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IGN: Stellar Blade has racist artwork which will be removed with the day one patch

Man, you Americans are fucking obsessed with race. Should've taken Morgan Freeman's advice on the matter when you had the opportunity.

This is something people from the Anglo-Saxon sphere fail to understand. Even though in the rest of the world there's xenophobia and hatred toward foreigners for a variety of reasons, race obsession is not a thing, and most people won't give a damn about it. Politicians have tried hard to inject that brain worm but it's not happening because we don't look through race-tainted lenses.

Believing that Koreans view the world as an American leftie is delusional. Fun fact, it's also racist, because it disregards their values and cultural background.
 

ArtHands

Thinks buying more servers can fix a bad patch
There's really no need to redefine the meaning of censorship here to avoid calling what's happening here a censorship. What's happening here is no different from the other Tomb Raider thread with the 'censored' in the thread title.
 

Senhua

Member
As an East Asian, I'm not surprised. A quick glance at the politics of Global North countries, especially the US, reveals why Anglo-Saxon governments, particularly the US, have historically been discriminatory towards people of color.

Everything must align with US interests.
Anything international or global must conform to the preferences of the G7, especially the US, and so on.

A multipolar world order cannot arrive soon enough.
The time for the world to be led by the US world order is coming to an end soon.
 

tommib

Gold Member
As an East Asian, I'm not surprised. A quick glance at the politics of Global North countries, especially the US, reveals why Anglo-Saxon governments, particularly the US, have historically been discriminatory towards people of color.

Everything must align with US interests.
Anything international or global must conform to the preferences of the G7, especially the US, and so on.

A multipolar world order cannot arrive soon enough.
The time for the world to be led by the US world order is coming to an end soon.
We’re getting a glimpse of the multipolar reorder already and you know what? It looks like a nightmare.

Be careful what you wish for.
 

STARSBarry

Gold Member
This is something people from the Anglo-Saxon sphere fail to understand. Even though in the rest of the world there's xenophobia and hatred toward foreigners for a variety of reasons, race obsession is not a thing, and most people won't give a damn about it. Politicians have tried hard to inject that brain worm but it's not happening because we don't look through race-tainted lenses.

Believing that Koreans view the world as an American leftie is delusional. Fun fact, it's also racist, because it disregards their values and cultural background.

Which is why when you search for "Hard R" on Google you get this.

"Noun
edit
hard r (plural hard r's)

(phonetics, phonology, informal) a rhotic sound which is emphatic or strongly enunciated; in English accents especially a postvocalic consonantal r, as distinguished from its absence in a nonrhotic accent or from an R-coloured vowel quotations ▼

(US, in particular), the hard r at the end of the word nigger when spoken with a General American accent and considered maximally racist; as distinct from the African-American Vernacular English pronunciation conventionally spelled nigga, whose final sound is sometimes called soft a quotations ▼"

Its literally only the yanks that use Hard R in this conext, hence the second special 'US in partcular' meaning. Because they are indeed utterly obsessed about race, like African American or Irish American, have some yank come over and say "oh I'm Irish" and they will fucking laugh you out the bar. No your American, simple as, your drop of blood from six generations ago means fucking nothing to us.
 
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Senhua

Member
We’re getting a glimpse of the multipolar reorder already and you know what? It looks like a nightmare.

Be careful what you wish for.

I have chosen to anticipate an unknown future characterized by multipolarity rather than a single US-led one.

Why? Because, as my ancestors have already experienced since the first Western contact with the Far East in the 1700s, nothing good comes from them unless you are willing to submit to them completely.
China (both Taiwan and the mainland), 2 Korea, and Japan have all experienced this until today.
 
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There's really no need to redefine the meaning of censorship here to avoid calling what's happening here a censorship. What's happening here is no different from the other Tomb Raider thread with the 'censored' in the thread title.


It is censorship but it has nothing to do with the case of Tomb Raider. Two main differences.

- It is Sony (publisher) who censors, not devs.

- It's "traditional" after-the-fact censorship meaning that devs had total creative freedom and something was removed afterward. In Tomb Raider censorship happened during the creative process. This is "modern audiences" censorship, infinitely worse.
 

