Voidpoint, the studio behind the just released Ion Fury, has apologized for a series of "incidents" wherein multiple developers were found to use transphobic, ableist, homophobic, and sexist language in the game's official Discord channel. This is on top of some homophobic language found within the game itself.
Over the weekend, a thread had popped up on gaming forum ResetEra that showed multiple instances where the developers had made transphobic remarks via Discord. Members of the dev team were also shown to make derogatory remarks about feminism, derogatory and unironic remarks about "social justice warriors," and also used ableist slurs.
When confronted with the images on Twitter, the official Voidpoint Twitter account had decided to double-down on their remarks about "SJWs" and "leftists." In fact, some of their Twitter remarks are still live as of this posting. They even tried to suggest that the images showing their transphobic, homophobic, and ableist remarks were perhaps Photoshopped or cropped in a way to make them look worse than they are. Unfortunately, the "full context" images do just the opposite of what they suggest, instead showing that their remarks are as disgusting as first suggested, if not worse.
In addition, it was even discovered that Voidpoint's Twitter was following a number of GamerGate supporters including the likes of Brad Wardell, Christina Sommers, and about half of the team that worked on the hit piece The Sarkeesian Effect. Despite following these notable accounts, Voidpoint claimed ignorance on why it was so bad to follow those notable garbage eaters.
Within Ion Fury itself, users discovered a not-so-hidden developer room. In this room a homophobic slur (F**bag) was written on the wall. This is in addition to an in-game texture for lotion reading "OGAY" as a play on "OLAY."
Thankfully, it seems as though a generous apology was issued earlier today. A statement was issued to Game Informer that apologizes for the actions of the Ion Fury developers at Voidpoint, though it's not clear whether or not the statement comes from Voidpoint directly or from 3D Realms. The game's official Discord is also banning any further discussion of this incident and cracking down on the slurs that were used.
Perhaps the best part about this is the fact that they are donating $10,000 from Ion Fury's release date proceeds to The Trevor Project. The team is also going to patch out the homophobic slurs from the game.
The entire statement can be read below. If, after all of this, you're interested in Ion Fury, then you should know that it's available now on the PlayStation 4, Xbox One, Nintendo Switch, and PC. I haven't played the game myself, but I hear that it's quite good. I feel better about recommending it again given that this incident has ended on a positive note.
"Members of Voidpoint’s Ion Fury team have made sexist and transphobic comments, and included homophobic language in Ion Fury. We recognize these statements are insensitive, unacceptable, and counterproductive to causes of equality. We unequivocally apologize both for these comments and language as well as for any pain they have caused the gaming community, particularly women and members of the LGBTQ community. We take full responsibility for any damage that has been done to the relationships we've worked so hard to build.
"Moving forward, Voidpoint will institute a zero-tolerance policy for this type of language and all employees and contractors will undergo mandatory sensitivity training. As part of our efforts to contribute to the work that must be done to further support these communities, we are donating $10,000 from Ion Fury's release day proceeds to The Trevor Project. We are also patching Ion Fury ASAP to remove all unacceptable language."
"Moving forward, Voidpoint will institute a zero-tolerance policy for this type of language and all employees and contractors will undergo mandatory sensitivity training. As part of our efforts to contribute to the work that must be done to further support these communities, we are donating $10,000 from Ion Fury's release day proceeds to The Trevor Project. We are also patching Ion Fury ASAP to remove all unacceptable language."
