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Least favorite regional censorship?

What? That's like the best censorship.



Was amazing. It's actually more funny than the content it censored (which wasn't funny).

Why was it censored in the EU/Australia? Someone could easily import a US copy and see it all no problem. Also, it tells you what happened. How is that okay but showing it wasn't?
 
For me my least favorite regional censorhip is when they changed the girls into guys in Final Fight.

That's exactly what I thought when I read the thread title.

Also, when you smash up the car, after beating Katana (as we can't have him called Sodom in the West), the cry of "Oh, my car!" is incredible lame. Was "Oh, my God!" really so unacceptable even back then?
 
What bothers me about censorship most of all is how heavy handed it tends to be. Things that are censored are necessarily delicate, nuanced issues that differ from country to country. Sometimes censorship is the means to enable sales in some countries. That's just the way it is. But more often than not it seems like fear and haste get the better of localization teams and the game suffers. Delicate issues require a delicate touch. The gambling example in Pokemon is a perfect example of this.
 
#FE definitely had some of the most bizarre censorship I've seen since the 90's-00's.

8DYb8s2.jpg
 
I still haven't pulled the trigger on TMS. Just sitting on my 'save for later' list on Amazon. There are so many other games to play, a bunch of stuff will have to align before it floats to the top.
 
For me, it's almost always been a "it is what it is" thing, so nothing really pops to mind.

Hopefully, considering how TMS bombed in the West despite these changes, they'll realize that they don't actually bring more people in (depending on the context of the game of course). Shame TMS had to be sacrificed for it though, but hey, there is the uncut version that's pretty easy to get a hold of and play.

Well, let's be fair here: it bombed in Japan, too. The changes were unfortunate but I don't think Nintendo knew what they were doing with the game in general.
 
I still haven't pulled the trigger on TMS. Just sitting on my 'save for later' list on Amazon. There are so many other games to play, a bunch of stuff will have to align before it floats to the top.
You should. The censorship is bad but the game is still a great one.
Most of the time, it is stupid censorship but it is not bad. I found only the wedding dress to be awful.
 
You should. The censorship is bad but the game is still a great one.
Most of the time, it is stupid censorship but it is not bad. I found only the wedding dress to be awful.

the wedding dress is only thing that stands out, everything else you wouldnt really notice it was changed
 
I didn't remember or give a shit about the "censorship" in TMS despite looking it up before I played. Completely forgot about it when I started that wonderful game.
 
I know this will probably sound extremely silly and First World-ish (and I'm unsure if this counts or not), but...

My personal vote goes to the slot machine situation in the Pokémon games starting from Platinum. From my understanding, some countries in Europe passed an act that deemed it illegal to for games marketed to kids to feature gambling of any sort. When Platinum hit Europe, the slots were literally ripped out of the game (or I think just made unaccessible?), and instead, the game corners just randomly gives out coins.

But wait, I live in America, how does that effect me? Because for HeartGold/SoulSilver, to make it easier for translation purposes, all regions with an English language option (including both America and Europe) had the slot machines completely missing and instead removed with the annoying and boring Voltorb Flip game. And for all generations and remakes after that? Well, since we all essentially get the same version now, just with language options in the beginning, no more game corners ever again.

Voltorb Flips existence made HGSS my favorite form of regional censorship actually. I hate slot machine type games in RPGs because I don't feel in control and so I almost never mess with them (the only times I ever use the Dragon Quest casinos is for monster fight bets and Treasures and Trapdoors/Pachisi if that game is around). Voltorb Flip was a very fun logic puzzle game with a bit of luck pressing if you're stuck/get further along and I adored it. It was the first time I ever stopped to grind enough coins to get a high coin prize (Dratini) as soon as I reached the game corner area. The fact that I was doing a Nuzlocke and needed a good pokemon from Goldenrod City did help alot though.

I'll give you the fact that it means no more Game Corners though. I'd love to flip more Voltorbs.
 
When australia never received Mortal Kombat, GTA and pretty much every mature rated game for a good time.

When brazilian politicians banned San Andreas and Carmageddon from being sold.

THAT is some true censorship

For me my least favorite regional censorhip is when they changed the girls into guys in Final Fight. Storyline wise they could have just ignored the censorship instead of making Poison transgender to unite both regions storylines.

Poison was trans since the first artwork before the japanese game was even released. You can read a derrogatory term to mention trans people on her artwork in the Capcom Classics Collection extra material
 
I still haven't pulled the trigger on TMS. Just sitting on my 'save for later' list on Amazon. There are so many other games to play, a bunch of stuff will have to align before it floats to the top.

It's pretty easy to uncensor, fortunately. You don't even need to mod your Wii U or anything.
 
