Hmm. I wonder when someone's going to spot that the UK release of Elite Beat Agents on DS also has an "offensive" word left in from the US version. One of the characters in the cutscenes for the "Red Carpet Premiere" mission is called "Mr Fanny" (as he was in the US version released oh so long ago).

This begs the question why us UK folks are made to wait 8 months for a game to be "localised" from the US version when they don't make a single change. In the case of Elite Beat it's not even the case that the cart is multi-language, either - there's a different cart per European territory, so why don't they just launch the English language versions of games worldwide at the same time and make the countries that aren't thoughtful enough to speak English do all the waiting?

Does "spastic" mean something worse in the UK than it does here? I don't get it.
:/

______

'Fanny' - just not offensive really is it? It's the equivalent of the U.K.'s 'bum' in the U.S.A. Over here, I suppose it's the equivalent of 'front bottom' but not 'c**t'.

Now, I've got to admit to a vested interest in the whole 'spastic' as offensive discussion. This relates to a close relative - so it's possible that I'm not entirely objective about the entire thing. Which is why I didn't write either story.

That vested interest stated, I've got to say that the use of 'spastic' to mean 'worthless', 'stupid', 'broken' or 'sub-human' is offensive.

Not spotting this in a game is at best a fault in process and at worst mean-spirited.

As I say, I'm not objective and have had this discussion again and again and again... and I'd expect to keep having it until people who don't have direct experience of cerebral palsy get their lazy, self-satisfied, small-minded fannies off their seats and go and get some. That way, you lose the fear of disabled people and start seeing them as 'people'.

Either that or we start introducing the phrase "You played that like a cancer-victim! I pwn'd you, you Cancerer!" you know, for the laugh.

Ahem...



It's all about publishing and distribution rights. However, that is a bloody good question which I will steal and claim as my own.

Cheers

Tim

Worse? Why, what does it mean in the U.S.A.? Something good? That would be a first.

I think you are missing something, Irritant. Use of certain words in english in the u.s and u.k differ. In the u.s it seems okay to say spastic or retard, but here it's frowned upon. This is one thing that is never pointed out and its impossible to please ever language region a game is released in.

This is the big and worrying problem though, the bbfc etc can't police all game content, when so many games are released on a weekly basis. It would take a vast legion of testers to even try. If this kind of stuff continues to happen, we could see many more games being held back.

Has the quality assurance depts quality slipped?

Fanny means the opposite of what it does in the u.k, than in the u.s. It could easily be a persons name so I guess that would have been passed if seen. EBA is also a comedic game which adds to its edge.