Open Letter about the censoring in Austria/Germany

[Ponzo]

Hi! 

First of all, i like to mention that i initially preordered the game when i heard about it, like many else. 

As an Austrian, the censoring and removing of content hits me a little hard, since Austria never censored video games, i never even heard an austrian politician use the word "video game" or "game" in general. Many of my German friends order uncut/uncensored versions of Games from austrian shops/amazon for that reason. 

I am almost 27 years old, i own 16 seasons of South Park on DVD and dont feel that a South Park game of all, should be censored, (i get into the swastika dilemma in a second). What is the harm about anal probing in a game? Since i see boobies on a daily basis on national german/austrian TV, without censoring, during the day, i cant imagine that a drawn space dîldo would cause much of a problem. Especially in a Mature rated game, *for adults*, or did you try and go for a PG13 rating? Which i highly doubt with South Park. 

I understand the swastikas in Germany, because they are a bit weird when it comes to that, but its not like you immediately change your political view after playing a game with dead nazi cows using hitlers speeches, or go out to anal probe random strangers on the street after playing the game. I never understood that in general, its perfectly fine to run documentarys about WW2, Hitler, the SS on national TV (with swastikas shown ofc), but if a nazi zombie appears in a game, they have to censor it.

But with the decision to throw whole europe into one pot, i had no other choice but to refund my preorder on steam (http://i.imgur.com/hbtkJHi.png
), in hopes that maybe one day, austrians will get their uncut versions. 

till then, i have to watch someone on Youtube play it for me.

-Ponzo

[Apatia]

How about sending this letter of yours to Ubisoft? They were the ones who made the decision to censor it, not Obsidian.

 

I get it that people are mad/sad/whatever about it being censored but there are several topics, Obsidian tweets and whatnots about this, Obsidian can't do anything about it. Not their decision or call.

 

And about the swastikas in German releases. It kinda is the law there so there were two options, 1. remove swastikas and get the game released, or 2. keep the swastikas and not release the game there at all. I'm not an expert in German laws but from what I've heard the reason why swastikas can't be shown in games is because in Germany games are classified as toys, not art. I believe it is because of this the anal probing etc. has to be censored from the German release as well.

 

Yes, the censorship at this day and age is very unfortunate but that's just the way it is.

 

Edit: Forgot to mention about the fact(?) that PEGI already passed the game uncut but it still got censored. It was Ubisoft's decision.

Edited March 16, 2014 by Apatia

[Shirobon]

I think you're pointing the finger at the wrong entity, OP. Obsidian are the developers of the game and just follow directions from Ubisoft. The other commenter summed it up well, so I won't reiterate any more than I have to. There is also a user-made patch that uncensors the game on the PC. I've seen it floating around. 

[maxmaster]

And about the swastikas in German releases. It kinda is the law there so there were two options, 1. remove swastikas and get the game released, or 2. keep the swastikas and not release the game there at all. I'm not an expert in German laws but from what I've heard the reason why swastikas can't be shown in games is because in Germany games are classified as toys, not art.

Austria is not part of Germany.

I believe it is because of this the anal probing etc. has to be censored from the German release as well.

Those scenes are only gone from the console-version.