Not really too surprised. Singapore has their eccentricities. A few years back I was working a job that got outsourced to singapore, a couple of us ended up going over there to train them, and they came back with some stories allright. Apparently you have to be real careful over there. Seems they still have public canings for law violations. Not sorry I didn't go, but not because of the laws or for want to see a new country. (My employer at the time was telling people to pay the costs up front and they'd reimburse. Cheap sons of a $$%%^.)

I've said it before, and I"ll say it again.

As bad as we think it is here, in other countries, it's freaking worse.

Pathetic! A semi lewd scene that shows nothing more then normal tv can, and they get pissy about it.

To all those that bitch about american ratings, myself included, be grateful.

Least we don't live there.

This is the infamous lesbian love scene? I see more on tv than I do with that.

Wow...just wow. (laughs hysterically at the stupidity of some people)

@ Video game time

Doubt it, most people like that only outcry against homosexuality because it makes them uncomfortable and threatens their perceptions of sexuality.

Girl/girl action however dosen't present the same problems to a patriarchal morality system that the boy/boy scene does.

To sum up, in their twisted minds;
boy/boy = gross
girl/girl = hawt

Besides! The blue lass is obviously an alien - perhaps it has an x and y chromosome and only looks female by our perceptions? When you get right down to it gender isn't nearly as set in stone as current western thinking would portray.

@ Kharnivore

Get it through your thick skull, I was just leaving a little teaser that Jack Thompson would not mind seeing the game banned just for that little scene.

It seems like you are not smart enough to understand that so back off me.

Now you know what a truly fascist state is like. Never pick of Australia again.....Ever. You cannot compare the two countries. Singapore is a superficial, ultra-conservative, repressive dictatorship. That country is no democracy, I don't care what you try to tell me. In Singapore, same sex intercourse is illegal, oral sex is illegal, chewing gum is illegal, Cosmo & Cleo magazines are restricted to adults, porn is entirely illegal, movies like SAW and Borat are banned from being released on DVD, the list goes on and on.

Singapore is the new Nazi Germany.

It may be banned for sale in the country, but it's not illegal to play it. Only local retailers won't be able to stock it. But if Singaporean gamers want to play it, they could just order from an online store or parallel import it from elsewhere. The government can't do anything to players who already own it.

Can anybody confirm this?

Last I checked, not even the regulars over at the official Mass Effect forums even knew about this.

Don't they also arrest you for chewing gum in public over in Singapore?

It's a nice place to visit, but I sure as hell don't wanna live there. Even their guided tours felt like subliminal propaganda.

I am very curious to see how the media and the anti-games folk will handle this. The christians in this country (and their republican puppets) have basically made homosexuality the number one worst thing a person can do.

I personally can't wait for Mass Effect for this very reason- I want to see if a game can tackle a sexual/romantic situation in a serious manner. Given Bioware's track record, I believe this could be a significant evolution in videogames as a storytelling artform.

That looks sharp graphically but is less than some of the things you can see on tv, like other people said. But whatever. We'll see how well government censor can work the internet and mail system to stop people from importing.

Feh, that was one of the stiffest sex scenes I ever saw...

*ba-dum-tish!*

Did they ban it for the censored version (above) or the actual one that you could download off gamevideos.com or somewhere?

@ SLIPSLOPSLAP:
Godwin in 11.

Big 'meh'. I agree with Godkarmachine O Inary; TVs done worse. Let's just hope no one figures out that it promotes interspecies couples so me and my green girlfriend can continue to live in peace.

Also if no one's going to say it... needs more (.)(.)... even if they are virtual.

Its interesting that Pandralisk hasn't made an appearance in this article. Perhaps it is because he cannot connect Singapore with his twisted view of Christianity.

@ Fat Cat Lim

Play-Asia FTW!

As I said at GayGamer.com *face palms*

Whoops, ment .net, but still, the face palm still applies.

That scene was...surprisingly underplayed. Not offensive at all.

