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Modern Warfare 2 Not Recalled In Russia After All

Posted by Soulskill on from the it's-the-thought-that-counts dept.

thief21 writes "After claims that console versions Modern Warfare 2 had been recalled in Russia due to complaints from politicians and the gaming public over the infamous airport slaughter scene, it turns out the stories were completely untrue. Activision never released a console version of the game in Russia." Instead, they simply edited the notorious scene out of the PC version. They did this of their own volition, since Russia doesn't have a formal ratings committee.

17 of 94 comments (clear)

  1. In Post-Soviet Russia... by papapurinii · · Score: 3, Funny

    ...free speech censors itself! Wait, that's not funny. That's horrible. Why would you censor yourself when you don't have to...?

    1. Re:In Post-Soviet Russia... by sopssa · · Score: 2, Funny

      Because Infinity Ward's nuclear bunker under their development studios didn't finish in time, and it would be pretty stupid to piss off a country with tons of nuclear weapons without one.

      Duh.

    2. Re:In Post-Soviet Russia... by santax · · Score: 2, Insightful

      Sometimes common sense wins over free speech. (although I didn't find that level shocking, but rather amusing. Then again, that should be enough for any sane person not to pick up a copy)

    3. Re:In Post-Soviet Russia... by JAlexoi · · Score: 3, Insightful

      A lot of people censor themselves. Even though there is no censorship authority, people like to look good in other people's eyes. And there is popular opinion, that is a lot like censorship.

    4. Re:In Post-Soviet Russia... by V!NCENT · · Score: 2, Interesting

      It's censorship. But what if a Russian game studio made a kickass game with a scene where the US is pure evil and bad and you take the role of a Russian person to kick the US governments ass?

      Well that would be a bit stupid to release it like that in the US. Allthough I do not think a lot of US citizens would mind kicking the ass of their own government. I know I wouldn't mind kicking mine ^^,

      But it's still kinda wrong...

      --
      Here be signatures
  2. You're kidding?! by Macthorpe · · Score: 2, Insightful

    Slashdot posted a story with no basis in fact whatsoever? Slap me, I must be dreaming.

    --
    "It does not do to leave a live dragon out of your calculations, if you live near him." - Tolkien
  3. On the other hand... by Baldrake · · Score: 3, Insightful

    Of course we all shake our heads in wonder that such a fuss would be created in Russia over fiction in a video game. But I wonder how US media would react, say, if a Chinese company released a game featuring US rednecks heading into a first nations reserve and gunning down everyone in sight, including women and children. Just thinkin'...

  4. MW2 and Steam by sopssa · · Score: 4, Interesting

    This whole MW2 release on PC has been notoriously shitty. First the removal of dedicated servers and leaning (that still pisses me off so much in multiplayer). The matchmaking system works nicely, but they could had still added.. eh, enabled the support for dedicated servers, since it's already build-in to the engine. Now it also seems that pirates and hackers are running rampant on the legit servers, and they also hacked support for dedicated servers. If you do this with a legit version, you'll probably get banned for cheating.

    And yesterday they removed MW2 from everyones Steam account that had bought the game from different region or sites like g2play.net that sell it cheaper. This happened for me too, so now I'm unable to play my legitly bought game. This is a response from Steam support:

    Your Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 2 CD Key has been purchased from an unauthorized re-seller of Steam CD Keys. Your CD Key has been revoked. Please do not complete any purchases with this vendor.

    Only CD Keys included with retail copies or purchased from authorized retailers will be allowed.

    Still it's a legit version of the game, just that it comes from a reseller instead of Walmart or Steam. And all Activision, IW and Steam made money on the purchase - only one that lost was me and I cant even play it anymore. It's great when legit, paying customers are treated that way while pirates get more off the game for free and don't risk losing their money and game.

    1. Re:MW2 and Steam by Corbets · · Score: 2, Insightful

      Just out of curiosity: how do you know it's a legit copy if you paid a discount price from an unauthorized reseller? Sounds kinda shady to me.

    2. Re:MW2 and Steam by Xest · · Score: 5, Insightful

      I've been pointing out for a while that Steam is bad, in fact, as was pointed out here by someone else the other day they're arguably worse than EA now that EA is a little looser on DRM than it used to be, effectively making Valve the worst proponents of DRM in the industry.

      What annoys me most about Steam is that you haven't done anything illegal yet they block access, and similarly those who receive games early who have done nothing illegal (and neither have the suppliers because there's no actual legal duty not to release early, just industry agreement) but get blocked access from using a product they've paid for until release day. Then there's the blocking of second hand sales, again, yes, nothing illegal, in fact in some countries it is a legal right, and yet again, Valve block it, even making sale of full accounts with games attached in itself against their EULA so that such accounts will be shut down if they change owner.

      Yet there's still so much support for Steam, they've built an Apple style fanbase that will rabidly defend them no matter how wrong they do, even if to do so means being hypocritical in going against previous stance in other discussions about how bad DRM is.

