Quake 2 remaster id vault censorship

[Scottier681]

I noticed there are two design documents in the Q2 id vault with the "nazi" blurred out ( document 1 and 2). Was there a legal issue then before releasing this remaster or even before that about using/seeing the word "nazi"? Just curious if the night dive group had to do it because of zenimax, Bethesda or Microsoft or other people not wanting the word to be seen. Any ideas/thoughts? Is the censorship even a big deal in the overall product quality?

[esselfortium]

My guess is it's probably a precaution to avoid needing separate versions for an international release, or something like that.

[elf-alchemist]

Post-original release, every game by id that had references to the Nazi in any way, were censored or toned down in some capacity, Q2 is just another example of this.

 

See the Doom 2 secret levels in the official ports, historically, these have been modified to not include the SS Officer, and the Nazi imagery was modified.

Clearly, this is a precaution for an international release, just so the games won't need separate versions in other countries which prohibit this content to be shown in banal media like video games, that is, Germany, for obvious reasons.

[Kinsie]

References to the Reich make your path through the age classification system in some countries considerably harder. And in many cases, those countries buy a lot of PC games. I can't say I blame Id or Xbox or whoever for not having the appetite for getting into that kind of brawl and potentially delaying or stymieing sales over a couple of words in a scan of some coffee-stained old printouts. Especially when they'll have plenty of time to wrangle their way through all that for the new Indiana Jones game Machinegames has been doing...

[Edward850]

Kinsie pretty much has it. For the most part you can use nazi imagery and references in media and art, however for specific countries (not just Germany!) you need to be able to prove context when submitting for age ratings and other sales requirements. The time it takes for such paperwork is extremely not worth it when the game has no need for it and you're trying to publish it on a very specific date (that being for QuakeCon). Quake 2 is about fighting an alien machine race on an alien planet, it is not Wolfenstein.

[Scottier681]

While I don't always agree with censorship issues, I do understand what you have explained edward850. In the grand scheme of things, the blurred out "word" is not a big deal when reading the context of the documents. I am grateful nightdive( or whomever) created the id vault and gave us video game historical content playable, readable and viewable. It should set a standard like "the making of karateka" did with historical content, and the Atari 50 as well. The id vault alone is worth the price of the game. Is there any hope of future Q2 content that could be found? One can only hope! 

[Devalaous]

I found it weirder that the playstation ads in there censored the logo. Legal nonsense rarely makes any common sense to normal people.