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South Park: The Stick of Truth has been censored in EU (only consoles affected)
- Thread starter ShogunDarius
- Start date
In Germany the reason a game gets no rating and ends up on the Index is to even further "protect" minors by making it impossible to e.g. advertise these games. Online shops can only sell "indexed" games if they have an age-verfication (and only the user with a verfied account can see those games). Most retailers and online shops don't even attempt to sell games that are on the Index so publishers never want that to happen so they cut their game to get an USK 18 rating or just don't bother with the German market.
Rating boards can't decide such things. Only the Publisher can censor their own games, however in some cases they can be forced to censor the games to be able to sell it in that country.
In this case e.g. Ubisoft decided it was a good idea to cut the stuff for "marketing reasons", however at the same time they were also forced to cut the swastikas in the German and Austrian version to sell it in those countries.
lol fair enough.
Yeah I cancelled my 360 pre-order and am waiting on hearing if the Xbox 360 version is region free or if I can import the PS3 version.
I did email Ubisoft support but they redirected me to the Uplay shop and they said I couldn't buy it from them (not what I asked them so not sure why they redirected me to them) and said they think it's likely to be region locked and I could have issues with DLC.
VG+ in Canada has confirmed that the game is region-locked.
SquiddyCracker
Banned
At least I'll be able to play abortion doctor on the PC version.
When i go to the steam store it says:
I'm from Austria and the steam PC version seems to be censored so not only consoles affected? I'm so lost.
Steam only has this one warning, but they're referring to the removed/changed swastikas in the German/Austrian version. Otherwise nothing is cut.
Thanks, sounds like I won't get this on the 360 and I'll have to try and get the North American PS3 version (as I think all PS3 games are region free, DLC might be different though) as I don't have a PC.
Anyone know of a good online retailer that lets you import games from North America to the UK?
Thanks, I'll check them out.
A lot of people, including many on this forum, complained about Duke Nukem Forever having crass, insensitive and degrading jokes. Like Duke Nukem, South Park is a series that should have the right be unapologetically unpolitically correct as it chooses to be. So I guess the people who were offended by very loosely implied "rape" references in DNF won.
Marc
Member
Interesting info about this from Matt Stone, seems his version of events is different from the reality, I wonder if Ubisoft sold them a lie about the ratings system here.
Source: http://www.theguardian.com/tv-and-r...t-stone-trey-parker-stick-of-truth-video-game
Source: http://www.theguardian.com/tv-and-r...t-stone-trey-parker-stick-of-truth-video-game
I'm playing the Australian PC censored version of the game.
The censorship is pretty jarring, and definitely messes with the flow of the game, especially in one certain dungeon. It's a massive shame, and it does make for a worse game.
I have a question though for those who are playing this game...
The censorship is pretty jarring, and definitely messes with the flow of the game, especially in one certain dungeon. It's a massive shame, and it does make for a worse game.
I have a question though for those who are playing this game...
I've just gotten to the Nazi Zombie part, and often the Nazi Zombie characters will have their mouthes move like they are saying something (and all the other characters on screen are just looking at the Zombie as if paying attention to something they are saying), except no vocal audio can be heard. Are their lines censored as well? Does anyone know?
That must be a bug. I was playing the Aussie version of the game on the PS3 at a mate's place last night and the Nazi Zombies were most definitely... talkative.
1st: what PC versions are 100% uncut?
2nd: can I buy those versions as retail and install and play them here in germany without any problems?
Every one save for copies sold in: Germany, Austria, Australia, New Zealand, Singapore, Hong Kong and Taiwan (retail copes in SG, HK and TW may be exempt).
You'd need to use a VPN to activate the key, but that's it.
Yeah must be a bug... Thank you
Using a free VPN to activate the game will take you about 5 minutes. It's the only way to the play the game in Germany anyway, since it's not released here yet. Steam won't let you start the game if you don't connect to Steam with a non-German IP due to that. That's also the reason why no one will be able to tell you whether or not the German version might be patchable.
... But then again, buying the game somewhere else is so easy that I can't imagine anyone wants to bother messing around with patching it.
Possibly, as there's already a patch that uncensors the Aussie version, but it's worth keeping in mind that German copies are region-locked to Germany and Austria at the runtime level so if you were to ever move to a different country you'd be unable to play the game without a German/Austrian VPN.
Georgiee85
Member
Reading all this makes me glad they didn't censor the PC version for us lot in the UK. I was actually going to buy the PS3 version but glad I avoided it now having finished it.
so I could buy the Pc version here: http://www.amazon.co.uk/dp/B00CMJ1H7C/
then use a VPN to activate it and after that I can play the uncensored version without using VPN again?
btw.: why is the pc version 47,50 and the console version 35 at amazon uk?
then use a VPN to activate it and after that I can play the uncensored version without using VPN again?
btw.: why is the pc version 47,50 and the console version 35 at amazon uk?
Supply? There's only 7 left in stock for that version looking at the site.
just finished it, steam says 13 hours, sounds about right. Did all the side quests I could find. Amazing game, and easily the best licensed game ever. I would say bring on a sequel, but that will never happen.
I really think we are playing one of the best games of the year right now.
I imagine the game will win a lot of "best graphics" awards when all is said and done.
EDIT: I don't know if anyone else has done this... but I had a look at the game's files on PC and found a txt file called "australian.txt" in the root.
it contains this:
<?xml version="1.0" encoding="utf-8"?>
<Region>
<Country>australia</Country>
</Region>
Do you guys think changing this would change the censorship?
Ok, I don't think its a bug. A character mouthed "Sieg Heil" however there was no audio. I believe the vocal track is cut in the Australian PC version too.
CastleRybread
Member
The stuff they cut in the EU versions was probably for the best. The controls in those parts of the game absolutely stink. Had to turn off the 360 controller to get it to work on PC.
Derpcrawler
Member
Not sure if people saw the Australian censor screen yet, but here it is. I really enjoyed this game, how much effort they've put into it, like jokes changing depending on class/skin color combo. Like the Cartman mentioning me being "Kyles mom relative from New Jersey or something" for choosing Jew as a class while having "fake tan" skin. They even made different censor screens/text for different regions.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2C8QK3yr8OI
Damn, wanted to post this in OT. Can delete the post.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2C8QK3yr8OI
Damn, wanted to post this in OT. Can delete the post.
Eh, it's not that hard. There were times when they try to make things difficult by having so many buttons to press at rapid rate. But if you fail that, they'll give you an easier one. I'd definitely not wanna miss those scenes.
Now, if they censored the farting tutorial, OTOH, I'd gladly skip them. Those are torturous!
Most PS3 games are not region-locked. Persona Arena was the exception.