      It's part of a bigger problem, people will whine, and moan, and bitch, but when it comes to if it means not getting that shiny new toy or having to order that game online and wait a whole day for it to arrive by post, or even, god forbid, get off their arse and go to a shop for it then morals be damned, they'll go right against them and keep feeding the machine that is screwing the consumer and reducing consumer rights drastically. They miss the fact that over time this means things are getting a whole lot more expensive for them if it isn't already due to not being able to buy second hand copies of games, or due to not being able to sale games that they've finished with and never intend to play again on, or most prominently by increased cost of games, which anyone whose paid attention to Steam's prices over the years will notice have gone up for new AAA titles- that doesn't matter as long as they can have their game right this minute. You know what? I actually have more respect for pirates than I do people who whine and buy anyway because at least the pirates aren't feeding companies that don't deserve cash for the way they treat their customers. Sending a message by just pirating the game rather than buying still sends a message, and these companies aren't stupid, they know DRM has no effect on piracy and is just designed to try and slowly increase costs for the honest consumer so it's not like any further restrictions will arise as a result of increase piracy, only as an attempt to squeeze the honest consumer more. I suppose in the context of your distaste of the lack of dedicated servers, this sums up my point precisely:

      http://kotaku.com/5403286/what-modern-warfare-2-boycotters-are-playing

      Personally, I just play XBox 360 games, which unlike on Steam, have decreasing prices, and which despite being on a closed platform are less restrictive in that you can still at least sell second hand and such if you wish to. For what it's worth, I do put my money where my mouth is, I wont buy Left 4 Dead 2 after the way Valve pushes DRM, and the way Left 4 Dead had less content than most free mods with the free content that was meant to make up for this eventually being charged for.

      I don't ask people to agree with my points, I know many loved Left 4 Dead for example, what I do ask is that people grow some will power and learn to start putting their money where their mouth is on what matters to them- don't bitch about DRM on an open platform like the PC if you're going to buy from Steam for example. If you don't, then don't come crying when you realise things are costing you more and more, and when as it has with the parent, it comes round to bite you.

    3. Re:MW2 and Steam by Xest · · Score: 5, Insightful

      Read what he posted, the resellers are able to sell it cheaper because they buy keys from a different region of the world where the game is actually priced cheaper than it is in his native country. This is not illegal, as long as you abide by the tax laws in your country importing is perfectly legitimate.

      What Valve don't like is the fact he has bought it cheaper because he worked around their price fixing mechanism that aims to squeeze as much money out of people in different parts of the world as possible.

      Note that this would effect you identically if you for example bought a copy cheaper whilst in Asia on holiday and took it home to play in say the UK or US where it's more expensive.

      They are basically creating their own additional import laws outside of those already imposed by the country into which he is importing goods. It is similar in a way to DVD region encoding, which was used to try and block people in Europe getting films early because they were released 6 months earlier in the US, and also getting them cheaper because the US prices were lower than European prices for example.

    4. Re:MW2 and Steam by Xest · · Score: 3, Informative

      Many games now, presumably including CoD MW2 on the PC force you to register with and attach the game to Steam to play them. They use Steam for activation to check your CD key is legit, and now it seems, to ban you from using the game. They can also for example use Steam to prevent you from playing a game you've purchased outside of Steam before the release date if it arrives early.

    5. Re:MW2 and Steam by QuoteMstr · · Score: 4, Insightful

      Little by little, without our even realizing it, we're in the nightmare DRM world. Imagine waking up today after last being conscious in 1995. What, you need to be connected to the network to play games you purchased? What, the operating system limits the number of hardware changes you can make? What, you TV and speakers have DRM built-in? What, operating systems won't load kernel-mode code unless it's been approved by the OS vendor? Our books can be deleted out from under us? That's preposterous. That's fiction.

      No, this was the stuff of dystopian fiction 15 years ago. Now it's daily life. Who knows what restrictions we'll see in the next 15 years? Will you finally stop thinking those of us who decry DRM are just crying wolf?

  5. Manipulation by Dunbal · · Score: 4, Insightful

    Isn't it great? Leak a fake story on the internet and reap the free publicity, then leak a statement denying the original fake story, and get another bout of publicity. TWO slashvertisments for no cost at all! Marketing at its finest.

    --
    Seven puppies were harmed during the making of this post.
  6. its not censorship by hellfish006 · · Score: 3, Informative

    When they are removing a level from the game that is completely unnecessary to play, should just be a video, serves no real point since you don't have to shoot anyone and the mission still plays out the same. The level and your actions in it have no real effect on the game whatsoever. It was for pure media attention which is ridiculous because this game was already going to be huge.

    1. Re:its not censorship by TheKidWho · · Score: 4, Insightful

      As opposed to every other level in the highly scripted linear game where your actions don't affect the outcome at all.

    2. Re:its not censorship by hellfish006 · · Score: 2, Insightful

      No, you are right. But at least in other missions you have to kill the terrorists to proceed, you can't win without killing them. But in the airport level "No Russian" you never have to fire a round, you can walk the entire time, you don't have to shoot any of the cops that show up, the terrorists you are with will do that for you. If you turn and shoot Makarov you can't kill him its friendly fire. If they already knew you were a spy why did they risk having you on this job, why not just kill you, bring your body in the ambulance at the end and drop your body at the scene? Why risk having you screw it up, blow their mission or anything else? Why play this at all? The mission itself doesn't even make sense. Because one American was associated with a terrorist act in a Russian airport they invade the US? And even though one of the Russian terrorists dies in the level no one thinks, oh hey maybe this was a multi-national terrorist attack? The entire level is ridiculous and pointless.