Zen Studios Under Fire For Censorship In Pinball FX3, Explains It Was To Keep Game "Family-Friendly"

I'm glad they went this route. It's in the nature of this type of game to be more family friendly than others. Either way, there's a million pinball games out there, If you don't like this one, choose your pick of like a dozen others

Just release a seperate adult version of pinball so us grown ups can have some fun

Ya know, I’m surprised they even took the time to address folks’ comments about it. I think they gave a thought out response, too. I suppose it’s not much different than Grimm’s fairy tales being told differently to not scare the jeebus out of children.
I don’t play pinball games, but I’ve seen a huge offering in the eShop. Maybe everyone can find something they like.

Well, they did do tables for Deadpool, South Park, Family Guy etc. and kept em all family friendly in the past.

I'd agree, an adult version of Zen Pinball would be preferred but till then, they're sticking to their company image. Though I do hope it avoids the more adult franchises in future and stick with the all ages stuff like Star Wars, Marvel, etc.

I can understand the stances for both camps. On one hand, preserving the original tables' art and sound bits is respectful to the artists and all others involved with the original product. On the other, I can totally understand why some parents/guardians would be bothered by letting kids play the uncensored tables.

At the end of the day, I bet this has little to no impact on the gameplay of each table. Their stance on this seems well thought out. I personally think separate collections (family-friendly vs. original content) would be the best solution here.

Meh, who cares? If it's really that big a deal, wait a bit and somebody will make a mod restoring the original artwork back for those who want it. Pinball was a fun thing to play with my family in my childhood, so I totally get their reasoning. Unless I'm missing something, the modding community will fix the extra things people are taking issue with. I'm just glad that Zen put the work into this so it could happen in the first place.

Ok, that is low. Not so much the actual censorship, but them trying to dis The Pinball Arcade for their preservation steers me the wrong way like you wouldn't believe.

As for the censorship, as others have stated, why the crap would you bother doing this project if you're just going to not keep things faithful to the originals? Zen, for shame.....

LOL no kids these days play pinball. They are all playing Fortnite. Zen should start making some MA rated tables, they will sell.

@Retupmocnin
They (kids) can play different things not based on mainstream.
Just depend on their parents habits & the environments.

I understand both the critics and Zen Studios. I can't help but feel there should be some compromise they could reach. A way to have mature content as an option. Perhaps they could link it too the parental control app. As I understand it, that app can block access to M rated titles from from children's accounts, so why not DLC too?

@Retupmocnin That's a pretty broad generalization, don't you think? Just because Fortnite is the big thing right now, doesn't mean it's the only thing...

Very surprising remarks on here. I'm the biggest pinball fan of any having owned nearly all these tables in the past and I am very grateful to be able to play them with better physics than the pinball arcade ever did and better graphics. Zen Studios have done a great job and I love the game You don't notice that stuff when your having fun!

They're lucky they have so many other tables I enjoy.

Political correctness gone mad!

Also a quick note to the players.. use single player mode. I was using the classic mode arcade and tournament and the physics are wrong on both of these but somehow corrected when playing the first mode. Try hitting the captive ball on fish tales on all modes and you will see the difference.

I don't care that much as long as the gameplay quality is good... these are modern, digital re-creations... it's not like they went back and altered the physical tables.

That being said, most of the stuff they censored is really lame and should have just been left in for art's sake.

First "The Pinball Arcade" looses the licenses to the Bally/Williams tables and now Zen censors them.

Really should've left the option of censorship to the players. Oh well, what can you do?

Players shouldn't care about purely aesthetic censorship like this on pinball tables, anyway, otherwise they're just being overly whiny brats. It's not like the gameplay is affected, and they have a good reason for it, so let it go.

@Tasuki

It has nothing to do with "SJWs" and everything to do with keeping the E rating that they've had for this game. People crying about social justice/political correctness are louder and more annoying than anything.

@RyanSilberman They're not dissing "The Pinball Arcade" for their preservation. They're dissing them for fooling the ESRB in the process.

@BulbasaurusRex Fooling with what? Any possible PG-13-esque pinball cabinet artwork? Beer and cigar imagery? The Pinball Arcade games are T-rated!! This is just weak, unjustified mudslinging they never had to throw.

I doubt they've had one person telling them "thank you" for doing this.

Don't release it if you can't release it while staying 100% authentic. That's that.

I was thinking of buying these new tables, but now I will skip them. I really hate game devs / publishers that do stuff like this. I will vote with my wallet here.

