Nintendo explain racial slur in Animal Crossing

Mike Bantick
Friday, 05 December 2008 03:35

Your IT - Entertainment

The most family orientated of the three big players in electronic games has been rattled by a controversy with a racial epithet contained in the popular Animal Crossing game.  But don't get too excited, there is something easy to blame, the Internet.

Its a bit of a storm in a tea cup, but then again many would argue the same could be said about Sony's LittleBigPlanet recall earlier this year.  And that little incident must have cost Sony a tidy packet in order to keep the image of a big title as squeaky clean as possible.

This time around it is the family friendly Nintendo putting up the defensive walls around a recent media gaff surrounding the release of Animal Crossing:City Folk (or Animal Crossing: Let' Go To The City depending on where you live) for the Wii.

Sending out the 2005 Nintendo DS game Animal Crossing: Wild World to games journalists seemed like a good idea.  The copies had been pre-played with much of the content unlocked.

The aim was to show off the content transfer options between the older DS game and the new Wii version.

The gaming journalists that received the game got a little surprise when speaking to the resident sheep Baabara, the sheep consistently dropping the racially offensive 'N' word during the discussion.

Nintendo have been quick to respond:"Previously played copies of the 2005 DS game Animal Crossing: Wild World were sent to 14 members of the media to demonstrate the ability of players to transfer items to the new Animal Crossing: City Folk for Wii. We regret that an offensive phrase was included without our knowledge via a wireless function that allows user-generated catchphrases to spread virally from one game to the next. This version is limited to 14 copies created for media review purposes only and is not available at retailers. We sincerely apologize for the incident and are working with media who received the game cards to return them to Nintendo immediately."


Bloody internet, it is the root of all that is evil in the world, the sooner we start living in walled off gated communities, disconnected from each other, the better.