Blizzard Entertainment Launches New LGBTQ+ Pride Merch Collection, Players Speculate Announcement Was Made To Deflect From ‘Overwatch 2’ PvE Cancellation News
In keeping with their now-established habit of covering up bad news with corporate rainbow pandering, Blizzard Entertainment has followed up their cancellation of Overwatch 2‘s PVE modes by announcing a new line of LGBTQ+ Pride apparel.
Developed by the Blizzard LGBTQ+ Employee Network in honor of this year’s Pride Month, the publisher’s exclusive offerings include shirts, socks, and even a beach towel, all of which are emblazoned with a Rainbow- or Transgender- flag design.
Per their official announcement, Blizzard will be donating all net proceeds from purchases of the Pride Collection made between May 16th and June 30th to the National Center for Transgender Equality (NCTE), a nonprofit organization who ” advocates to change policies and society to increase understanding and acceptance of transgender people.”
However, Blizzard’s aforementioned reputation for performative activism has led the collection to garner more criticism than praise from players.
“I swear this company has no shame,” opined @PekenArts. “Every single time there’s a controversy Blizzard reveals something like this to bury said controversy.”
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“There’s no pride when you’re throwing an entire group of people in front of a firing squad,” they continued. “Or the fact that your logo represents an entire culture of subhumans sexually harassing women or the fact that your CEO allegedly pushed a woman to suicide. To see your evil logo with the trans flag is an insult.”
“This just screamed ‘Graphic designers we need you to make a pride product line as quickly as possible! Our fans are going to be pissed at OW2’s PvE announcements later today!'” speculated @SkyminSlash, who then proceed to spend “about 6 minutes making a rough recreation of the merch they soullessly regurgitated.”
This just screamed "Graphic designers we need you to make a pride product line as quickly as possible! Our fans are going to be pissed at OW2's PvE announcements later today!"
So I spent about 6 minutes making a rough recreation of the merch they soullessly regurgitated.
(1/3) https://t.co/JPPqlsEnU7 pic.twitter.com/LYTNbTMrl6
— Skymin (@SkyminSlash) May 17, 2023
“I hold no ill will towards the designers that made these, only the s–tshow of a corporation that is Activision-Blizzard,” they added in follow-up. “In fact I can’t imagine they were the happiest having to put out such basic designs that just scream ‘corporation doing the bare minimum for clout.'”
“I’m also not a professional graphic designer and will never claim to be,” the unimpressed user concluded, admitting, “This re-creation is very much not the correct technical processes for design and it was just done quickly to see how fast a relatively similar copy could be made. There are a lot of inaccuracies.”
Interestingly, some took notice of what they perceived as a coded criticism hidden in the coloring of the Transgender flag variant of Blizzard’s logo.
Highlighting how the pink letters in the ‘Blizzard’ part of the logo seemed to spell out ‘LIAR’, @ChristinaTasty asserted, “I think even Blizzard are subconsciously sick of using LGBT people as a shield for the terrible things that happen to them.”
Likewise, @KalebPrime posited, “The pink letters spell Liar.”
“This is in reference to their promise of a PvE mode in Overwatch 2,” he further speculated. “The lie is then masked on the trans flag, this is in reference to Blizz’s usual MO of announcing or releasing something LGBT related to steer bad PR away. It’s like pottery.”
My son was telling me about this today,” recalled Clownfish TV co-proprietor Kambrea “Geeky Sparkles” Pratt. “They kind of deserve all the crap they get because they screwed people on Overwatch 2 and then put this brain fart up to ‘deflect.'”
“There is no way no one caught this in the production line,” she added. “Companies rushing to cash in. Instant Karma.”
“‘Quick we’re in trouble with our fans again, break out the LGBT Pride!'” mocked @MasterLeytrx. “Like clockwork.”
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