Nintendo Blocks Japanese Indie Game From Switch Release Due to Commercial Parodies

Kokoro Clover Sun: Prehistoric Invaders is currently blocked from releasing on the Nintendo Switch due to its parodies of commercials, which the company interpreted as real advertising. The game is developed by Japanese indie developer Hikotel and is part of the Kokoro Clover series.

The developer found out that Nintendo’s Switch store is pretty strict regarding commercials and shared Its thoughts in a blog post. “Apparently, even if it belongs to the same series, there are no rights issues, or it’s simply meant to resemble a commercial, it’s still not allowed. They’re very strict.” Automaton provided the translation.

Because of this, the game’s release is being pushed back to mid-to-late June. Kokoro Clover Sun: Prehistoric Invaders was already released on Steam back in March but didn’t have any problems regarding the game’s commercial parodies. Steam also has a guideline related to players watching ads in its games to continue playing.

Kokoro Clover is a franchise that draws significant inspiration from Power Rangers-styled TV shows and anime. The latest entry displays this fondness by including animated openings, endings and commercial breaks, the last of which has been the source of the developer’s problem now.

Hikotel informed its fans, saying that it’s currently updating the Switch version of the game to remove the commercial breaks to be able to release the game on the console. It also added that the Steam version of the game will be updated with bug fixes to coincide with the release of the Switch version.