Well…here we are again. The ‘idealogues’ vs the regular gamers. What was the controversy this time? A remake of a game has unnecessarily updated a character model because it’s ‘problematic.’ To add to the controversy, the Japanese creators were caught on tape criticizing Western censorship…which then got censored.
I know…shocker. If your reading this as if I’m speaking very deadpan, you are correct. To get the full details, here’s the link to the article we cited at Push Square, and the followup story at That Park Place.
We chose this topic based on our interest in gaming and our own exhaustion with Western game companies pushing ideology instead of story…or just simple fun. But the story became just a little larger than that. Instead, we’re talking about a MASSIVE over-reaction.
The original broadcasters of the interview complained about a mistranslation of what was said in the original Japanese broadcast. This led to the translation being pulled from the internet. Okay, that might be fair. The single mistranslated word didn’t really affect the tone or context of what was being said, but whatever.
But then, why pull down the original broadcast? Aha, that’s the real question!
Speculation is that it was pulled down not just because it was mistranslated, causing a new controversy, but that the game creator and interviewer’s comments themselves were controversial. How dare someone criticize the Western gaming industry for censorship! CENSOR THEM!!!
Except, guess what. As Hiro says, the internet is forever. And look at that, we’re all now talking about the thing that got censored talking about a thing that got censored. It’s almost as if censorship does the opposite of it’s intent. How weird.
Other Topics Discussed on These Lives…
- ZELDA LAUGHS AT VEILGUARD PREORDERS
- GHOSTS OF YOTEI DRAMA ISN’T WHAT YOU THINK
- CAT WALKS 500 MILES, AND THEN WALKS 500 MORE
- KOTAKU EDITOR IS PLAYING WITH FIRE
- MAN HAS A RICH COLLECTION
You can watch the Live podcast below. The Dragon Quest topic begins around the 1 hour 15 minute mark.
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