Forum - View topicThe X Button - Costume Changes
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KoujiTamino
 Posts: 163 Location: Tacoma, WA, USA |
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Alright. Enjoy your little protest in the corner, I guess. I've got the Collector's Edition pre-ordered and that baby isn't going anywhere. |
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se37
 Posts: 229 Location: Annapolis, Maryland |
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This whole debate in censorship is brought up heavy in art. The main points in art is what people would offend someone and what doesn't. Everyone has their own point of view in what would be offensive or to "cross an imaginary line" if you will.
You can also make a case that censorship is needed as allows restrictions to put in place to allow an artist to have more creativity to get around the restrictions and bring us stuff that you typically won't see if something wasn't censored. The best example I can give (since I'm studying it) is the Hayes Code for movies in the Golden Age. Some of the best movies of all times had the film makers work around the Hayes Code. That is an example of censorship working with the medium of art and while the original film makers may not have liked the Hayes Code and people don't like it anymore, you can not deny that without it in place then the Golden Age may not have been so grand. However, this can be also said that censorship is still bad. The question then becomes should artist have free range on what they said and also let us not forget that the video game industry, just like the movie industry is all about money. Take the first Mortal Kombat on the SNES, which was censored. The main reason Nintendo decided to uncensored it was due to the fact that not only did the first one sell poorly compared to the Genesis version but they got letters demanding to know why the censored it and so they allowed it uncensored in Mortal Kombat II but the question then goes to why they decided to censor it in the first place? Simple, they thought that the censored version would sell better and they wouldn't worry about watchdog media groups up in arms about it and attacking towards them because at the time when Mortal Kombat was released was during the creation of the ESRB rating system when that stuff WAS happening with Mortal Kombat. Granted this was also during the censorship that NoA was doing at the time but still that was a case why they censored anything to begin with (with some minor exceptions like the cross in Earthbound due to them not owning the copyright to it in the US) That then becomes the next question is should Video Games be classified as art such as other media. While my answer is yes it should, I don't believe in the eyes of the law and the public that it has (I know there has been court cases on this but I'm not sure 100% if the courts ruled that yes, video games are a form of art) and at the time that was published it was still questionable to people that this was art people were seeing. |
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Raikuro
Posts: 347 |
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Considering the flack and call for boycotts Dragon's Crown got for having oversexualized adult women, Square Enix made the right move in pushing Bravely Default away from nearly naked child-like characters. That would have drawn a lot more ire, as if Japanese entertainment doesn't get enough trouble for promoting pedophilic tendencies. |
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Dmysta3000
 Posts: 50 |
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Wii U
Yeah people are kinda exaggerating the whole "NINTENDO IS DOOOOOMED" thing. But you'd have to be a blind fanboy to not see that the Wii U has been a huge failure for them so far. They will probably bounce back from this (SSB4 is guaranteed to bump up sales at least a little) but damn do they have a huge uphill battle in front of them. Best Case senario: This ends up like how the PS3 went this gen, with the Wii U coming out the stronger system in the end. Worst Case: They completely abandon the Wii U and focus exclusively on the 3DS and more handheld devices. (which really wouldn't be that much of a bad thing) Monster Monpiece Censorship Not that I was gonna get this in the first place, but if your are gonna cut out a good 10% of the game's content when the game's main selling point is its otaku fanservice, you'd be better off just not localizing the game at all. Rune Factory 4 Cancelled in EU Given this, and the fact that they still have yet to release Shin Megami Tensei IV in Europe I'm beginning to question the logic in buying a european 3DS. Geh, region locking is so annoying... Censored Costumes Meh, BDFF's cencored costume dont really seem that much of a big deal. So long as nothing is cut out of the actual game, I dont really care. I do mind, however, when the game's major selling point is its fanservice, which like I mentioned about Monpiece, why the hell even localize it in the first place? Also tried out the Lightning Returns demo, it was pretty fun! Already have the game preordered. 
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Cecilthedarkknight_234
 Posts: 3820 Location: Louisville, KY |
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Bravery default's censorship doesn't honestly bother me because it's not going to affect the game play, story/narrative that it has. Also the characters aren't sexy due to the chibi design but that's just a personal preference/taste. The only thing that bothers me is changing the characters ages. In all honesty that should have been left alone sine that was something rarely touched on in the nes/snes rpg days. Still I'm looking forward to picking up this game and hope it does well in the western market.
Now for Monster Monpiece, after taking a look at the illustrations on the cards I see why they are being cut/removed. Still I do hope they replace the cards since they are essential to the game it's self at points that you can't even progress with out having them. There is two ways they can do this by doing your typical covering/altering of outfits or design new cards for the NA/EU release. The link below is NSFW and shows what cards are being removed from the game, open at your own risk =/ http://i1160.photobucket.com/albums/q496/cecilthedarkknight_234/1390407615277_zps93e2ce19.png |
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ActionJacksin
 Posts: 112 |
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While I'm not exactly frothing at the mouth to play Bravely Default (the gameplay is not quite my cup of tea), I have to say that if you're someone who is really looking forward too it, then you wouldn't be bothered by the risque content in the first place, especially if you knew it was there initially.
I remember a time when if something offended you, the content itself was what you shrugged off, not the censorship mandated by some entity that thinks you must be coddled from feeling "uncomfortable" or "offended", because oh no, the creators didn't think of every single person's social and moral proclivities when designing a piece of entertainment. Last edited by ActionJacksin on Thu Jan 23, 2014 1:29 am; edited 1 time in total |
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StormVanguard
 Posts: 149 |
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The main problem i have with bravely default is the dialog is probably gonna be altered among other things as well.