Topher

Identifies as young
It is censorship but it has nothing to do with the case of Tomb Raider. Two main differences.

- It is Sony (publisher) who censors, not devs.

- It's "traditional" after-the-fact censorship meaning that devs had total creative freedom and something was removed afterward. In Tomb Raider censorship happened during the creative process. This is "modern audiences" censorship, infinitely worse.

This isn't a case of Sony forcing Shift Up to change something that was a product of "creative freedom". Frankly, we don't know if Sony forced anything at all. This was an unintentional result of two images placed next to each other that formed that expression. There was no meaning or message here that was changed. Censorship has to meet a higher bar than a change like this.
 
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yanhash

Member
The somewhat hype this game has, you think the developers gonna leave the softies money on the table over something minor, cant be mad at them wanting a perfect launch

Offset Hip Hop GIF
 

TheInfamousKira

Reseterror Resettler
42 years old

Never heard of HARD R in my life

It's fucking cute that woke Americans journalists really believe the fucking world revolves around them. Why would HARD R be anywhere else in the world? I'm trying to compute how a Korean artist would even know this. It's so specific. I know American culture bleeds worldwide but again, I consume it every night, never heard of this. It's really out of nowhere for me and I'm a Northern neighbor in Canada.

edit - CRIME R now? Oh FFS

Confused Parks And Recreation GIF

I've only ever seen it used by people trying to be edgy or clutching pearls so hard that they can't use the slur. It's like the American phrase to allow you to talk about the n-word without saying it. I've mostly seen it used by 20-somethings who are discussing the difference between black people shouting "nigga," at each other and people who "aren't allowed," to say the word are usually rrrrraaaacists who use the "hard R," version. Like, it's usually used by the same type of people losing their minds over it.
 
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I'm not bothered by the change, but I do think it's an incredibly stupid and silly overreaction by race-obsessed nutbags.

Just goes to show that people tend to project meaning into the world around them based on what they think about most.

Like some other posters here, the first thing that came to my mind when I first saw the Hard R image was that it was a sexual reference, as in, "harder, harder!"
 

mystech

Member
Yep, I'm a black dude and didn't notice what was the problem until somebody said it. That's reeaally reaching there. My first thought was "Hard Rock" but I guess the other one works too.

Still, I can't help but think if it were in any other game, no one would have said anything about it. Journalists have a hateboner for that game and look for reasons to put it down.
I’m black as well and had to scroll through the comments to actually see what was “racist” about that screenshot…

I’m not sure if this is symptoms of an election year or just the “woke” train going too far but I’m really getting tired of all this reaching. It’s kind of ironic when white journalists are telling black people what they should find offensive…

If this keeps goin on, it will hurt what creativity is still left in this industry. Once upon a time, games were art. Art you could interact with. Proper art needs room to openly express to survive. Obvious hate speech should obviously not be allowed but what these people call “hate speech” is obviously not… obviously 😂

Hopefully this sh*t doesn’t impact GTA6. I still want my raw experience.
 

rofif

Can’t Git Gud
Checked a stream of the game and it looks incredible. Just like the trailers few years back.
Artstyle like gears of war 1 with all the grand monuments and angelic style.
Creative characters and environments
Amazing costumes.
THIS GAME... and yet these fucking idiots reviewers focus on wrong shit. Lance, the guy who found hard r is actually great. He just had some troll fun and I guess it worked lol. He only pointed it out as fun coincidence really. The fact people go crazy with this stuff is just nuts
 
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In the game's context, it fits:



One of the definitions.
Watch it... lol, even posting the link has a word that got pappa john fired from pappa johns for uttering in a definition. Well i joke, but if this was somewhere else, the censors and pearl clutchers would be out in force, sadly.

Really this whole thing is stupid. They are Korean devs, like they have a clue, even I who live in the USA wouldn't of thought anything of this.
Leave it to woke skolds like ign who see race in everything to bring this up...jeesh.


edit:... .ahhh shit, looks my quote from the original reply, has it on me now too.... am I to be purged now too? lmao, I'm leaving it.
 
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MudoSkills

Volcano High Alumnus (Cum Laude)
People are all like 'this is a reach', 'US liberals are deranged' but the company's most successful previous game is called NIKKE, which (all right thinking people will agree) is basically the N word.