No surprise at all they've screwed this up, although the way they've gone about it is a bit more unexpected. Another reason it's a pity that the licences were lost.

@Tasuki This has nothing to do with social justice and if you think that's the case, you need to take a step back.
Zen Pinball made something weird and probably dumb to keep their rating at the ESRB, not to please an imaginary group of people who want to ruin video games for real men.
Come on.

@JayronAuron Yeah, er..... the modding community is really jumping on the Switch.

@sanderev This, and the lack of class in them having a dig at Pinball Arcade too as well.

@Fidget I think most of the outrage is coming from people who have never played the game and never will.

I’m actually glad they have made something kid friendly. I’m not at all into this SJW culture, but having kids makes you appreciate things without swearing, nudity and zombies.

@Kienda Yep kids really make you think a lot differently. Don't think I'll ever stop playing games though

Violations of ESRB can result in fines up to $1 million, product recall, and much more stuff. Without a rating, you are not allowed to be sold on many places.
Don't invent any "SJW" where there is none.

@Masurao What's this got to do with "SJWs"? They did this so they could keep their age rating, not out of some backlash from easily upset people on the internet. You're kinda missing the point. So what if the tables were in pubs back in the day? Now, they're being sold in digital form on the switch, and the company want to keep their family friendly image. Although I agree it's a little disappointing in terms of preservation (but ultimately, who actually cares?..)

I can’t see how this is something to be upset about. If they kept these elements they would have had to change the rating of the entire game just for the sake of a few DLC tables. And seriously, are you really going to enjoy the game any less because of a couple of missing cigars and beer cans?

@JoakimZ Its the thin end of the wedge. Even if you don't mind the changes, it's what it represents in terms of a potential precedent. I can absolutely understand their reasons for it, not the SJW nonsense some people are spouting, but the certificate they're aiming for. But people never have taken kindly to enforced censorship especially applied retroactively (see the many people in my opinion being rightly dumbfounded by Spielberg changing the guns to Walkie Talkies in the 20th Anniversary Edition of E.T. by way of an example). I feel that if they wanted to operate this way then maybe these were not the licences for them, and they should have continued creating their own family friendly tables. Obviously this is a capitalist environment and they had every right to acquire those licences, but I think people have a good case to also be unhappy about the artistic integrity aspect.

Okay, Complaindo Life, just so you know The Pinball Arcade tables weren't exactly authentic either. Some had animations/logos removed/replaced. The Addams Family table for example has uncle Fester missing from the electric chair & also the artwork is changed so that the characters don't look like the actors. Apparently in Medievil Madness the gap between the flippers was too wide too. Personally I am more disappointed because this means tables like Who Dunnit won't be released at all, unless they actually decide to make a separate version.

Well that was stoopid. The majority of the people interested in these tables are in their 30s and 40s and have (rightly or wrongly) grown up with these classic tables.

This absolutely should be a seperate product. I was ready and willing to hand over my wallet for accurate renditions of classic pins like Madness and Tales but I'm now happy I picked up Pinball Arcade physically instead.

Half the attraction of pinball has always been the audio/visual experience.

I find it absolutely mind boggling that people can blame ‘SJWs’ for anything. At what point did Zen say they were influenced by outside sources? They took the decision themselves to keep their rating and yeah, individual DLCs can have their own age rating but they’re trying to maintain their company image. If you don’t like it, literally just don’t buy that table.

"the Managing Director revealed the development team had grown up admiring these pinball machines"
Apparently the development team managed to survive seeing these tables when they were younger...

Lots of wrong opinions here 😂

Well that is silly.

It doesn’t bother me really. It would have been nice to have both options, as the point is that they are real tables.

I probably wouldn’t have worried about my kids seeing the real tables (2 & 4) either. They see worse even when you try and protect them.

censorship never led to anything good, I'm afraid it'll be too late when the majority of society realizes that

Sorry, but this is awful. Zen really, really dropped the ball on this one.

Also - double standards... do you parents cover your child's eyes when taking them to history museums? I saw actual human remains (behind glass) long before I started watching "mature" movies.

Lol, I guess there go our hopes of seeing a lot of popular tables getting converted (like the ones TPA doesn't have).

People arguing that it's only cosmetic need to actually read the article: he stated that any table with any sort of gambling theme is going to have to have that gameplay element removed. So tables like Jack-Bot? Probably not happening at all.

Did somebody care about this?

The most important thing video games ever taught me is that being an adult means looking at pictures of titties and beer cans.

