Upcoming anime MMORPG Blue Protocol isn’t coming to the West until 2024, and publisher Amazon Games has now outlined some of the changes from the Japanese version audiences can expect to see when it does finally arrive.
Blue Protocol is developed by Bandai Namco and launched earlier this summer in Japan. The Western version of the free-to-play MMO is being localized and published by Amazon Games, which has made a name for itself in the MMO space recently. Amazon developed 2021’s New World and handles the Western localization for the Korean MMO Lost Ark.
In an interview with the fan site Blue Protocol Database, Amazon Games franchise lead Mike Zadorojny discussed specific changes fans can expect to see in the Western version of Blue Protocol. Zadorojny said changes to the game are coming from a “cultural, legal, and a regulatory perspective,” and are being made to ensure a Teen rating and appeal to a teen market. The goal is for the game’s gameplay content, events, and story to be the same across both versions.
Zadorojny called out a few specific changes players can expect. Amazon Games has updated the outfits for some of the game’s children characters to make their outfits less revealing. Another change Zadorojny said Amazon Games has made is the removal of a “physics shake” button for female characters on the character creation screen. The button did exactly what you think it did.
“These are the types of changes that are culturally accepted in Japan and which they do in their titles,” Zadorojny said. “However, in the West it can be uncomfortable for our players and that’s where we will step in to say ‘Hey, can we make a slight change for this?'”
Those answers haven’t gone over well with some on the Blue Protocol subreddit, where heated discussion caused the subreddit’s moderators to move all discussion of the topic to a single megathread in order to more easily moderate “what has been a really divisive topic that has led people to break site-wide and subreddit rules on several occasions.”
Some users on the subreddit make it clear that they are not okay with any form of what they view as “censorship.” Others take issue with Amazon’s reasoning that the changes are being made to promote the game to a teen audience, despite Blue Protocol featuring “gacha” mechanics akin to gambling.
It’s not the first time Amazon has gained the ire of fans concerned about changes. For the release of Lost Ark’s Artist class, Amazon updated the character’s outfits to be less-revealing. Amazon had previously added more conservative options for Lost Ark’s female characters while choosing to not put images of the game’s more risqué outfits “front and center.”
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