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AnimenexuS
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Censoring of Monster Monpiece is stupid and pointless. i have seen the cards that were remove. Some they even that bad.
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razisgosu
Posts: 657 |
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Actually all the noise Dragon's Crown got over it's hyper over exaggerated women and men only increased its popularity. Dragon's Crown is a huge seller. |
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Levitz9
 Posts: 1022 Location: Puerto Rico |
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The dialogue that was changed, IIRC, was some dialogue from the Red Mage quest with some awkward pedo/ephebophilic implications. 'Cause that's what every JRPG needs, don'tcha know. I think people are taking this censorship too personally. That one poster who compared the costume alterations to editing A Clockwork Orange is way off-base: the costumes are definitely not the point in Bravely Default. Heck, they're bonus costumes: some people might not even use them, let alone see them. I don't think this issue is anybody's fault: Square Enix recognized that the U.S. has different social mores concerning sexualized designs than Japan, and reacted accordingly, and people don't seem to get that. This isn't political correctness, this is simply adjusting for a different market--one that isn't steeped in Japanese pop-culture. We all forget how desensitized we are from our hours spent watching Saber Marionette J. |
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Shiroi Hane
Encyclopedia Editor
 Posts: 7580 Location: Wales |
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It was the costume changes in Project Zero (Fatal Frame) that just never made sense. The character was also altered to look less Japanese - which makes perfect since in such a very Japanese game, right?
I'd be really annoyed if this was a PS3 game since I really enjoyed Oceans. We did get a cut scene DVD of the first Xenosaga. Words cannot describe how enjoyable a very long, very low quality CG movie with all the action scenes cut out was. |
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Yttrbio
 Posts: 3650 |
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StormVanguard
Posts: 149 |
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Personally i don't mind the costumes so much, you said bonus right? The regular costumes look like a patch job which more silently annoys me than anything else, tera which was already mature to begin with got some retarded patch jobs that made a lot of the costumes look pretty bland in the end. And the reason i bring up dialogue because my favorite game series Ar Tonelico has a large amount of innuendos and inappropriate jokes even while you're item crafting. I could see the very heart of bravely default being changed. Mangagamer for another example has gone to stupid lengths regarding censorship by changing the dialogue as well as removing "event scenes." But i think the intended audience should remain, if that's the age group the game was meant for. |
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Henry Jones
 Posts: 97 Location: Nebraska |
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The thing is for those who consider Xenosaga Episode III a great game (And I do), you have to have the caveat of, "buuuuuuuut they cut the blood out so some of the most dramatic scenes in the game are suddenly very silly." And there are already enough caveats to Episode III as it is (You have to play through 2 games, one kinda' okay and one straight bad to get to it). |
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GLindis
Posts: 14 |
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Altering a game to fit different social mores is about political correctness. And it's no good to use that as an acceptable excuse. What say you to this: Over 60% of Americans are Christian. Should all religious aspects in Japanese games be altered to fit Christian norms? That's what some Christian game reviewers state. I read an article on a Christian review website for Kid Icarus Uprising. The reviewer liked the game except for the fact that Palatena was a Goddess instead of an angel, and that there were other demons, Gods and Goddesses. He called for KIU and any foreign game with religious aspects to have those aspect converted to a Christian version since indeed most Americans are Christian and anything that comes here should reflect that. Should he get his wish? It fits your criteria. I don't know about you, but I think that is ridiculous. I thought we were supposed to accept other cultures, exchange and understand. DMP publishes Tezuka manga uncensored with an afterward explaining the seemingly racist aspects of the work, and why it should still go uncensored. Why can't we have these messages on games in place of invasive alterations. The argument, "it doesn't need it, so it's okay for it to be taken out" is weak and hand-wavy. If we're to go with that, then the individual consumer doesn't need to play the game, or read the book, or watch the movie. They can walk away, or deal with the material within. That would only affect them. When a product is altered to suit the needs of the people who won't walk away but also refuse personal responsibility then it affects everyone who wants to enjoy the product as the creators intended. Did Fahrenheit 451 need the obscenities the publisher omitted on a reprint? Probably not, but Bradbury was rightfully furious at the "minor" alteration of his work - which is even about censorship! The argument that a change is, "so minor most won't notice" also works both ways. If it's so minor, why change it at all? Then if someone does notice, and it bothers that individual, then that person can respond in the way they deem appropriate. They could get over it, sell or trash the item, write a nasty review, tell everyone they know what's there. This would work just as well for marketing a game as sanitizing it for a wider audience that may not notice anyway. As someone else said, controversy sells. Many people wouldn't have heard of Dragon's Crown, or the GTA series, or Doom, or Mass Effect if it wasn't for uppity people freaking out and turning more heads to these games. As another poster stated, this is all done for sales. Not out of a real sense of decency or moral standard, just sales. Do those who support this kind of censorship feel a little bit manipulated or irritated that companies are convinced they can score your buck by a few quick changes of code over some faux rectitude? It's a newer kind of censorship for the last few decades. A kind of cowardly marketing censorship in this design-by-commitee age. Obviously not nearly as horrible as government censorship, but just so needless and selfish. It's the endless argument along the lines of people who won't raise their own children and expect a "decent" and "moral" government and society to do it for them. We need to put more focus on taking personal responsibility and growing a personal moral code than expecting everything to cleanse itself and serve itself up on a gentle, mediocre and non-offense platter. Obviously a couple recolored sprites in some game is not nearly as big a deal as the overall theme, but every little step forward (or backwards) counts. |
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