(The second most important thing they taught me is that most gamers don't understand censorship. )

@Shane76 "miscreants"
Holy crap, do you know what that word means? Do I have to kneel to my God VidyaGame?
This over the top behaviour against imaginary enemies is crazy talk.
This whole thread is one big strawman argument when we're just talking about an over zealous company which [checks notes] deleted a cigar.

You guys are insane, just take a step back and calm down.

Screw the kids. Can't "protect" them all.

I had initially read that only Fish Tales was censored, and that was due to it being a free table that all users got. Guess that is wrong.

DLC only needs to be rated by the ESRB if it exceeds the rating of the original title. I'm sure all the parents of all the impressionable kids that enjoy Predator, Alien, The Walking Dead, Family Guy, & South Park are relieved to know they won't see a cartoon woman in a bikini or a cartoon cigar.

Yeah TWD and South Park couldn't be worse than showing a cigar or even a half naked woman. Think about the children!

I get what they want to do....but that is not handling the tables with "respect." Is it so hard just to let users toggle it on or off?

Annoying but possibly necessary regarding today's environment. People unfortunately are offended easily. They are playing it safe, and who can blame them. Especially as they say they have been warned in the past.....

Guess they wanted to corner the pinball market on Switch so bad they were willing to get the license, even though they knew they'd have to sacrifice the artistic authenticity. It's not that they're criminal... They delivered the gameplay, but strictly from a purist pov, the artistry is part of the charm of any pinball cabinet-- So if they weren't going to be 100% authentic, and needed to maintain their rating, then they should've passed on this opportunity. They have more than enough creativity and originally (and other licenses) in the Pinball FX3 brand that this wasn't necessary. Just my opinion.

Especially the censored animations at the display of Medieval Madness are really annoying.

They even changed the cabinet flyers, so this is a kind of faking history – despite this is not the end of the world this is really questionable.

Zen uses licenses of Doom, Skyrim, Walking Dead, Jaws and Aliens, but wants to be family friendly? This must be a joke...

Give us the uncensored tables! The excuses are ridiculous!

@Steel76 I agree it's sad. People seem offended at every possible moment.....

@Tasuki Yeah. that just took SO much out of the game mechanics that it's just .... wait... no. It's actually no big deal and you saying this is just silly.
You know, ....
SILLY! hehehehe So angry! lol

@Tasuki Yeah. that just took SO much out of the game mechanics that it's just .... wait... no. It's actually no big deal and you saying this is just silly.
You know, ....
SILLY! hehehehe So angry! lol

Zen should have just left the Williams license alone. It's interesting to see if they decide to release Elvira or Xenon. That would require them to censor elements of those tables.

If a company believes they would see highest profits by censoring content I think it’s capitalism to blame.

Nobody wants ERSB fines. They are brutal. Or to go back through the ratings process to keep a few internet mobs happy. I’m sure their sales will survive the outrage.

Personally this accidentally works in my favor as I will actually pick this up now. I mean it sounds like the structure/gamepay of the actual pinball table is unchanged (and any that they have to change won’t show up) and not everyone, kids or not, wants crude images or crass language everywhere. Yes it sucks for those that are into that but I think the positives outweigh the negative.

Also is SJW the boogeyman that gets butt pulled when others don’t want to accept a rational answer or business decision? Where are these people living where they curse all day and drink beer and oogle half naked women like creepers? I have two jobs to hold down myself so none of that is acceptable and that is where I spend 70 hours ofmy week. You can’t curse on this website either or most public forums so I don’t understand this perception that the world is a bar brawl waiting to happen with a few people ruining the vulgarity and insult marathons for all the normal people.

The 4 tables play wonderfuly In my opinion and when you are playing you do not notice the changed artwork. If I had a choice I would rather have them kept the original art but it is a compromise I'm willing to take to let Pinball FX take over licensing from the Pinball arcade. I personally always liked the physics feel in FX more than the Pinball arcade. In the big picture it really isn't a big deal when you consider the gameplay which is most important.

They should have not of ragged on Pinball Arcade considering they had the HONOR to do the tables as original as possible.

What they're doing here is just wrong, wrong to rip on them, and wrong to rip the original content of the games apart or excluding them entirely. There would have been two good ways to address this over their rating concerns. 1: Make a T(Purists) original version basically like TPA had. 2: Make it default to E, but have a lock and key parental lockout key code you get so unbind the original media for those who aren't kids or mentally children adults who can't or shouldn't handle such things so they're safe.

