Japan has a very different culture than the West, this is most apparent in games like Criminal Girls, but how different that culture is, is not always that up-front and obvious in the United States or Europe. Why not? Because a lot of the time we are seeing censored versions of games.
Most recently, Fatal Frame: Maiden of Black Water made headlines for censorship – despite its 17+ rating. While we were aware that Xenoblade Chronicles X would be seeing censorship in the West, we had no idea how censored it would be. Thanks to a series of tweets by user Teigake, we officially have a look at the censorship.
Lin, a 13-year old character in the Japanese version has been supposedly aged to 15-years old for the Western release and has a bit more clothing in the West too. I can't have any real complaints about the censorship in this front, the outfits were quite revealing for such a young character.
Another costume. Left is EU version and right JP version. pic.twitter.com/cYPnYTbKq5
— 聖剣の騎士 (@_teikage) October 30, 2015
Lin is censored in the EU (and probably USA) version of Xenoblade Chronicles X. Left is EU and right is JP. pic.twitter.com/2Pr9HokYdf
— 聖剣の騎士 (@_teikage) October 30, 2015
If the character had been at least 18-years old, then yeah, I might have a problem with the censorship… But in this case, it's a fine line to draw.
