Topic: Nintendo Switch 2

A reminder of the new method to selectively omit certain DLC from downloading:

1) Delete game
2) Find desired DLC page on eShop
3) Press +/- 5x to hide from redownloading
4) Download game

This is useful for say, Fire Emblem Warriors where I downloaded the JP language pack, which takes up over 1GB space, and no longer want it installed.

@FrenchVaniIIuxe, I wasn't going to get that one anyway because I'm busy with other games, but man, that sucks. Hearing about stuff like that really makes me upset. I can handle modern gaming stuff being more expensive and haven't really complained about that. It's censorship, whether it's government-imposed or self-imposed, but especially government-imposed, that really just grinds my gears.

Everybody needs to cool their jets on the censorship thing for DQ7 until we actually see some proof.

The same nonsense went around about the Trails in the Sky remake, and in reality the changes were exceedingly minor and didn’t even tick off the Trails diehards on Reddit. Yep. Reddit.

And now most people can’t stop praising the Trails Remake.

So yea. Hold your horses.

One week until Final Fantasy VII Remake Intergrade launches! It's already at #2 on the Best Sellers chart on the US eShop, behind only the upgrade pack for ACNH.

What do you mean by censored? It's fundamentally a new game. It's not even a straight remake, it's a reimagining. Censored would mean there is one version of this exact game in e.g. Japan and then e.g. the US said 'remove thing X'. I don't think that happened here, I think they just made this brand new game the way they wanted to.

Since it is a reimagining, character design and dialogue should change. I suspect some side plots and maybe even entire characters will be new or different also. Literally the only thing that has to stay the same to fit the reimagining theme is the approximate plot.

I'm too lazy to figure out how to download the first 8 years (8 because I didn't get Switch early) outside of this video they got me to download so...screw it, here are my stats just plainly posted as text.

Doom 2016: 35 hours
Castlevania Advance Collection: 39
Celeste: 41
Bug Fables: 44
Pikmin 4: 47
Mario Odyssey: 49
Astral Chain: 56
Neo: TWEWY: 62
Splatoon 2: 66
Advance Wars 1+2: 68
Splatoon 3: 69
Final Fantasy XII: 70
YIIK: 73
Smash Ultimate: 78
Great Ace Attorney Chronicles: 85
Age of Calamity: 116
New Horizons: 129
Xenoblade 1 DE: 134
N64: 163
Xenoblade 2: 254
TOTK: 260

Look. I'm against abuse of localization like Tokyo Mirage Sessions, and I'm against activist ideologues trying to weaponize their localization positions to interject agendas, but barring that... who cares.

Like, I don't mean to dismiss peoples' concerns here but, come on. Pick your battles in life. There are things to genuinely stand your ground on in principle. And it can't be every time a line was changed or an outfit slightly revised.

I firmly believe in a common sense approach. I don't identify with either side on the extreme end. Yes there are times censorship is a real problem we should speak out against. No, not every change made warrants some so-called righteous cause to fight back.

Apologies if that comes across brash. It's just how I feel. Please don't take it personally as if I dislike you just because I have a different view than you about this.

@JaxonH, I don't take it personally, no hard feelings 😀.

I've just noticed a growing trend lately, and that trend is affecting no small number of the kind of games that I'm interested in the most. I try not to be too upset about it, but sometimes I just need to rant about it for a bit. In all honesty, I still have residual miniscule negativity from back when Nintendo of America canceled the American Switch ports of the Hyperdimension Neptunia Re;Birth games, which is definitely a consequence of what we're talking about.

And yes, I have picked my battle in life. That battle is ranting about media I like being tampered with in localization and all that. But still, no hard feelings 😀✌️.

@Nep-Nep-Freak
Tbh, I'd be lying if I said this sort of stuff didn't get under my skin to at least some extent, I just came to realize I'm powerless to change it, so barring some massive issue where I feel a line in the sand must be drawn, I just brush it off because I don't want it affecting my contentment in life. It's not ruining their day, so I don't want it to ruin mine.

@rallydefault

The proof is out there

@FrenchVaniIIuxe
Uh-huh. Then show us, yea?

Lemme guess: the "censorship" in question involves the remake having some female character model be less fanservicey and less sexist than how it was in the original game?

Personally, I'd take video game fandom's cries for "censorship" way more seriously, if 99% of them weren't about:
A) the makers of the game changing some elements of a game in a remake/remaster to fit better with the times, which is perfectly reasonable and by definition not actual censorship, and
B) the "censored" content being tits & ass for gamers to ogle at instead of, for example, some bold political or social commentary that actually deserves to be there.

@FrenchVaniIIuxe, that's actually not as bad as I thought it would be, but still concerning, considering the direction things are going lately with authoritarian governments cracking down on stuff in anime and other Japanese media for no reason other than control.

So, the "censorship" in question is that a character's ridiculous bikini armor is redesigned to look a tiny bit less ridiculous by her having underwear under her weird skirt thingy instead of going commando? I'm sure this drastic design change really compromises the original artistic vision of showing 10% more of her nude thighs.

Censorship is bad actually.

I generally agree. But, again, the case of Dragon Quest 7 reimagining is not censorship. This is the choice of the developers while making a new game - a new game which happens to be a 'reimagining' of an old game, but still a new game. Are you really saying game devs shouldn't have freedom of expression? That they should be required to just drugingly create games identical to past games even when that is not the goal?

There are certainly cases of censorship in gaming (the restriction of Animal Crossing in China for example), but dragon quest 7 simply isn't one of those cases.

@FishyS, I think what @FrenchVaniIIuxe is worrying about is warranted because this may be Square Enix just worrying about and avoiding government censorship from some governments on its own. For example, I believe a few months ago, it was revealed that the casino or whatever wouldn't be returning in this reimagining. That might be because the EU gives any game with simulated gambling a mature rating. Did Square Enix itself decide to take out the casino? Most likely. But would they have just kept it in if the game wouldn't have been slapped with a mature rating because of it? Also probably, considering the DQ series' relationship with casinos throughout the entire series. They might've only taken out the casino just to avoid the mature rating so that it would be viewable on the eShop for gaming platform accounts that aren't mature-verified or whatever.

Now about the specific case at hand (the changes to the outfit design), several governments and organizations have ramped up their crackdowns on stuff like s*x, n*dity, outfits that show a lot of skin, and the like, especially when it comes to Japanese media. Case in point: what happened with Steam, Visa, Mastercard, and Collective Shout in the summer of last year. So Square Enix might've decided to make some outfit changes just to not face any crackdowns from said organizations and governments. Did Square Enix make the changes themselves? Yes. But did they do it out of fear of getting cracked down? I'd say that's probable, especially with all the news going around involving "protecting kids online", and the UK's online safety act, and the fanservicey gacha game Brown Dust 2 wanting to censor some new outfit designs for all regions just because one region wanted them to (though they did back down on that, saying that they would just change the designs for that one region only).

So, to recap: Square Enix most likely did choose to tone down the designs themselves. But there's also a decent chance that they only did it in the first place because of fear of being cracked down upon. And crackdowns are seemingly only getting worse as time goes on. That's why I think the situation sucks. Not because of this one small change, but because the past few years, there has been one more small change after another, one more small crackdown after another, and it is very slowly reaching the point where many people are getting concerned about their favorite series that are being impacted, or have a chance of being impacted because of their contents. I myself didn't become more concerned about "censorship" and all that until late 2024, when I started getting into series that are kind of controversial like Hyperdimension Neptunia.