Re: [ARCHIVED] Unjustified disallowed words

@halloweenchild13 As a Japanese speaker, I never heard of a person's name being Suki (when used as a noun, it has more than 5 different meanings in Japanese if spelled that way in alphabet ➡ 抄き、酸き、犂、隙 etc.). Aside from that, you are correct if you say, there is nothing wrong about using this word in Japanese since it describes methods of fabricating papyrus, an old name for a farming tool or simply meaning a gap, but  I can assume there are other languages like Russian or Polish in which case you may be insulting women. So I would be careful.

@halloweenchild13 If "Suki" was used as a Japanese name, someone got it wrong since it is in an adjectival noun format. To put it simple, suki ➡ 好き translates into "to like" or "to love" someone or something, and I highly doubt that anyone would name a child i.e. To Love Smith or To Like Anderson if you get the idea (it's much more complicated than that but I might keep it simple). A proper name in your case would be "Ai" ➡ 愛 which stands for the noun "love", used exclusively for a girl's name, occasionally in combination with other Kanji like Aiko ➡ 愛子 (the loved one) or Manami ➡ 愛美 (the one embraced by love). Hope this helps.

Edited: BTW, I looked up in my dictionary and found out that "suki" in Russian or Polish stands for "B*tch" or "B*tches", which is definitely not a word I would like to see posted in the Gallery.

@halloweenchild13 You have good hearing when you say, you can't hear the "u" in "Suki" because it's actually true. As in all languages, spoken and written forms may differ significantly, also depending on how you put together single letters in order to form words. In some cases certain sounds simply don't exist in other cultures. In English, you say "taxi" and not "tagzi", in Spanish "Xhosé" instead of "José" and the French don't pronounce the "h" at all (in most cases). Well, I guess you get used to it after a while.

To avoid being off topic, back to that naming issue, even in the English version of TS4, we are not only having problems with randomly created names, but also with standard NPC names like "Count Vladislaus Straud IV" (the vampire who knocks on your door) as someone posted earlier not being able to upload him onto the Gallery without changing his name. I assume, they use a different set of lists for the game (for picking random names in particular) and the Gallery.

I would say, you may file a new Bug Report, stating that there is an inconsistency issue with those lists. It doesn't seem right to have the game come up with a name that is being rejected by the very same game. I can't do that because I am playing in Japanese with a completely different set of alphabet, hence never encountered issues with rejected Katakana or Kanji names (including that vampire guy) to begin with.

@halloweenchild13 I think EA, as well as all the other software companies, would never share the list of disallowed words with the public. And there is a reason for that. The moment the list goes public, people will find ways to go around, coming up with a million different alternatives (think of all the bad abbreviations or synonyms that exist today) which eventually have to be added to the list and the circle starts anew.

I'm having similar issues trying to upload Seraphim from the Blood of Zeus anime. Problem is I've cleared the description entirely, changed his name (From Seraphim Periander to literally Prince Zeus, and the family name is just "BoZ" and it STILL won't let me upload him). Sounds like EA has a weird hatred of great anime characters.

You can make babies with other sims, start a homosexual relationship with one, suck their freaking blood, but god help you if you try to upload a completely benign recreation of a anime character, lol.

Seriously though, for those of us who are builders (of both sims and sim-homes) more so than players, most of the fun of TS4 is the joy of creating and sharing those creations through the gallery. My "niche" if you will, is creating sims based on video games, films/tv, and real life -- and making them as close to identical to the real thing as I can -- using no CC or mods whatsoever. This often results in me spending hours upon hours trying to get every, single, detail just right. I've never had any trouble uploading before, and I've uploaded characters from Apex Legends (CC-free Crypto was a struggle, but he turned out great in the end!) and Cyberpunk 2077 with zero issue whatsoever. In this instance, I literally re-rolled him a random name, removed the description entirely, and just used "BoZ" as the title/name on the Gallery. Still nothing. I can't imagine what the issue is as I've removed every instance of anything that could possibly be seen as inappropriate. His name has now been randomized completely so it can't be that. Is his save file just cursed or is a dude named "Prince Zeus" with a blank description and the family name "BoZ" just too inappropriate for EA's lily-white sensibilities?

