Blizzard Censors StarCraft II Maps

[TerranDominion]

StarCraft 2 user Created Map Faced Deletion for Disapointed Content

'StarCraft 2' User-Created Maps Facing Deletion For 'Inappropriate Content'

Posted 2 hrs ago by Brian Warmoth in Mac, News, PC

Blizzard listens to "StarCraft 2" players on the Battle.net forums, but they also watch the custom maps they make for inappropriate and offensive content. Trademarks, racism and vulgarity are just a few of the ingredients liable to get your map deleted, so being aware of Blizzard's content policy can only help you attain wider fame and notoriety through map-making if you take a notion to share your work.

"While players are encouraged to share the maps they create through Battle.net, published maps are subject to review to ensure that they promote a fun and safe environment for all players," a Blizzard representative wrote on Battle.net thread discussing the subject.
That post came in response to a user complaining that their map was deleted without warning, stating that they would have preferred the option to fix the map to watching it be deleted outright.
"If a map is found to contain inappropriate content, it will be removed from Battle.net and the map maker will be contacted via email," the Blizzard rep explained. And that seems to be exactly what happened in this particular case.
So just remember, while making your landmass or mountain look like something you'd find in a health class anatomy textbooks, how you label it and which human organs you choose to construct could mean the difference between having that map around a day after you share it and waking up to a sternly worded note from Blizzard.
Do you think Blizzard's content policy is fair? What's the craziest user-made map you've encountered thus far in "SC2"? Share your responses in the comment section below.

 

[Polar_Bear]

It's the wrong way to handle this, it's just like how the movie- and gaming business, pushing the consumer away rather than engaging in a dialog. But on the other hand this is one of the first encounters, and I hope that Blizzard have learned a lesson and will build rather than destroy, now that they have the crew to do it.

 

[Dr Super Good]

Im sure he is allowed to reupload the map if he fixes it, however it was removed until he fixes it and reuploading it without fixing it will probably get you banned.

This will effect virtually no one as most of us try our best to make fun and high quality content instead of stupid and rude content. As the game is 16 rated, words like "bastard" and "ass" are allowed apparently cause they were part of the campaign so removing such maps would make no sense at all since all the users have axcess to 16 rated content but do not go over the top and use words you would find in an 18 game like GTA or whatever.

 

[Gallin]

Dont alot of the maps in the campaign violate that Sexual Orientation thing? They talk about hitting like every female you see in the game for as far as I have gone. Being straight is a sexual orientation also.

It says

"Refer to any aspect of sexual orientation pertaining to themselves, other players, or in-game characters"

They are in game characters arnt they?

 

[lightning brigade]

There is a post that clarifies, because apparently, the waves had made the shape of a swastika, this is unintended, but might prove to be offensive, consider taking the discussion to medivh's tower, as the swastika is offensive to jews, and other minorities plagued by hitler, some had family members die, some had experienced it themselves, and some are just too ignorant to realize it hurts.

 

[viiva]

I think it's pretty easy to spot a racist map. In WC3 I have played a couple of TD's that were indeed swastika-shaped, but AFAIK had no harmful intentions (everything else looked normal). Yes you can be offended by that at first, but if you realize the map maker had no clue of its meaning, you'd be a douche to report it to Blizzard. Now, there are also some obviously racist maps out there.

 

[Dr Super Good]

For some of you who do not know, the Swastika is and illegal symbol in germany. Use of it can result in serious criminal charges and a lot of games which featured nazies and their symbols have been forced to be edited or were banned from germany. As such blizzard is forced to comply with this law cause a large number of sales are from germany.

The easiest fix I imagine is to change the overall direction of it, thus it is no longer a Swastika.

 

[Midnighters]

Hahaa, thats bull, since Blizzard is a US based company, and pretty well only have to comply with US laws. If Germany is so against, it, why are they allowed War3, and Sc. They both have the same exact content, yet blizzard does nothing, even though now they can.

 

[Gallin]

Plus the swastika has many many many more meanings that that used by the NAZIs

 

[Dr Super Good]

Fact is it is illegal to own one in germany. Fact is that the game is sold in germany so must comply with their laws.

In WC3 and SC the custom maps were not supplied by blizzard, and as such they had no legal liability for the content they expressed. As SC2 uses their servers to host the resources, they are now legally liable for any illegal content (that violates laws orthat does not fit in the age ratting) and as such are forced to do something.

 

[mescovic]

Are you people that dense that do not get the deeper problem behind this. First they took away lan . Then maps have to be uploaded approved by them. Now they will be deleting maps based on being inappropriate. This is not problem in them deleting swastka or racist maps but for the below mention reasons.

