Ashley Poprik has Has never been the model for a video game character. As a writer on projects such as Spider-Man 2 and Call of Duty: Black Ops 6they work on Games, not as characters in them. In 2023, however, a cabal of angry gamers was convinced differently. They were furious about how Spider-Man 2‘S Mary Jane looked; More specifically, they complained, she simply wasn’t hot enough.
The problem, according to these players, was that Poprik-Dan put a writing internet with no ability to change a character’s face, let alone another based on an actual model-themselves. Gamers put together this conspiracy based on a photograph of the author, posted side by side with Mary Jane; In the photo, Poprik and MJ are both long hair with a middle part, smile and have a similar facial form.
Poprik, who identifies as a gender fluid, describes themselves as androgenic features. “A big narrative said I was a trans woman, which is why I got hatred of any right wing,” they say.
“I got so many death threats, photos of beheaded women and YouTube videos about me who were just straight information,” Poprik says. “It has changed the way I feel about video games forever.”
In the end, things got so bad that Poprik had to wipe personal information from the internet for fear of their safety.
Poprik has to do for months the businesses they worked for.
“If a marginalized dev is plagued, they are on their own,” says Poprik.
Today, to be anything Besides a Cisgender game developer in the United States, is more dangerous than ever. Online, transgender and gender-providing developers become harassment targets on the whims of reactionary Grifters that are socially progressive against everything or the result of efforts to diversity, equity and inclusion (Dei). President Donald Trump wants to refuse their existence with executive orders aimed at “restoring biological truth to the federal government”, which limits life -saving health care for minors and removing trans people from the military.
However, other executive orders pose a more threatening threat. Trump’s attempt to eliminate government financing for programs that fight discriminatory practices is already mimicked by technical companies such as Meta, Google and Amazon. Developers fear their own employers may follow it. Since so much of what has become known as “Gamergate 2.0” has focused on players who are against rights or perceived dei attempts, these concerns do not seem unfounded.
Wired spoke to seven developers across the industry in workplaces, ranging from AAA studios to small, independent businesses. Many people spoke to us only under the condition of anonymity from concern about their safety or because they did not have permission to speak to the press on behalf of their businesses. (Wired independently confirmed all their identities and employment.) What emerged was a consistent narrative of fear, tension and alienation that they follow in the workplace and thrive in the online culture of video games.