This Week in Games

Censorship in Japan

Welcome back, folks! With February, it's finally Black History Month. It's a good time to read up on the many important Black members of the game industry who have shaped our hobby. This can include voice actors like Cree Summers or John Eric Bentley, industry figures like Reggie Fils-Aimé, or the esteemed Jerry Lawson—the man who invented interchangeable media for video game consoles, changing the face of the industry forever and charting the course for games to be released on cassette tapes, diskettes, MyCards, cartridges—and eventually CDs and flash cartridges. Every time you slap a Super Mario RPG: Legend of the Seven Stars cartridge into your Super Nintendo with its Super Accelerator 1 chip, that's because of the work Jerry Lawson pioneered. Also, someone was nice enough to tag me in some Izuna fanart over the weekend. I appreciate that people think of me whenever they see Izuna somewhere. At this rate, once we hear something, I'll find out from all the people pinging me about it.

It's been a while since we last heard anything about Mega Man from CAPCOM. The last big move on their behalf would've been Mega Man Battle Network Legacy Collection—which netted itself recognition for being the fastest-selling game in the series to the tune of one million copies sold in one week. Nothing to turn your nose up at, to be sure. There's more good news for the Blue Bomber—according to CAPCOM's recently updated Platinum List, a registry of all their titles that have sold over one million copies, Mega Man 11 has sold two million copies. That currently puts it as the best-selling game in the whole series.

What does this mean? A few things need to be taken into consideration. For starters, Mega Man 11 came out in 2018. Six years is a very long time for the industry; while any random CEO will likely plug their ears and go, "La-la-la-la, I can't hear you!" it shows that the long road can be successful for games. Consider 13 Sentinels: Aegis Rim, which took a few years to build its reputation and reach 1 million units sold. Also, consider Grand Theft Auto Online, one of the most lucrative games in the series—and also a game that's been out for the better part of a decade, giving it actual time to build up that profit. Good luck finding a studio that's willing to sit on a game for a few years while it breaks even—WayForward Tech is pretty good at focusing on getting their one game across every platform, one step at a time, but not a lot of people can afford that kind of deliberation.

Second, there's still a ton of demand for Mega Man. Sure, folks still meme on how much they want Mega Man Legends 3, but hey, there's still room for jaunty action-platformers like Mega Man. Maybe not enough to make Mega Man a top-seller, definitely not something you can hang on a triple-A rung—but something people would look forward to every two years or so. The model would collapse if CAPCOM tried supporting five spin-offs as they did in the mid-00s—the industry just doesn't have that kind of money or attention span. But keeping it to one Mega Man title in a while, with maybe an extra Mega Man X? That could work. It wouldn't make gangbusters, but it would make a reliable amount of money.

CAPCOM has proven that they're serious about their desires to emphasize some of their older franchises, what with the one-two punch of the announcement of the Okami sequel and Dino Crisis 1 and 2 getting new GOG ports. I think a new Mega Man game wouldn't be too hard to squeeze in with whatever plans they have. A smaller, multi-platform title that does well enough would appeal to any studio.

I don't think we'll ever be guaranteed a Mega Man Legends 3 out of this deal. A Mega Man 12 is more likely, or maybe even a Mega Man X9. CAPCOM definitely won't be overextending Mega Man with all the spin-offs we saw in the '00s—Mega Man X: Command Mission, Mega Man: Battle & Chase, none of that. More's the pity, I liked Command Mission, but thems the breaks. Not much more can be done, but wait and see what CAPCOM does—but 2 million units have to have a few bigwigs furrowing their eyebrows.

While on the subject of CAPCOM and them not messing around with their older franchises, CAPCOM also held a CAPCOM Spotlight earlier this week. While most of the stream was dedicated to updates on Monster Hunter, we also got a trailer for a new remaster for Onimusha 2: Samurai's Destiny. It's coming in a bit late after the Onimusha 1 remaster from 2018, but I'll chalk that up to CAPCOM sensing a change in the winds. At this rate, there's a chance they might even get around to Onimusha 3, which co-starred the likeness of everyone's favorite not-actually-French-actor Jean Reno! Assuming the likeness rights don't cause folks trouble, anyway.

