Bandai Namco Opens Up About Controversial Tales of Berseria Localisation Change

...Worry

I give them credit for responding to this so quickly. Whether you agree or disagree w/ the decision - I like their explanation - I think it's always better to address the issue than hide away on your mountaintop.

I totally understand where they are coming from if it was rated mature (M) would it still sell well or would it have been overlooked and forgotten. I think they did the best they could with the rules they have to follow. I think if there is no nudity in it then it should be a teen(T) game. Let's look at Watchdogs 2 it was rated mature (M) and still got patched for some nudist in the game. It goes to show you in my case the US is very sensitive and need to grow up. A game is another work of art and if a nake women paint can be in a museum then we can have a game with nudist or violent cutsences. It's no different then watching HBO with people having sex and you can see a boob or two. Sorry for the long rant just had to get it out.

@rjejr I tend to agree. These days, mostly thanks to the rapid pace of the internet, I think staying silent is often more damaging than simply providing an explanation - even just a basic one. Letting rumours and misinformation build up and snowball can really harm public perception in the long run.

"As a company, Bandai Namco Entertainment has to follow the regional regulations regarding video games content to allow the games to be released with appropriate rating"

this pretty much explains it

i find it amazing that the people moaning still hasn't got to grip with the fact that some things that are allowed in one country isn't in another, they don't change things to p*** you off ,they do it because they have to in order to comply with regional laws

so stop moaning and enjoy the game FFS

I think this is fair enough.

They are a business and if they can't release a game at the targeted age groups it will affect sales. Kudos to them for not cutting it out entirely and making something disjointed but reworking it to pass the age review. Also, they responded and explained the reason swiftly.

I guess you could argue that gamers are getting different experiences but it happens with movies all the time. If they have done a good job, it should have limited impact.

There has been a lot of censorship in BN's games lately. They're getting like Nintendo of America. If people want to see less of it, then don't support butchered releases. Support companies like Marvelous and Pqube that make as few cuts to the games they localize as possible.

At least they're responding to concerns about the changes in a timely manner, though.

@NintendoFan4Lyf Most of the time these changes are made before the game is ever submitted for a rating. As another example of recent censorship from BN, sword attacks in Dragon Ball Fusions, which aren't graphic at all, were replaced with characters attacking with sticks. This wasn't at the behest of some rating board. NoA suggested the change, and BN preemptively censored the game.

I don't mind censorship when it's really necessary, and the game would have issues launching in this region otherwise. That was the case with something like Dungeon Travelers 2, which was just a bit too risque for the M rating. Atlus made some minor changes to get the M rating, and was open with people about the process. More often than not, however, that just isn't the case.

I'm ok with this, because they give a good explanation I'm sure most gamer won't have problem.

@NintendoFan4Lyf I try not to get too worked up if it isn't a complete hack job. As a Nintendo fan, I've put up with most of the recent censorship in games they've published. One optional costume in BD wasn't a big deal. Same with the risque bonus outfit for the preteen in XCX. But then we started getting stuff like Fire Emblem: Fates and Tokyo Mirage Sessions, where entire mechanics were being removed, entire storylines were being re-written, and changes were happening in weird and random ways. This is what happens when you allow censors to keep freely censoring. They start censoring stupid stuff, or changing the meaning of parts of a story, etc.

Censorship is about controlling what other people have access to, and people who get a taste for this control will start abusing it. Censorship has a place in this world, but it should be minor and very tightly controlled.

Not a fan of censorship or altering of any kind in regards to movies, tv shows or video games. If you don't like the content you are free to avoid these things and let the market decides what's acceptable and what's not. That said, I also understand where these companies come from, from a business perspective and beyond that, this is great PR work here by Namco. Very quick response time, and it's reasonable. If you don't like the changes, don't buy the game, it's simple but you can't get mad at the company in this case when they're flat-out telling you why this is being done.

Not fond of the censorship myself, if the game is dark I'd like it to remain that way and not changed into something suitable for a younger audience.
Though looking at the Japanese box art it's a 12+ age rating in Japan.
I don't really want any spoilers but how violent was it? : S

@Bliquid Side-by-side comparison (spoilery): https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=oLWZEIU8R74

Summary of the scene's content, scrubbed of context as best I can:
Both versions- A character states their intent to take a child (let's call them Doe)'s life. Then... Japanese version- The character runs Doe through with a weapon, depicted clearly, but in full silhouette. Western version- The character casts a spell that lifts Doe high into the air and surrounds Doe with big, flashy rings and seals of light for an extended length of time. The character stabs a small magical seal in front of them, and the spell shatters as Doe (in silhouette) is pierced by a large jagged X of light.