For me my least favorite regional censorhip is when they changed the girls into guys in Final Fight. Storyline wise they could have just ignored the censorship instead of making Poison transgender to unite both regions storylines.
That was a funny after-effect.


Also, one of the worst offenders I had ever seen was KLab's idiotic English localization for Love Live! School Idol Festival. And no, I'm not talking about Nozomi's "washi-washi" turning into tickle attacks.

No, they removed the LGBT/Yuri undertones for the characters relationships.

For anyone familiar with the franchise, you should know Love Live is especially popular for the amount of material and subtext that allows fans to (relation)ship their favorite potential female couples(or OT3+). KLab instead tried to poorly cover it up with shit like this:

This is awful censorship on so many levels. 😡It misses the point of the source material, hurts the creators' original "artistic" intentions, disregards and insults their biggest demographic, and it's just plain homophobic.

Luckily, they were smart enough to restore all of the undertones.


Also, when you smash up the car, after beating Katana (as we can't have him called Sodom in the West), the cry of "Oh, my car!" is incredible lame. Was "Oh, my God!" really so unacceptable even back then?
Oh yeah. There was a lot more Christian fundamentalism from the 80's onward. Remember, there were still groups who tried to ban Pokemon and Harry Potter for alleged Satanic themes. It had only begun to die down after the late-2000's.
 
Killer7's Samantha raping wheelchair Harman scene edited to Samantha dancing to disco music alone
Not that the original scene added anything to the story but the edit was so awkward you'd know something was censored right away
What version was this?
 
Hopefully, considering how TMS bombed in the West despite these changes, they'll realize that they don't actually bring more people in (depending on the context of the game of course).
But then other "tampered" games like FE: Awakening, FE: Fates, the Bravely series, Xenoblade X, Yo-kai Watch, Animal Crossing, etc... sold really well.
 
That happens much later in the game, I think.

I don't think what Gemeanie says is exactly correct, but I think it is the case that at least some versions of Killer7 censor that scene (by skipping the first few seconds). I feel like it was either the PS2 version or European version.
 
That happens much later in the game, I think.

I don't think what Gemeanie says is exactly correct, but I think it is the case that at least some versions of Killer7 censor that scene (by skipping the first few seconds). I feel like it was either the PS2 version or European version.

My bad. Can't remember which chapter it was but the censor only happened in PS2 Japanese version. US version was uncensored.
 
Later versions of Ocarina of Time making Ganondorf puke green blood always kinda bugged me.

I didn't remember or give a shit about the "censorship" in TMS despite looking it up before I played. Completely forgot about it when I started that wonderful game.

Yeah, honestly people mention a lot that the changes are so minor they wonder why Nintendo even bothered, but on the flipside for me, they're all so minor that I really don't care or consider it a big deal at all. Didn't detract from the overall game at all.
 
Later versions of Ocarina of Time making Ganondorf puke green blood always kinda bugged me.



Yeah, honestly people mention a lot that the changes are so minor they wonder why Nintendo even bothered, but on the flipside for me, they're all so minor that I really don't care or consider it a big deal at all. Didn't detract from the overall game at all.

Chapter 2 was the biggest offender. Everything else was fine by me, even though the wedding dress looks a bit odd.
 
Chapter 2 was the biggest offender. Everything else was fine by me, even though the wedding dress looks a bit odd.

Chapter 2 was the photographer one, right? They changed the bikini pics to just generic model girls? See that was funny because it conveyed what I assume would've been the same overall intent, just a bit less in your face. And those pics were all over the dungeon so I can understand why the original might've been overwhelming in less a "man, this villain is creepy" and more "man, playing through this makes me feel dirty" way.

I did remember just now that they changed Tsubasa's fight costume from a bikini to a skater-looking outfit. That was pretty drastic I guess, yeah. I didn't mind it though.
 
I know this will probably sound extremely silly and First World-ish (and I'm unsure if this counts or not), but...

My personal vote goes to the slot machine situation in the Pokémon games starting from Platinum. From my understanding, some countries in Europe passed an act that deemed it illegal to for games marketed to kids to feature gambling of any sort. When Platinum hit Europe, the slots were literally ripped out of the game (or I think just made unaccessible?), and instead, the game corners just randomly gives out coins.

But wait, I live in America, how does that effect me? Because for HeartGold/SoulSilver, to make it easier for translation purposes, all regions with an English language option (including both America and Europe) had the slot machines completely missing and instead removed with the annoying and boring Voltorb Flip game. And for all generations and remakes after that? Well, since we all essentially get the same version now, just with language options in the beginning, no more game corners ever again.
Was not expecting some one to start trash talking The BEST Pokemon mini game in existence when I clicked on this thread. Voltorb Filp is god tier. It removes almost all the luck from the game corner, which is the best change ever.
I hate slots in games so much.
 
