The UK is full of spastics.

Mario Party 8 is being recalled in the UK. Why? There is a HUGELY offensive word that the UK just can' t handle. The word? " Spastic" .

Nintendo has recalled all copies of Mario Party 8 in the UK due to it containing an offensive word.

The title was released for the Nintendo Wii on Friday and has seen heavy promotion over the weekend with TV advertisements.

" Unfortunately we have discovered that a small number of games contain the wrong version of the disk due to an assembly error," reads a statement from the company.

" We have therefore decided to recall all copies of the game from UK retailers so that this mistake can be corrected."

Last month, Ubisoft was forced to pull all copies of DS game Mind Quiz in Europe after it was found to contain offensive comments.

Nintendo said it will announce a new release date for Mario Party 8 shortly.

From gamesindustry.biz



If you guys would just euthanize your spastics, this wouldn' t be an issue. Wrong version and assembly error, my ass!

You little ignorant ****

The UK has seemingly increased in acts like this in many sectors over the years. I' m also under the impression that the majority of the public is annoyed by such efforts.

I could be wrong, but the government interfering in things like this so often would sure piss me off.

There has been an increasing overuse of Political Correctness in the UK, that' s what you get with a ' trendy' lefty pinko government. There are however some words that it just isn' t right to use in any context and that' s one of them.

It' s not about being PC it' s being down right ignorant, anyone with a spastic child or relative would feel the same.

That' s not cool. I' m sorry, pick on foreigners, politicians and celebrities all you want, but leave the mentally ill out of it.

This also happened recently with a brain training game released in the UK by Ubisoft. If you ranked low, the game called you a spastic. People went nuts. Buildings were burned down. The Queen said " Oh dear" . It was hell on Earth. I could understand if the game called you a fucking asshole, but a spastic? That' s like calling someone a retard (that' s our word for it in the US). We love the word " retard" .

The games that got nailed with this were marketed directly for children.

Did Nintendo recall the games on their own accord or were they forced into the recall?

Nintendo did it. But if they hadn' t, somebody would have made them.

Mario Party is aimed at children? Well I guess it is, since it is Nintendo.

The people playing Mario Party aren' t necessarily playing The Darkness. Their tolerance levels for violence and profanity (on a general scale) is far lower than other consumers. We' re assuming it' s kids or easily offended adults.

I bet it' s the new moms who are offended. Everytime there is a PC movement, moms are behind it. I didn' t know " spastic" was a swear word. Here in the US, the word literally means " hyperactive" . It' s also kind of a funny-sounding word.

Did you even look at the screenshot guys? I don' t see how the sentence " turn the train spastic" is supposed to be an insult to anybody.

The games that got nailed with this were marketed directly for children.

So what? How are children affected by the word " spastic" ? Kids are use to seeing F' s all the time, adding a new word for dumbass wouldn' t crush their ego' s. Replacing " Game Over" , Fail, F, better luck next time. All convey the same thing. It means they lost. You can' t protect children from losing. Why would you? What kind of life lesson is that? The word " Spastic" is mearly another word to enrich their vocabulary. It changes nothing else.

Saying that certain words are bad is no different from saying that the English language is bad.

What about manhunt II that has to be fundamentally changed just to see release? A game that was rated 18+, somehow adults are too young to play the game. Where does this censorship end? Who gets to draw the line?

Anytime there is censorship, there is an elitist not too far trying to hold on to power. In a perfect society, where there are no marginalized and no one being oppressed, there would be no need for censorship.

" Turn the train RETARD!"

Someone who is " Spastic" is someone who is both physically and mentally disabled, it like " retard" are 2 of the most offensive words ever invented when used out of context, think of how any of you would feel if you brother, sister, nephew or niece were termed as being spastic.

If nintendo pulled this themselves then why did they use the word in the first place.

They said it was an abberation in disc manufacturing. Nintendo Corporate would have a hard time picking up on an offensive word that was in 1% of the stock.

I' m not skilled enough in english to take the debate of how unappropriate the word " spastic" is. But I do believe that if you have a choice to use a word that won' t offend someone, or a word that might offend someone, the non offensive alternative is always the best one.
In this situation, I think another word would have been more appropriate and I think the translator did a bad job by not realising that the word might not be the best one to use. It comes as no surprise that Nintendo chose to take action.
It' s not a big issue to me though so I would never demand a recall of the game, but it' s enough to motivate some critique.

