Voidpoint Games’ Ion Fury has seen a fair share of drama recently: Not only did comments made by the game’s developers urge players to pirate the game, Ion Fury itself also contains a number of seemingly homophobic references. While Voidpoint has apologized for the statements made by the developers, it seems that the Ion Fury homophobic content is here to stay.
Voidpoint and publisher 3D Realms released a joint statement on the game’s Steam forums stating that they would not be censoring Ion Fury nor any other games going forward. “We do not support censorship of creative works of any kind and regret our initial decision to alter a sprite in the game instead of trusting our instincts,” stated the announcement. “3D Realms and Voidpoint stand together on this matter.”
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The content in question refers to a couple of homophobic jokes found in the game. The first is a bottle with the word “Ogay,” in reference to the Olay line of skincare products, but there’s also a hidden developer room that contains a very specific homophobic slur.
The fact that these will not be removed from the game contradicts previous statements from Voidpoint. As part of its apology for all the drama caused by its developers, the studio stated that it would patch the game as soon as possible to remove all “unacceptable language.”
As for the reason why, it may be because the initial decision censor game content resulted in Ion Fury getting review bombed on Steam. It seems that the influx of negative reviews caused Voidpoint to reconsider the changes.
Whether or not this reversal of the decision to remove controversial content means that the studio is walking back on its other promises is unknown. Aside from stating intent to remove in-game content deemed offensive, Voidpoint also stated that it would implement a zero-tolerance policy and mandate sensitivity training for its developers. In addition to this, the studio also stated that it would donate $10,000 of Ion Fury‘s launch day earnings to The Trevor Project, a non-profit aimed at suicide prevention for LGBTQ+ people.
