Jeff Kaplan has apologized to the entire country of Australia. The reason for this is a small spelling mistake in Overwatch (and a lot of humor).
Overwatch is a game that keeps trying to bring together the many nuances of different cultures around the world. All players are supposed to be represented through detailed locations, ways of speaking, and other subtleties. However, it is inevitable that now and then a small mistake occurs that only locals might notice.
When you pick up food from a fast-food restaurant in America, these places are usually called “Take-Out.” Apparently, Blizzard thought that this would be the case in the rest of the world as well – but that was a wrong assumption.
On Reddit, the user RagingWinston pointed out in a (not entirely serious) post that there is a small mistake on the new map Junkertown, which is set in Australia. In the middle of the map, there is a sign advertising “Take-Out.” While this is correct, nobody in Australia uses that term. There, these places are called “Take-Away.”
The user demands that “Jeff Kaplan should directly apologize to the players.” Such a mistake would make the game utterly unplayable and cause a total loss of interest in the game.
Jeff Kaplan then responded exactly as you would expect from the Overwatch lead – with a good dose of counter-humor. He replied on Reddit:
“I would like to offer a direct apology to the entire state of Australia. Please forgive us our cultural insensitivity. We will fix this mistake in a future patch (but this sign embarrassment will probably remain for a while). Also, Muselk told me that our coffees are too large. We are learning and trying…”
With such a response, you cannot really be angry.
