Age of Conan To Be Censored in U.S.

Oft-delayed MMOG Age of Conan: Hyborian Adventures is going to see some minor changes in the U.S. and Germany in order to meet with game rating requirements.

Voodoo Extreme has reported on a post in the official Age of Conan forums which says the game will be censored in those countries to remove offending content. The German version of the game, which has been rated 18+ by the USK, will have decapitations, dismemberments and "over-the-top" fatalities removed, although full gore will otherwise remain. The U.S. version of the game, rated M (Mature) by the ESRB, will not include nipples.

"Please note this isn't a design decision or something we can reverse," the message reads. "It's a legal (or as good as legal) requirement to sell the game in that particular territory." The game has been rated 18+ by PEGI in the rest of Europe, and will be available uncensored in those countries. Not all is lost, however; American and German gamers who think they have the fortitude to tolerate the sight of cartoon violence (or nipples) without being overtaken by fits of murderous rage can bypass the restrictions by purchasing the game from a different territory.

In development since 2003, Age of Conan: Hyborian Adventures has been plagued by numerous delays since it entered beta testing in mid-2006. The game is currently scheduled for release on May 20 for the PC, with an Xbox 360 version expected later in the year.

Update: Community manager Shannon Drake has posted a follow-up to the original message saying that while the German version will be censored, the U.S. release of the game will actually hit the shelves with nipples intact. "The ESRB reviewed our application and gave us a rating of Mature 17+," he said. "The full rating with descriptors has not yet been publicly announced but will be posted on the ESRB web site on 13 February 2008."

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Americans should be proud, you've reached a point of censorship where you can compare yourselves to Germany. Aint it great? You can show a guy getting his head torn off but nipples? God no, you went through Janet Jackson once, Hell aint gonna break loose again eh?

God i love canada. :D

Yeah, I thought that too.. Why is it that Americans have this hang-up on nipples?

The website is the best bit: need to put your DOB in for the US version... But the UK version you don't need to, yay! \o/

I don't think the change of the graphics was needed, but i also think that this isn't a big deal and the only people who are gonna be upset by this are gonna be a bunch of 10 year olds who think that graphical blood is "imba".

I love how the German version has a list of gory overkills listed being removed, whereas after USA all thats said is "nipples" :-P.

I don't get it... God of War had Nipples. hell, DIABLO had nipples. Tiny, pixellated ones.

I hate game companies.

I just think this is such a brilliant comment: "The U.S. version of the game...will not include nipples." Seriously. How are nipples worse than "decapitations, dismemberments and "over-the-top" fatalities".

I concur with strayjay when I say I don't get it. All I can say to people who seem to think that seeing nipples in a game will damage their brain functions is, Don't play the Prince of Persia games. The angsty Prince goes through almost all three(four?) games with his nipples waving in the faces of sand creatures.

Anyway, it's good to see that the ESRB review board has overcome their paralysing fear of nipples and lowered the rating to 17+, in this case anyway. Oblivion still had its rating bumped up because of a mod that allowed nipples.

Man, I've said nipples so many times in this post, I wonder what rating the ESRB would give me?

P.M.

the american rating board is totally psychotic. How can such a body part be worse to show than murder? On a rated M game?

Don't you know? Nipples are the signs of a witch. At least, too many of them are, anyway. Now remember that the founders of the US were puritans and it becomes much more clear. It's like a national identity thing for them, I think.

Aren't there bigger fish to fry than whether people see pixels naked or not?

Dude. Did you guys see the update? The North American version is not censored.

PWNED!

H0ncho:
Yeah, I thought that too.. Why is it that Americans have this hang-up on nipples?

We're way more sensitive to sex-type stuff than European (and other) countries, but we're less sensitive towards violence (hence, our non-censorship of the violence).

We're pretty immature about this sort of thing. Oh well.

Same thing happens so many times before. Violence is ok kids but sex, a completly natural and healthy past time, is not. Oh my god what if some young child watches this MA15+ game?! They will become rapists.

Are we talking about Man-nipples? Cause if so... I could get my man-nipple fix by going to the beach and staring at the hundreds of bare chested males lounging around.

Unless it's an outcry against homosexuality?

Or maybe I'm reading into this too much and should just think as they do.

"Duhh."

Its really not the fact about sex or nipples, its Americas attiude towards nudity in games they really don't care about porn on the web or Violence in movies. For some unknown reason they target games that express nudity or violence

Not according to this, which quieted a lot of complaining on the AoC forums.
http://forums.ageofconan.com/showthread.php?t=55373

Deatre:
Are we talking about Man-nipples? Cause if so... I could get my man-nipple fix by going to the beach and staring at the hundreds of bare chested males lounging around.

Unless it's an outcry against homosexuality?

Or maybe I'm reading into this too much and should just think as they do.

"Duhh."

Technically, stack things in that order:

XY + Muscle + skin + nipple: OK.

Don't do it that way:

XX + Fatty tissue + skin + nipple: jail.

I'm sorry my American friends, but I find the irony of your censorship laws truly astounding.

You can blow the head off a realistically-rendered man, with full gore and blood displayed, but you can't see a set of animated boobs you could easily find within 5 seconds in Google?

Absolutely hilariously stupid, most of the world can only but giggle at you.

*sigh* i hate the censorship in this country. we just come off as so damn childish.

Demonbear:
God i love canada. :D

Too bad we don't get our own regionalization anyway.