Here's a spot of good news for German Fallout fans who like their gore as nature intended: Your edition of Fallout 4 will be entirely uncut and uncensored at release. The news comes from German site PC Games, which revealed, "Fallout 4 erscheint uncut in Deutschland," complete with excited exclamation mark.
You probably get the point, but here's the Google Translate breakdown, with a few additional details, just in case: "Fallout 4 will appear uncut in Germany!" it says. "As the manufacturer Bethesda tells the apocalyptic RPG appear uncut in Germany. This gives German players with the USK offshoot an identical version in comparison to the versions for the British or American market." The site also provided a link to an image on the Fallout 4 Facebook page of the box, with a "USK 18" sticker [USK, the Unterhaltungssoftware Selbstkontrolle, is the German equivalent of the ESRB] and a "100% Uncut" stamp.
Why is this relevant? Because, as the Fallout Answers wiki [via PCGamesN] explains, the German release of Fallout 3 did away with fun features like human dismemberment and exploding skulls. The Bloody Mess perk retains the five percent damage bonus but has no visible impact on how enemies die, and it is apparently impossible to register a headshot, even during the "You Gotta Shoot 'Em in the Head" quest.
It's not clear why the new game gets a pass while the old one didn't, although it bears a mention that the Fallout: New Vegas Game of the Year Edition also went out uncut, after the original release of New Vegas has been censored. Fallout 4 doesn't seem significantly changed from its predecessors in terms of turning people into multi-part piles of red muck, so the great likelihood would appear to be that the USK, quite possibly inspired by the advent of the digital realm and all the convenient access to everything it brings, has decided that this is just not a battle worth fighting. Sehr gut.