What really might excite people to hear is the upcoming release of CAPCOM Fighting Collection 2! These CAPCOM collections have been scratching the itches for a lot of people, even if you're not that interested in Marvel Vs CAPCOM. Fighting Game Collection 2 is loaded with fan favorites that might make it the best one yet. CAPCOM Fighting Evolution is fairly maligned and I've never met a Plasma Blade: Nightmare of Bilstein fan... but this set also promises to include Project Justice—a.k.a., Rival Schools. The set also includes both Power Stone titles, an updated version of Street Fighter Alpha 3, and both CAPCOM Vs SNK games.

Power Stone and Project Justice are incredible games. CAPCOM fans have hungered after them for ages. But CAPCOM Vs. SNK makes this set indispensable for fighting game fans; those are some of the best fighting games ever made. Ignoring the piles of fan service in both titles (like Ken tossing Terry Bogard his cap at the start of a round), the Groove system allows for all kinds of customization in how these characters play. I'm not a huge fan of the roster for obvious balancing reasons that I'm assuming are from an over-correction on CAPCOM's behalf after they saw what folks were doing with Magneto, Dr. Doom, and Sentinel in Marvel Vs. CAPCOM 2. See, each character in CAPCOM Vs. SNK is given a "cost" of one to four points, usually based around their basic power. Your roster for each match caps at four points, forcing you to be strategic to play a tag-style match. Heavy hitters like Geese Howard or Akuma will take up all four points, but obvious "weaker" characters like Nakoruru will only cost one. I see the logic behind the system, and I know why it was implemented, but it never felt good to use. There will always be something wrong with one of these masterpieces.

CAPCOM Fighting Collection 2 also includes a ton of other bonuses that we can take as standard: replicas of arcade marquees for each game, rollback netcode, training modes complete with hitboxes, and a complete soundtrack for each game (the trailer winkingly let us know that CAPCOM Vs SNK 2's "tuna with bacon" is included among them). Look forward to this one later this year.

Even if you don't recognize the name Takaya Imamura, you know his work. While he left Nintendo in 2021, Imamura's resumé includes artwork and supervisory roles on F-Zero and Star Fox—notably credited as art director for The Legend of Zelda: Majora's Mask. Late last week, Imamura published a blog entry wherein he explained his decision to leave Nintendo. It wasn't anything scandalous; Imamura had always wanted to transition into a freelance role once he reached a certain age. But Imamura does make a rather poignant statement in his writing.

"Nintendo is still in good hands, thanks to the many charismatic developers who have created major hits," Imamura says. "But the idea that 'as long as we have popular IPs, we'll be fine!' is a big mistake. It's crucial not to forget the talented individuals who uphold the value of those IPs."

As far as I know, Nintendo is a pretty sweet place to work in Japan; their employee retention rate is the highest in all of Japan, at an astounding 98% (for reference, the average employee retention rate across Japan is 70%). Nintendo also does a good job of educating and training its developers. Still, people have put up a very valid criticism towards Nintendo in the past few years: who actually makes these games?

Think about this. Imamura himself has a fairly stellar resumé, but how many of you knew his name before I mentioned him today? Think of all of the other artists and sound engineers working at Nintendo who might be responsible for a character design you love or a song you're attached to. Nintendo has done well in recognizing its many longtime talents—Koji Kondo, Kazumi Totaka, Eiji Aonuma, and Shigeru Miyamoto. But—who's the new blood? James Turner made a name for himself following his work in Pokémon Black/White, being the first foreign artist to work for GAME FREAK. His contributions became instrumental to the United Kingdom-inspired Pokémon Sword/Shield games, and he recently worked on The Plucky Squire (which you should play). But he's from GAME FREAK, not Nintendo. Who are the up-and-coming artists following in Koji Kondo's footsteps?

