Godot Engine User Blocking Controversy / #Wokot

Submission 11,162

Overview

Godot Engine Blocking Controversy refers to a controversy surrounding the community manager for the game engine Godot blocking users on X / Twitter and, reportedly, GitHub over negative reactions to a social media post in support of indie games with LGBTQ+ and "woke" themes. The blocking became a subject of viral discussions on X and Reddit in late September 2024, with the hashtag #Wokot used by posters to refer to it.

Background

On September 24th, 2024, an indie video game developer posted footage from the upcoming Windstorm: The Legend of Khiimori on X^[1] / Twitter, revealing that it was built using Unreal Engine 5. In the X^[2] thread, user @kryztofcheski wrote, "Woke studios always use pre-built engines to make games because they can't build their own engines." In the following days, several X^[3] users quote posted the post, mocking the presumption that gaming engines could be "woke" (example post shown below).

On September 27th, the official X^[4] / Twitter account for Godot Engine, run by a community manager, made a post referencing @kryztofcheski's post, calling for indie developers to showcase their "woke" game built using the engine. The post (shown below) garnered over 1.7 million views, 2,000 reposts and 16,000 likes in three days.

In the following hours, Godot Engine blocked several developers and other users who replied to the post with criticisms. For example, on September 27th, 2024, developer funnygamedev reported being blocked on X^[5] by the Godot Engine X account after asking them to focus on fixing and supporting Bitmap fonts (post shown below). On September 28th, indie developer and pixel artist @Cosmic_Scr wrote on X^[6] that they were blocked by Godot Engine on X after replying with Godot Engine creator Juan Linietsky's quote "I deeply believe that any political discussion that puts labels to a group of people is one that should not have started." On September 28th, 2024, Godot Engine backer Starkium reported that they were blocked on X^[7] by the account over a comment. Developer @dev_bonnie made a post about being blocked by Godot Engine on X,^[15] writing, "Erm friendly fire" and pointing out that they are bisexual.

On September 29th, indie developer Anthony Waldsmith wrote on X^[8] that he has been blocked by Godot Engine on the developer platform GitHub (post shown below).

On September 28th, Godot Engine creator and technical advisor Juan Linietsky made several posts regarding the controversy before making their X^[9] account private (shown below).

Developments

Xananax Discord Messages

On September 29th, 2024, X^[10] user @LxixStLee posted a screenshot of a statement made by Xananax, a moderator of an unofficial Godot Engine-related discord, in which they lashed out at negative comments on X, writing that "the drama is created by reactionary insecure cowards" and that "anyone who has a problem with [the tweet] can fuck off to oblivion." The post (shown below) was widely circulated online; it was not made clear that the message was not made by an official Godot Engine representative. On September 29th, 2024, X^[11] user @GamesNosh posted a screenshot of Xanaxan using racial slurs on Discord dating back to 2016.

Godot Foundation Response

On September 30th, 2024, Godot Foundation Board posted^[12] an official response to the controversy, condemning the harassment against their staff and admitting to mistakenly blocking individuals who had not participated in it, offering to appeal against the blocks via a Google Form (post shown below).

In a separate statement,^[12] Godot Foundation Board clarified that the unofficial Discord moderator Xananax was not affiliated with Godot Engine and condemned their harmful language.

Online Reactions

The blockings of game developers by Godot Engine on X and the reported blocking on GitHub became a viral subject of discussions online, with multiple users accusing Godot Engine community manager of abusing her position and wrongfully blocking developers and other users (example post shown below).^[13] Several users called for Godot Engine creator Juan Linietsky to remove the community manager.^[14]

Following the viral discussions, the controversy became a subject of memes on social media, primarily on X / Twitter. For example, on September 29th, 2024, X^[16] user @CodeRed_dev posted a Phil Swift slaps on Flex Tape meme about the block wave that garnered over 280 reposts and 6,000 likes on the platform in one day (shown below).