That wouldn't be such a bad thing now would it? Everyone wins. Now they're going to lose some sales from those wanting the original table experience.

Doesn't bother me. The gameplay is more important.

Zen never said they wanted the most authentic pinball experience. Their tables are always alternate videogame-y versions or videogame exclusive (original) tables. This kind of censorship doesn't matter because their tables, graphics, gameplay, and presentation have a higher quallity than the other pinball games on the eShop. I think the only one that comes close in terms of quality and fun is Yoku's Island Express.

Zen wants to keep the E-rating and don't want a T-rating affecting the whole Pinball FX3 platform just because of a couple controversial (for the ESRB) background graphics. It would risk the family-friendly image of the game, kinda pulls all the other games on the collection down with it if the game needs to be re-rated by the ESRB.

If the tables in question were promised to be a faithful recreation, or a stand-alone release, or part of a mature Pinball Pub collection I would understand the outcry, but these are variations/remixes anyway and the bits that have been changed don't matter the slightest bit.

Ok, Zen is officially cursed now. Greed and hypocrisy, what a great combination.

Why would you acquire classic tables for nerd appeal, and then change them?

That's pretty spineless.

Kind of suprised that Williams has no problems with this, since it is their property that is getting changed for the worse.

I confess I didn't even notice the censorship after playing a bit last weekend (except maybe for some missing call-outs in Medieval Madness). The gameplay and graphics seem solid but I haven't played enough yet to say if the physics are superior to the Pinball Arcade versions (which I thought were fairly true to life.
BUT I must say I can't agree with their decision to go this route. It goes against the spirit of recreating these historic machines, and they should have found a better workaround than just lumping them in with their fam-friendly imaginary pins.
Pinball's always had a bit of a rebel edge to it, and I'd say the fan community is more passionate purists than puritans!
I'll wait and see how these ports go before investing in more expansions.
I'm lucky in that I can play real machines locally, anyway.

@sanderev Don't skip them. They're great. I didn't even realize they changed them a bit. Come out and play, dude!

@Tasuki Only three comments in and I see the classic SJW argument. Like SJWs have anything to do with the ESRB. Unless you consider Conservative Christians and concerned parents SJWs.

This makes me happy I got these titles on Pinball Arcade for my iOS devices back when they were offered. Censorship sucks, and so long as they are censoring these tables I won't be buying them again.

It also makes me upset how they are messing with history here. It is like going through classic movies and editing out everything that features a cigarette or something along those lines. Shameful.

@Link506 The "there is other pinball games out there" excuse doesn't fly when this is the only source for Bally and Williams pinball tables. These are classics that have a dedicated following of enthusiasts, saying "just play something else" doesn't work in this situation. It could if Pinball Arcade still offered them, but considering how Zen now holds the exclusive license to sell them this is a major blow for fans of these classic tables.

Ps. Tsk tsk on those here saying the censorship doesn't matter. Just shows you likely never played the actual pins.
What an uproar there'd be if Sega suddenly removed violence and questionable teen content from their upcoming Genesis collection, Even if they left the "core gameplay" intact somehow.
Kiddy versions of the tables may be better than nothing, but still very disappointed about this.
Bally/Williams tables are the most beloved in the community, and deserve authenticity. TPA got that. What a shame PFX chose to compromise instead.

This game is completely inferior to thepinballarcade. This is the worst implementation of Williams and Bally tables and is not worth anyone’s time.

If they planned to do censorship before development started then yeah, there is fault on their part but at least they meant well when recreating these arcades.

I'm don't think it would have been too hard to set up variations as an option but I'm not in their shoes.

@Anwpro Have you even tried the Williams tables yet? They play a hundred times better in Zen than in The Pinball Arcade. I love Farsight for The Pinball Arcade, but I'm also super excited to have such a huge improvement over their game. There's no way I can go back to play TPA versions now that I've played the Zen versions.

@Teksetter I've played all of the original pins in this pack IRL and I understand why Zen made this decision. It goes deeper than Zen "staying family friendly." They have agreements with companies like Disney and I can only assume they have to make them happy. I hope they can come up with a solution, but ultimately I'd rather the mild censorship happen than not get this at all.

