A while ago I read an article on 1Up.com about the
earthquake and tsunami that occurred in Japan back in March of 2011. The
article was called “How Japan’s Earthquake Change Japan.” I wanted to
briefly touch on the topics presented in the article, one of which
being, Sensitivity. The article mentions several games that were in
production at the time that were forced to be altered or were pushed
back to be released at a later time. The delays were not entirely caused
by the catastrophe itself but instead by public reception and backlash.
After the tsunami many games that were set to be released, such as: Tekken Tag Tournament, Yakuza: Dead souls, and even Naruto, all came under heavy fire from the public for containing insensitive sense portraying disaster. Another incident described in the article was in the case of the 9/11 attacks on the World Trade Center. Public backlash caused Kojima Studios to remove a scene from Metal Gear Solid 2 In which a ship crashes into the Statue Of Liberty. Kojima’s team also started spelling the name “Raiden” rather than katakana because people felt it sounded similar to “Bin Laden.”
A larger underlying topic of this article soon becomes very clear to the reader, that topic being: Censorship in games. Gaming is still a relatively young medium and still has a long path ahead of it on its road to respectability. However, in any case, we as a community should be assertive and steadfast in our convictions. We need speak out against public out cry and censorship no matter what the reason if we ever hope to achieve public recognition as a mature respectable medium. When ordinary people see a team of game developers they don’t see hard working artists, and storytellers, they see toy makers, naive, and immature.
Games have the potential to take us to places we could never dream of, tell us story and teach us thing; not only about the world around us, but about ourselves as well. Im not saying we should all turn into insensitive pricks in the name of gaming, we should stand up for the games we love and not crumble at the first sign of trouble. I believe Toshihiro Nagoshi said it best:
“we should be proud of what we make…sometimes in entertainment, we should make bold decisions against minor concerns. In this case (the case of Yakuza: Dead souls), the story was about the city being destroyed, but the focus was on how the characters tried to fight back and their struggle to retain what they lost. So if something like this happened again, and we were faced with the decision whether to postpone the title past its original date, I think we’d stick to the original timing.”
The earthquake and tsunami that occurred on March 11, 2011 was, no doubt, a tragedy. Many people lost their homes and loved ones to the catastrophe. To every disaster there is fear, pain, suffering and loss, but in its wake there is also heroism, love, bravery, and triumph. The human condition is not always an easy one. Life is a gift, a story waiting to be told. No matter how much pain and suffering, no matter how much love and joy, You can be sure that games will always do their best to tell a story.
link to article: http://www.1up.com/features/how-japans-earthquake-changed-developers
-Brice
After the tsunami many games that were set to be released, such as: Tekken Tag Tournament, Yakuza: Dead souls, and even Naruto, all came under heavy fire from the public for containing insensitive sense portraying disaster. Another incident described in the article was in the case of the 9/11 attacks on the World Trade Center. Public backlash caused Kojima Studios to remove a scene from Metal Gear Solid 2 In which a ship crashes into the Statue Of Liberty. Kojima’s team also started spelling the name “Raiden” rather than katakana because people felt it sounded similar to “Bin Laden.”
A larger underlying topic of this article soon becomes very clear to the reader, that topic being: Censorship in games. Gaming is still a relatively young medium and still has a long path ahead of it on its road to respectability. However, in any case, we as a community should be assertive and steadfast in our convictions. We need speak out against public out cry and censorship no matter what the reason if we ever hope to achieve public recognition as a mature respectable medium. When ordinary people see a team of game developers they don’t see hard working artists, and storytellers, they see toy makers, naive, and immature.
Games have the potential to take us to places we could never dream of, tell us story and teach us thing; not only about the world around us, but about ourselves as well. Im not saying we should all turn into insensitive pricks in the name of gaming, we should stand up for the games we love and not crumble at the first sign of trouble. I believe Toshihiro Nagoshi said it best:
“we should be proud of what we make…sometimes in entertainment, we should make bold decisions against minor concerns. In this case (the case of Yakuza: Dead souls), the story was about the city being destroyed, but the focus was on how the characters tried to fight back and their struggle to retain what they lost. So if something like this happened again, and we were faced with the decision whether to postpone the title past its original date, I think we’d stick to the original timing.”
The earthquake and tsunami that occurred on March 11, 2011 was, no doubt, a tragedy. Many people lost their homes and loved ones to the catastrophe. To every disaster there is fear, pain, suffering and loss, but in its wake there is also heroism, love, bravery, and triumph. The human condition is not always an easy one. Life is a gift, a story waiting to be told. No matter how much pain and suffering, no matter how much love and joy, You can be sure that games will always do their best to tell a story.
link to article: http://www.1up.com/features/how-japans-earthquake-changed-developers
-Brice
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