arrr_matey post=9.72006.753753 said:
Allow me to be devil's advocate here for a sec...
Whatever opinion you may have of Chavez' sanity, it's not like Venezuelans have the market cornered on being way too oversensitive about stuff like this. Look at how badly Americans freak out whenever the news reports about an Iranian or Syrian game where you blow up Americans.
I think the key questions here are:
1) Why did Mercenaries 2 have to be set in a real country at all? What do they gain from calling the country Venezuela when they could have just called it Kookamungaland and made exactly the same game?
2) Imagine if a Venezuelan company produced a game where you got to take down American forces and overthrow the U.S. president? As if Americans wouldn't be outraged.
1) Because it makes the game feel more realistic. Personally, I hate it when a TV show or game doesn't have the balls to use a real country because they want to be "politically correct." It is hard to take a game seriously when they use "Thisplaceisfakeistan" as a setting instead of a real country because of "political correctness."
2) I don't think anyone would notice, honestly. The game wouldn't be released here, so I don't think anyone would even learn about it, much less care.
Moving on topic:
Really, Chavez? Why are we actually paying attention to anything that bag of hot air or his "lawmakers" say? It is right up there with listening to Mahmoud Ahmadinejad's chest-pounding. I mean come on, we are talking about a country with a government that honestly thinks every time President Bush takes a piss it is a sign that American aircraft carriers will be on their horizon. Just last month Chavez was rambling about how his 24 new Sukhoi fighters fresh from Russia will be enough to "fend off any Imperialist America expansion."
Chavez can't go more than a few weeks without saying some random thing like "Americans are SATANIC!!" or "America has a fleet gathering to invade us, I just KNOW IT!!!" So why are we taking him seriously? It is like taking a tinfoil hat conspiracy theorist who claims that E.T. was beamed down from space and raped him in his sleep seriously.
On a side note, there are worse countries when it comes to game censorship. I won't mention the Germans or Aussies because they already had a passing mention, but look at Saudi Arabia. They banned Pokemon because it "supports Zionism and the Israeli regime." POKEMON! Just because a six-pointed star is in the card game for the "colorless" type. A six-pointed star that doesn't even look like the Star of David.
Or how about China, where they banned a HISTORICALLY ACCURATE WWII RTS because it showed certain territories under Japanese control and not Chinese control. In China, if the game doesn't fit into the government's twisted view of Chinese history, then it is an instant ban.