If there's one thing video games have a long-running relationship with, it's censorship. Ever since the days of old arcade games, censorship has been a hot-button issue in the video gaming world. The fire of controversy in games is usually lit by adult content such as intense violence, graphic ꦯadul🤡t themes, unsavory themes or depictions of criminal activity such as gambling, drinking, use or even trafficking of narcotics, and so forth, and the effects these have on society and the youth in particular. Of course, you'll see a lot of examples of these reasons on this list, but there are less immediately obvious reasons a game can get banned or even voluntarily pulled from the market. Some of them are just flat-out strange.

While gamers usually feel betrayed when develop🧔ers decide to censor their games to remove controversial elements, the alternative of outright banning or state censorship is often worse. All over the world, video games have had government censorship crack down on them and have been pulled from retailers' shelves when the controversy surrounding them proved too much. But whether censorship is justified or not, it's fascinating to examine why games stir so ꦆmuch passion and disagreement in people, even to the point that the developers or the government of the country itself has to intervene.

While there have 🌟been many publicly divisive and edgy games over the years, here are 20 of the most controversial games that ended up being banned, pulled, or cancelled due to a storm of controversy, and why.

20 Custer's Revenge

This entry is a serious contender for the worst game ever made. 1982's Custer's Revenge for the Atari 2600 has become synonymous with racist and offe💞nsive video games, quickly stirring controversy upon its release for its depiction of the sexual assault of a Native American woman. It was sold in a sealed package with the phrase, "NOT FOR SALE TO MINORS"🍷 emblazoned in huge letters, which should tell you something.

Women's rights groups, Native American groups and spokespersons, and activists protested the game, and legislators actually outlawed it in Oklahoma City. Atari itself even tried to sue the game's creators after receiving numerous complaints. Eventually, the game was pulled from the shelves, but the controversy an꧒d media attention caused it to sell over 80,000 copies.

19 Pakistan Army Retribution

An Android game based on the 2014 Peshawar massacre, it goes without saying that Pakistan Army Retribution is a first-person shooter. The game depi⛦cts the massacre, the deadliest terrorist attack in Pakistan's history. After the Pakistani national anthem plays, the player goes through nine levels, shooting Taliban♏ militants along the way.

While it's easy to think of this game as another project by edgy kids on the internet like the countless "Columbine" shooting games, believe it or not, P.A.R. was conceived as part of the Peaceful Pakistan campaign. Commemorating the one-year anniversary of the massacre, the game was designed to teach school children that "the pen and the book" were the greatest weapons and to promote peace and tolerance in Pakistan. After bad🍌 reviews and criticism that the game was in poor taste, the developer apologized and the game was removed from the Google Play Store.

18 Doom

Often credited with popularizing the first-person shooter, Doom is easily one of the most popular and influential video games of all time. However, despite critical acclaim,ღ it soon became notorious for its graphic violence, gore, and what some perceived to be satanic imagery, becoming one of the first games to be ra🌃ted M for Mature. The first-person shooter format was criticized by many religious and advocacy groups for being a "mass murder simulator" and being too realistic in its depiction of killing.

Even after its initial release, Doom caused controversy again in the wake of the Columbine High School massacre after it was discovered the shooters were huge fans of the game. Both Doom and Doom 2 were banned in Germany 🧔upon release, and the ban was only lifted 17 years later in 2011 after it was decided t🅷he historical importance of the game outweighed any potential negative effects.

17 Survival Island 3

Another app game for IOS and Android platform, Survival Island 3 was a 3D first-person survival-action game where the fair-skinned player must shoot or beat Indigenous Australians to death in order to survive and earn points. Yeah, it's every bit as racist as it sounds. It's not made better by the warning that pops up telling players to "beware of Aborigines" or the fact that the Natives in the game are depicted with grass skirts, spears, and body pai🐠nt.

Soon after it was published on the App Store and Google Play in December 2015, Survival Island 3 drew strong criticism and a petition circulated 🔯calli꧋ng for the game to be removed, which went on to gather over 20,000 signatures in less than 24 hours, and 84,000 signatures in total. On January 16th, 2016, the game was removed from the Apple App Store and Google Play.