A lot of digital ink has been spilled over Nintendo's secrecy about its developers. A lot of it isn't Nintendo being nefarious—that's just how Japanese companies work. Few people will have a social media presence to avoid the possibility of making The Company™ look bad. If you look at how American fans handle things like "Dexit" or Smash Bros. character reveals, you'd be forgiven for keeping your team in a panic room. But big corporations don't make games; developers do. You could follow Totaka courtesy of his signature song being an Easter egg in so many Nintendo games. Aonuma regularly got called in by the press to make appearances. They all had humble beginnings; who's to say someone working on the audio design for Tears of the Kingdom won't be the next Satoru Iwata?

I'm not using Iwata's name lightly, either; the other side of the coin is the sad truth that sooner or later, these talents won't remain at Nintendo. Shigeru Miyamoto is 72 years old. Koji Kondo is 63. Eiji Aonuma is 61. The Switch 2 will likely be the last console that sees these men working on Nintendo games. So what will happen to Nintendo once these industry figureheads aren't there anymore? Is the Nintendo "spirit" tied to these men (who mostly hold advisory positions at this point anyway)? Or does it remain with the spirit of quality and appreciation of play that fuels Mario Party Jamboree? And if so, what is Nintendo doing to keep that alive—especially once its bigger names are gone? Nobody can fill Miyamoto's shoes, but they can keep his philosophy alive.

Imamura's is a stark warning, I think. And it's rather specific to Nintendo. Other companies are a bit better at rallying around and showcasing their developers. From Clover, you have Hideaki Kamiya and Ikumi Nakamura. In the last column, we talked about Tomonobu Itagaki. GAME FREAK still has figures like Junichi Masuda and Satoshi Tajiri. We see talent cultivated and celebrated once their work comes to light. Does it make the games better? No. In the cases of some of these people, it paints a target on their backs (to hear some people talk, Masuda's only achievement is "ruining Pokémon"). But creative endeavors have and will always have one thing at their core: someone making something in the spirit of putting it out there. A feeling, an idea, an observation about the world. Even the most cynical game allegedly made with "no artistic intent" reflects how the creator views the world—which is a central artistic thesis. Why not lean into that and show us who made the games we love?

It's not something I can resolve within the confines of a few paragraphs of a weekly gaming column—but I think Imamura's left plenty to put a bug in our ear.

The topic of game censorship is difficult to discuss because it's been kicked into the dirt by reactionary opportunists. But on its face, it's a truth of the industry: there have been times when games from abroad had their content changed to comply with cultural standards or social mores in the United States. Depictions of blood are too much in a Zelda game? Change it from red to green. Beating a woman in a side-scroller too awkward? Redesign the sprite as a man. Can't get away with Hitler being the bad guy in your game? Just call him "Master-D." While many are familiar with what this looks like, in America, an angle that this discussion seldom covers is the other side of the equation: what happens when an American game needs content alteration for a Japanese market to comply with their industry standards or social mores?

It's not a rare phenomenon, either! It's a lot less common now that so many IP are multinational. There are concerted efforts to maintain brand parity across national borders, but long-time Japanese Beast Wars fans were hounding for Transformers: Rise of the Beasts to be a "voice actor lawless zone" where Beast Convoy (Optimus Primal's Japanese name) performed his iconic "Yvonco Pettanko" song. Cartoon watchers of a certain age might know Dr. Doom as "Akuma Hakase," best known for speaking with a Nagoyan accent as he does battle against the Science Ninja Gomess, Ganrock, Fireboy, and Suzie. (Yeah, that's what the Fantastic Four were called.) But we're not here to talk about cartoons specifically—I cover games here at This Week in Games; it's in the title.

