Sony forces Japanese developers to censor sexual content - For Japanese audiences too.

[Truthspeaker]

And tbh, even though they’re being somewhat modest now, MS aren’t exactly a humble publisher either. The reason Sony eclipsed them in 2012 or so to begin with was because the Kinect was hot garbage and MS slowed down production of major exclusives in favor of Kinect shovelware

It's best to treat publishing companies with as little respect as possible. They're all capable of utter fuckery at a moment's notice, and deserved to be punished for it.

I get why MS bet on the Kinect, the Wii was making waves back then, and they needed something to compete with it in the casual games market. Like in comparison, Sony was far lazier with their PS Move, and that didn't go anywhere either.

What I will never get is why it bet that big and that hard on it though, like it was a very big part of why the XB1 flopped (pretty sure we can say that by now).

It was probably because of how well the Wii did at launch in the previous generation. It's easy to forget now, but the Wii sold by far the best of any console of its generation, and the gap was far wider during the early years of the PS3/360/Wii era. Microsoft must've thought the Kinect'd do even better, since it automatically enabled multiplayer support with a single device.

Except the Wii was cheap, and its novelty had already long worn off in the public eye before the next console generation had been announced. The novelty of the Kinect wore off even faster, since it was released before the Xbone, and people already had a chance to get to know how it was even shittier and less immersive than any version of the Wiimote.

I'm sure there were other contributing factors. The rise of the smartphone and tablets also crippled the appeal of products like the Wii and the Kinect, but I maintain the above paragraph's definitely the prime explanation.

 

[UE 558]

I get why MS bet on the Kinect, the Wii was making waves back then, and they needed something to compete with it in the casual games market. Like in comparison, Sony was far lazier with their PS Move, and that didn't go anywhere either.

What I will never get is why it bet that big and that hard on it though, like it was a very big part of why the XB1 flopped (pretty sure we can say that by now).

More or less, PS Move was quite shit too, but Sony at least backed out of it early and basically repurposed it into a PS VR accessory without even bothering to enhance the specs for PS4, MS went HARD with the Kinect, making two unique iterations and originally attempting to make Kinect mandatory for XB1

 

[Judge Dredd]

Tbf, PS3 did eclipse 360 in the end, though that was mainly because Sony’s first parties began picking up the pace with exclusives around 2009 or so, meanwhile, MS started to fly off the rails around that time, since they began shifting attention away from exclusives in favor of the trashfire that was Kinect.

I'd put the 360s downfall later, but one thing I think is worth mentioning is that when Netflix became popular the 360 was what most people were using for it. This gave MS the brilliant idea to try and turn the 360 into a multimedia box. By the end of it's lifespan the 360 dashboard was a barely functional bloated mess of ads for sports and films no one cared about.

I can't speak for others, but once the PS3 was cheap, the ability to use stock hard drives and the lack of a region lock made it a no brainer. Though I'm the only person I know who actually went ahead and bought imports for the thing. It's like backwards compatibility or the ability to rip CDs. Everybody claims to want it, but only a few people actually use it.

And IMO, Sony pretty much has earned the right to be smug when it comes to the home console market, they pretty much boast the best record of any other hardware maker, dunno whether that influences the outcome of the next console war tho.

If there's one cycle throughout consoles is that a company will get a lead, become arrogant and start doing stupid shit (stopping crossplay, censoring games) and then be harshly punished for it next gen.

 

[UE 558]

If there's one cycle throughout consoles is that a company will get a lead, become arrogant and start doing stupid shit (stopping crossplay, censoring games) and then be harshly punished for it next gen.

In the early 8th gen we kinda got a double whammy of that, we got all of MS’s fuckery with multimedia, the kinect, and their assbackwards pre-2017 indie game policies and we had Nintendo sort of expecting people to buy WiiUs just because it was part of the “Wii” line and devs having trouble making games for it early on because Nintendo just sort of threw dev kits at them and expected them to figure out the rest on their own

 

[AbyssStarer]

Here's another example of Sony's arrogance

(here's an article about it from Eurogamer)

They were so certain that the Playstation Vita would sell based on its specs that they ran this tasteless ad in 2012. Makes it more funny that they called the 3DS a babysitting tool when it massively outstripped the Vita in sales.
They should have known that specs don't sell a system when their PS2 outsold the Gamecube. It's games (or DVD capability), and they lost Monster Hunter to the 3DS. That in itself is probably what prompted them to make Monster Hunter World a Playstation 4 exclusive in Japan.

