Schafer: Self-censorship stops games being funny

Psychonauts developer Tim Schafer is known for putting a heavy element of humor in his games, but the cult designer wants more. He believes that games aren’t funny enough, and it’s because of studios vetting their own material. 

 “There are a lot of funny people in the games industry, and [they seem to] think of the funny thing, and then say: ‘No, I can’t do that. Let’s cut that out because someone might be bothered by that,'” he explained. “I think if people censored themselves less there’d be a lot more funny stuff out there.”

I totally agree with Schafer here, but given how there are plenty of people out there who live to be offended and will employ any bullying tactic they can to squash any kind of racy humor, I almost can’t blame studios who wish not to bother with it. 

Humor of any kind is nearly always going to bother somebody, and it’s sad that people have to cherry-pick what is funny and what is not based on which voices squawk the loudest. Hopefully we get some more developers who have the wit to be funny and the balls to deal with the fallout, because censorship is more offensive than any joke could be.

Schafer: Self-censorship stifling game comedy [CVG]