The conflict over Black Myth: Wukong continues to escalate. Now, the Twitch streamer Asmongold has targeted a freelancer from the gaming magazine IGN who was involved in a critical article on Game Science in November 2023. A tweet with 79 views has a video with 860,000 views in response. This is poisoning the atmosphere and making controversial discussions impossible, believes MeinMMO author Schuhmann.
This is the core conflict:
- On November 20, 2023, a critical article appeared on IGN about the studio Game Science, which has now created a big hit on Steam with Black Myth: Wukong. The article was written by a senior reporter from IGN, Rebekah Valentine, and Kee Hoon Chan, a freelancer and translator.
- The authors of the article were accused of maliciously mistranslating a statement from the head of Game Science to make him look like a weird pervert.
- For months, this article has been described as a “hit piece” by Twitch streamer Asmongold, repeatedly criticizing the authors of the article, the US edition of IGN, and gaming journalism in general.
Black Myth: Wukong becomes a political issue
This is the new level of escalation: The conflict has flared up again in recent weeks because Black Myth: Wukong is such a big success on Steam – especially among Chinese players.
The controversial and currently influential game developer Mark Kern argues that the success of Black Myth: Wukong proves that “western gaming studios” hate their audience, while Asian developers love it. This resonates with a culture war in the USA that is directed against “allegedly woke” companies that pay too much attention to “DEI,” meaning diversity and equality.
Translator of the critical IGN article speaks out in tiny tweet
Note: The translator uses the pronouns they/them.
In the course of this conflict, the author of the article spoke out in a forum and came under fire again. Their translator has now expressed support on X and wrote in a post:
Do not play Black Myth: Wukong. If you must, then pirate it. If you like it, I don’t want to know. Fuck Game Science and all the assholes doing this to one of my favorite people in the gaming industry.
The post was shared by an online magazine and had a total of 79 views at that time.
Editor’s note: The translator’s X account has since been set to private.
Asmongold exposes translator in video with 868,078 views
The streamer Asmongold addressed this tweet in a video “IGN Finally Goes Mask off” on the evening of August 25. The video reached 868,078 views after just 10 hours (via YouTube).
Here, Asmongold also showed a post by the translator from January 21, in which he says that white gamers, when they get angry, just shout loudly, and then the world gives in to them. He hates white people so much because of their privilege. He clarifies that this is not directed at individuals but against “white privilege”.
In the video, Asmongold effectively puts the translator in the crosshairs and says:
I don’t think you should harass him. Obviously, harassment is bad. But publicly disagreeing with someone, publicly calling him out on the internet – that’s absolutely and damn okay. That’s called public discourse, and if you have a problem with that, delete your account.
Asmongold irresponsibly wields his reach
This is the bottom line: That Asmongold targets a journalist with such tiny public reach and publicly shames him is like an elephant stepping on a peanut.
The problematic aspect here is the generalizing portrayal in the title:
- A critical gaming review by a film site on Black Myth: Wukong becomes “You don’t hate gaming journalists enough.”
- A tweet from a freelancer becomes “IGN takes the mask off.”
This tendency of such large influencers like Asmongold to use their reach like a cannon aimed at people who hold different, even provocative opinions leads to an atmosphere where no controversial discussion is possible out of fear of being targeted by influencers who use their reach so irresponsibly.
While he may say, “Harassment is not okay” – with such a large reach and his audience, Asmongold knows exactly what kind of flood of toxic comments such videos will provoke. The translator’s Twitter account is now protected.
A game like Black Myth: Wukong gets pushed to the background in such a discussion and serves only as a vehicle to conduct a completely different discussion that guarantees enormous reach and thus also financial profit, especially in the politically charged USA: The success of Black Myth: Wukong on Steam is celebrated by the wrong people
