8 Times Censorship Almost Ruined Your Favourite Video Games
Who'd have thought Microsoft would be bigger prudes than Nintendo?
Like it or not, video games get censored all the time. No matter how big the release, every new title has to go through a vetting process to make sure its content doesn't defy any guidelines or cross any unsavoury boundaries. Sure, you could argue that everyone should be free to express themselves however they want in their art, but at the end of the day, business is business and video games still have to abide by general rules of taste.
Usually the censorship and ratings process don't have too much of a major impact on a game, maybe resulting in certain sensitive scenes having a few seconds shaven off, a bit of blood omitted or a couple of obscene words replaced with something more family friendly, but they rarely result in an objectively worse experience.
Other times, this censorship does become intrusive, resulting in versions of a title that vary massively depending on region. Fundamentally changing major parts of the experience, some of the most successful and beloved games over the years have had content cut or changed that came close to gutting the game entirely.
8. Conker: Live And Reloaded Proved Microsoft Were Tamer Than Nintendo
The Conker series has always had a strange relationship with censorship. Originally envisioned as a cuddly mascot platformer in the same vein as Mario 64, the developers at Rare quickly changed focus on the original Conker when they realised that the market was too saturated, turning their titular hero into a hard-drinking, womanising rogue instead.
Begrudgingly, Nintendo released the adult-themed game which became a cult hit on its platform. When Rare was bought out by Microsoft shortly after however, their new owners also wanted a bit of the Conker pie, and tasked the studio with making a remixed version of the title for the original Xbox.
Weirdly enough though, while Nintendo - a company notorious for censoring its releases and aiming for the widest family market possible - were fine with Conker's adult themes, Microsoft had a bit of a problem with them. Despite originally being titled Live and Uncut, somewhere in development there was a decision to heavily censor the game, with even small curse words and innocuous toilet humour being edited out entirely.
It was Rare's first misstep under Microsoft, and it neutered an otherwise excellent and original voice in the gaming space.