Disgruntled worker spams gamers of 14-year-old MMO with profanity-laden official notifications
On: September 18, 2022
Numerous customers on the subreddit of the 2008 youth-oriented MMO Wizard101 shared screenshots of official server messages pushed to gamers that contained jokes, profanity, and complaints of poor pay at developer KingsIsle.
According to an official assist account from the developer on Twitter, the game’s servers had been taken offline Friday evening earlier than coming again on early Saturday morning. The messages are of a stunning character, very NSFW, and readers of delicate sensibilities could want to look away.
Someone fetch my fainting sofa. (Image credit score: KingsIsle, consumer yellowvitt on Reddit)
Wow, harrowing stuff. That one comes courtesy of consumer yellowvitt on r/Wizard101. Several of the opposite messages are equally temporary and direct. “This game is shit,” one other message shared by consumer jakeofsteel reads.
Others converse to an worker’s deeply compromised relationship with KingsIsle administration. User scumfolry shared a group of server messages complaining of the pay and dealing setting at KingsIsle. My favourite is, “The next world is my boss’s asshole.” Incredible poetry to that one. “BRADLEY COME DOWN TO THE OFFICE THIS INSTANT -the ceo” from Disco_Potato_Go can be fairly good.
Some of the messages are comparatively nonsensical trolling. A fan favourite of the subreddit appears to be a snippet of dialogue from Walter White in Breaking Bad shared by lidikgurl. Another one advises gamers of a nonexistent payout of ingame foreign money.
Clearly, somebody employed or till very lately employed by KingsIsle had a nasty week. The conspiracy theorist in me wonders if this may very well be some aggressive type of guerilla advertising for the game—we in all probability would not be reporting on it at PC Gamer in any other case, for instance.
Write this in gasoline and blood exterior the Whirling-In-Rags cafeteria and light-weight it on fireplace. (Image credit score: KingsIsle, consumer scumfoldry on Reddit)
Indeed, how will we ever know something for sure in our post-post-truth society? I nonetheless have not recovered from the key NieR Automata church saga. The server down time leads me to consider this actually was one worker (Bradley’s?) Sisyphean rebel. Of course, that is simply what a advertising particular person would need me to assume. I’ve reached out to KingsIsle for remark, and can update this story if we hear again.
Whatever the truth of the scenario, the messages themselves are a delight. There’s one thing significantly desolate about seeing them in Wizard101’s home font, Comic Sans. Hating on the notorious font is a bit gauche within the 12 months of our Lord 2022, but it surely nonetheless actually provides to the impact right here for me.
The forceful simplicity of “dick and balls” can be my favourite of the lot, had been it not for the haunting despair of “The next world is my boss’s asshole.” That one looks like graffiti from Disco Elysium. To the rogue worker/deep cowl viral advertising affiliate of KingsIsle, I want you properly in your job hunt/sizable quarterly bonus.
