Zen Studios alters classic pinball art to protect family-friendly rating

[Maneki1972]

I'm totally in support of this. I mean if you think about it, right? 100 billion people die from lung cancer or end up being perverts or killers because of pinball artwork every single year. That means that you reading this are either dead, killed someone or you're going to have overly perverted thoughts.

How did we as a culture survive swimsuit clad girls since the '50s, tobacco use for hundreds of years and fighting with a sword for over a thousand years?

(sarcasm meter about to explode)

 

[Kolchak357]

I'm totally in support of this. I mean if you think about it, right? 100 billion people die from lung cancer or end up being perverts or killers because of pinball artwork every single year. That means that you reading this are either dead, killed someone or you're going to have overly perverted thoughts.

How did we as a culture survive swimsuit clad girls since the '50s, tobacco use for hundreds of years and fighting with a sword for over a thousand years?

(sarcasm meter about to explode)

But I haven't killed anyone today. And let's face it, most pinball junkies were perverts long before they started playing pinball.

 

[shutyertrap]

But I haven't killed anyone today. And let's face it, most pinball junkies were perverts long before they started playing pinball.

Who doesn’t remember walking past After Burner, hanging a right at Dragons Lair, and then going through the curtains between TMNT and Zaxon to play pinball? I think it’s where the video stores got the idea from for the ‘adult’ section.

Kidding aside, when I went to Arcade Expo a few years back they actually did have a room with a curtain that had Sopranos, Big Bang Bar, and 2 others I can’t recall in it. The curtain was mainly because the room was lit with a black light and that was rather cool. But yes, the machines also had full adult modes going on with Sopranos dropping f-boms left and right.

 

[bavelb]

Compare that to yesterday, where I was playing in a public arade with tons of kids around, on an Elvira and the Partymonsters where the backglass was...let's say ....adjusted (link minus the black rectangle).

Can't outdutch the Dutch I guess

 

[shutyertrap]

Well clearly Elvira doesn’t need anyone’s support

 

[Citizen]

https://www.kotaku.com.au/2010/09/pinball-machines-films-most-omnipresent-villain/

We may all be villains. I mean, syt definitely is.

(I wanted to just post a YT of that Sideshow Bob quote, but I couldn't find it.)

 

[The loafer]

Meh, for the art no censorship would be better but bottom line is for some of this, their hands are tied. Now as to the rules, change one rule then you better not release the table at all. I can accept the art but the gameplay is sacrilegious and should in no way be modified.

 

[TFHFony]

Don't get me wrong: I would prefer uncensored tables as well, but you can hardly blame ZEN for restrictions set by Disney or ESRB.
I do hope they find a way to solve this by making a special 16+ DLC or whatever solution they can find. Though I'll end up purchasing the tables anyway.

 

[pinball_chaos]

Hi All - Mel from Zen here.

We are going to have a big update on this topic in the near future. We thank the community for the continued feedback. It's great for us to have such clear understanding of what you want and expect from us.

 

[Pinballwiz45b]

Hi All - Mel from Zen here.

We are going to have a big update on this topic in the near future. We thank the community for the continued feedback. It's great for us to have such clear understanding of what you want and expect from us.

OH?

I await this news, good or bad.

But yeah, as long as 99% of the art is untouched and 100% of the rules remain intact, I'm fine.

 

[bavelb]

Hi All - Mel from Zen here.

We are going to have a big update on this topic in the near future. We thank the community for the continued feedback. It's great for us to have such clear understanding of what you want and expect from us.

Hey Mel, nice to hear from you through this less formal channel. Got to say, after playing some real life Junk Yard and Medieval Madness his week, I'm even more impressed than I already was (played Fish Tales as well, but the RL table had some weird-ass flippers so I couldn't compare). Looking forward to these future updates.

 

[pinball_chaos]

Hey Mel, nice to hear from you through this less formal channel. Got to say, after playing some real life Junk Yard and Medieval Madness his week, I'm even more impressed than I already was (played Fish Tales as well, but the RL table had some weird-ass flippers so I couldn't compare). Looking forward to these future updates.

Thank you. It will only get better from here.

 

[Citizen]

Hi All - Mel from Zen here.

We are going to have a big update on this topic in the near future. We thank the community for the continued feedback. It's great for us to have such clear understanding of what you want and expect from us.

Thanks Mel, looking forward to it.

It's great how well-informed you guys keep fans.

 

[Kolchak357]

OH?

I await this news, good or bad.

But yeah, as long as 99% of the art is untouched and 100% of the rules remain intact, I'm fine.

Kind of how I feel as well. It’s fine as long as I don’t notice.

 

[Blkthorne]

Hi All - Mel from Zen here.

We are going to have a big update on this topic in the near future. We thank the community for the continued feedback. It's great for us to have such clear understanding of what you want and expect from us.

Really enjoying the tables and certainly appreciate the work Zen has done on them, just hopeful that a solution can be found on the censorship front and no removal of game modes.

 

[kinggo]

Hey Mel, nice to hear from you through this less formal channel. Got to say, after playing some real life Junk Yard and Medieval Madness his week, I'm even more impressed than I already was (played Fish Tales as well, but the RL table had some weird-ass flippers so I couldn't compare). Looking forward to these future updates.

IMO, the most formal way is just like this, on the actual community board with people that are most interested in the product. I get that those don't generate most of the sales but they do understand what the product is about and how it should look/work while the rest of the buyers will just buy it. Or not. For whatever reason often not related to product as such but some reason that they can't exactly explain.

 

[Pinballwiz45b]

Blahcade had the interview with Mel earlier today. Looking forward to hearing what's going on in about 2 weeks' time.

Anyway, I recently remembered another game and wanted to share this, regarding the cigars/tobacco portion of the censorship, specifically. Yeah, it's a minor detail, but Pinball FX3 (and as Jeff Strong also mentioned, Heroes of the Storm) is not the only game to have had tobacco references removed.

Back when Bejeweled 3 was almost finished with development, PopCap originally intended to have Zen mode include things to break bad habits -- before then, it contained "helping players quit smoking". Guess who intervened -- the ESRB. If they left it in, Bejeweled 3 would've been a T-rating right then and there.

Because Fish Tales is free, that table is immediately available to players, and the original art would be rated by the ESRB.

 

[wolfson]

get use to it , this is Zen , they aren`t Farsight . I have never had any problems with Zen

 

[Silverball67]

I really hate our present time of censorship and fu***** political correctness so much.
Wish I had a time-machine-travel to the 70´s!

I wonder why many RAP-Songs have very exclusive rights (rap*** women, ki***** cops..., no Problem, part of a special, worth protecting "culture"?). Most Kids "enjoy" these garbage, but bikini-ladies and a Smoking fisherman in pinball got to be censored? Very strange and rediculous.

 

[wilbers]

With Zen and Farsight, it seems their attitude is the same as some peoples attitude to planning permission when unsure if its needed or not. Zen does it the right way and checks what is needed in advance, and hence are sustainable in the long term. Farsight ploughs on thinking "well it will probably be OK", and deals with any issues later when it isn't.