Inappropriate
This category includes both clear and masked content which:

Is a mildly inappropriate references to human anatomy or bodily functions
Is a reference to illegal drugs or activities
Has neutral or positive racial/ethnic/national connotations
Has any connotations of major religions or religious figures (i.e. Jesus, Christianity, Buddha)
Is otherwise considered inappropriate for the game world
Advertising

This category includes both clear and masked content which:

Is trademarked/licensed by a company or an individual

This is going include all the many wonderful maps I enjoy in warcraft 3 like drug lord and ones based on movies and other games.

 

[Dr Super Good]

Most of the maps that violated this in WC3 were poorly made and overall had little to no replay value like LoaP or the many usless reproductive maps.

Instead of drugs, use illegal chemicals and hide any detail into what they do.
Instead of calling the map after a movie, change its name slightly. If a map is good no one will care if you call it "Secret agent - the search for the lost relic" instead of "007 - Quantum solice" or even "008 - Universal cup" (example).

If you honestly lack the ability to conceive non physical aspect to create a map about or use to replace barred physical aspects, mapping/moding is not for you.

One could even look foward to see how imagnitive people are at getting around copywrite.

 

[FelFox]

Most of the maps that violated this in WC3 were poorly made and overall had little to no replay value like LoaP or the many usless reproductive maps.

Instead of drugs, use illegal chemicals and hide any detail into what they do.
Instead of calling the map after a movie, change its name slightly. If a map is good no one will care if you call it "Secret agent - the search for the lost relic" instead of "007 - Quantum solice" or even "008 - Universal cup" (example).

If you honestly lack the ability to conceive non physical aspect to create a map about or use to replace barred physical aspects, mapping/moding is not for you.

One could even look foward to see how imagnitive people are at getting around copywrite.

Yea, it should be pretty easy to just rename everything. Makes the censorship bit kind of pointless since it's still the same idea, but it should be enough to get around the Moral Correctness Committee.
Still though, it'd all depend on how competently and viciously Blizzard enforces their decisions. For example, there's a rather popular Left 4 Dead map that heavily infringes on Valve's trademark. It even rips audio directly from actual L4D, yet no action has been taken as of yet. If Blizzard felt like it they'd just ban this map, and they could quite easily ban any historical diplo-map if they wanted to (national connotations is explicitly in their don't-do list).
As it is, we're probably going to get infrequent, arbitrary, and irritating censorship that only affects a few people and doesn't really accomplish anything.

 

[MGCǂSpectre]

So dont make 2 round hills with 1 spike on the top of each hill or your map gets deleted hahahah. Or dont make a long mountain with 2 round hills on both sides rofl @ Blizz map moderation

 

[Na_Dann_Ma_GoGo]

Oh god people frigging relax.

It's absolutely fine and right to remove inappropriate content. I doubt they delete it from his hard disc which would be the only problem.

And don't start any other conspiracy theories when it's just about removing inappropriate content.
I've no problem with Blizzard doing so, why would I? I neither enjoy playing such maps as they're bad mostly anyways and well... it's immature anyways.

There was this one map in Wc3 which name I don't really know anymore. Was a quite fun hero defense but when you won it there some gay pic which is not what I'd like people to see.

 

[Just_Spectating]

it seems that the FCC got to Blizzard

 

[tagg1080]

Oh no, if your map is just a giant porn picture, then they can delete it??

OMGG

NO WAY!!!!!


How is this a big deal?
It is their game, their property, they can do whatever they want.

Welcome to life.

 

[Dark.Revenant]

Anyway, this is the justification for this policy:
The guidelines are the standard bullshit that every company on the face of the planet will stick in their policy somewhere. The difference here is that Blizzard actually has the manpower to enforce those guidelines to a considerable degree. The reason they're doing this is not because they're fascist (or communist), but rather because these maps and their gameplay are all hosted on Blizzard servers and bandwidth. The game is also rated T, at least in the USA, which means, since Battle.net is an obligatory thing to log on to at least once, that Blizzard can't just cop out with "Online experience is not rated by the ESRB." Blizzard MUST enforce the custom maps and filter the language, otherwise ESRB would have grounds to change the rating to M (the rating change won't matter at all to Blizzard, but the press reports and news articles made from it CERTAINLY will be a gut punch to Blizzard's reputation). Worse still, because the maps are hosted by Blizzard, they might be sued for harassment or somesuch; of course, they would win the case, but they'd lose money due to court/lawyer fees.

