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Different Country, Different Game Content
Thanks to EvilAvatar for finding a registration-not-required (via NPR) version of a LA Times article about changing game content for different cultures. As the article describes, "Red blood in a game sold in the United States turns green in Australia. A topless character in a European title acquires a bikini in the U.S. Human enemies in a U.S. game morph into robots in Germany. Violent sex scenes in a Japanese game disappear in the American version." There's also discussion of localizing for cultural reasons, citing Animal Crossing, which has added "..folding lawn chairs, inflatable wading pools, tiki torches and pink flamingos" for the US version.
I wonder how the Wolfenstein games were altered for Germany? Take away the nazis and the blood and you don't have much of a game
Totally Life!
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Americans are overly violent, while Europeans are oversexed. That's it; I'm moving to Europe!
The way the German command and conquer games work is kind of funny. It reminds me of the old super nintendo mortal Kombat game, where they took out the blood and people stayed away in droves, going for the Blood coded genesis version.
One of the amusing things to note is how much of an uproar American otaku will cause whenever anything at all is taken out of a Japanese game which makes it to the US. Mind you, a lot of these fanboys probably are looking for the prurient detail, but I can understand if it was a major plot point. I rather pity anime fans every time certain companies (read funimation) picks up an anime, because it ends up edited to the point where it's no longer recognizeable.
A question to all the other /.ers out there, have you ever played a game which was notably edited for American market? I think the most obvious example of this was Xenosaga, although Metal Gear Solid 2 after 9/11 also got a number of cinema scenes axed. (A rather unfortunate thing in my mind, while the game was ridiculous, it was very pretty.)
What's too bad about this is that, if I feel like playing a certain game, I can't go out and buy the unaltered version.
Used to be the case that I'd run to the store to pick up what's basically a license key, with fancy packaging and a CD-ROM included, then download an ISO and burn it from somewhere outside the country.
Now, some newer anti-piracy technology doesn't let me burn CDs, so in effect I have to wait for my game to arrive in the mail from some overseas distributor, at a substantial markup.
Terrible, terrible. Woe is me. Oh well, it's a nice day outside
Cole's Law: Thinly sliced cabbage
I'm missing something here...I understand all of the other corrolations, but why does red blood in America turn green in Australia? Have our neighbors down under become infested with Klingons?
--trb
Why sometimes things look "almost" right, but still really weird, when it comes to scenery and phrases used in some games that came over from Japan? I get a kick out of designers that grab some eccentric part of american "life" and assume that everyone uses it. Like pink flamingoes for example. They are funny, but I don't know a single person that actually owns one. There are other examples i'm sure...
Maybe it turns out the translations aren't actually bad at all... certain parts were just edited out for content! Turns out the Japanese enjoy censoring random verbs and nouns in order to protect our fragile North American minds.
-"One machine can do the work of fifty ordinary men. No machine can do the work of one extraordinary man." -EH
Back in the old days, Nintendo did something like this (not for any kind of censorship however).
After Super Mario Bros., Super Mario Bros 2 was released in Japan, with similar gameplay to SMB 1, only different levels (like a mod). The American Super Mario Bros. 2 was only a hacked version of some other Arabian game or something like that. That's why it's so different from SMB 1 & 3.
The American SMB 2 was released in Japan as Super Mario USA.
The Japananese SMB 2 was released in the US later, on the SNES Super Mario All-Stars cartridge as the Lost Levels.
Don't believe me? Google it.
Robert Bindler
A Computer Science student's views on technology.
Wolfenstein 3D and Kz-manager are NOT INDEXED!
,a non govermental institution, that tests games, and gives out age recommendations ranging from "educational/no age limit" to "not below 18".
read on...
The indexing practice here in germany actually is a bit more fine grained than they discribed in that article.
At first, there are two institutions. The USK (Unterhaltungssoftwareselbstkontrolle/Voluntary gamesself control) USK
The second institute is the "Bundesprüfstelle für jugendgefÃhrdende schriften/ federal control comission of Youth endangering media" or BPJS, the federal organ.
The functioning of these 2 institutions have been changed a bit recently. Before, the USK was allowed to test any game they saw fit, but was only able to issue recommendations, while the BPJS was able to index or ban games (more on that later), but was only allowed to test games when an official complaint has been filed with them.
The new law basically says, that every game, that is not tested and rated by the USK has to be treated like it has an USK18 (not below 18) tag.
The rest of the system still stands.
The BPJS need to get an complaint about the contents of a certain game (which requires that game to be sold in Germany first), then test it for some weeks (in which the game still is beeing sold) and then decides it the game is left alone as USK18, gets indexed, or gets "eingezogen".
To clear up the terms.
USK18 means, the game may not be sold to minors, but can be displayed and advertised.
Indexed means, it may not be shown in public or be advertised, but still can be sold to adults. (in effect, its even possible to display and offer the game, but only in the classical "smut corner" that is inacessible to minors, most stores shun that. Big retailers won't sell these games, gameshops usually have a small stack behind the counter where so you have to ask to get them.
Eingezogen is in effect banned.
Ownership in general is still allowed, but any form of distribution, even in private, is forbidden. This usually only applies to heavy Racial/Nazi content. (Mein kampf, Kzmanager and Wolfenstein3D all are Banned and NOT indexed).
Hope that clears it up.. i stopped counting just how often i wrote this in various threads on god-know-how-many newspages, since i yet have to come about one single american article about the german jugendschutz (youth protection) that atlest gets the basic facts right.