I like trashy, middle market lewd games, dumb ones where the character portraits are 80% skin and they beat up monster girls, and if they don't want the games I like then I won't get their systems. My favorite series are going multiplat on the Switch anyway.

 

[The Demon Pimp of Razgriz]

I can't speak for others, but once the PS3 was cheap, the ability to use stock hard drives and the lack of a region lock made it a no brainer. Though I'm the only person I know who actually went ahead and bought imports for the thing. It's like backwards compatibility or the ability to rip CDs. Everybody claims to want it, but only a few people actually use it.

One other thing the PS3 had going for it is that its online service was free, whereas Xbox Live required you to pay to play online, even though the console was ad ridden. I almost considered getting it for that alone towards the end of its console cycle; then Sony threw its middle finger up and started charging for their previously free service anyway when the PS4 came out. Haven't looked back at Sony consoles since. The only reason I'd get a PS4 would be to get Bloodborne, and I wouldn't buy the console, I'd buy it secondhand.

Anything else is inconsequential

Not completely true. As Nintendo learned, censorship is an issue for many people, and it gives ammo to your opponents. Sony it practically spitting in the face of an entire subset of the market, a subset whose users and, more worringly for them, whose companies, may simply balk and leave the console in droves. The Switch is established now, and PC is becoming less of an afterthought Japanese companies. They are only helping their opponents and damaging their sells.

 

[UE 558]

That in itself is probably what prompted them to make Monster Hunter World a Playstation 4 exclusive in Japan.

Tbf, Xbone releases of multiplats have been a rarity in Japan since like 2015, most of the major Japanese multiplats will usually do PC and PS4 for Japan and only release the Xbone version in the west just because they know that it’s not gonna sell over there. Gotta keep in mind that in Japan, Xbone was a catastrophic failure that hasn’t even surpassed the 1 million mark

The only reason I'd get a PS4 would be to get Bloodborne, and I wouldn't buy the console, I'd buy it secondhand.

Meh, I still like many of Sony’s first party single player games like a good little soy filled nigger, my mine gripe lies in the company publishing them.

One other thing the PS3 had going for it is that its online service was free, whereas Xbox Live required you to pay to play online, even though the console was ad ridden. I almost considered getting it for that alone towards the end of its console cycle; then Sony threw its middle finger up and started charging for their previously free service anyway when the PS4 came out.

Yes, the PS3’s servers were free unlike PS4, 360, and Xbone, but they were also kinda awful compared to the fee’d servers. High pings were very common, as were lag, crashes, and disconnects. Also, hackers and cheaters were super common in PS3’s online games. Not saying it was right for Sony to charge on PS4, but at the same time I have a feeling that PS3 servers were only free because Sony knew they were shit and gave zero fucks about improving them. Thankfully, most of my library on both PS3 and PS4 consists of shit I can play either alone or with an irl friend.

 

[Done]

One other thing the PS3 had going for it is that its online service was free, whereas Xbox Live required you to pay to play online, even though the console was ad ridden. I almost considered getting it for that alone towards the end of its console cycle; then Sony threw its middle finger up and started charging for their previously free service anyway when the PS4 came out. Haven't looked back at Sony consoles since. The only reason I'd get a PS4 would be to get Bloodborne, and I wouldn't buy the console, I'd buy it secondhand.


Not completely true. As Nintendo learned, censorship is an issue for many people, and it gives ammo to your opponents. Sony it practically spitting in the face of an entire subset of the market, a subset whose users and, more worringly for them, whose companies, may simply balk and leave the console in droves. The Switch is established now, and PC is becoming less of an afterthought Japanese companies. They are only helping their opponents and damaging their sells.

How did Nintendo learn that censorship is bad? They only really lost out on MK1 sales way back when (which is literally one game), then they opened it up and got more sales in the 2nd installment.

It's not like the SNES failed because blood was censored in MK1.

 

[vertexwindi]

How did Nintendo learn that censorship is bad?

By having all their former third-party developers leave for the Playstation instead. N64 sold only 33 million consoles, the PS1 over a 100 million. Took them until the Wii to have them (begrudgingly) return, then they fled again when the Wii U hit the scene.

