Wolfenstein pulled from German store shelves

Posted Sep 22nd 2009 3:30PM by John Callaham
Filed under: FPS, Multiplayer

It's a known fact that games released in the US with any kind of Nazi symbols have to be edited out if they are to be released in Germany. Now it appears that some of those symbols may have slipped into the German version of Wolfenstein and now that game is being pulled from store shelves in that country.

Fan site Planet Wolfenstein, reporting the news from German language web sites, says that it's unknown at this time if publisher Activision Blizzard will try to re-edit and return the game to store shelves. Since the game hasn't been a sales success on this side of the Atlantic it's possible the company may cut its losses and not fool with returning the game to German stores.

[Via Blue's News]

Gallery: Wolfenstein

Tags: activision, activision-blizzard, id-software, raven-software, wolfenstein

Reader Comments (Page 1 of 1)

The problem runs a little deeper than "boo, violent game". It's a fact that showing of Nazi symbology aside from an "educational context" is a legal offense in Germany, which includes games but strangely excludes movies (Indiana Jones comes to mind). Don't ask me why, I didn't make that law.

ActiBlizzard overlooked one small swastika when self-censoring the game for the german market and that is the reason they are recalling the game, for fear of getting slapped with a potentially costly lawsuit.Posted at 8:01PM on Sep 22nd 2009 by BFBeast666

i suppose germans dont want to have any association with their nazi heritage. it must be difficult, and embarassing, but grandparents can be that way i suppose. just accept that the rest of the world hates your grandparents, and lets move forward. we dont hate germany, just your grandparents. Posted at 1:23PM on Sep 23rd 2009 by goog9