Company Of Heroes Online Replaces Germans With “Federation”

They also have to replace the bodies with bags of grain and all the guns with walkies talkies.

@ithyphallus, lazy beareaucrat: It depends. If this is going out to Taiwan, too, then they would want it censored, because the Nationalist Chinese- whom the US also supported, mind you- were in pretty deep cahoots with the Nazis. The reason that China didn't immediately fall to Japan was, paradoxically, that they were using German weapons and equipment for the first years of the war.

Polterg3ist: BURN HARDER!

@Phydeaux: It's all about Blu Streak, man..

@yantelope(pirate):

You win for mentioning Animal Farm. I enjoyed the movie as well.

@Sammo21:

The only such instance of a Muslim outright denying the Holocaust I can think of would be Iranian president Mahmoud Ahmadinejad. And I'm not even sure if even he's still running his mouth about that. So it's probably a series of isolated cases.

"[Amid] concerns surrounding CHINA'S laws forbidding any reference to the Nazi party"

... I wouldn't have seen this coming in a thousand years.

As for the 'Nazi controversy,' even if there had been references to the National Socialist party in the game, I can't help but wonder: Could the game be coded so that it said "Nazis" for every country that didn't mind the reference and "Federation" for those countries that did, or would the edits have to be universal for the game coding to hold up?

@Hardcore: Fuck that, I'm restoring RED team to it's full glory via a mod!

{gets arrested by the Chinese government}

@yantelope(pirate): That's pretty interesting. I've lived in China for some time and I'm basically around University students, but they seem completely different. They tend to take anything the government tells them with a grain of salt. Most of them desperately want to leave the country and study in the US or Europe somewhere, usually not because they hate China or anything, but just because they want to get out and see the world. (Prague must have been in some movie popular there or something... because 85% of the students who want to go to Europe want to go to Prague.)

The ones who are English students go even further as they commonly read English websites and news (BBC, etc...) as part of their study.

Most of then use various, very easy to get programs to go around the firewall in China, most of them pirate uncut versions of games and movies, etc...

I'm not going to say they were all 100% savvy on politics and current affairs, but that'd be ridiculous because even in the US a huge portion of college and highschool kids don't know or give a damn about that stuff. I worked with two people last year who didn't know EITHER Vice Presidential candidate by the end of October. Young people across the world are just too interested in other things, usually.

Where exactly were you in China anyway?

@omgwtflolbbqbye: He's probably misinformed. The Nazi party itself is illegal in Germany and that may be what he's referring to. People don't understand just how much censorship goes on in China. I've been there and spoken with highschool students and as much math as they know they don't know a dang thing about politics or current affairs. People only know what they government tells them. For crying out loud the government mandates when people can turn their heaters on in the winter time! Not joking! Go read Animal Farm. It's about as accurate a portrayal of communism as you can get.

yantelope(pirate)

The next title to be ported to China, "Generic First Person Shooter Online,"(Online has to be added to everything over there. Even Pepsi had to have Online added to it), will have "army against army" in "some sort of conflict," located in "some distant land." The Chinese government has agreed with these changes, and thinks that Team Fortress 2 will do well in their country.

Hardcore

Just as long as they don't ruin the ending for me

Vamplosion

@Sammo21: Yeah that's totally not true, on so many levels. Islam does not deny the holocaust and I live in Europe and have studied it.

Vamplosion

@Kitsune Sniper: Yeah Japan are pretty liberal with this stuff, they don't try and deny it but they've made their constitution now so they will never enter another war.

Vamplosion

@OW-Holmes--Serious Face.: You started it first! You invaded Poland!

I'm trying to cheer her up you stupid Kraut!

excaleranth

@Kenny: Mmmmm, I love colons!: That would actually persuade me to get a chinese version of a game.

excaleranth

@Sabre_Justice: Okay, no more long name.: I want Pandaren!!!

excaleranth

@Sammo21: It would appear that a) You're not European and b) They [your teachers] didn't teach you anything.

-MasterDex-

Oh China, how do you put up with this shit?

pandafresh

@RawnevetSbboD: Dont mention the war!

But why didn't they cut aut the alleis as well? Didn't they shoot thousands of Chinese in Korea a few years later?

@Sabre_Justice: Okay, no more long name.:

It's called censorship comrade! The only reason behind it is that it's dangerous for a dictarorship if all of a sudden 1.300.000.000 people start to be critical.

"Hey heard what the Nazis did?"
"they executed those who opposed the government"
"oh the noes! evil! but wait a sec... isn't there a link with our own Chin..."

