10 Genius Ways Video Games Got Past The Censors

Video games and censorship go together like Wolfenstein and Nazi killing or… Wolfenstein and indiscriminate bad guy killing, if you’re from Germany. Censors around the world have tampered with and changed many elements of games throughout the years, from Earthbound on the SNES, to the infamous scene in Modern Warfare 2, to something as simple as Left 4 Dead’s zombie dismemberment.

For us adult gamers, unless we’re talking about Manhunt, it’s quite hard to get too graphic. However, we have to remember the underlying root of censorship, which is to protect younger players from experiencing inappropriate content. We could sit here and argue the flaws of censorship, how a lot of the controversy is overblown and unwarranted. Instead, we're going to look into how some sneaky developers skirted around said censors and made the best of their situation.

Some crafty creators actually got very clever with their alternatives, even going as far back as the first Mortal Kombat, locking all its nasty parts behind a special code. Similarly, you’ve got black and white filters, removal of certain symbols and the clever idea to change the in-game item of morphine to a more stylish Med-X. Some developers are just too smart for their own good.

It’s hard to state just how impactful Mortal Kombat was in the olden days of gaming and yes, I'm really calling it the olden days. Back when arcades were the big thing, rolling those quarters into the machine and beating up your friend, Mortal Kombat was one of the first big worries for censors around the world. As the game later made its way onto the Sega Genesis, SNES and Game Boy, this was where censorship panels such as the Entertainment Software Rating Board (ESRB) became apparent within the gaming industry.

These boards demanded that Mortal Kombat be toned down, ultimately causing the removal of the horrifyingly gruesome fatalities and substituting all blood with sweat. Looking at the earlier Mortal Kombats now, you really wouldn’t see the issue. However, worried parents and fragile politicians will always need something to complain about.

Gore removed, now with a blunted edge, Mortal Kombat was beaten by the censors - okay, have the parents left? What actually happened was that the developers allowed for the input of a cheat code. This sneaky code bypassed the censors, the parents and anyone who didn't play video games, re-implementing all the originally intended gory content back into the game. Safe to say, Mortal Kombat was the innovator of censorship workarounds.