Since July, a lawsuit filed by the California Department of Fair Employment and Housing (DFEH) against Activision Blizzard for workplace discrimination has led to a slow but constant reform across the company. At the same time, Blizzard has taken measures to address problematic content within games like World of Warcraft and Overwatch. Now, with its most recent efforts, the name of a few achievements in World of Warcraft are being targeted.
The change comes along with the 9.15 World of Warcraft: Shadowlands update which also introduced a slew of character customization options for the Lightforged Draenei and Nightborne races, and changes to the Island Expeditions content from Battle for Azeroth. At the end of the patch notes, Blizzard announced two achievement name changes, marketed as its first move towards cleansing World of Warcraft of inappropriate references.
The two achievements in question were added along with the achievement system back in 2008 during Wrath of the Lich King. While some players view the names as rather innocuous, the argument was made by others for the change, and in light of details surrounding the recent lawsuit against Blizzard, the company decided it would be best to purge its game of potentially offensive references.
The first achievement, now named "My Storage is Gigantique" is given to players that buy a 1200 gold, 22 slot bag from Haris Pilton—an obvious reference to Paris Hilton—in Shattrath. The second achievement that was changed, now called "Holiday Bromance," is granted to players that cast the Mistletoe spell on a number of NPCs that have the word "brother" in their name. In addition to these changes, the 9.15 patch also ushered in stronger chat moderation as well as harsher punishment for repeat offenders, in a continued effort by Blizzard to crack down on in-game griefing and unsuitable behavior.
Of course, the majority of fans saw the move as putting a band-aid on a bullet wound, sarcastically applauding the company for its efforts, suggesting that the work to address major internal issues could hardly be achieved with in-game changes. To make matters worse, the forum discussion highlighted a number of other potentially problematic achievements and NPC names that could have been addressed along with the two changes. For many, the tiny changes made during the 9.15 Shadowlands patch were considered too insubstantial for them to consider renewing their subscription, and many fans decided to join a growing exodus away from World of Warcraft.
World of Warcraft is available now on Mac and PC.
Source: Icy-Veins.com