In Germany, the debate is raging as to whether “Winnetou” by Karl May is still okay today. The venerable fantasy role-playing game “Dungeons & Dragons” is experiencing a similar discussion at the same time. The team revived a 1980s setting in August 2022, but the “flying ape-men” are now viewed by some Twitter users as racist. The developers apologize for their mistake and respond.
This content is about:
RPG fan has been running “the best Dungeons and Dragons campaign in the world” for 40 years
What is so problematic about the setting? A discussion arose on Twitter on August 30th regarding the “Hadozee” people:
Additional content describes the Hadozee people:
It is said that the Hadozee “happily” serve on the ships of the elves – any homeland they had one has long been forgotten. In her cultural memory one was always on the go.
Individual excerpts from Hadozee lore outraged users on Twitter who saw racist parallels.
Critics see parallels between fantasy people and slaves
This is the criticism: A user on Twitter explains the problem:
He sees great parallels between the Hadozee and enslaved Africans.
Is it okay if I call the dragon game racist now?
He says these were former “monkey slaves who weren’t a people” until the elves decided they should be a people after all, so the former monkey slaves chose to happily work for them.
An ape-like people who love being slaves
Another user on Twitter says: “A wizard creates an intelligent race, sells them into slavery, and then a good wizard frees them from their chains. They work for elves, but they don’t respect them.”
A third user says, “The Hadozee could be such a fun, well-written race. But instead they are made into ape-like slaves who love being slaves and who love their oppressors.”
From the critics’ point of view, a racist story is told here in a fantasy universe about a people who are saved by “white people” and are then happy to do menial services for their rescuers and are satisfied with it. This seems to reflect a hierarchical order within the peoples.
The parallels between enslaved Africans and those who were deported to America are painfully obvious to critics.
Anyone who wants to play Dungeons & Dragons as an MMORPG will find an implementation with Neverwinter:
MMORPG Neverwinter shows new expansion Dragonslayer in the trailer with exciting dragon hunt
Wizard of the Coast apologizes for failure, removes content
How are the developers reacting? Wizards of the Coast announced in June 2020 that they were moving away from racial stereotypes and have now issued a statement:
It states that you acknowledge and accept responsibility for having content in Spelljammers: Adventures in Space that you find objectionable. You failed here and the team is sorry.
The campaign features a race called Hadozee, which first appeared in 1982 – not all of the content was properly revisited before it was published
Throughout the 50 years of Dungeons & Dragons history, some of our characters have been portrayed as evil and monstrous using descriptions that are painfully reminiscent of how groups in the real world have been and continue to be humiliated. We understand the urgency of changing how we work to make the game more inclusive.
Wizards of the Coast says it immediately removed objectionable content about the Hadozee from the digital version and the content will not be included in reprints of the books. You’re also checking internally how it could have happened that something like this went live and want to prevent it from happening in the future.
Dungeons & Dragons is likely to play a bigger role in the mainstream again in the next few years. A big film is on the way:
2 new trailers for Dungeons & Dragons and Lord of the Rings really get you in the mood for fantasy MMORPGs again