 

[The Demon Pimp of Razgriz]

Yes, the PS3’s servers were free unlike PS4 and 360, and Xbone, but they were also kinda awful compared to the fee’d servers. High pings were very common, as were lag, crashes, and disconnects. Also, hackers and cheaters were super common in PS3’s online games. Not saying it was right for Sony to charge on PS4, but at the same time I have a feeling that PS3 servers were free because they were shit and Sony gave zero fucks about improving them. Thankfully, most of my library on both PS3 and PS4 consists of shit I can play either alone or with an irl friend.

I wouldn't quite call Sony's paid online as it is now anything to write home about, but that's just me. I get what you're saying though.

How did Nintendo learn that censorship is bad? They only really lost out on MK1 sales way back when (which is literally one game), then they opened it up and got more sales in the 2nd installment.

It's not like the SNES failed because blood was censored in MK1.

Are they censoring third party games now? Even their own internal censorship, while still present in some titles, is not what it used to be, for example the company is willing to publish M rated titles, something they would not have done for the N64 or prior consoles (and don't say Conker's Bad Fur Day, they didn't actually publish that, Rare did. Eternal Darkness was Nintendo's first M rated game). As @bigniggerdicklover said, third parties left for much less restrictive systems, like the Playstation, and Nintendo gained its reputation as the "kiddie console maker". Well, that appellation is starting to look less and less appropriate for them.

 

[UE 558]

I wouldn't quite call Sony's paid online as it is now anything to write home about, but that's just me. I get what you're saying though.

Same, but they’re at least functional, with PS3 on the other hand, not being able to get through a single match in an FPS or fighting game was extremely common. I can assure you that Sony would’ve made PS+ mandatory for online on PS3 if their servers were less shit

 

[BrokenWokenBespoken]

So the real reason why Sony are censoring games with lewd themes isn't because of old and tiresome 'think of the children' argument but because of fear of getting any backlash from the #MeToo movement?

You know the sad thing from all of this that I would at least have some respect left for Sony if they just did stuck with the 'think of the children' excuse rather than seeing them just caving in to a hate mob that has declared a war on men in general.

It's really sad when Nintendo (a company that is known for being family friendly) really doesn't give a shit now about lewd and sexual themes in many of the video games that are developed by a third party as they now allow them uncensored on their platforms while Sony does a 180 and decided to pick up the outdated censorship policy that Nintendo used back in the early 2000's and screw over both their fans as well as screwing over many of their own business partners in the long run.

All this will do in the long run is drive away many of Sony's fans to other platforms and most importantly this stupid shit will eventually drive away many of Sony's business partners to their competitors as well. See if you piss off your fans and they start to leave you then it's easy to get them back when you give them what they want but when you piss off your business partners then it's very difficult to get them back because they don't want to really risk losing more of their own money working with you after the fact.

So Sony can rot for all I care, unless they wake up and realize that their stupid censorship policy will hinder them in the long run and they may go down the path of Sega down the line.

Press Pandering at it's finest, they figure so long as the press is on their side this portion of the fanbase needs to lose relevance in their market by any means necessary. Sony had hoped the Vita was going to be for killer apps, instead it was kept alive by VNs and games with touching mechanics.

Tbf, PS3 did eclipse 360 in the end, though that was mainly because Sony’s first parties began picking up the pace with exclusives around 2009 or so, meanwhile, MS started to fly off the rails around that time, since they began shifting attention away from exclusives in favor of the trashfire that was Kinect.


Still better than Sargoon capo Bill Usher reeeeing about Mortal Kombat tiddees all hours of the night while also telling us in TRUE AND HONEST detail about his favorite hentai games

Orselli and Usher are on the two different sides on the same coin. Niche shares the same fanbase and comment as OAG as the article has the usual lot of angry weebs screeching with Usher like any other article related to Japanese shit.

 

[Done]

By having all their former third-party developers leave for the Playstation instead. N64 sold only 33 million consoles, the PS1 over a 100 million. Took them until the Wii to have them (begrudgingly) return, then they fled again when the Wii U hit the scene.

That was because of them sticking with the Cartridge, and wanting to charge devs more money. Censorship played zero part in that my dude.

They later made it worse by going with those weird minidiscs when designing the GameCube.

