Video games in Germany have always had to censor Nazi imagery, because to display that content would violate the country’s constitution. Now, after pressure from the German Games Industry Association, the government has relaxed its interpretation of some laws and will allow it in certain circumstances.
In a striking departure from history, Assassin’s Creed: Origins’ Discovery Tour mode replaces any nipples or genitalia with sea shells. There was no nudity in Ancient Egypt, it appears.
As expected, Wolfenstein 2: The New Colossus was modified for the German market, with edits including the time-honored tradition of removing Hitler’s moustache. To counter this, a team have created their own low-budget version of the game called Wolfenstache.
Games are censored in Germany all the time, and Wolfenstein 2: The New Colossus is no different. Here’s one of the ways the game is different to the one we’re playing in America.
Copyright, free speech, and entertainment lawyers have mixed opinions on the legality of game developer Campo Santo’s decision to fight hate speech with a copyright strike after reaching a breaking point with YouTube celebrity Felix “Pewdiepie” Kjellberg.
A fighting game about world religions on Steam is causing trouble in Malaysia. PQube Games, publisher of the recently released PC game Fight Of Gods, says that the Malaysian government is taking steps to ban the game including blocking access to Steam within the country.
In the heated ongoing conversation over “censorship” in localization, we’ve heard a whole lot from fans and even translators, but we haven’t seen much discussion from Japanese developers. Which is why, when speaking to Tetsuya Takahashi this week in Los Angeles, I asked him for his thoughts on the matter. His answers…
The studio behind the massively successful game World of Tanks walked back their controversial actions against one of their former community YouTubers today.
A prominent World of Tanks YouTuber who is a member of a promotional program for the game had to remove a critical video after developer Wargaming threatened a copyright strike against it.
The Half-Life that was released in Germany in 1998 was a little different. Instead of marines there were robots, and instead of dying horribly the scientists would just kind of sit down and be sad. Well chin up lads, in 2017 Germany’s Half-Life is now as human and violent as everyone else’s.
Yesterday, a localizer for the publisher XSEED took a dramatic stance on what he saw as potential censorship, asking his company to remove his name from the credits of the upcoming JRPG Akiba’s Beat after the developers removed a controversial phrase involving the KKK from the game.
One of the most striking things about Resident Evil 7 is just how gore filled it is. It’s packed with chopped off limbs and sickening body horror. But it seems that the experience is a tamer in Japan.
As of today, July 1, all mobile games must be pre-approved by the Chinese government at least 20 days before they’re released. It’s part of sweeping new regulations to curb when, what, and how media is distributed in China.
As of this morning, the website Twitch has banned 32 games from appearing on its streaming services. But just what kind of games are they? Let’s take a look.
The twisting controversies about the translation of Nintendo games, harassment, and the firing of one of its employees got even messier this week.
Plenty of games have been touched up and altered as the years went on, but few games have seen as many changes as the original Resident Evil.
When Fire Emblem Fates was released for 3DS in Japan early last summer, it didn’t have a US release date. Within 24 hours, fans were hacking the game and translating it on their own. What started as an experiment became a race to translate the game before Nintendo of America.
The Cut Content Police is a Steam Group with one goal: to warn people about games that have been “in some way censored due to cut, edited, changed, [or] modified content.”
Yandere Simulator is the latest game to get banned from Twitch. If you stream Yandere Simulator, you could get banned, too. Thing is, the developer making the game doesn’t exactly know why Twitch made this call. He’s willing to change some things, if they’d consider lifting the ban, but Twitch isn’t talking to him.
