A few weeks ago (forgive me -- I was in a holiday K-hole) Gamepolitics noted this tidbit from the Korea Times:
Government to Lift Ban on Games on North Korea
Military and action games dealing with North Korean politics will be available in South Korea next year, the game censorship agency said.
Kim Key-man, the chief of the Game Rating Board of Korea, said last week that it will allow the sale of such games after carefully reviewing their contents, to guarantee freedom of expression.
So far, games like ``Ghost Recon 2’’ and ``Mercenary’’ have been banned in South Korea as the government is worried they may damage the relationship between the two Koreas. The two games depict imaginary war scenarios between North Korea and China,
and between North Korea and the United States, respectively.
``Through propaganda, entertainment and movies, Americans have shown everyone their hatred for us,’’ North Korea’s Tongil newspaper said about ``Ghost Recon 2.’’ ``This may be just a game to them now, but a war will not be a game for them later. In war, they will only face miserable defeat and gruesome deaths.’’
Spicy copy from Tongil there.
South Korea announced its censorship of games depicting North Korea as enemies only a year ago, as noted back in Dec 2005 in the New York Times. The Times stressed that the South Koreans didn't necessarily approve of seeing North Koreans depicted as one-dimensional villains, and wished to avoid factual inaccuracies:
"Ghost Recon 2 assumes that North Korea has nuclear weapons at a time when we are unable to verify their possession of nuclear weapons," [South Korean game ratings board member Lee Chan Gyeong] added. "If we were to allow distribution, the users might perceive an unreal opinion, one that is unfavorable in an international setting."
Well, guess that argument's outdated...
Link: GamePolitics.com » Blog Archive » South Korea Lifts Ban on Military Games.