Dying Light: The Beast, the latest entry in Techland’s zombie horror series, was released with toned down gore and no nudity in Japan. As Game*Spark reports, changes were made to comply with CERO, Japan’s video game rating board.
All games releasing physically for consoles in Japan require a rating from CERO, and it seems Dying Light: The Beast had to introduce censorship even for the highest CERO Z bracket (ages 18+ and up). According to the title’s official Japanese website, changes from the global version include removed depictions of internal organs, modifications to infected female characters, removed depictions of dismemberment, and removed nudity.
Interestingly, the Japanese Steam version also comes with these restrictions, even though PC games do not generally require a CERO rating to be released. The publishers assure players that co-op with global players will be seamless, despite the changes.
Techland has been focusing much of Dying Light: The Beast’s marketing on its realistic gore and “increased brutality levels,” positioning it as the franchise’s most visceral entry to date – so they probably weren’t eager to tone things down. CERO is notoriously strict about mature content, which has sometimes led to high-profile games not getting to release at all – like in the case of EA’s Dead Space and The Callisto Protocol. More recently, Ubisoft also had to censor the Japanese version of Assassins Creed: Shadows, toning down depictions of dismemberment. Nudity and sexual depictions have also been scrutinized, like in the case of Baldur’s Gate 3’s rather amusing genitalia censorship.
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