A pair of upcoming Xbox games have been canceled right before their release due to claims of censorship. Unlike PC marketplaces such as Steam, console manufacturers in PlayStation, Nintendo, and Xbox often have guidelines that developers must meet in order to publish games on these platforms. Occasionally, this will lead to conflicts where developers will report that they’ve been told that certain elements of their games have to be changed or else they won’t be allowed to release their games on these consoles. Now, another situation of this sort has come about, and it has resulted in one developer just choosing to scrap its Xbox port altogether.
In a new statement released on social media, developer City Connection shared that it has chosen to cancel its Xbox One versions of Steam-Heart’s Saturn Tribute and Advanced Variable Geo Saturn Tribute. Both games were originally released in the 1990s across PC, PlayStation, and Sega Saturn platforms. While popular, each game also featured erotic content that made each title controversial at the time of its arrival.
When choosing to re-release Steam-Heart’s Saturn Tribute and Advanced Variable Geo Saturn Tribute, City Connection acknowledged that both games feature “provocative” content. While changes are said to have been made to each game that have allowed for their release on PlayStation, Nintendo Switch, or PC platforms, those at Xbox are said to have continually requested changes to both games in order to greenlight them for launch. Rather than comply with these drastic overhauls, City Connection says it has instead opted to cancel its release entirely for Xbox.
“We would like to announce that we have decided to cancel the Xbox versions of Steam-Heart’s Saturn Tribute and Advanced Variable Geo Saturn Tribute, which were under development and scheduled for release on Thursday, May 29th,” the company wrote. “Due to the nature of each game being a revival of a work that contains provocative content, we have been developing these titles with the goal of providing a common gaming experience across multiple platforms. While each platform has its own standards, and we have made many adjustments to the content of the game, we have recognized the need to make significant changes to the expression of the game on Xbox. It was a difficult decision, but we have had to make this decision. We apologize to everyone who has been looking forward to the release of the Xbox version.”
Moving forward, City Connection says that it still plans to release its games on Xbox platforms in the future. Xbox itself hasn’t responded to this claim from City Connection, and it likely won’t, especially given the smaller nature of these re-releases. For those still looking to pick up these new versions of Steam-Heart’s Saturn Tribute and Advanced Variable Geo Saturn Tribute, both should still arrive on PlayStation, Nintendo Switch, and PC without issue on May 29th.
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Source: https://comicbook.com/gaming/news/xbox-one-series-x-s-games-censored-release/
