development kits. They seem to have learned from their mistakes in the N64 (cost them most JP partners) and GameCube (cost them most US partners) period and reached some equilibrum.

Sony became a western company a while ago, without reforming their shittier practices and structures on the US side, the same structures that discouraged niche Japanese games exported to the US, and their policies crept more and more to the Japanese side ("doesn't use the hardware good enough" was a SCEA policy for PS1 and PS2 that was then used against vertical shump developers for PS3), but to see them directly overseeing the process is unreal and delicious.
Is this a self-fulfilling prophecy that the PS4 lost in Japan and they don't even care anymore? In the end they are harming the very real third party exclusive support they still get. I hope they do their worst, since it seems to help Steam and Switch success over there and might throw into motion a real comeback of PC development in Japan.
 
Same here. Sony was the champion of indies at the onset of this generation. What the heck happened? I'm honestly confused.

They were the first to pick up certain controversial indie games like Hotline Miami 1 and 2. The Playstation brand became the new home for the Senran Kagura series including an exclusive spin-off (below).

5fUqcNt.gif


There just doesn't seem to be any rhyme or reason. Are they imposing similar restrictions on Western devs?

I doubt it will because Western developers can basically get away with whatever they want. I feel that as long as Western games continue to dominate the world, that is where Sony and others will put most of their focus on which means being more lenient and receptive to them.
 
Last edited:

Iaterain

Member
The petition against censorship received only 2900 votes. The controversial games never sells well either.
I'm sorry people, but you are the vocal minority. This war is already lost and you are tilting at windmills.

I was watching the screenshots that our fellows provided and honestly, I don't think that it is that bad. It is more like a micro-censorship, than a real one.
My advice is to try to accept the "censored" versions of these and stop acting like the "experience" is totally ruined.
 
It is more like a micro-censorship, than a real one.
What's so micro and imaginary about at least two forcibly cancelled games with no alternate release out?

And it does affect games like Yakuza 3, Persona 5, and Final Fantasy 7 (from Nomura and Uematsu's remarks)... in increasingly obvious ways with each passing day, every game developed in Japan, period. You can accept those cut-down versions, or entirely cancelled games there's only trailers left of, if you want, but you can't demand apathy from others. As for the consequences of this, time will tell.
 
Last edited:
The petition against censorship received only 2900 votes. The controversial games never sells well either.
I'm sorry people, but you are the vocal minority. This war is already lost and you are tilting at windmills.

I was watching the screenshots that our fellows provided and honestly, I don't think that it is that bad. It is more like a micro-censorship, than a real one.
My advice is to try to accept the "censored" versions of these and stop acting like the "experience" is totally ruined.
"This is more like a micro-censorship"
" 'Actual' censorship is worse"
"Therefore, micro-censorship is okay"

Ladies and gentlemen, I present to you the Relative Privation fallacy.
 
"This is more like a micro-censorship"
" 'Actual' censorship is worse"
"Therefore, micro-censorship is okay"

Ladies and gentlemen, I present to you the Relative Privation fallacy.
That's a nice website, everything on the subject I ever read pales compared to that (let's not mention wikipedia since it seems some editors there like some fallacies so much they can't stand them treated as anything less than a legitimate discussion tactic), so thank you a lot for sharing it, and whoever put it together.
 
extreme violence wont ever be censored but sexuality will. the weird puritanical like hypocrisy just keeps on going. as people and companies try to be more progressive the farther way from it they actually get.

people want to express their bodies and show how they are beautiful but only at the cost of if someone has a better body than you.
 
Last edited:
This is new for me. What was censored from that?
A bunch of lines the anime adaptation actually used, that were recorded and written in Japanese then English, then most of it cut or replaced with euphemisms.
It was from Makoto's arc whenever she explicitly mentioned how exactly is Kaneshiro making money off girls, or when he first met her and talked about his plans for her. The party's encounter with him was much shorter than what's in the files.
That would not be new for Sony. They already had Falcom cut the Star Door 15 cutscene entirely from the Japanese PSP version of Trails in the Sky 3rd, and then the licensed PS Vita "remaster" (that still has the scene's images, but unused, and the publisher said they "had to publish the cutscene's text as a book instead). For comparison, not even the Chinese publisher for the PC version cut that (instead edited the dialogue a bit).

Making the fifth SMT mainline game Switch-exclusive might have been the right choice.
 
Last edited:

Senhua

Member
A bunch of lines the anime adaptation actually used, that were recorded and written in Japanese then English, then most of it cut or replaced with euphemisms.
It was from Makoto's arc whenever she explicitly mentioned how exactly is Kaneshiro making money off girls, or when he first met her and talked about his plans for her. The party's encounter with him was much shorter than what's in the files.
That would not be new for Sony. They already had Falcom cut the Star Door 15 cutscene entirely from the Japanese PSP version of Trails in the Sky 3rd, and then the licensed PS Vita "remaster" (that still has the scene's images, but unused, and the publisher said they "had to publish the cutscene's text as a book instead). For comparison, not even the Chinese publisher for the PC version cut that (instead edited the dialogue a bit).

Making the fifth SMT mainline game Switch-exclusive might have been the right choice.
Ah i see thanks, if in the past only the localized version changed but now they want to change from the origins. Isn't this some culture imperialism?
 
Top Bottom