Gamescom 2015

Oh i understood what you wrote and i also understood that it's plain wrong.

The fact that you have to CENSOR your art here in Germany to get it to the public the way you want is hilarious. Again, look at Austria or Sweden, i can't recall them being more "harmed" by having no censorship. That argument was always pure bullshit and won't become more true no matter which way you put it.

Given, we have this kind of stupidity here in Germany, other countries have their fair share of idiotism, but honestly, don't try to defend stupidity, you're making a fool of yourself. And that's not me saying gore & violence should be free and easily obtainable, but there's one hell of a difference between strict law and censorship.

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ahcos wrote:

Oh i understood what you wrote and i also understood that it's plain wrong.

The fact that you have to CENSOR your art here in Germany to get it to the public the way you want is hilarious. Again, look at Austria or Sweden, i can't recall them being more "harmed" by having no censorship. That argument was always pure bullshit and won't become more true no matter which way you put it.

Given, we have this kind of stupidity here in Germany, other countries have their fair share of idiotism, but honestly, don't try to defend stupidity, you're making a fool of yourself. And that's not me saying gore & violence should be free and easily obtainable, but there's one hell of a difference between strict law and censorship.

Sorry man. You want to discuss opinions. I want to discuss facts. Not going to discuss any further. Please don't take it personally. Two different worlds ;)

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The fact that you have to CENSOR your art here in Germany to get it to the public the way you want is hilarious. Again, look at Austria or Sweden, i can't recall them being more "harmed" by having no censorship. That argument was always pure bullshit and won't become more true no matter which way you put it.


Given, we have this kind of stupidity here in Germany, other countries have their fair share of idiotism, but honestly, don't try to defend stupidity, you're making a fool of yourself. And that's not me saying gore & violence should be free and easily obtainable, but there's one hell of a difference between strict law and censorship.

Nobody has to censor games or movies. There is no censorship in Germany. You are either misinformed or are repeating dumb clickbait youtubers.


Again it's the publishers fault. Many publishers just sent in a censored versions to be rated because a rating costs high 4 to low 5 digit numbers. So wanting to rerate a title may go into the 6 digit numbers. That's something happened to GTA4, Dead Space, Saints Row 4 and so on. Titles that are expected to sell well.

Other publishers just sold their unrated version such as Clive Barchers Jericho or Shellshock 2. The first wasn't restricted and received an 18 rating the other got restricted.

Look at Fallout New Vegas it was precensored by Bethesda for the rating. The BPJM checked if it should be restricted because its violence. They said it's okay and oh wonder suddenly Bethesda sold uncensored Fallout New Vegas games and old versions received uncutpatches.


A restricted title(named "indiziert") isn't rated and is treated like an Adults only title in the USA. You can buy them only in special stores because marketchains refuse to sell them.

You are most likely too young to understand the establishment of the rating systems.
Till the beginning of the 80s only movies in theathers got rated, so movies to be banned from theathers meant the police came and seized the movies. That happened only a few times.

The the age of VHS and Betamax came. This resulted in kids being able to rent porn and the most violent movies from stores because there was no rating. And unlike Sweden or Austria Germany is a big country.(And you should know that Germany produced a lot of soft and hardcore pornmovies in the 70s which were mocked as "Fuckmovies")
So imagine a 7 year old kid goes to a video rental shop borrowed Disney's "The Rescuers" alongside porn and Mondos.

The Toy Industry wasn't helpful at all Movies like Robocop had toys marketet for kids.

Kids will be scarred for life watching such movies.
That actually happened and resulted in an establishment of the rating system.

The highest rating is an 18 rating but those media are only allowed to be "mildy dangerous" for minors because there are unresponsible vendors not checking for an ID.
The common way back then was older brother 16-18-->younger brother 10-13-->youngest kid 6-9.

The Index is just there to make sure there is no advertisement of moderatly or more dangerous stuff.
Porn is automatically restricted, so is more violent stuff.