Sounds like a bad faith dog whistle to me. Pretty sus tbh. Yikes. Jinkies. Gross.
 

stn

Member
I'm a very logical type of person, so in my mind I was thinking "why would a company deliberately put racist content into a game, thereby risking lawsuits, drama, decreased sales, and other issues?" For a company like Sony, who I am sure have spent a lot of money over the years working on their reputation and marketing, why would they deliberately allow a game to have racist content? The more logical answer is that it was a mistake, which makes even more sense when you consider the game was made by Koreans, and they may either not speak English or understand the slang, even if they do. Finally, why would Shiftblade deliberately do it? As far as I know, this is their first game and entrance into the Western market. You would think they want the game to sell well and not alienate people because its racist.
 

Mattdaddy

Gold Member
Man, you Americans are fucking obsessed with race. Should've taken Morgan Freeman's advice on the matter when you had the opportunity.

I think most normal Americans really don't give that much of a crap about it. But there's certainly a group of lunatics out there, especially from the younger generation, that are constantly looking for ways to be offended... and unfortunately for us all they are very, very loud lol. And even more unfortunate for us all is that their loudness seems to often gets results.
 
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Kataploom

Gold Member
Did they remove the racist art already? As a latino (obviously non-white even tho my skin is pretty clear) I don't feel safe playing in such a toxic environment
 

mdkirby

Gold Member
It was at one point used to mean “hardcore / r-rated”, which is what I assumed it meant, and given the developers penchant for sexing up their game seemed a likely intent. I was incredibly confused why saying r-rated would be racist. Assumed I was missing something. Seems for some Americans it’s urban dictionary for the N word. I have never ever heard it in that context and would not have guessed it in a million years, granted I’m British not American. But if I didn’t have a clue, I can’t imagine they would in Korea. This is all just people hunting for things to rage over and seeing racism under every corner imo. Can’t expect people to self sensor every obscure urban dictionary definition 🤣
 

Chuck Berry

Gold Member
Checked a stream of the game and it looks incredible. Just like the trailers few years back.
Artstyle like gears of war 1 with all the grand monuments and angelic style.
Creative characters and environments
Amazing costumes.
THIS GAME.

Hows it going to stand next to Forspoken

That's the real question
 

BlackTron

Member
Remember when Nintendo didn't realize that their Fire Temple midi had religious chants that would be offensive, and decided to remove it?

Yep, that was totally censorship too lol
 

Topher

Identifies as young
Unfortunately this isn't looking to be the case either:


So yeah, Sony made them censor it.


Not so sure about that, but we will know soon enough when more folks are playing the game.

Edit:

Further in the reddit.....guy says this is the NG+ version.



Also, that bunny outfit was "censored" but these were allowed?

twitter

GMBq4BUXYAA9mhm
 
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ArtHands

Thinks buying more servers can fix a bad patch
It isn't "self censorship" because it isn't changing intentional speech or expression. No message was changed here. That is like calling fixing a typo "self censorship".

It matters not if it’s intentional speech or expression. It is altered to not get people unhappy.

Tbh it’s nothing wrong to call it censorship. No need to treat it as a dirty word here.
 

Topher

Identifies as young
It matters not if it’s intentional speech or expression. It is altered to not get people unhappy.

Tbh it’s nothing wrong to call it censorship. No need to treat it as a dirty word here.

Certainly not and that's not what I'm doing. We just have different takes on what is and isn't censorship. All good.
 
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Generic

Member
Not so sure about that, but we will know soon enough when more folks are playing the game.

Edit:

Further in the reddit.....guy says this is the NG+ version.



Also, that bunny outfit was "censored" but these were allowed?

twitter

GMBq4BUXYAA9mhm

The devs should've made the game for the Switch 2 and PC.
 

Topher

Identifies as young
"To address some of the comments:This was recorded way before day1 patch. Review copy. Uploaded minute after embargo lifted. There was never any "censorship day1 patch" that could be in this video. If there was any censorship it was made before closed release, maybe even before going gold.There are no other costumes that we know of. If there are any we missed, please provide reference and how to obtain those for everyone. "

Rabbit outfit timestamped


Article published April 17

gTsTYN1.png

 
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