Troublesome References to be Removed From World of Warcraft in the Wake of Blizzard Scandal
Content that the company believes should not be there in light of recent events will be removed from World Of Warcraft. The action is related to the controversy surrounding Blizzard.
- Troublesome references will be removed from World of Warcraft;
- The references in quest are most likely related to Alex Afrasiabi, such as NPCs, quests and items;
- Afrasiabi is one of the people involved in the recent Blizzard scandals.
Days after Activision Blizzard employees sent an open letter regarding numerous executive abuses, the company is trying to put out the raging fire. One way to improve the situation is to remove from World of Warcraft references that may be considered troublesome in light of recent events. It has not been revealed which elements are specifically in question, but this may include a character known as Field Marshal Afrasiabi.
The NPC directly refers to Alex Afrasiabi, a former creative director at Blizzard Entertainment. Afrasiabi is one of the main people involved in recent scandals at the company. Using his position, he was alleged to have committed sexual harassment and mobbing. When this matter came to light, the aforementioned NPC became a victim of hatred from players, who expressed their displeasure through organized group actions, such as "spitting" on the character using the emoticon "/spit".
It is possible that the developers want to solve the problem by simply removing the NPC from the game. Most likely, however, this will not be the only element to be erased from the game. There are also quests, items and memories in the lore that refer to Afrasiabi. It's possible that they will also be removed from the game, but so far it is not certain what will be erased. For now, only a general declaration of such actions was expressed. They will affect both Shadowlands and WoW: Classic.
At the same time, looking through the comments posted under the announcement, we can already tell that the move was not well received by the players. Fans accuse the company of preferring to simply remove a few elements of its game rather than take real action to solve the problem. They considered the message itself as a PR cliché full of empty words. It looks like it won't be easy for the company to rebuild the trust players once had in it.