Banned stuff are mostly stuff that would also affect adults, which includes Nazistuff(history), several special forms of Porn(Animal, Violence... while Childporn is the only thing also covered by law that you aren't allowed to own it) and extremly violent stuff like snuff.

A judge ruled out several years ago that if you order a banned title from a vendor specifically he isn't selling it because selling means he would sell many copies to randoms.


This case meant unless you want to obtain childpornogprahpy you are free to obtain whatever you like unless you are a minor.


So unless you are a minor German repeating stuff like: "Erfurt 2002 omg", "FSK /USK Nazis", "Zensurusla" "Winneden" because some clueless German clickbait youtuber like lefloid iblali talk this bullshit get the facts straight.


The Gamescomdemo of Hotlime Miami actually received an age 12 rating. You can be sure that no other country gave the playable demo such a low rating(well the final versions received age 18 ratings)

^ basically what he said but I disagree in one point: 'indiziert' (or AO in Murica) essentially means your game is ded on arrival. While theoretically you can still sell it, practically no store will be selling it and you aren't allowed to advertise your game, so you make no money. And that's the reason why publishers pre-emptively censor their games. Can you blame them for not throwing away a six figure amount to test the waters what's allowed and what isn't?

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ghamadvar wrote:

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ahcos wrote:

Oh i understood what you wrote and i also understood that it's plain wrong.

The fact that you have to CENSOR your art here in Germany to get it to the public the way you want is hilarious. Again, look at Austria or Sweden, i can't recall them being more "harmed" by having no censorship. That argument was always pure bullshit and won't become more true no matter which way you put it.

Given, we have this kind of stupidity here in Germany, other countries have their fair share of idiotism, but honestly, don't try to defend stupidity, you're making a fool of yourself. And that's not me saying gore & violence should be free and easily obtainable, but there's one hell of a difference between strict law and censorship.

Sorry man. You want to discuss opinions. I want to discuss facts. Not going to discuss any further. Please don't take it personally. Two different worlds ;)

Give me a single fact and i might take you serious. Otherwise, deal with the facts that i stated already and don't try to get out of this one by trying to ridicule what i'm presenting.

@Hilbert:

Thanks, but there's still the fact that in german TV, there are up to 10 (or even more) minutes of certain movie scenes missing. If you don't call that censorship, then well, i don't know what to say to you. Seems we have completely different views on that subject. If a legal administration forces artists to self-censor in order to avoid possible conflicts with the law, then this is censorship. This has nothing to do with "youtube clickbaits" or so, because honestly i don't even know what you're refering to. I'm certainly old enough to have my own oppionion, tyvm, and i can read (and actually do so).

Hilbert named all the facts. But you just seem to don't get it at all: The movies you mentioned are cut in german TV because they are targeted at a younger audience. If you rent the 18+ version or the index-version, you will see all the gore that you call "art". It's like soft- and hardcore-porn. If you see a porn-movie in tv, it is cut. So that it can be softporn, rated 16.

But_It_Is_No_Censorship. At all. Maybe it's a bad decision of the station to show the mutilated movie ("Blade" comes to mind where nearly the whole end-fight is cut out). But that's all. As i said: You have an opinion. That's okay. But you don't know the facts. You are mixing up words, you are misleading or are mislead. That's all. Maybe you just check the rules, laws and circumstances regarding age-ratings again. And don't follow all the clickbait and so called "opinions" of gaming-magazines. Especially those in germany. They suck.

Fun fact: Age-restrictions are one of the tools to allow artistic freedom. Imagine a world where everyone has to do 16+ art only...Or 12+!
Think about it ;)
The problem is the money and the artist. 18+ has not the reach of 16+. Less reach means less money. That's in 99% of the cases the only reason, products get "censored" as you would say.

