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Post by Discoalucard on Dec 27, 2006 16:49:53 GMT -5
Read this interview bit with Akitoshi Kawazu regarding Final Fantasy XII: This scene was restored in the American version, which is here (and is fairly early in the game, so you don't need to worry about being too spoiled...it's right after you escape the prison with Balthier and Fran and head off to the Bujerba Mines): www.youtube.com/watch?v=x-gKm5tQaCANothing too violent, right? Oddly enough, the Japanese GBA version of FF6 has also been censored a bit - the part where Celes where captured and chained to a wall was removed, although I can't remember to what extent (I'll have to get there myself.) They're both scenes with slightly cruel treatment to captured prisoners. The amount of censoring happening in Japanese games lately (and only in Japan, strangely enough) is quite fascinating. People were all up in arms about the ESRB amounting to a huge censorship organization, but it's much less stringent than Japan's recently revised CERO system, wherein the most violent games are deemed worse than porn and (so I'm told) are practically hidden from most shoppers sights at retail. I'm really wondering what incidecent Kawazu was referring to. Apparently back in 2004, Japan went through a few hostage situations (much like America) in Iraq where visiting Japanese citizens were captured, demanding that Japan remove the SDF troops from the region (I didn't even know Japan had troops in Iraq.) As most of us know, many citizens of other countries are fiercely opposed to allying with the US and stationing their troops there, so this was a pretty big deal for the Koizumi administration. A few of them made it back - others weren't so lucky. Anyway, the last reported incident I can find about this is from late 2004, and the Japanese FFXII came out in early 2006 - there's a good eighteen months difference. Could that be what Kawazu was referring to? Or maybe something not reported by English speaking media?
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Post by Neo Rasa on Dec 27, 2006 17:58:19 GMT -5
It was probably a more recent incident not reported outside of east Asia.
The marketing of these games is true though, you have to dig around in the back of the store behind layers of more safe product or ask at the counter in some more mainstream stores.
This sort of began in the late nineties though, there were several games in which blood/more violent content was added for the US version (the original Bushido Blade and Sword of the Berserk come to mind).
Ninja Gaiden, Dead Rising and Resident Evil 4 are three recent examples, no decapitations in any of them in Japan!
Resident Evil 4 also had several things in-game removed like the impaled woman in one of the earliest sheds in the game (this version oddly making it into the US store demo as it was based on a demo build older than even the Famitsu demo that was released three months prior). The US version retains all of this content.
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Post by sirjake on Dec 27, 2006 19:01:02 GMT -5
I really don't see what's wrong with that scene. At first I thought you meant that they took a scene out a scene where it implied rape.
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Post by Neo Rasa on Dec 27, 2006 19:07:27 GMT -5
That's kind of his point, culturally it DOES trigger implications of rape/ruthless murder.
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Post by Discoalucard on Dec 27, 2006 19:07:47 GMT -5
Actually, read this: en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tsutomu_MiyazakiIt happened nearly twenty years ago, but his death sentence was upheld by the Japanese Supreme Court in January 2006, two months before FFXII came out over there: Both of the removed scenes involved around implied violence to captured (young) females - and since video games are a medium still associated with otaku, perhaps Square-Enix did not CERO to find a correlation between the two.
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Post by Discoalucard on Dec 27, 2006 21:31:37 GMT -5
OK I checked out the FF6 censorship. In the SNES/SFC versions, the guards beat up Celes while interrogating her, then she collapses as they leave. When you enter the room with Locke, she's in chains. In the GBA version, the guards don't hit her at all, and she mysteriously collapses after they leave anywhere. When you walk in, she's still lying on the floor, not chained up. SNES GBA
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Post by The bag of sand on Dec 28, 2006 0:22:58 GMT -5
Wow thats strange.
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Post by Scylla on Dec 28, 2006 1:19:34 GMT -5
While it would be easy to take the stand that Japan becoming more inclined to using censorship is a bad thing, I'd rather state that it's a GOOD thing that the most violent games are regarded as worse than porn. America has its morality all backwards with the attitude "Sure, my son can go see -insert generic gory horror flick here- and play Grand Theft Auto, but oh God, it's a nipple, I'm going to have a fucking heart attack!"
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Post by kal on Dec 28, 2006 1:53:32 GMT -5
Actually the Japanese are pretty nutty about there Censorship in general I always thought.
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Post by michiyoyoshiku on Dec 28, 2006 15:10:00 GMT -5
Actually the Japanese are pretty nutty about there Censorship in general I always thought. Breasts ok.....Penis and vagina not ok
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Post by kal on Dec 28, 2006 16:08:46 GMT -5
But if the 'Penis' is a 'tentacle' then it's okay.
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Post by michiyoyoshiku on Dec 28, 2006 16:10:14 GMT -5
the outline of a penis is ok (see Battle Royal Manga)
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Post by Neo Rasa on Dec 28, 2006 20:54:42 GMT -5
Interesting contrast here. CHeck out the US theatrical and Japanese television preview trailers for Death Wish III (called Super Magnum in Japan). The rape scene that's cut short in ALL currently existing versions of the movie is fully shown in the Japanese trailer for the television broadcasting. US: www.youtube.com/watch?v=kh2CSXUQbnsJapan: youtube.com/watch?v=3952mRmITGACheck out the Terminator-influenced sound/graphic design for the US trailer.
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Post by brianc on Dec 28, 2006 22:30:06 GMT -5
In the Japanese Yggdra Union, there is a bath scene where Yggdra is covered by a leaf. In the US version, the leaf is gone and more skin is showing.
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Post by Discoalucard on Dec 28, 2006 22:55:07 GMT -5
Yeah that is very weird.
They also censored the bath scenes in the PSP version of Riviera. CERO at work again.
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