 

[UE 558]

Orselli and Usher are on the two different sides on the same coin. Niche shares the same fanbase and comment as OAG as the article has the usual lot of angry weebs screeching with Usher like any other article related to Japanese shit.

Though, NG kinda behaves like fags such as QuarterPounder or NoBullshit, in that they’re “anti-SJW”, but in a way that’s just milquetoast and bland enough to prevent advertisers from being scared away, while Usher seems more like he at least BELIEVES the autistic shit he spews and isn’t completely in it for the sake of scamming fat KIA neets out of their hard earned disability checks

 

[The Demon Pimp of Razgriz]

They later made it worse by going with those weird minidiscs when designing the GameCube.

I've yet to see any real proof that those mini disks were any real impediment to devs. Fact is, the Gamecube was getting ports of third party games at the same rate and with parity to the other two consoles for most of the generation, then saw its games dry up towards the end. The more logical issue for the Gamecube was the fact that it started out behind the PS2 and never really caught up and the Xbox further eroded its potential player base, so devs just walked away towards the end due to them just needing to focus on the Xbox and PS2 to get the majority game sales (not having to deal with Nintendo's restrictive policies being a bonus). The situation would have probably been much different had the Gamecube launched when it was originally supposed to.

 

[Done]

I've yet to see any real proof that those mini disks were any real impediment to devs. Fact is, the Gamecube was getting ports of third party games at the same rate and with parity to the other two consoles for most of the generation, then saw its games dry up towards the end. The more logical issue for the Gamecube was the fact that it started out behind the PS2 and never really caught up and the Xbox further eroded its potential player base, so devs just walked away towards the end due to them just needing to focus on the Xbox and PS2 to get the majority game sales (not having to deal with Nintendo's restrictive policies being a bonus). The situation would have probably been much different had the Gamecube launched when it was originally supposed to.

Disc size was very constrained compared to the DVDs that Sony used at the time on the PS2. Not sure if that had an effect or not, but it sure wasn't a good choice.

I also think that Nintendo didn't really pay too much attention to 3rd party devs at the time and made it's consoles in a way that suits their in-house dev teams.

 

[AbyssStarer]

Tbf, Xbone releases of multiplats have been a rarity in Japan since like 2015, most of the major Japanese multiplats will usually do PC and PS4 for Japan and only release the Xbone version in the west just because they know that it’s not gonna sell over there

I might have been wrong on that, I can't find anything to back it up. My friend was absolutely sure but now I don't know.
It makes sense to not bother with Xbox in Japan, but even Tales of Vesperia launched on all platforms worldwide.

 

[UE 558]

I might have been wrong on that, I can't find anything to back it up. My friend was absolutely sure but now I don't know.
It makes sense to not bother with Xbox in Japan, but even Tales of Vesperia launched on all platforms worldwide.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_Xbox_One_games take a look at this, do ctrl-f, and put in "unreleased" and you'll notice how many of them are in the the "Japan" bar and includes many high profile games like Sekiro and Dynasty Warriors 9, just because many publishers don't want to print Xbone discs in a region that'll never buy them.

 

[AbyssStarer]

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_Xbox_One_games take a look at this, do ctrl-f, and put in "unreleased" and you'll notice how many of them are in the the "Japan" bar and includes many high profile games like Sekiro and Dynasty Warriors 9, just because many publishers don't want to print Xbone discs in a region that'll never buy them.

I stand corrected!

 

[Syaoran Li]

I've been a staunch Sony fan since the PS1, but if they keep going in this SJW direction, I'm probably going to skip the PS5 and buy a Switch and maybe whatever the next-gen Xbox will be.

I thought I would never see the day that Sony would become the censorship-loving Puritans and Nintendo would be the cool console company again.

I mean, it's sad when fucking Nintendo, a company known for being the "kiddie console" and was often mocked as the short bus of gaming has less stringent censorship policies than the company whose consoles became successful because of the lax restrictions they had for third-party developers.

I'm just going to echo what others have said and say that in a cruel ironic twist, Sony is making the same mistakes that allowed them to defeat Nintendo in the console wars three times (PS1, PS2, and PS4) and now Nintendo will likely defeat them in the Ninth Generation of Consoles.

The only reasons why Wii beat PS3 in the late 2000's was because Wii was very cheap at launch while PS3 was initially very expensive at launch, and the Wii also had the initial boom of popularity among casual game fans because of the motion controls gimmick.