In the original German black & white version of Link's Awakening, the fisherman under the bridge catches a bikini for the mermaid. For whatever reason, it was changed into a necklace for the colour version.

192169-265403-zelda4JPG-620x.jpg


The hippo in the animal village was also changed. Oh, and the trees in the intro were changed.

LOZLA-IntroBackgroundJPN.png

Intro-09-Large.png
 
In the original German black & white version of Link's Awakening, the fisherman under the bridge catches a bikini for the mermaid. For whatever reason, it was changed into a necklace for the colour version.

huh , in both versions in north america it was changed to a necklace,
 
In the original German black & white version of Link's Awakening, the fisherman under the bridge catches a bikini for the mermaid. For whatever reason, it was changed into a necklace for the colour version.

192169-265403-zelda4JPG-620x.jpg


The hippo in the animal village was also changed. Oh, and the trees in the intro were changed.

LOZLA-IntroBackgroundJPN.png

Intro-09-Large.png

Guess Nintendo catched on.
tumblr_m6hxx66m3U1rw70wfo1_500.png
 
Middle East version of Rise of the Tomb Raider censored word prophet in vioce acting completely and changed the text to leader
 

This is honestly the worst I can think of as well, especially considering Xenosaga 1 had a significant amount of blood in it and it got away with a T rating. I wouldn't really question the change as much if it were just because they didn't want blood on a child (but then why have the scene in the first place?), but then there's
Jin's death scene, the hospital right before that scene with young Shion, the Durandal occupation and Febronia's death scene
, none of which involve children.

Only thing I can really think of is that they wanted to bring the game out in Europe and there was a country that was against giving it a lower rating with all the blood so they edited it out, but they decided against releasing it there and just said screw it, they already put in the work to edit it once and didn't want to go back and edit it back in. I mean surely the intention was there to bring out 3 in Europe at some point, considering they got 2 and got a disc with all the cutscenes from 1 on it.
 
Heh - thought someone might bring this up.

I have a morbid curiosity about how they'll go about it (provided sales of 2 are good enough for them to do so). There's culture shock elements to the narrative and when American characters speak to Keita, they do so in English and he (and by extension some Japanese players) can't understand what they're saying.
Actually this only happens for the first guy you meet. Keita befriends Peraperalion (a pun on Merameraion, called "Blazion" in the west) which lets him understand and speak English fluently. I'm still curious how they'll address this in the US version if it gets localised.
 
Violence and sex being edited out never bother me in the slightest... unless it interferes with the experience in a way that confuses the player or dilutes the story. Xenosaga III is the perfect example of censorship that actively detracts from the experience. Otherwise, I couldn't care less how many V shapes get removed from people's waists or whatever.
 
Only these two modes were cut out, the normal game wasn't censored.
The German PS2 version of the game was uncensored and still had Assigment Ada, Mercenaries and the other mode were removed though for whatever wierd reason.

Still blasted off heads with Ada happily as a teenager in Krautland.


Nazism censorship (and violence censorship up to a few years ago) in Germany is pretty hilarious though, as games are legally classified as "toys" instead of "art". But the law is pretty nuts in general, for example the German version of the manga Hellsing is not only 18+ only with quite a few volumes (extremely rare for non-porn comics) but also had all the Swatsikas and SS symbols removed (except the odd small one they forgot, funnily enough). Meanwhile the even more brutal Anime version Hellsing Ultimate was "art" and thus exempted from all censorship. Same with the first Hellboy movie, 12+ rating and Swatsikas all over the place.
The most offensive example for videogames has to be the German version of The Stick of Truth (with a black bar literally covering all of the Nazi enemies almost completely).
 
For anyone familiar with the franchise, you should know Love Live is especially popular for the amount of material and subtext that allows fans to (relation)ship their favorite potential female couples(or OT3+). KLab instead tried to poorly cover it up with shit like this:

This is awful censorship on so many levels. 😡It misses the point of the source material, hurts the creators' original "artistic" intentions, disregards and insults their biggest demographic, and it's just plain homophobic.

Luckily, they were smart enough to restore all of the undertones.

I'm not one to defend KLab, but there's honestly no evidence they were going out their way to remove all signs of LGBT considering the main character that you play as is a female (you go to an all girls school) and literally every single female in the game is hitting on you.

The real truth is KLab is an incompetent company and the EN release is filled with typos, grammar mistakes and even formatting mistakes (text going outside of text bubbles). It's far more likely they just translated it badly.

To imply they censored the game is to imply they can do anything with purpose.
 
I also think TMS had some really wierd and random choices.

Some I understood, but the wedding dress looks absolutely ridiculous in the western version. And it's crazy because Tsubasa's standard outfit is way more revealing than the non-edited wedding dress. What the hell?

Also the removal of the sexy outfit of Miu in Project Zero is stupid because the outfit was relevant for her story.
 
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