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And how would this word magically find itself in 1% of the discs? It even rhymes with the other words. It was there intentionally. Someone typed it in. It was approved.

Ehm, doesn' t it say to " turn the train spastic" ? Thus changing the behavior of the train.
Not " turn the train, spastic" as in giving an order to someone spastic. There' s a difference with or without comma. Of course many of the complainers there won' t know this. Political correctness doesn' t always go hand in hand with common sense or intelligence ;)

To me it looks like they chose the word to be able to make it rhyme a bit there. But it' s kind of careless if the word is kind of offensive to some of course. They could almost know there would be people who would interpret it the wrong way.

What rubbish, the use of the word spastic in any contest is a derogatory one, whatever spin you put on it, Nintendo have used a word that is offensive to people, and people who either have a relative or raise money for spastic people or causes.

I guess it is mostly true, then. I posted this news on this site since it is based in the UK and therefore has a lot of UK members. We were talking about how offended people in the UK get with this word. I just had to test it (the news story is true, I didn' t make it up). Here in the US the word is " retard" as I said earlier. If something like that showed up in a game (and probably has), very few or no people here get offended. I find this very interesting. Granted, we (or most of us, rather) don' t go up to retarded people and make fun of them. I guess it' s more of a slang word than anything. Do they have slang in the UK?

Spastic!

Hahaha, what a fucking joke. What harm can a word do?

Don' t think too many people would be offended down here in Aus. I barely hear the word spastic anymore though. We just use the corrupted version " spakka" when we want to say someone' s being a complete dolt.

What rubbish, the use of the word spastic in any contest is a derogatory one, whatever spin you put on it, Nintendo have used a word that is offensive to people, and people who either have a relative or raise money for spastic people or causes.

Why would it be rubbish? The comma does make a difference. But those who complained first of all probably didn' t think of this and interpreted it the way they wanted. In other words, the negative way despite the context. Besides that, spastic doesn' t only refer to people with that condition. Someone with a stroke or after a car accident can also get into a temporary state of spastic movement. Should they also stop using the word there then out of respect for those with long lasting spastic movement disorder (those who people usually refer to as spastic)? I assume the word must be VERY sensitive then in the UK judging from this.

I didn' t say it was very smart though to use the word since they should know that it could create problems.

The meaning of the word is not changed just by adding a comma, look the word up in the Oxford English dictionary and you will see that the word has one meaning and one meaning only.

That is a person who has uncontrollerble spasms due to some form of brain damage, there is no other meaning.

No there is no need to stop using the word with regards to a temporary spastic state, again the meaning is the same, due to some form of brain injury the person is in a spastic state, either way it is the correct meaning of the word.

Telling someone to " turn the train spastic." is incorrect use of the word and is an insult and meaning that person has a form of severe disability.

ys, in swedish the equivalent would be
" Gör tåget CP-skadat"
Doesn' t sound very respectful does it?

It' s bad with incorrect use of names of deceases and similar, since it kind of removes the seriousness of the described state.

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I know very well what spastic means. And there are different meanings actually. It doesn' t refer to brain damage necessarily (the condition most associate it with). Spastic could very well refer to spasms (involuntary contractions) in muscles due to local chemical imbalance etc. Another synonym is energetic. BUT the thing here is that it apparently sounds much worse for people in Great Britain compared to others. And from what I' ve read it is because some organization there used the word spastic in their name. While they actually work for people with cerebral palsy as it is actually called. So it all depends on how widely used the synonyms are per country.

Of course the meaning of the word doesn' t change with a comma. But the connotation within the sentence does. Without a comma there is a connotation between train and spastic, making spastic like an adjective to it.

Again, I' m NOT saying it was right to include the word. They should' ve thought of how sensitive this is for British people before releasing this. I just feel that there' s always someone offended these days over small things. If they were insulting all the time I could understand. But all this fuss over one word while it was clear that there wasn' t any harmful intent behind, I don' t know. They of course wanted it to rhyme a bit and tell that the train would get " energetic" . Maybe someone from the US or another country did the translation? And translating from Japanese (or any other language) while keeping the same feel in other languages isn' t easy of course.

But whatever, it' s not like I' m trying to prove that it was wrong to remove the games with this word. Just that it' s not as offensive everywhere.

Hahaha, what a ***ing joke. What harm can a word do?

That' s exactly what I' ve been saying my entire life. People are so bloody weird.