If you wish a world without any laws regarding age-restrictions: well, as is said - you obviously don't have children. And you obviously want a world where people have no guidelines what to expect from a movie or game. Man would they have some bad times...

So, i answered you. Not because i want you to take me serious. Just for not being called a back-off-guy ;)

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Thanks, but there's still the fact that in german TV, there are up to 10 (or even more) minutes of certain movie scenes missing. If you don't call that censorship, then well, i don't know what to say to you. Seems we have completely different views on that subject. If a legal administration forces artists to self-censor in order to avoid possible conflicts with the law, then this is censorship. This has nothing to do with "youtube clickbaits" or so, because honestly i don't even know what you're refering to. I'm certainly old enough to have my own oppionion, tyvm, and i can read (and actually do so).

As simple it is. They cut popular movies for better ratings. A movie getting rated age 16 might be cut so it might be aired earlier.
Blame broadcasting stations for being greedy-

If you are talking about restricted movivies there is another issue.
Because TV Station had to ask for permission to send restricted and that costs money(so only a few broadcasting stations like Arte do that). In the 90s they did it with many restricted 80s actions flicks.

Unrated versions can actually be treated as age 18 movies if they haven't been restricted. So some years ago The hills have eyes 2 was shown uncensored despite the movie being unrated because it didn't receive a rating.

Only banned movies mustn't be shown under any circumstances in an uncut versions. There are only 2 banned movies that were broadcasted in TV. Voyeur.com has been broadcasted several times before it was banned, while it was only restricted.

And the other thing was a mistake that some broadcoasting station accidently has shown the uncut version of a banned movie and received a lot of trouble(aka pay those large fines).
I am not sure anymore which movie it was I think it was Evil Dead or Halloween 2.

TV is purely economical nowdays. Cheap production costs for max profit. You can compare it to the "Bad Word" list in US TV, which result in fines when you say "Fuck" "Shit"... and it isn't beeped.
Nothing prevents broadcoasting stations to ask for permission. But those movies have to be broadcasted after 11PM and you can be sure the ratings will be low so the ads barely surpass the money they had to pay for permission.


The reason the DVD market isn't destroyed here like in the USA are the broadcasting stations and the lack of good streaming services(the current ones let you watch 20 minute ads for a 40 minute episode)

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Xavderion wrote:

^ basically what he said but I disagree in one point: 'indiziert' (or AO in Murica) essentially means your game is ded on arrival. While theoretically you can still sell it, practically no store will be selling it and you aren't allowed to advertise your game, so you make no money. And that's the reason why publishers pre-emptively censor their games. Can you blame them for not throwing away a six figure amount to test the waters what's allowed and what isn't?

The "Bad" press will do that for you. See Hatred.

http://n4g.com/news/1734728/love-it-or-hate-it-hatred-shoots-to-the-top-of-steams-best-seller-list

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Hilbert wrote:

Banned games here are only: Condemned 1&2, Dead Rising 1&2(most likely 3 soon), L4D 2, Manhunt 1&2,Mortal Kombat 1,2,3 & 2011(the new one is only restricted so far but will most likely be banned), Silent Hill Homecoming(the irony is that the censored version is censored in only 2 cutscenes/QTE only) and Soldier of Fortune Payback.

There are several other games here that are waiting for a decision if the game should be banned or not but some cases are so old that everybody forgot about the game anyway.

There are a few games banned for Nazi symbols such as Wolfenstein series, Commandos and Mortyr.

"Banned games here are only"

To me this is absolutely terrifying. I new UK and Australia was bad, thought Germany was better.

there is no difference in games being actively censored and companies censoring their games in advance to prevent being censored/restricted.

because the reasons for both are the actual censoring rules of the government.

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rondanashu wrote:

To me this is absolutely terrifying. I new UK and Australia was bad, thought Germany was better.

it's actually worse: in the uk they use "censored in germany" as a means for advertisement. the only free thing in germany is speeding on some parts of the motorway...