I really hate how much hate Zen is getting for this. They've worked hard to create something great for pinball fans. You can tell they put a lot of passion into these recreations. They look wonderful, and they play wonderful. The censorship is the only real issue, and while I agree with others in that I hope a workaround can be found, I hate seeing people say such terrible things about Zen because of it. No, they're not SJWs. I doubt SJWs would want to touch pinball with a 10 foot pole. No, there are some good reasons why the censorship was deemed necessary by Zen. Not only would some of the content require additional descriptors (Which would cause a lot of complications), but they also have some deals with big companies, mainly Disney, who very likely require a certain age rating to be maintained.

I've seen some people say that censorship is the worst thing that could happen to pinball, but I feel that Zen not getting the license would have been worse than this. Farsight's versions were often buggy and way too easy, and you were often seeing people complaining about the issues with TPA rather than actually enjoying the games. I for one was getting tired of having an hour long game every time I decided to play Twilight Zone. I have a good feeling that Zen's recreations will always be quality and always play well, and that's something that can get people into pinball. I've already seen people talk about how they actually like Fish Tales now after playing the Zen version, noting that they didn't enjoy the TPA version.

Finally, for those who are saying kids aren't going to be playing this, I just want to say that I played Pinball Hall of Fame: The Williams Collection when I was about 10 years old, and that got me hooked on pinball which practically changed my life. Obviously I'm the minority, but if people end up playing this, young or old, and end up getting into pinball, that's going to help the hobby far more than the censorship here is going to hurt it.

Meanwhile there are games on the eShop in which a young Japanese woman will talk dirty to you and one soon to be released that diagnoses your psychological issues with a focus on your sex life.

@mystman12 I will give them another go, but I am not a fan of Zen or pinballfx anyway. I have always enjoyed thepinball arcade much more and have many tables on that platform. I will not buy the williams pack in pinballfx if it remains in a modified state.

@Anwpro I actually never really liked Zen pinball either. Still not a huge fan of their fantasy tables. They made a more realistic, improved physics engine for the Williams tables though, and it's so much better than the physics in TPA. Not to mention that everything looks nicer too. I understand if you don't want to make a purchase due to the censorship, but at the very least Fishtales is definitely worth trying out since it's free!

@Masurao Are you really equating "family friendly" to Social Justice Warriors?!?! Because that's what it looked like you did...

Censorship is bad no matter if it's cartoons or pinball. I'm glad I have all the pins on TPA. Not gonna buy them on Zen unless it's pins FarSight never got around to recreating, and it's not censored.

I can't believe people are getting upset over this. It's pinball. It's not like it's the next Zelda or Mario game.

Well this seals the deal on me not getting these. I loved the Pinball Arcades version of their tables and I wish I got them all on the switch for the heartbeat of time they were up. It’s only gonna take Zen longer to produce a fraction of the the tables TPA had especially now that they’re self censoring them to be extra cautious with the censor board.
I don’t even get why they aren’t running these things by the ratings board first anyways? The games already exist both physically and in TPA versions, couldn’t they send them a layout of the game and then find out what if anything they need to change?

I can't fault them for wanting to makea family pinball game. What i don't get is, why would they spend money on securing rights to historic cabinets only to say they don't actually want to sell those cabinets? The whole point of the license is to continue existence of these old tables as they were. Kids aren't interested in that. And editing it doesnt offer the art and design that was part of the historic experience.

If zen wants family pinball why not make their own tables and buy appropriate tables rather than buying M rated tables and editing them to E?

I wasn't at all enthused when I heard Zen was securing the rights to Williams and Bally's tables. Farsight had done an amazing job with their pinball games while Zen, in my opinion, went off the deep end with their table design. Granted, Zen's games where original designs that didn't need to obey the laws of physics, but I had a bad feeling they'd get a little too creative when they got their hands on the rights to real pinball. One thing I am still having trouble believing is I'm having more fun with the pinball games being put out by Enjoy Up (more famous for mobile trash games) than I am with FX3.

@AxeltheBuizel I take it you're not that much of a pinball fan. I couldn't care less about Zelda, but I love pinball and I've pumped a lot of quarters into the real tables they are butchering with their "family friendly" make overs and stupid modernizations (but at least those you can turn off). Farsight had done an amazing job with accurate recreations of these pinball games, so for those of us who know and love these tables, it's annoying to see them get this treatment.

This is one of the reasons I hate the word "family" so much. I don't like "wholesome" either.

so...i own a few of these pinball machines. what's censored? i mean, these things were being played by 7 year olds back in the early 90s. in public. in bowling alleys. in malls. so to say, "we're doing this for family"...is a crock of crap.

there's nothing offensive in pinball machines made in the 90s. now sopranos...ya, that can be offensive. for snowflakes.