If you don’t play your cards right, lots of people can die in Until Dawn. One such gory finish has been censored in Japan. But rather than modify the game (or death) in any way, the screen just cuts to black while all the nastiness goes down.
Waring: Spoilers ahoy!
The YouTube channel Censored Gaming dug up this change, which includes a direct comparison between the altered version in Japan and the one most Until Dawn players will be familiar with.
Here’s how it plays out, starting with the American version:
(Thanks to ArcadeRoot for this clip.)
Nasty! So good.
And here’s what it it looks like in Japanese:
It actually cuts away twice. Once when Josh’s torso is severed and again when the camera briefly pans over to what the body looks like, as Ashley makes her escape.
It’s not as though Sony’s removed all the violence from the game, either—only select deaths. Take, for example, the first set of kills, when Josh’s sisters crack their skulls open.
This isn’t uncommon in Japan, though.
The decapitation scenes were removed from Resident Evil 4, Resistance: Fall of Man and Uncharted: Drake’s Fortune shipped without any blood, and Gears of War had had various scenes toned down. With Until Dawn, what’s interesting is how they changed the game.
You can reach the author of this post at patrick.klepek@kotaku.com or on Twitter at @patrickklepek.