After watching both of them, they feel notably different, and I really respect the visceral impact of the Japanese version over the eye-rollingly overwrought Western version. I've also seen comments that the approach taken in this scene may have symbolic or substantive repercussions later in the game as well, but I don't know or want to know the details on what those might be.

Glancing at the content descriptors on the ESRB website, as far as the US is concerned, they may have been trying to shift this scene from a potential categorization of Intense Violence (M rating and up) to Fanstasy Violence (E rating and up):

• Intense Violence - Graphic and realistic-looking depictions of physical conflict. May involve extreme and/or realistic blood, gore, weapons and depictions of human injury and death
• Fantasy Violence - Violent actions of a fantasy nature, involving human or non-human characters in situations easily distinguishable from real life

Not that those descriptors are by any means objective or evenly-enforced in practice.

@Bliquid https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3Zw2oVRr3Ms

That shows off both versions of the scene.

I'm very wary of the rating excuse. NISA uses the same argument but when asked, the ESRB confirmed that their games are already censored when they send them in for ratings.

Can Bamco be blamed for a change stemming from regional content regulation standards they didn't invent? An odd question.

I have an honest question: Does the alteration matter much if you're still shown the action (in this case the death of a character) or result of a scene? Either way, you're still shown the death of the character, just with a different method. Admittedly, the original version has more punch to it yeah, but that the death even happens is something more noteworthy to me, for two reasons-

1. If you're invested in the story, you're probably more concerned that the character is dead if you care about him.
2. They could have had it offscreen with the death, or at least the killing blow not shown at all. It seems to be made clear he's dead, while it could have been implied or made non-fatal, but close enough to it (put in a coma, spirit sealed, shadow realm, etc.).

It could have been edited due to how young the character looks, even though it's a given with the art style. I don't know if that's actually a child, but it would explain the alteration.

Good that they responded quickly but I have to say the new version of the scene is a bit rubbish. Loses most of its impact I think, I wasn't entriely sure what was going on watching the edited version first.

Care to mention exactly what the change is?

@EVIL-C Basically in the original a kid gets stabbed through the chest, in the censored version he dies cause he gets sucked into a magical ball of light thingy

@Athrum Thank you for explaining what the articles author did not.

Couldn't they have just kept hands on sword hilt, eyes widen then reaction shot? JP version was very striking visually and i get why they changed if for western "sensibilities" but if you have, or want to make changes there are more subtle ways, surely than a giant mega spell.

Not their fault, but the fault of Western ratings system.

@Orpheus79V I agree with you here. There are plenty of games from different companies that have varying degrees of content in them and yet are given the same age rating. It's curious how some companies don't have to remove that much from their games to get the same rating. Especially western games.

This is clearly something that has been done before submission. The whole point of sending in the games for rating is to have your game rated. If they were going for 12+ rating, I could kinda see why they may want to change a somewhat graphic representation of the character dying. At 16+, this is just a lame excuse to not send the game in for a second rating in case they somehow get an 18+, (which they won't, as it's not anywhere near as graphic as it could be). 16+ games are generally very adult games, and films and TV shows with lower ratings deal with child characters dying. Besides, when did a rating change of a game series alienate the fanbase? And when did Tales games become so mainstream that they would loose so many advertised slots, despite that fact that most Call of Duty games are 18+ and get advertised on TV and in console bundles?

This is a Japanese company that is out of touch with how ratings work. They need to look at western games and gauge how violent a 16+ game can be. I just watched the reworked scene and it's not at all violent for a 16+ game. Western games such as Warcraft 3 have a scene containing a character being stabbed through the chest (rated 12+, CONTAINS SPOILERS)

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=982XQDzw6fQ

Also, Heart of Darkness anyone? Anyone remember that?

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jYyZfME5XYY

Thank goodness there's a PC version coming so that modders can have a go at restoring the original scene. And at least they aren't rewriting the story.

Cutting through their corporate bullcrap: "lower age rating = more $$$"