The authors of the indie project Spiritfarer were accused of discrimination against the disabled in their game about death

Developers from the Thunder Lotus studio, who released the “cozy death game” Spiritfarer, were criticized online and forced to apologize. Users felt that the storyline of one of the characters offends people with disabilities.

What happened?

Shortly after the release, some Internet users noticed one of the Spiritfarer storylines. In it, the player encounters a disabled character named Gustav, who thinks about death as a way of liberation.

User Kayla Whaley, who is confined to a wheelchair, was outraged by the scripted moment: “Are you kidding me? I can’t even play fucking Spiritfarer without some nonsense in the spirit: “Only death can free me from my terrible wheelchair.””

Many supported Kayla and noticed that for people with disabilities, a wheelchair is freedom. The gamers who criticized the studio did not want to take into account that, within the framework of an artistic statement, such a character could help reveal one of the themes of the game.

Developers’ reaction

After the negative reaction in the network, the Thunder Lotus studio published an official apology on Twitter. The developers promised to fix the plot details that “go against the inclusive values on which we built our company.”

Also in a comment to the Can I Play That portal , the studio stated: “According to the author’s idea, this character realizes that the negativity comes from the outside, from how disability is perceived by other people.” According to Thunder Lotus, they failed to convey this idea correctly, which they eventually perceived as ablism.

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Spiritfarer was released on all major platforms on August 18. In the story, the players get the role of Stella, who transports the souls of the dead along with the cat Narcissus. The developers themselves describe their project as a “cozy game about death.”

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