Let's start with an easy one. It's long been known that Japanese media has an aversion to depicting characters with four-fingered hands. This is problematic because giving characters four fingers is a common artistic decision in the United States, purely because drawing a hand with four fingers is easier. A common conception is that this is to avoid references to the yakuza—given the yakuza practice of cutting off your pinkie. And strictly speaking, it's not untrue, but it's not the whole of the thing. It has more to do with the burakumin. The buraku were considered the lowest of the low-caste from Japan's medieval era who carried the reputation of being "unclean" due to working "filthy" jobs like butchery or leather tanning. Their reputation sadly carries with them to this day; many Japanese citizens still carry the reputation of being burakumin due to their ancestry, and identifying as such can still get you denied for many jobs or even marriage certification—even today. A common way to refer to burakumin is by holding up four fingers; the four fingers representing an animal's four legs.

A good example where this had to be fixed would be with Oddworld: Abe's Odyssey. Protagonist Abe and other Mudokons like him have non-humanoid four-fingered hands (Abe himself refers to it as a "paw"). This becomes a significant point in Abe's journey as he looks at the moon for the first time and notices that it features a massive imprint shaped like his own hand. It's a powerful moment in the series... but it had to be changed in Japan, given the stigma towards four fingers. In the name of ensuring the Oddworld series could enjoy better sales in Japan, series creator Lorne Lanning even went ahead and canonized Mudokons having only three fingers in Abe's Exodus (though this has been reversed as of the New 'n Tasty remake).

And Oddworld wasn't alone in this; famously, Sony's Fat Princess had its Japanese release date pushed back while the art assets were changed to give the cast an extra finger. Japanese media is just really, really careful not to depict anyone with four fingers. You can see it a bit with works like Osamatsu-San, where even with the "simpler" art style, the characters nevertheless have five fingers. Japan would rather have full fingers or no fingers, a la Anpanman.

Japan can also be a bit more sensitive about works that might be seen as touching upon current events. Anime fans might be familiar with this; it's what led to things like the infamous School Days "Nice Boat" incident or CLAMP simply deciding to put the X/1999 manga on indefinite hiatus. In researching this topic, a curious name popped up: Crash Bandicoot. You might be wondering what li'l ol' Crash could've done to ruffle feathers in Japan, especially since Japan was responsible for adding plenty of character to Crash (specifically, Crash's iconic victory dance came from the first game's Japanese commercials). The change itself wasn't a huge one, mind; one of the deaths in Crash Bandicoot 2: Cortex Strikes Back was omitted. The death animation was after being flattened by a falling log, Crash turns into a head on a cartoonishly-flattened pair of feet. This animation was omitted in Japan due to the then-recent Kobe child murders, wherein one of the victims had been decapitated.

Japan's rating board, CERO, is known for being more stringent in its demands than the United States' ESRB is. Graphic violence is far more restricted in Japan than in other territories. Famously, certain games that feature excessive gore like The Callisto Protocol are just outright refused for ratings in Japan; while not an official ban, this does prohibit the game from being sold akin to a video game in the United States not being given an ESRB rating, since no vendor would dare risk the liability of selling an unrated game. As it turns out, the ESRB and CERO are pretty good for making sure vendors have a bit of protection; the rating on the box tells the buyer all the potentially objectionable content, so it's on the consumer if they bought The Mask and got blind-sided by "cartoon mischief." Most vendors don't want the negative heat from selling an Adult-Only game (or a "Z"-rated game, as they'd be rated under CERO). All this to say that being too extreme to be considered for rating puts a game at significant risk.