16 Rule Of Rose

Rule of Rose's brand of creepy survival horror may have been ahead of its time, but it was also criticized for its poor controls and mechanics. Getting your hands on a copy is not easy (they sell for around $200). Why is obtaining a copy of this Lord of the Flies-esque PS2 game so difficult? In a word: it's one thing when you have implied sexuality and violence with adults in video games, but having children do it is a whole different matter. And in a game with a cast mostly consisting of female minors, the erotic undertonesღ and violence didn't fly with authorities.

Rule of Rose spurred debates on whether video games were corrupting t🌳he youth; it was banned in the UK less than one week after its release, and legal battles about it erupted in France, Australia, New Zealand, and Poཧland.

15 Playing History 2: Slave Trade

While at first this game might look like an offensive flash game, Playing History 2: Slave Trade is actually🍌 an educational game aimed at elementary and middle school children to teach them about the horrors of the slave trade. In it, you work as a young slave steward on a ship crossing the Atlantic. But the game attracted controversy for a puzzle segment in which you stack cartoon slaves inside🐟 the ship. Dubbed extremely insensitive by some people, the segment earned the game the unflattering title "Slave Tetris."

As part of a series of educational games developed by Danish company Serious Games, Slave Trade didn't spark controversy until it was ad😼ded to Steam in 2013. Twitter users roasted the game and the outrage went viral all around the world. Eventually, the company removed the "Tetris" segment, claiming it was meant to highlight the brutality of slavery.

14 Silent Hill: Homecoming

While Homecoming raised little ruckus in the United States for its violence, it had difficulty getting past censors in other countries. The Australian Office of Film and Literature Classification (OFLC) refused to classify the game due to scenes involving body parts being drilled into and the bisection of a character, effectively banning the game. The German version was also rejected by censors, which forced the game to delay release until 2009, so cuts and edits could be made (eventually it got the highest age rating, or 18+, in both countﷺries).

In November of 2010, authorities in Frankfurt confiscated all uncensored copies of the Xbox 360 version of Silent Hill: Homecoming imported from the UK.

13 Postal 2

Every few years, a game comes along that pushes the boundaries of bad taste and becomes known as the most depraved and violent video game ever made. But none have pushed the envelope quite as much as the Postal series. With its graph𒈔ic violence, racial stereot🌳yping, cruelty to animals, dirty jokes, urination, homophobia, and pretty much every other offensive description that exists, the first-person shooter sandbox follows Postal Dude during his everyday activities, though you can also commit mass murder.

Postal 2 has been banned by many countries, including Sweden, Germany, Malaysia, New Zealand, and Australia. Distribution or possession for personal use is frequently punished by a hefty fine or even jail time. Nevertheless, the game has a huge cult following and they even released a film ꦫadaptat💦ion directed by Uwe Boll.

12 Six Days In Fallujah

In some ways, Six Days in Fallujah could be considered revolutionary: it was the first FPS to focus directly on the Iraq War. Apparently made by Konami at the request of the U.S. Marines who actually fought in the Second Battle of Fallujah over the span of six days in November of 2004, the aim was to create the most realistic military shooter possible. Six Days would feature a meticulously accurate in-game version of the city, real life Marines and their likenesses, and recreations oᩚᩚᩚᩚᩚᩚ⁤⁤⁤⁤ᩚ⁤⁤⁤⁤ᩚ⁤⁤⁤⁤ᩚ𒀱ᩚᩚᩚf the events of the battle.

However, the idea became highly divisive, with some people objecting to the subject as inappropriate given that the true events depicted in the game were still recent and the war was still going on. In 2009, Konami ꦅbacked down from publishing the game. 💧Atomic Games announced that the game is finished and still coming out, but has no release date.

11 Mass Effect

Microsoft and BioWare's sci-fi action role-playing game Mass Effect has enjoyed immense popul♔arity for its expansive storyline of alien invasion, extensive dialogue trees, and, of course, numerous romance options. But not all countries share the positive view of the latter. Commander Shepard can be a male or female in the game, and romance options exist for a variety of characters of different genders and races. This didn't sit well with countries w🌊ith more conservative views on sexuality.

Mass Effect was banned in Singapore because of the possibility of homosexual (and specifically lesbian) and cross-spe♔cies encounters betwe☂en a female Shepard and the feminine Liara T'soni, though the ban was later lifted in favor of an M18 rating. Meanwhile, the United Arab Emirates still bans it for homosexuality, though the ban does not extend to digital versions for some reason.