No, I do not use any CC or mods, and I can't, because I play on console. So this is definitely looking like an issue on EA's end. Shocker. How did we get here? In TS1 you could literally order a dancer who comes out of a cake scantily clad and does a "sensual" dance for the sims on the lot (there were ""dancers"" of both genders, too!). But now I can't even upload a completely appropriate creation for seemingly zero reason because the words "Prince" "Zeus" and "BoZ" have somehow triggered the word filter??? Ridiculous.

TS1 had an expansion pack called Hot Date that was rated T for Teen. But now, 21 years later, everything's gotta be E for everyone? Kinda seems like we're going backwards, no? Kinda seems like they don't at all care about the quality of the game or even the satisfaction of its playerbase. They only care about making everything squeaky-clean so they can market it to kids, when The Sims franchise was never envisioned as a "kids" game. Wish they'd just take the L (well, the T, rather) and focus on making a game so good everyone wants to buy it, instead of focusing on inserting microtransactions everywhere they can & scrubbing away every last bit of character that made this game the amazing franchise it once was.

Sad times. Also, for the record, I tried uploading with "PlasmaOfZeus" but even that won't let me upload. TF?

@BeautyBot Sure, I am having issues with words as well and I wish they'd come up with a better solution but I don't think they are aiming at Anime on purpose (I highly doubt they even have time to check if it's Anime or not) rather than that they find themselves in a dilemma after deciding to go with English (or no specific language at all) within the Gallery. This also means ESRB ratings don't apply solely since there are others like PEGI, USK, CERO and what else with different criteria for each region of the world. One has to keep in mind that EA doesn't go ahead banning words at will. They have no choice as people (and institutions) around the world actually demand that those words are being taken out.

Edited: In earlier times (up until TS3 if you disregard the TS2 online store) we didn't have internet features within the game so language and rating issues were distinctive to each language version. Nowadays we don't have that kind of freedom anymore.

@SqueamishNerd I am not sure if it is possible to allow everything since age rating submissions (in all countries) have to be filed by the software developers way ahead of the release of the game (and you may even run into legal issues in some countries if you do not) but a combination of a basic list of words + reported issues may be the right choice (which is what EA seems to be doing for years anyways). One major problem of banning people for using disallowed words is, that you may find yourself in a situation, in which you get busted for no obvious reasons, only to find out that a word you were using happens to be banned in Japan and there was no way to know if you don't speak Japanese. In matter of fact, almost in every case reported here in AHQ, people are wondering "I got a warning. What did I wrong?" I think it is still a good idea to have an early warning system that prevents things like this from happening. As I said, it's not EA who makes the rules.

@SqueamishNerdBut not in English. So, why?

Really, unless the word is used in a derogatory way, I just don't see the point. And I am inclined to cuss in Turkish! (Which is actually a very creative language that way. Always loved: "Sit here and see Istanbul!")

@stjmk There is no way for the program to determine which language you are actually using within the Gallery because you can use any language you want (just like on Twitter). The truth is, there is no official language in the Gallery. It's just a coincidence that most people use English because it's the most common but if someone decides to write in Russian, Chinese or a mixture of several different languages, he can do so without restrictions.

The only feasible solution I can think of would be, to introduce some form of an A.I. algorithm that can acknowledge whole sentences and determine its meaning before applying the filter. So, if you write i.e. "Fukuoka is a city in southern Japan", the program should be able to recognize that you are not referring to the F-word.

I shall add that there might be another way to deal with censorship issues. Some game platforms (like Steam) offer profanity (chat) filters that can be switched on and off so it's up to the individual player to decide whether or not to make use of it. Then again, having PlayStation and Xbox versions may cause complications as they go with their own set of requirements and guidelines.

I completely agree, just get rid of the stupid censorship and update the rules like "hey don't use offensive language or you'll get a month long ban". At least leave the character names be.

There's always a word in someone's native language that's offensive in some other language. I saw Spade mentioned and it's a perfectly normal nickname here, I could see myself playing with a household with a dude called Spade. No big deal but EA is making a fuss out of it for absolutely no reason. *rolls eyes*

@siirysiir I do agree to a certain degree, however I still prefer having a warning beforehand as the basic language issue persists. Getting banned for no obvious reasons is a bit harsh if you are not familiar with all the offensive terms in each and every language. Or can we generally assume that everyone does know that for instance the term "Feb" which I usually use as an abbreviation for "February" is banned in the southern part of Ireland and therefore can't be used within the Gallery? I don't see a point in having 5000+ people getting banned every day for using offensive language without the intention to do so.