The digital game retailer has not clearly explained how the hate symbols made it into an email, but apologized for the "unfortunate visual association."
Holy hell, this does not look like an accident. This combination of runes does not just happen. Whoever did this at the company thought they could get away with it.
It sounds like they knew the most obvious one, from the first apology. Though they did leave that in anyway (emphasis added):
What was displayed in several devices as doppelrune is out of our control. ᛋ was displayed as ϟ on several devices (might display for you differently here as well just letting you know). We should pay more attention to checking it on a different systems and devices. I also recognize that placing two such runes next to each other could create an unfortunate association with symbols used by the Nazi regime. This was noticed before distribution, and out of respect for local sensitivities, the material was not sent to the German community.
The S rune is not the only issue. By combination of runes, I meant the whole thing. All of these runes have been used by Nazis and extensively so. While the rune used by the SS is the most well known, this is like a best-of of which runes Heinrich Himmler and modern Nazis are especially fond of.
Looking further into that other thread I see what you mean, it looks like the devs themselves realized the other icons (and even changed one for the game’s logo) but GOG just not have known that. I’ll have to update my reply, thank you!
This doesn’t even make sense when it’s about symbols that are illegal in one country. Not all German speakers live in Germany, not all people in Germany use the German language version of things.
But also not everyone with a .de domain lives in Germany. You can’t really accurately filter for this in a newsletter unless you know everyone’s location. So they just used the language, thinking that would catch most German citizens.
Someone else further down mentioned that it was likely the translators that caught the issue which would make more sense as to why the German translation was held up while it was still sent out in other languages (regardless of user location).
And yeah I can absolutely see a German translator/QA person just going, “No, I’m not sending out a fucking SS rune. That’s a fucking crime.” Because apparently it was only censored in the German language version of the newsletter, Germans with language set to English still received it with the runes. So that part, the “hey the German censor was the only one who caught this”, that I can believe. And some PR person rephrasing this embarrassing state of affairs as “German QA” and “respect for local sensitivities” that I can believe too.
Beyond that, there is pretty deep lore on this already. The developer used an Indian sun wheel before being made aware of possible “connotations”, and then apparently misinterpreted the term connotations, see here (same reddit thread as above, but different comment). Then the GoG rep saying in the reddit thread above the S-like runes were supposed to be Sowilō runes, which are indeed sun symbols, although not Slavic ones, which may comes in pairs, but not in the same orientation, and seem to render different depending on fonts. But the email seems to have used Greek Kappa, which may or may not render differently, looks like it doesn’t. It’s confusing, but plausible enough to have a difficult time disbelieving it outright.
But on the whole, those three/four symbols just don’t come together by accident. Some person put those there on purpose and is trying to play it off as a mistake. I suspect the author of that first damage control message on reddit.
Holy hell, this does not look like an accident. This combination of runes does not just happen. Whoever did this at the company thought they could get away with it.
It sounds like they knew the most obvious one, from the first apology. Though they did leave that in anyway (emphasis added):
It’s worse to remind germans they were nazis than to blast nazi symbols at the rest of the world apparently.
The S rune is not the only issue. By combination of runes, I meant the whole thing. All of these runes have been used by Nazis and extensively so. While the rune used by the SS is the most well known, this is like a best-of of which runes Heinrich Himmler and modern Nazis are especially fond of.
Looking further into that other thread I see what you mean, it looks like the devs themselves realized the other icons (and even changed one for the game’s logo) but GOG just not have known that. I’ll have to update my reply, thank you!
That’s not even true. Am German, got the mail. (To a “.de” e-mail adress btw, so it’s not like it would have been hard to filter.)
AFAIK, it was not sent to people signed up for the German language newsletter. Filtered via language, not location.
This doesn’t even make sense when it’s about symbols that are illegal in one country. Not all German speakers live in Germany, not all people in Germany use the German language version of things.
But also not everyone with a .de domain lives in Germany. You can’t really accurately filter for this in a newsletter unless you know everyone’s location. So they just used the language, thinking that would catch most German citizens.
There is also a “location” in my GOG profile, wnich is set to Germany.
Someone else further down mentioned that it was likely the translators that caught the issue which would make more sense as to why the German translation was held up while it was still sent out in other languages (regardless of user location).
“We noticed it was some nazi shit but we did it anyway, except in Germany where it’s illegal.” Pretty wild defense.
Well I don’t know. Their response overall is quite incoherent in places, but they mentioned somebody, presumably German, interfering twice now:
https://x.com/GOGcom/status/2062981104362242551
https://old.reddit.com/r/gog/comments/1txmcyd/ts_gotta_be_racist_gog_explain/opxtour/
And yeah I can absolutely see a German translator/QA person just going, “No, I’m not sending out a fucking SS rune. That’s a fucking crime.” Because apparently it was only censored in the German language version of the newsletter, Germans with language set to English still received it with the runes. So that part, the “hey the German censor was the only one who caught this”, that I can believe. And some PR person rephrasing this embarrassing state of affairs as “German QA” and “respect for local sensitivities” that I can believe too.
Beyond that, there is pretty deep lore on this already. The developer used an Indian sun wheel before being made aware of possible “connotations”, and then apparently misinterpreted the term connotations, see here (same reddit thread as above, but different comment). Then the GoG rep saying in the reddit thread above the S-like runes were supposed to be Sowilō runes, which are indeed sun symbols, although not Slavic ones, which may comes in pairs, but not in the same orientation, and seem to render different depending on fonts. But the email seems to have used Greek Kappa, which may or may not render differently, looks like it doesn’t. It’s confusing, but plausible enough to have a difficult time disbelieving it outright.
But on the whole, those three/four symbols just don’t come together by accident. Some person put those there on purpose and is trying to play it off as a mistake. I suspect the author of that first damage control message on reddit.
They only apologize when they get caught. Everything else is “fine”.