My thoughts:
It's clearly unfortunate that we are limited severely in what we can do. Escape Gay Heaven is something that would probably be a perma-ban offense. Risk might be hit for a trademark, or it might be hit for all the country names, but it's hard to say. Civilization might have religions (if modeled after the fourth game, at least) along with the usual civilization names and figureheads. Russian Roulette, a funmap I made, would probably be blocked due to the entire core of the gameplay being based on trying to survive despite committing suicide. Even Mafia (like the party game) would be iffy because of the clear connotations of a real-life problem (the mafia), complete with illegal acts such as chain murdering and vigilante justice, plus the illegal AND sexual-connotation-ish role of prostitute/whore (roleblocker). Blizzard should post some more clear examples, for starters.

 

[TerranDominion]

Fri, Aug 6th, 2010, 3:00 pm (EST) by Colin

Looks like Goldshire on Moon Shine isn't the only naughty thing Blizzard has its Big Brother eyes on. Apparently the industry giant has been busy monitoring user-made maps for StarCraft II and censoring, aka deleting, certain maps deemed inappropriate.

That's great and all but not so according to one user who demanded that Blizzard give him a reason or at least let him know what was wrong with his map so that he could fix it, as opposed to simply deleting it without any notice.

"My map (Ultimate Tank Defence) was deleted because someone at Blizzard deemed something with the map inappropiate, instead of asking me to change said problem or anything, it was deleted, it took over an hour for them to e-mail me that my game was actually deleted, and then never told me why it was deleted only that it was inappropriate."

Of course the community wasn't too happy with that.

"There were plenty of profane maps in WC3 and nobody died, no children were scarred for life, and most of all...they allowed the freedom map builders needed to make some G R E A T maps."

"I think Blizzard needs to butt out of the map building process. Give us the tool and let the COMMUNITY decide which maps are fun to play. After all, nobody is forcing you to play any map. If you are offended then just EXIT," said another user.

Unfortunately, Blizzard's community manager Bashiok - yes the very same one that had a lovely run-in with the consequences of Real ID - responded with a brusque "because we can...literally."

Technically, Blizzard is within their rights to censor whatever they deem inappropriate according to their Terms of Agreement; however, the community obviously isn't very happy with that. Remember the last time what happened when the community was upset? Pretty sure it had something to do with real names.

 

[redmarine]

I can't see any issue here.

Because they own the service they can basically do whatever they like. When we agreed to the terms of agreement we accepted this sort of censorship.

Also, Blizzard officially stated that they're looking into actually telling users why their maps have been removed or deemed inappropriate.

So, what is the problem?

 

[Colonel Lance]

Also, if you read the entire thread the ultimate tank defense author made you'd know that the reason it was removed was because the units made a swastika on the minimap. They also released a list of what you can't have in your maps.

Blizzard released a list showing what might cause a map to be banned: http://us.blizzard.com/support/article.xml?locale=en_US&articleId=33752

According to the website, the player can not just have his/her map banned, but also lose his SC2 account: "In extreme cases, the account will be closed outright"
Here is what you cannot have in your map:

Racial/Ethnic/National

* Has any racial/ethnic connotations
* Has any national connotations

Extreme Sexuality/Violence

* Refers to extreme and/or violent sexual acts
* Refers to extremely violent real life actions or events

Sexual Orientation

* Refer to any aspect of sexual orientation pertaining to themselves, other players, or in-game characters

Obscene/Vulgar

* Is an inappropriate reference to human anatomy or bodily functions
* Is pornographic in nature

Harassing or Defamatory

* Insultingly refer to other characters, players, Blizzard employees, or groups of people, be they in the game or external

Blizzard Employees

* Customer support representatives or employees of Blizzard Entertainment (Both real names and aliases)

Inappropriate

* Is a mildly inappropriate references to human anatomy or bodily functions
* Is a reference to illegal drugs or activities
* Has neutral or positive racial/ethnic/national connotations
* Has any connotations of major religions or religious figures (i.e. Jesus, Christianity, Buddha)
* Is otherwise considered inappropriate for the game world

Advertising

* Any non-beneficial businesses, organizations, or websites

Trademark This category includes both clear and masked content which:

* Is trademarked/licensed by a company or an individual
---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
And, has redmarines mentioned, they're working on letting the author know why their map was removed.

 

[Dr Super Good]

I am sure there was a thread on this already...

however, the community obviously isn't very happy with that.

We are not? Personally me like 95% of people do not care, so do not speak for the community.

