Nintendo censors Dispatch nudity and characters giving the middle finger

Dispatch has just arrived on Nintendo Switch, albeit heavily censored, prompting confusion and refund demands from players.

While Telltale Games is still struggling to get The Wolf Among Us 2 out, AdHoc Studio, which was founded by former Telltale staff, has helped fill the void of episodic choose-your-own adventure games with superhero workplace drama Dispatch.

Dispatch launched in November for PlayStation 5 and PC and proved a massive hit, having now sold over three million units and having earnt a Best Indie Game nomination at The Game Awards 2025.

The game’s audience is now set to expand, thanks to the recent launch of the Nintendo Switch and Nintendo Switch 2 versions, but the excitement has been undercut by some bizarre and enforced censorship from Nintendo itself.

It may resemble a cartoon, but Dispatch is very much meant for an adult audience, with copious amounts of swearing, some nudity, and one character having a sex dream. As such, it’s earned an 18-age rating.

And yet Switch and Switch 2 players quickly noticed that black bars pop up to cover instances of nudity and even middle fingers gestures are censored.

In a statement to Eurogamer, AdHoc explained that, ‘‘Different platforms have different content criteria, and submissions are evaluated individually.’

‘We worked with Nintendo to ensure the content within the title met the criteria to release on their platforms, but the core narrative and gameplay experience remains identical to the original release.’

Dispatch already has censorship options for more prudish players on the PlayStation 5 and PC versions but the Switch versions go further than even that.

The whole situation is very strange as Nintendo was not known to have any unique censorship rules and certainly nothing draconian enough that it would prevent a character from flipping the bird.

We’re long past the days of Mortal Kombat needing to change its blood from red to green, as Nintendo has grown more comfortable with allowing mature games on its platform – even as far back as the mid-2000s, when it scored exclusivity deals for the Resident Evil remake and Resident Evil 4.

In more recent years, the company has effectively turned PlatinumGames’ sexual superstar Bayonetta into an honorary Nintendo icon, while games like The Witcher 3: Wild Hunt and Cyberpunk 2077 (the latter of which Nintendo proudly announced as one of the Switch 2’s launch games) feature full frontal nudity and were ported over without any changes.

Cyberpunk 2077’s character creation even lets you customise your character’s genitals.

This isn’t even getting into how hentai games keep sneaking their way onto the Switch eShop. Nintendo did crack down on them last year, but we took a quick scan through the eShop’s recent releases and still easily stumbled across the likes of Hentai Golf and at least two games with Hentai Balls 3D in the title.

There’s already been loud complaints from players on Reddit, who aren’t satisfied with AdHoc’s explanation and are asking for refunds.

We’ve contacted Nintendo to ask for its statement on the matter and will update the article should it respond.

At this point, though, the most plausible explanations are that either AdHoc misunderstood the rules, and censored where it didn’t need to, or Nintendo has instituted new guidelines… that somehow haven’t affected any other games yet.

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