"Unpleasant Horse" the first game launched by PopCap Games' sister studio, 4th and Battery, was banned from Apple's App Store for what it said was "mature content."
"WTF? Apple rejected Unpleasant Horse cuz of 'mature content?' ” We thought horses dying in meat grinders was wholesome family entertainment!” tweeted 4th and Battery.
4th and Battery took down the tweet, allegedly very quickly, and then replaced it with something much more self-serving, "Anyhoo, we still love Apple. Honest. We even had (and liked!) a Newton back in the day. Hope we get an appropriate rating for the game."
Apple did not immediately return Press:Here's request for a comment.
The free game follows the exploits of a cartoon winged horse who is described as "destroying small birds and landing on more pleasant horses from above." The pancaked horses are then sent to a meat grinder.
4th and Battery started as a second studio for PopCap Games to basically create little, quirky games without the red tape of a major game studio. The concept for "Unpleasant Horse" came from a 24-hour GameJam in December 2009 and the game, complete with a red-eyed, black horse with little white skulls on its rump targeting rejects from "My Little Pony."
It's strange that Apple rejected this cartoonish violence yet approved the decapitation and dismemberment of zombies in PopCap's "Plants Vs. Zombies." Perhaps Apple would say that zombies are the undead, but pretty winged ponies deserve a better fate.
