Ubisoft has pulled the Nintendo DS game MindQuiz off the market due to complaints about offensive language contained in the game.
Specifically, players who perform poorly are subjected to being called a name considered derogatory to the disabled.
“As soon as we were made aware of the issue we stopped distribution of the product and are now working with retailers to pull the game off the market,” a Ubisoft spokesman said. The company said the game was developed in Japan, which would account for the inclusion of the offending term, and slipped through quality control without being caught.
The offensive label was discovered when a woman from Belfast contacted a BBC Radio Ulster show to complain about the game. She had been playing it while in the hospital giving birth to her son, when her poor performance caused her to be labeled in the derogatory fashion. “I thought it was absolutely appalling that a word like this should be used to describe someone who has not achieved very well,” she said. The word was particularly affecting for her because of the recent death of another son, who suffered from cerebral palsy and severe brain damage, just before Christmas.
Ubisoft has issued an apology “to anyone who was offended by the game.”