So when it comes to violence in Japanese games, Japanese releases play it cautiously when it comes to gore. Lollipop Chainsaw is a great example: while the US release plays up the grindhouse-style gore and violence, the Japanese release relies upon cutesy glitter, sparkles, and beams of light to tone it all down, going so far as to avoid showing decapitated heads or bloodied stumps (the severed bits are painted black instead of red). This goes on to explain the Lollipop Chainsaw: RePOP remake's "RePOP" mode, which allows you to choose between the gore or the glitter. Other games with extreme amounts of violence, like Metal Gear Rising: Revengeance or Resident Evil 4, also have the violence toned down for their Japanese releases. When you're playing the American versions of these Japanese games, you're playing a game that's more extreme than the Japanese release! (Apparently, it's also possible to access the American levels of violence by swapping regions from Japanese to English.)

The targets of violence can also be a point of contention. Bear with me; it turns out Call of Duty has fans in Japan, and Square Enix handles the localization for the games in Japan. I know, weird, especially given the massive lines in the sand American audiences make between first-person shooters and the famously RPG-centric Square. Call of Duty: World at War was a famously contentious point for the series since it's about World War II. For people who fell asleep during history class, Japan took part in World War II, so many of World at War's levels took place in Japan against the Japanese army. Given the gory violence in World at War (in addition to the landmine of its setting), it's no wonder the game was refused for sale in Japan. Still, Japanese fans really like Call of Duty, so the ban was quickly reversed, and it was sold in Japan with toned-down violence and all Nazi imagery removed.

Historical context can also be a major bugbear. I would imagine people wouldn't need too much context on Japan's strained relationship with nuclear weaponry. But suffice to say that quips about nuclear bombs don't quite go over as well in Japan as they do in the United States. So when you've got a series like Fallout, which goes all-in on the Dr. Strangelove-esque black humor on nuclear devastation and society struggling to survive in an irradiated post-apocalyptic wasteland... you understandably need a bit of tact. So it shouldn't be any surprise to readers that the Power of the Atom side-quest in Fallout 3 was changed in Japan to outright remove the NPC Mr. Burke, which locks you out of the option to trigger the nuclear bomb in the middle of the settlement of Megaton. (Curiously, Fallout's signature gory dismemberments via the V.A.T.S. system were left intact.) The "Fat Man" weapon was also renamed the "Nuka Launcher", since "Fat Man" was one of the two nuclear bombs dropped on Japan in the first place.

This is far from comprehensive, but it shows that a lot of nuance in this discussion gets overlooked. Cultural values and social mores differ across countries, that's just a matter of fact. There's a good conversation to be had about how to import media from abroad while staying within cultural boundaries but not erasing the "core" of the story.

Back to Japanese Beast Wars, have you guys heard the intro? It slaps.

Fans of Bandai Namco's Gods Eater franchise are currently celebrating its 15th anniversary! Bandai Namco shared some pretty art to commemorate the event. I wonder if this means a new game is coming down the pipes...

The CAPCOM Showcase also confirmed two returning monsters for Monster Hunter Wilds—and of course, they're two of my favorites. Look forward to fighting the arachnid Temnoceran Nerscylla and the freaky Gore Magala!

Landmark visual novel Tokimeki Memorial: forever with you Emotional gets a release date! Look forward to it on May 8. This would be a phenomenal opportunity for Konami to release a Tokimeki Memorial game in the United States...

That'll do it for this week. How have you guys been doing? Have you made sure to eat anything yet? Remember to find time to do something that doesn't involve a screen. It's always a good time to pick up a new hobby. If you have a Gunpla kit lying around, this is your sign to dust it off and assemble it! Don't sweat the painting or panel lining, just build the darn thing! You'll be a lot happier when you're done and have something you can be proud of. (Also, showing off Gunpla kits is a surprisingly effective way to meet people.) Give yourself some time to try something new or to disconnect. Then jump back into the fray when you're done. Be good to each other, I'll see you in seven.

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This Week In Games! is written from idyllic Portland by Jean-Karlo Lemus. When not collaborating with Anime News Network, Jean-Karlo can be found playing JRPGs, eating popcorn, watching v-tubers, and tokusatsu. You can keep up with him at @ventcard.bsky.social.

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