 

[killer1390]

I am sure there was a thread on this already...


We are not? Personally me like 95% of people do not care, so do not speak for the community.

Which you are doing in your sentence. Don't speak for the community.

I find this outrageous. But at least they will fix there deletion system.

 

[Teelo]

Unfortunately, Blizzard's community manager Bashiok - [...] - responded with a brusque "because we can...literally."

Source?

 

[Arhowk]

the blizzard forums? lol. ive read that topic where he replies.

 

[Mechanical Man]

So we still can't have a word 'Africa' in our map?

 

[Kamikaye]

They will never post clear examples. In that way they would lose the option to hide behind legal text copypastes since people would use these posted examples in debates for their defense in the forums.

Seriously.. their sudden concern about "Family safety" and "appropriate content". That seems to be a new abominable trend. Or argumentations like "For your own safety" , if you think about the nature of these phrases they are outrageous intimadations implying that you cant handle things yourself and Blizzard (or any other company/institution using them) takes care of it for you.

 

[Statharas]

Which you are doing in your sentence. Don't speak for the community.

I find this outrageous. But at least they will fix there deletion system.

Please. We are the community. He is part of us. He is right. 95%. YOU are the 5%.

 

[Gallin]

You shouldnt throw out random numbers that you have no clue about. Dont speak for others just speak for yourself

 

[Mepper]

Haha wow, just because we agreed to something doesn't mean we can't have opinion, if things were like that, governments and coprporatios would have too much power.

Anyways, I'm part of those "95%" that is upset about the censorship system, while it makes sense to remove some maps that are just plain racist, pornographic, etc. it seems like this is almost becoming McCarthy-like paranoia on Blizzard's part. Why did Blizz have to make the game 12+ -.-'

 

[Colonel Lance]

Source?

http://us.battle.net/sc2/en/forum/topic/248105900?page=6#115

There's is much more to what bashiok said, and it was in response to a question. TerranDominion took that "quote" out of context to make it sound really bad.

The question was

why do you guys review maps "to ensure that they promote a fun and safe environment for all players" in this game, and not the original?

And bashiok answered with

Because we can. Literally. We have a support department now of size and ability to enforce these types of things. It simply wasn't possible when our in-game support used to consist of approximately 20 technical support agents. We did, however, actually police Warcraft III maps to a small degree if they were reported. But it was a rather archaic process.

 

[Dr Super Good]

Merged threads cause they are about a simlar issue.

 

[TerranDominion]

Merged threads cause they are about a simlar issue.

What do you mean ?

 

[WherewolfTherewolf]

The original thread was a single area where some overly protective new restrictions led to a map being deleted for a bs reason, and the new thread is about the new restrictions themselves.

FUCK YEAH FOR LIMITED GEOMETRY IN YOUR MAPS SHAPE!

 

[MGCǂSpectre]

They also censor for a terrain in the shape of reproductive organ or a Tarsonis tower with 2 spheres on the left and right.

 

[Tyranid]

Blizzard sure is protective. Guess "Experience May Change During Online Play" no longer bears any meaning.

 

[Weep]

Amongst all this, I'm wondering whether the map wordfilter/censor is still in effect, preventing the publishing of maps with certain blocked words, or has that been removed since the end of the beta?

 

[TheOverWhelming]

I think it was removed, but I haven't published my map yet.
I tested it when I started (after beta) and it said "Illegal words: Starcraft", I removed Starcraft and I put "Fuck" under suggested players, and it didn't say anything about illegal words. (Note: None of these were uploaded, just clicked the "Publish" button under File in the GE).
I have "Hell" and "Shit" in my map used in transmissions.
But I'm one of those guys annoyed about this. Why are they giving us such a powerful editor but policing us on seemingly useless things? The map size is already limited (being equivalent to WC3s 128x128 for a 256x256 SC2 map), the trigger size is already limited, and now they're limiting games that can be played. It'd be much more effective to put a rating system on the maps themselves IE "This map SWEARS so it is under T rating" or shit like that.
Half the issues that have arisen aren't even known by the map makers themselves. If most the people don't notice a sexual reference or anything deemed "inappropriate" but one person sees where a reference can be made, they report it and delete it [but give it to the map maker]? It's all seemingly very silly to me. And as someone else said earlier in the thread, "[If you find it offensive, don't play it]"
/Endrant

 

[Zwiebelchen]

Damnit americans (blizzard) always being offended by words or naked skin, let alone *shock* nipples! Yes ... I said it! NIPPLES!
But blood, gore and dismemberment is cool at the age of 16 ...