So you would be ok being called a word that has a meaning of being in a state where you cannot function independantly, and you would need help with the very basic human finctions?

If you say yes then you are either a liar or you have no human compassion whatsoever, have any of you had to deal with someone who needs constant help? I would guess those of you that say it is ok to use the word haven' t....just for the record I have or rather had.

If people didn' t use these words so negatively for all these years, they would' ve lost all meaning anyway. That' s why I find it stupid. They are all just words. Besides, I already have been called that several times in the past, and it hasn' t affected me.

Hell, I' m black, but I don' t mind being called nigger.

well that' s your choice and I am sure calling other black people Niggers would offend them.

Well I' ve called another black guy that, but he won' t let a white guy call him it. White people have called me it though.

I know everyone has different views on the subject, and always will, but that' s just mine. I will still help other people if they seem offended or emotionally hurt, though, because I don' t like seeing people like that.

So you would be ok being called a word that has a meaning of being in a state where you cannot function independantly, and you would need help with the very basic human finctions?

If you say yes then you are either a liar or you have no human compassion whatsoever, have any of you had to deal with someone who needs constant help? I would guess those of you that say it is ok to use the word haven' t....just for the record I have or rather had.

In the context of the sentence dont think its a bad word to use, people are really uptight about somethings.

The sentence is a spell to make the train go crazy, and spells are made to rhyme.

I understand it can be hard to care for someone with a dissability like that, the use of the word in a game, in a spell, is completely irrelevant and i believe that if it offends people, they need their heads checked.

No offence!

And how would this word magically find itself in 1% of the discs? It even rhymes with the other words. It was there intentionally. Someone typed it in. It was approved.

I' m not saying it was a random abberation. Unless I' m wrong though, according to the article it was only a small amount of copies. This doesn' t put the translator off the hook or anything, but would make it harder to catch before the game goes into wide release. Untill I' m told otherwise, I' m just going by what I' ve read.

In my opinion spastic is a word that has no right to be used in that context.

Some of my black friends don' t consider nigger to be offensive when used by another black person. It has connotation to them as a term of endearment. The same goes with me and my heritage. I have a certain group of friends that refer to me as " Paddy the Irish Polack" . My heritage on my mom' s side is Polish, and my heratage on my dad' s side is mutt. (Irish/Welsh/Scott)

I don' t take offense at that because I know they' re just having a good time, they don' t mean it enough to hurt, and I don' t care enough to be hurt.

You can' t call a mentally retarded person spastic as a term of endearment. There' s a huge difference between the words.

Some of my black friends don' t consider nigger to be offensive when used by another black person. It has connotation to them as a term of endearment. The same goes with me and my heritage. I have a certain group of friends that refer to me as " Paddy the Irish Polack" . My heritage on my mom' s side is Polish, and my heratage on my dad' s side is mutt. (Irish/Welsh/Scott)

I don' t take offense at that because I know they' re just having a good time, they don' t mean it enough to hurt, and I don' t care enough to be hurt.

You can' t call a mentally retarded person spastic as a term of endearment. There' s a huge difference between the words.

You' re missing the point, they arent calling any person spastic, its a spell to make the train react irraticly.

Im gonna sue Ninetndo for being this retarded and use horrible words like " spastics" .

Even if you break 2 legs from a crab it still runs!
What you gotta do is find its weak spot and do massive damage at it.

should we care?? really? Not as if one man is superior than others

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Very good, but just WTF has that to do with this thread. You really are a major league pain in the arse.


Vx it is not uptight, but if you have been near someone who is spastic, and understand what they have to go through, the indignity of not being able to do some of the simplest things that we take for granted, then pershpas you might understand why the word " spastic" should not be used in a form of entertainment. It makes it worse when you had a member of your family who was spastic, through no fault of their own you help them day in and day out, only for people to start to use the word to insult people or to play a game, that' s what annoys me, and then you get the people who go " I don' t see anything wrong because they are too narrow minded, too far up their own arseholes or are so detatched from reality that they just don' t realise what is happening in the real world. Unfortunatly you get people like that in all walks of life, which is I suppose just indicative of society as a whole. If anyone knows someone who is spastic, they are at times some of the most courageous people on the planet, and to use the " spastic" in a game to insult or to make a " train go faster," that is where the insult is not to the " normal" people but the insult is to " Spastics" , I doubt even half of you on here would even have the guts to carry on through an adversity like that.