{"id":358953,"date":"2025-01-02T12:09:17","date_gmt":"2025-01-02T17:09:17","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/nichegamer.com\/?p=358953"},"modified":"2025-01-02T12:17:20","modified_gmt":"2025-01-02T17:17:20","slug":"arrowhead-cco-comments-on-dei-says-to-make-good-games","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/nichegamer.com\/arrowhead-cco-comments-on-dei-says-to-make-good-games\/","title":{"rendered":"Arrowhead CCO comments on DEI, says to &#8216;make good games&#8217;"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"alignnone size-full wp-image-331707\" src=\"https:\/\/media.nichegamer.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2024\/01\/helldivers-ii-01-17-24-1.jpg\" alt=\"Helldivers II\" width=\"1920\" height=\"1079\" srcset=\"https:\/\/media.nichegamer.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2024\/01\/helldivers-ii-01-17-24-1.jpg 1920w, https:\/\/media.nichegamer.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2024\/01\/helldivers-ii-01-17-24-1-300x169.jpg 300w, https:\/\/media.nichegamer.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2024\/01\/helldivers-ii-01-17-24-1-1024x575.jpg 1024w, https:\/\/media.nichegamer.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2024\/01\/helldivers-ii-01-17-24-1-768x432.jpg 768w, https:\/\/media.nichegamer.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2024\/01\/helldivers-ii-01-17-24-1-1536x863.jpg 1536w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 1920px) 100vw, 1920px\" \/><\/p>\n<p>Arrowhead CCO Johan Pilestedt spoke with the community at-large on his X account, asking fans what they were hoping for next from the developer of&nbsp;<em>Helldivers 2<\/em>.<\/p>\n<p>In response to a user urging the company to avoid &#8220;DEI&#8221; (an acronym for Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion), Pilestedt responded with a post which appears to imply that such DEI initiatives would&nbsp;<em>&#8220;<a href=\"https:\/\/x.com\/Pilestedt\/status\/1874228396898869330\">detract<\/a>&#8220;<\/em> from any hypothetical game they&#8217;re working on.<\/p>\n<p><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"alignnone size-full wp-image-358956\" src=\"https:\/\/media.nichegamer.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/01\/helldivers-2-dei-1-2-2025-cropped.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"606\" height=\"591\" srcset=\"https:\/\/media.nichegamer.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/01\/helldivers-2-dei-1-2-2025-cropped.jpg 606w, https:\/\/media.nichegamer.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/01\/helldivers-2-dei-1-2-2025-cropped-300x293.jpg 300w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 606px) 100vw, 606px\" \/><\/p>\n<div class=\"entry-content\" data-content-ads-inserted=\"true\">\n<div class=\"entry-content\">\n<div class=\"entry-content\">\n<div class=\"entry-content\">\n<div class=\"entry-content\">\n<div class=\"entry-content\">\n<div class=\"entry-content\">\n<p>DEI initiatives have come under increased scrutiny in the wake of commercial flops like&nbsp;<em>Suicide Squad: Kill the Justice League<\/em> and&nbsp;<a href=\"https:\/\/nichegamer.com\/sony-shuts-down-neon-koi-and-firewalk-concord-wont-come-back-f2p\/\"><em>Concord<\/em><\/a>. In addition, fans are concerned about the impact narrative consultants like Sweet Baby Inc. may have in <a href=\"https:\/\/nichegamer.com\/sweet-baby-ceo-terrify-them-if-game-devs-dont-push-diversity\/\">chilling the free expression<\/a> of developers and publishers.<\/p>\n<p>In the year since the controversy over narrative consultants began, it seems developers are being given more breathing room to share nuanced opinions about their role and the role of DEI in game development. Last year, Abubakar Salim, the creative director behind&nbsp;<em>Tales of Kenzera: Zau&nbsp;<\/em><a href=\"https:\/\/nichegamer.com\/tales-of-kenzera-zau-dev-accepts-criticism-but-condemns-racist-comments\/\">shared his thoughts<\/a> saying that SBI&#8217;s involvement was a valid criticism, but emphasized the importance he placed on telling an authentic story.<\/p>\n<p>Pilestedt went on to make a tongue-in-cheek comment about how Super Earth is technically &#8220;inclusive&#8221; in its united xenophobia.<\/p>\n<blockquote><p><span class=\"css-1jxf684 r-bcqeeo r-1ttztb7 r-qvutc0 r-poiln3\">I don&#8217;t like labels. But mankind is united in its extreme xenophobia on Super Earth. <\/span><span class=\"r-18u37iz\">#Inclusion<\/span><span class=\"css-1jxf684 r-bcqeeo r-1ttztb7 r-qvutc0 r-poiln3\"> so, maybe that&#8217;s DEI? I really don&#8217;t care. Make good games, don&#8217;t make a contemporary political statement.<\/span><\/p><\/blockquote>\n<p><em>Helldivers II<\/em>&nbsp;is&nbsp;<a href=\"https:\/\/nichegamer.com\/helldivers-2-gets-delayed-to-february-2024\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">available now<\/a>&nbsp;for Windows PC (via&nbsp;<a href=\"https:\/\/store.steampowered.com\/app\/553850\/HELLDIVERS_2\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">Steam<\/a>) and PlayStation 5.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Arrowhead CCO Johan Pilestedt spoke with the community at-large on his X account, asking fans what they were hoping for next from the developer of&nbsp;Helldivers 2. In response to a user urging the company to avoid &#8220;DEI&#8221; (an acronym for Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion), Pilestedt responded with a post which appears to imply that such [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":32,"featured_media":331707,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[4542,12,20244,12420],"tags":[2098,22529],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/nichegamer.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/358953"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/nichegamer.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/nichegamer.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/nichegamer.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/32"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/nichegamer.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=358953"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/nichegamer.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/358953\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":358957,"href":"https:\/\/nichegamer.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/358953\/revisions\/358957"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/nichegamer.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/331707"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/nichegamer.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=358953"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/nichegamer.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=358953"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/nichegamer.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=358953"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}