As always, video games had plenty to be sorry for this year. Big delays, busted launches, offensive remarks, you name it. None of us are perfect. Everyone’s trying to do better. Except for Babylon’s Fall. No second chances there.
While Platinum Games is sorry its game sucked and is already shutting down, there were a lot of other apologies to go around. Not all of them were warranted. And most of them weren’t worth the Twitter screenshot they were printed on. Here they are.
“Men who are under 170 cm (5 ft 6.9 in) don’t have human rights.” That’s what rising Tekken star Tanukana said during a February livestream. The remark set off a firestorm in Japanese media and eventually led her to be dropped from Cyclops Athlete Gaming’s roster. “We would like to offer a deep apology to the fans, sponsors, and everyone else who supports us,” the esports organization wrote. Tanukana also posted her own apology while denying other allegations of having previously made discriminatory remarks targeting Black and LGBTQ people. “I have deep remorse for this statement, which is unbecoming of a pro esports athlete and a member of society,” she wrote.
Despite being priced at $50, Chocobo GP was structured like a free-to-play game with laborious grinding and pricey battle pass exclusives. It also launched in a far-from-polished state. “I am very sorry that bugs in the competitive modes of the game, and our lack of advance communication, have caused inconvenience to players,” producer Hironori Okayama wrote shortly after the game’s release in March. As an apology, Square Enix also promised 500 Mithril, the game’s premium currency, to launch players. Earlier this week, however, the publisher announced that the online multiplayer game wouldn’t be getting any new updates, an unfortunate outcome for the modern successor to a beloved Final Fantasy kart racer.
Polyphony Digital’s PlayStation racing sim reminded everyone why always-online games are a drag when it went offline for multiple days shortly after its March release. The sin was compounded when Gran Turismo 7 came back only for its races to dish out fewer credits upon completion. “I would like to apologize for the frustration and confusion caused last week with our patch updates which resulted in, not only a server outage but also adjustments to the in-game economy which were made without a clear explanation to our community,” series creator Kazunori Yamauchi wrote in a PlayStation blog post. He pledged to bring back more generous payouts and gave players 1,000,000 free credits to make amends.
After repeatedly teasing Breath of the Wild’s sequel’s 2022 release, Nintendo confirmed in March that it wouldn’t arrive until 2023 after all. “For those of you who have been looking forward to a release this year, we apologize,” series producer Eiji Aonuma announced in a YouTube video. “In order to make this game’s experience something special, the entire development team is working diligently on this game, so please wait a little while longer.” A delayed game is eventually good, but the developer of a rushed game is forever sorry.
343 Industries rolled out a new epic nameplate for Halo Infinite players ahead of this year’s Juneteenth to celebrate the end of slavery in the United States. But the Pan-African-themed color palette was named after an ape. Kotaku reported that while “Bonobo” is the name of a legacy asset-editing tool at 343 Industries, it’s not clear why it would have resurfaced in this very specific case, or not have been caught during one of the many quality checks updates go through before being pushed live.
“Our mistake today was inexcusable, and I’m ashamed we allowed it to happen,” creative head creative Joe Staten wrote on Twitter. Now-former studio head Bonnie Ross echoed that sentiment, writing “On behalf of 343, I apologize for making a celebrated moment a hurtful moment.”
After a growing number of complaints that players were being wrongly charged for items when attempting to preview them in the store, Mediatonic decided to make amends with refunds and free skins. “We heard your feedback on accidental purchases - and we’re sorry!” the Fall Guys maker tweeted. “We’re improving the store design to prevent this. All refund requests for cosmetics from 21st June 2022 will be honoured until we improve the store. We’re giving everyone GRANDIS”
Grandis looked like a big ol’ penis, but less funny were Fall Guys’ in-game purchase hijinks, which we now know were mirrored by issues with digital store mechanics at Mediatonic owner Epic Games. Months after the refunds, the Federal Trade Commission announced $520 million in settlements over privacy violations and accidental purchases in Epic cash cow Fortnite.
The Unity CEO and former head of Electronic Arts really stepped in it in a July interview with PocketGamer.biz. “Some of these people are my favorite people in the world to fight with – they’re the most beautiful and pure, brilliant people,” Riccitiello said of developers who don’t prioritize monetization early in the game production process. “They’re also some of the biggest fucking idiots.”
When people were like “what the fuck man?” the executive suggested the ensuing headlines were pure “clickbait” and took his remarks “out of full context.” “Deeply sorry if what I said offended any game dev,” he added, making sure all his bases were covered. Two days later he gave into the idiots. “I’m going to start with an apology,” he tweeted. “My word choice was crude. I am sorry. I am listening and I will do better.”
Hopefully for Unity’s sake he does. The company’s stock plummeted 80 percent this year, and laid off hundreds of employees just a month before Riccitiello’s comments. It’s unclear if the CEO tweeted his apology while hanging out in his $32 million mansion.
In early July, Juan “Hungrybox” Debiedma was either sick with covid-19 or an infection. While an at-home test turned up negative, he wasn’t completely sure what was going on when he played in person at a Smash Bros. tournament without a mask while coughing up a storm. He later disqualified himself “for safety” after people started freaking out.
