Mario Kart 8 Deluxe Updated to Remove Highly Offensive Gesture

When we think of Nintendo we tend to think of squeaky-clean, family friendly entertainment. In fact, usually Nintendo catches flak for over-sensoring some of its games when they get localized for Western audiences. Today Nintendo is making headlines because it had to take something out of Mario Kart 8 Deluxe which was found to be highly offensive to some people in specific parts of the world. The gesture in question comes from one of the newer racers who didn't appear in the original Mario Kart 8. The culprit is Inking Girl, and her celebratory gesture used to look like this:

Nintendo released patch 1.1 for Mario Kart 8 Deluxe recently, and the patch notes were pretty short. Hidden in the midst of them, though, you'll find a reference to the above image:

• Opponents' names are displayed in the rear view mirror view in online matches.
• Invincibility period after a spin-out or crash is longer in online matches.
• Up to two players can spectate a friend group while they wait to join.
• "Worldwide" and "Regional" modes add players to Mirror and 200cc matches less often.
• Can now properly create a friend lobby when you have 100 or more friends.
• Inkling Girl's animation has been adjusted.
• Starting positions in online races now properly reflect the order in which players join.
• Driver Miis now properly showing facial expressions.
• Tournament clock now properly reflects real-world time.

That gesture now looks like this:

While in Japan this gesture is a harmless taunt or boast, in some parts of the world, like Italy for example, it is basically seen as the equivalent of the middle finger here in the states. Imagine if we brought home Mario Kart and saw one of the characters flip us the bird every time we did a fancy trick. That's the shock that many European players received shortly after launch, so Nintendo had to make things right. It's actually pretty hilarious if you think about it. Bad boy Nintendo.