Oh, and to answer MaskedPixelante's question, yes there was a lesbian option in Jade Empire. If I remember correctly it ended in a rather passionate kiss.
Bioware seems to care the most about telling a good story and having solid interactions between the characters. Thus they seem to feel that gender should not be a limit as far as which characters can interact and how.

Actually, I doubt JT will pay any attention to this at all because: A) It wasn't made by Rockstar, B), it wasn't made by Take-Two, C) It wasn't made by Microsoft, D) it's classified as an RPG.

Yes, he really is THAT petty.

Didn't go down well, eh?

Nicely done.

Oh I forgot to add this is typical morlisim fro the top down to show that they are "protecting" and doing stuff.

@Eveyone who brought up JT

He dosen't care about stuff like this. If you keep mentioning it then when he does the search for his name here (as he always does) he will most likely give the "I don't care you morons!" line and leave it at that or talk about something that has nothing to do with the article. Don't jinx it!

@Article

This makes me automaticaly win because that means my pron is better than your pron. What do they have over there? Amish Girls Gone Wild? Look! It's an ankle! OHH!! A wrist!.

Ok, I ran out of jokes. But seroiusly, it is absurd enough that I can make fun of it easly.

Hey! Maybe he could put mass effect in one of his court docs!

*Sigh* Like it matters. Singapore has so far off the world's radar that I seriously doubt anyone's really gonna care. While this scene will probably offend a select few, it's tame. Nothing is shown. I don't think there'll be problems in the States.

I think what they're say is, "Why watch lesbian sex in a game when you could go to our Orchard Tower and get the realy thing."

@ MaskedPixelante

Who cares? Having gay/lez/bi characters can make RPing much more interesting.

@Erik

No one ever said christianity was the exclusive motivation for media bannings- islam and others are just as bad.

Singapore, however, just has a stick up their ass. Its kind of common knowledge that they are heavy-handed on lots of things. I fail to see why anyone would be suprised.

The worst thing about this is that bioware is one of the few game companies that cares enough to tell a good story. I'm sure there was quite a buildup to the scene (although I do question why they would choose to show such a scene in isolation). Singapore only harms its domestic and international perception with this action.

Comparing Australia to Singapore is like comparing the United States to Nazi Germany in WW2, seriously I know people aren't that stupid......Or am I wrong?

"No one ever said christianity was the exclusive motivation for media bannings"


Uh, yeah actually Pandralisk has, repeatedly.

@Erik

But that's because he suffered from rectal-cranial inversion.

"[Mass Effect's] single sex scene is brief and undetailed, although there is breast nudity in one version of the scene," read the board's summary. "The sex scene is triggered by the player making a series of choices about becoming more than friends with a colleague. If playing as a male character the scene can take place between him and a human woman or a humanoid female alien. If playing as a female character the scene can take place between her and a male human or a female humanoid alien." (Emphasis added.)

Taken from a GS news article.

http://www.gamespot.com/news/6179029.html?tag=result;title;6

I didn't see any breast nudity in that scene. Maybe the nudity occurs in the female/male or male/female scenes.

Hmm... there are 4 different versions of the "sex scene" in Mass Effect.

Female/male-human
Female/"female"-alien
Male/"female"-alien
Male/female-human

All 4 contain at least one person who looks female, and according to the BBFC, one of them has breast nudity. Before this video, if I had been forced to guess which one, I would have said it would be the "lesbian" scene, given that it has twice the number of breasts to potentially show. But it doesn't appear to be in that video. Is that really the full scene?

Wait a minute. They banned the game because of this! There is no sex in this scene. All you see are two heads, some kissing and a hand in the last scene. This is just completely idiotic. They rather ban a game over two people in a love scene than aliens and humans killing each other. If that is the case, that is really idiotic.

I am totally surprised by this piece of news.
This really comes from the little island nation where prostitution is legal, but also cover by insurance and receive health care?!

I hear more gay action than that on will and grace when i'm listening to it on my dual band TV radio reciever...

Tastefully done...but then again I didn't expect anything else from bioware.

You neglected to indicate that your posted video is the "tame" cut. There have been racier videos from the game posted on other sites.

i think singapore is ritw they should ban this gay game =)