Nintendo Switch game creator apologises for offensive treatment, deadnaming and misgendering of trans character
Deadly Premonition 2 has come under fire for its handling of a trans character
The creator of Nintendo Switch title Deadly Premonition 2 has apologised for the game’s handling of a transgender character.
The open-world mystery thriller game, released on Switch this month, has come over fire over its treatment of a prominent transgender character.
Deadly Premonition 2 misgenders and deadnames trans character.
The character, Lena, is repeatedly misgendered and referred to using her deadname by characters including the protagonist throughout the story.
The game’s Japanese developer Hidetaka Suehirom, known as Swery, has apologised on Twitter after online criticism of the plot.
Sending a message in English with help from Google Translate, he vowed to rewrite the scenes.
The creator of the Nintendo Switch game has vowed to rewrite scenes
He wrote: “I need to tell you about my apologies about DP2. So I wrote message by myself with Google-sensei. Please forgive my poor English skills.
“I realised by pointed out from friends, I might have hurt transgender people in my scenario.
“It wasn’t intentional. I am really sorry for that. Some scenes will be sanity checked by a team that included diversity.
“And I will rewrite that scene ASAP. So please continue to support Deadly Premonition.
“I’m the one writing the scenario. So the characters are not responsible. My fault. Please don’t hate them.”
In a subsequent tweet, he wrote: “I am just creator and hope to become artist. Human doesn’t have enough skill to change the way others think. So I just do what I think right.
“We can take a horse to the waterfront, but we can’t control horse and let them drink water by force.”
Switch game has been panned over technical issues and trans plot.
It was not detailed which parts of the game would be rewritten or when. Deadly Premonition 2‘s launch has also been hampered by significant tech problems, which the developer has also promised to try and fix.
Critics had laid into the game over both issues, with USGamer‘s Mathew Olson criticising both its “terrible technical performance” and making clear the portrayal of the trans character “hasn’t sat right with me since finishing the game”.
Trans players also expressed dissatisfaction with the “problematic” storyline.
