Black Myth: Wukong Diversity Controversy

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Overview

Black Myth: Wukong Diversity Controversy refers to the 2024 video game Black Myth: Wukong and early reviews that gave it lower review scores and claimed it was not "diverse" or "inclusive," as it was reported to have turned down a consultation by Sweet Baby Inc. The controversy, primarily stemming from two prominent IGN and Screen Rant reviews, came to a head when the game was fully released on August 20th, 2024, as many fans and social media users pushed back against the criticisms or mocked the video game journalists.

Background

Prior to the game's release, on November 20th, 2023, game review site IGN^[1] published a review titled "How Black Myth: Wukong Developer's History of Sexism Is Complicating its Journey to the West" in which the publication went in-depth into the company behind the game, studio Game Science, and about issues that IGN had with its previous history and the game being developed.

This article was later revisited on June 14th, 2024, after it was rumored that Game Science was contacted by Sweet Baby Inc. and offered their services in helping the game be more diverse and aligned with Western values. On June 15th, YouTuber Vara Dark^[2] went through the allegations and responses, as well as the developer's rejection of the offer (shown below), which received over 37,000 views and 3,100 likes in two months.

As the game neared release, the media site Screen Rant^[5] released its review of the game on August 16th, 2024, in which the publication scored it a 3.0 with one of the cons being labeled as "Lacking in Inclusivity and diversity," which was quickly picked up by fans of the game as another games journalism Too Much Water example.

On August 17th, 2024, YouTuber Minimal Effort Live^[3] uploaded a video in which they rehashed the previous Sweet Baby Inc. rumors and then went through the Screen Rant article and took a closer look at the author and their past examples of activism (shown below), receiving over 50,000 views and 1,500 likes in three days.

Online Reactions

Screen Rant's controversial review on August 16th, 2024, garnered numerous reactions from social media users across several platforms over the following days. For example, that day, Twitter / X^[7] user @Vara_Dark (Vara Dark) criticized the article and claimed the publication was "spewing lies," receiving over 428,000 views and 7,500 likes in four days. Also on the 16th, X^[6] user @mrpyo1 mocked Screen Rant for its review in a post, receiving over 425,000 views and 6,000 likes in the same timeframe.

Many posts about the Screen Rant review also appeared on Reddit in mid-August 2024, largely critical of the critique, such as posts on the subreddits /r/KotakuInAction^[9] and /r/Asmongold.^[10]

On August 20th, 2024, Black Myth: Wukong was fully released to audiences globally, with massive success. Within eight hours of release, the game had over 1.7 million Steam concurrent players (as reported by X user @LegacyKillaHD^[4] that day) and over 800,000 more total players than Elden Ring had at its all-time peak high, causing many people to talk about it as the "Game Of The Year" (shown below).

Also on August 20th, X^[8] user @Mangalawyer posted a meme mocking gaming journalists complaining about the lack of diversity in Black Myth: Wukong (shown below), receiving over 188,000 views and 7,700 likes in 12 hours.

Several YouTubers covered the controversy surrounding Black Myth: Wukong and Screen Rant's review, including YouTuber Legendary Drops^[11] (seen below, left) and Twitch streamer Asmongold^[12] (seen below, right), receiving hundreds of thousands of views each in 24 hours.