No references to the Nazi party?

lol.... but they seem so much like china these days =)

eatsleepdie

@Sammo21: If "sense" could be measured in units, your comment would be a 0.

Showmeyomoves!

@AOClaus: For some reason I remembered this.

dodger

And then the Borgs invade!

Julien Varenne

I gotta ask, why? I really don't know why China would be sensitive about portrayals of the Nazi Party, but then again it's not like they're lacking the same kind of morally outraged folks that you see everywhere else.

WoW was censored because of cultural issues- seems Chinese people don't like skeletons at all. Stop making borderline offensive knee-jerk comments and try to seriously consider why these changes might be made.

@sander_dutch: For some reason I don't think it's a law in China to deny German existence.

Liptons

@Sammo21: Europe's kinda broad fella...

I have no idea what countries you're referring to, but I know the holocaust isn't censored in france, germany, austria, switzerland, england... actually pretty much every major EU member

I also have no idea why it would upset their Muslim population at large (and why they would even care if it did if that was the case)

omgwtflolbbqbye

@AliShaikh:
Damn, they're getting wrecked over there...

Blah8

@Liptons: It's not a shooter, it's an rts.

And it doesn't matter anyway because in China they already play coh pirated in the internet cafes, with germans as germans etc...

Morgoth

@Liptons: Since the game is made for the Asian market, with the Chinese market being huge, I don't see why THQ is silly by following local laws.
Not a good idea for a Chinese developed game (THQ Shanghai) to try and defy Chinese law

@Sammo21: what does the killing of Jews have anything to do with Islam? I thought the only ones who deny the holocaust were NeoNazis and stuff.

America is going to have a tough time against the Enterprise...

AOClaus

Couldn't give less of a fuck, at LEAST they're getting the damn game.

@Atheist Jew: Well hey, in Europe they don't teach about the holocaust so they don't make followers of Islam mad, so there is precedent to this stuff.

China doing something stupid? No, this is nothing compared to the, I'm sure, millions of cases of humans rights violations.

@ithyphallus, lazy beareaucrat: It wouldn't. Japan doesn't censor any Nazi imagery in comics, animation, or games.

And here I thought they would be renamed The Empire or something.

Drogmir

@RawnevetSbboD: Although replacing history with Ultraman sounds awesome, Chinese history books mention the 1912-1949 period and tell of the heroic struggle for freedom and eventual victory for the Communists.

China is now preparing for the 60th anniversary of the Communist party and PR of China. There's a huge clampdown on criminals, as nothing must interfere with this upcoming harmonious celebration.
Not the best time to test out the censors in China

This just in, China requires all instances of "Japan" in videogames to be replaced with Hello Kitty. You know, so as to not bring back bad memories.

@NeVeRMoRe666: Hey, don't joke about that. He's a hero who saved millions of lives.

Liptons

Nazi censorship is still ridiculous, but I think THQ are the silly ones in this case. You can't have a(nother) WWII shooter without even calling them Germans. For some reason I think we all know who was fighting who.

Liptons

@RawnevetSbboD: Err...the picture above you is suppose to be a reply to your comment...dunno why it's there.

*I also realize, Ultraman is Japanese and not chinese but he's also quite popular there*

@TonyRockyHorror: I agree.
You want to steer away from anything that might be misinterpreted as China's Banhammer rivals that of Kotaku. On Banhammer Monday.

Pretty much 'cept they replace history with Ultraman, Yeeeeeaaah ultaman!

RAAAAAWR HISTORY!

Well then... at least it isn't going to affect my game with a patch =P

I wonder what a Chinese history book looks like... do they just cut out from 1912 - 1949?

this would make more sense in Japan since they were axis buddies with the nazis.

but China? they were on the other side. they largely censor their own history for political power but what's the use of censoring others' now?

ithyphallus, lazy beareaucrat

@Atheist Jew: It's probably some shifty law about hate speech being put out, with the devs wanting to play on the safe side.

Really, it's not like the Chinese Government wants people to forget WW2 happened.

@[forum.ea.com]

AliShaikh

So, they stripped out all of the historically-accurate bits to sell it in China.

That's...pathetic.

And by historically accurate, I mean, you know, the fact that the Germans were involved in WW2. That's kind of important.

The first thing I thought of was the "Allied Powers" being "The Federation" and the Germans being "The Empire" in Valkyria Chronicles.

I'm would imagine they DO know that, Luke. I would further imagine that it's better to be safe than take any chances with the Chinese government. You DO know what kind of record they have on censorship, DON'T you?

TonyRockyHorror