“I hate just saying words and pretending that solves everything,” the Jigglypuff main wrote on Twitter. “It doesn’t. So let my next actions speak for themselves. I’m sorry and I will be better.” The Double Down tournament’s official venue rules required everyone to mask up at all times and stay home if they were feeling ill.
In August, Capitol Music Group signed a digital rapper called FN Meka. The move was quickly criticized as an example of “digital blackface.” The AI-generated music act aimed at racking up views on TikTok featured videos full of gaming signifiers and, in one case, FN Meka being beaten by police in prison. Hip-hop artist Gunna and Fortnite pro Clix also became involved through a collaboration resulting in the single “Florida Boy.”
Whether it was offensive or just cringe (FN Meka was voiced by a Black man), Capitol Music raced to put the Dark Mirror episode behind them. “We offer our deepest apologies to the Black community for our insensitivity in signing this project without asking enough questions about equity and the creative process behind it,” the company wrote in a statement. “We thank those who have reached out to us with constructive feedback in the past couple of days — your input was invaluable as we came to the decision to end our association with the project.”
Insider gaming leaks peaked in 2022. While there was endless grist for the rumor mill, the high stakes got the better of some people. In September, YouTuber Dan Allen Gaming admitted to being behind the Twitter account TheRealInsider which leaked Ubisoft’s Assassin’s Creed showcase, including unannounced games codenamed Red and Hexe set in Japan and Europe.
TheRealInsider Dan Allen was not, with the info coming directly from Ubisoft under embargo. The confession came after he accidentally tweeted as himself from the insider account, prompting Bloomberg reporter Jason Schreier to spot other similarities between Dan Allen and TheRealInsider’s tweets. “I’m sorry to everyone for my actions,” Dan Allen later tweeted, followed by a five-minute apology video.
There was no shortage of controversy around Overwatch 2’s launch, but the most obvious problem was the fact that players could barely even log into the game in the days after it went live and replaced its predecessor. Then there were the busted heroes that had to be taken offline, and ongoing concerns around grindy battle pass rewards. To ease tensions in the community, Blizzard promised to shower players with some extra Overwatch goodies.
“We apologize for any issues players experienced around the game’s launch,” the company wrote at the end of its first week. “To help make up for any lost time, we’re planning to run several Double Match XP weekends: we will confirm the specific dates for these soon. We’ll also be giving all players who log in from October 25 through to the end of Season One an all-new Cursed Captain Reaper Legendary skin and a Health Pack Weapon Charm. These items will become part of your collection from the first time you log in during that time window.”
Babylon’s Fall didn’t even survive the year before Square Enix announced the online-only loot RPG would shut down. Following the news, some GameStop stores reportedly started giving the game away for free rather than literally destroying it before it became an obsolete piece of plastic. “Any disappointment that we might have caused for our fan base is something we feel extremely sorry about, the fact that we led our dedicated fans to feel that way as a developer,” Platinum Games CEO Atsushi Inaba told VGC. “Providing any sentiment other than enjoyment and fun in our creations to players is something that we’re not very happy about at all as a developer.”
PC hardware YouTube channel Gamers Nexus reported in October that the Nvidia GeForce RTX 4090s Founders Edition graphics cards could only be overclocked if all four of their 8-in connections were plugged in. A rep for PC part manufacturer Corsair called this “bullshit” in a private Discord. The remark blew up on social media, plus Gamers Nexus turned out to be right.
“It has come to our attention that a member of Corsair staff recently made inflammatory and incorrect comments regarding Gamers Nexus and Guru3D’s understanding of the Nvidia RTX 4090 power connector,” Corsair apologized in a statement. “These comments do not represent Corsair as a company, and we regret both the form and content of the individual’s outburst.” Moral of the story? Do not take cheap shots at Gamers Nexus.
In October, Golden State Warriors guard Klay Thompson called NBA 2K marketing hype man Ronnie Singh a “clown,” and blasted ESPN for giving airtime to a promoter rather than interviewing athletes. He also beefed over his three-point shot rating in NBA 2K23. And he was right! At least on the first part.
But he soon backtracked. The next day Thompson took to Instagram to make amends with Singh. “I would like to apologize to @ronnie2k,” he wrote. “I was in my feelings about a fictitious rating and I took out my anger on him with trolling in the comments. Cyberbullying is super lame and loser behavior and for that I am sorry bro.”
Yup, this happened, and the accounts in question were very sorry about it. Vtuber Sinsogumi and other streamers added porn to their Splatoon 3 matches by making the color green transparent and then inking it everywhere they could, allowing a second stream of adult content to surface beneath the map. The idea was, apparently, to see who could do it the longest without getting banned. Nintendo issued copyright strikes, YouTube suspended accounts, and apology videos followed.
“I made light of breaking the terms of service and simply jumped at the novel and interesting idea,” said Vtuber Ikinone while wearing a green dinosaur costume. “This time, there was an inappropriate act in the distribution of Tomeru Ikine, who is a member,” tweeted Vtuber group Sinsogumi. “We deeply apologize to everyone involved, including the viewers who were watching the distribution.”