 

[Mechanical Man]

I hope the multiplayer will be soon hacked so I can play my Life of elephant map I will create

 

[Tyranid]

Blizzard has already violated alot of the T-rating restrictions that they have, but "it's cool because it's Blizzard". Hell, the campaign is full of harsh curse words and the game itself has some pretty damn bloody and gruesome deaths for all organic units.

 

[Dr Super Good]

Incorrect, those are the reason why its 16. Without them it would be 12. Having people killed with plastic bags or showing sexual content is the only real reasons for an 18 game.

they made a model of "diablo" aka devil/satan/the antichrist etc.

Are you seriously telling me you have not played Blizzard's Diablo series? I hope this was a joke.

 

[Tyranid]

Incorrect, those are the reason why its 16. Without them it would be 12. Having people killed with plastic bags or showing sexual content is the only real reasons for an 18 game.

Hmmm, then I guess F.E.A.R. was a rated 16 game... No wait it was 18, even thought it only had blood and horror elements. I guess there was "nudity" at the end, if you can even call it that. Then again we also got:

SPOILERS

Naked Kerrigan at the end of the campaign.

I'm having a hard time believing that everything organic exploding in an orchestra of blood guts and gore when it dies (unless killed by flame or acid) qualifies as 16.

 

[mrzwach]

Anyway, this is the justification for this policy:
The guidelines are the standard bullshit that every company on the face of the planet will stick in their policy somewhere. The difference here is that Blizzard actually has the manpower to enforce those guidelines to a considerable degree. The reason they're doing this is not because they're fascist (or communist), but rather because these maps and their gameplay are all hosted on Blizzard servers and bandwidth. The game is also rated T, at least in the USA, which means, since Battle.net is an obligatory thing to log on to at least once, that Blizzard can't just cop out with "Online experience is not rated by the ESRB." Blizzard MUST enforce the custom maps and filter the language, otherwise ESRB would have grounds to change the rating to M (the rating change won't matter at all to Blizzard, but the press reports and news articles made from it CERTAINLY will be a gut punch to Blizzard's reputation). Worse still, because the maps are hosted by Blizzard, they might be sued for harassment or somesuch; of course, they would win the case, but they'd lose money due to court/lawyer fees.

QFT. While the restrictions are harsh and no one likes them, Blizzard doesn't exactly have a choice, as players are forced to go online just to activate their game.

 

[Dr Super Good]

Because blizzard owns the character Diablo and its copyright.

 

[tagg1080]

This is kinda pathetic.

You guys are bitching over something that makes perfect sense.


Blizzard wants the ability to be able stop anything that could possibly come up, so they put some clauses in their shit to be able to use against dumbasses later.

Shut up and play the damn game.

 

[TheOverWhelming]

"Dumbasses", in this case, constitutes any game made by someone(s) and now, any person who has a problem with it can report it since the "reasons for deleting your game" list is open to a lot of games (IE too much swearing). Units moving in the wrong shape or accidental references or shit, even swearing in it just a "little" [undefined] too much. Like that one guy that got his game deleted for apparently no reason obvious enough for him to see.

Edit: Err, Dr_Super_Good, I think he's referring to the point that Diablo means Devil/Satan which is a religious reference, which is apparently not allowed to exist according to their rules.

 

[killer1390]

Please. We are the community. He is part of us. He is right. 95%. YOU are the 5%.

Could you please send me the statistics you are receiving this from. Don't post bullsh** numbers out of nowhere.

Besides, I was just saying, he was being a hypocrite by saying don't speak for us and then he does it in the same post on the next sentence. I don't care if %95 is true or not.

{EDIT}

You guys are bitching over something that makes perfect sense.

Except the part where they didn't inform the person, or give a reason. That does not make much sense.

If however it were to make perfect sense, I agree.

 

[tagg1080]

I will say this one more time, then you can all grow a brain and read it.


Blizzard is a BIG company, obviously. They don't want their games spoiled by people being malicious. Malicious people have the habit of finding loopholes in rules to continue being malicious, and then Blizzard will look like the bad guys for shutting them down.

In the blob of legal shit that blizzard has released, they put a section that will basically let them take anything they deem offensive for any reason, and take it away because they can. This is to cover any malicious pieces of shit that come along.

Stop bitching.


Ever look at the permission you give to Warden when you accept that agreement? That is something to bitch about, not this.

 

[Eccho]

If you people can't come up with unique and creative ideas and concepts, which doesn't violate against their terms of agreement, then...

Tough Luck