Last night, on Monday, June 14, 2021, Take-Two’s live event took place at E3 2021. The publisher is known for games like GTA 5 Online, Red Dead Redemption 2, Borderlands 3, or the Civilization series. Some had hoped that Take-Two would showcase first trailers and images for the new games GTA 6 or Bully 2 in a classic E3 press conference, but instead, they tuned in for a discussion about diversity.
This is the situation:
- The E3 traditionally serves large publishers to present their new games for the Christmas season and the upcoming year: Ubisoft showcased the new Rainbow Six in 2021, at the Summer Game Fest, Elden Ring was featured and the new MMORPG Lost Ark, Bethesda granted fans a first look at Starfield.
- Take-Two also had a stream on the digital E3 on Monday evening, but the event was announced as a “Panel”, not a classic press conference. Nevertheless, many tuned in on Monday evening around 7:00 PM, expecting to see new games.
- Instead, Take-Two emphasized in the live stream how important inclusion and diversity are to them.
That was the theme of the live stream: The stream began with the 2k Director for “Diversity, Inclusion, and Equality”. He said: “Companies really need to take responsibility and do what is right.”
During the stream, employees of Take-Two spoke with representatives from organizations like “Gay Gaming Professionals”, “Games for Change”, or “Girls Make Games”.
A YouTube recording of the Take-Two keynote on GameSpot’s channel has 462 likes and 4234 dislikes. The segment begins at 33:38 minutes:
Twitch chat derails, switched to “Emotes Only”
This was the impact: Some fans apparently tuned into the stream to receive new information about video games and reacted accordingly disturbed or even angry at the actual presentation.
As the US site Kotaku reports, the Twitch chat immediately derailed into “terrible comments about trans people” and moderation switched the chat to “Emotes Only”. According to Kotaku, the Twitch chat spent the rest of the panel spamming emotes that conveyed “boredom, rejection, and cringe”.
However, looking closer, it wasn’t as negative as Kotaku portrays: there were also regularly “positive” emotes visible, with hearts.
As the site PC Gamer states, there were still around 100,000 viewers watching the official E3 stream at the end. So it wasn’t as if people panicked and immediately left.
I totally agree, but it’s E3 Monday – Did anyone see Bully 2?
However, the situation also had a certain comedy. There were co-streamers who broadcasted the Take-Two stream because they wanted to present new games to their viewers.
One of the YouTubers gave up after a few minutes and said:
I’m really on your side, I agree with everything, and this is beautiful, but it’s E3 Monday and I thought I tuned in here for game announcements and now it’s been ten minutes about politics and injustice and so. I agree 1000% — but it’s just kind of weird. I’m waiting for Bully 2. Has anyone seen Bully 2?
Yoda Wise, YouTuber
The YouTuber then interrupted the co-stream and showed his viewers E3 trailers from the previous day.
Did Take-Two show anything new? A new game from Take-Two that was showcased at E3 is Tiny Tina’s Wonderlands. They had previously presented the spin-off to Borderlands 3 at the conferences of other publishers and organizers.
However, information about GTA 6 remains scarce. Even though the internet brings us a new hot leak every two weeks.
Many other E3 conferences, however, proceeded in a classic manner and also introduced new games. Some of the most exciting multiplayer highlights are presented to you on MeinMMO in this article:
