Woke Boston-based MMORPG studio Standing Stone Games has apparently brushed off the concerns of thousands of angry Lord of the Rings Online players and is going full speed ahead with the sacrilegious implementation of the inclusion of African and Asian featured player avatars into their tortured version of Tolkien’s Middle-earth with a new content update called Homesteads and Harvests Coffers.
In one of the graphics, an African woman is holding a pitchfork beside an Asian man hugging a broom. Next to both of them stands a befuddled European man with a bucket. I suppose we should be thankful that Asian avatars don’t come with bamboo hats:
In another disgraceful promotional image, there is an African woman with trendy modern dreadlocks with silver metal, an Asian man sitting at the table, and a brown-skinned dwarf:
This ludicrous Middle-earth multi-cultural celebration would never have been allowed to happen in The Shire. The hobbits would have not allowed any dark-skinned outlanders into their realm and would have swiftly killed any that crossed their borders.
Of course, the inclusion of both African and Asian avatars in this new marketing campaign is no accident. This is an obvious attempt by Enad Global 7 and Daybreak Games to boost their ESG scores via representation. With this promotional image, they have evidence that they can include in their Powerpoint presentations to show their globalist masters that they are towing the party line of diversity, inclusion, and equity.
Standing Stone Games Defeaning Silence on Woke Avatars
Standing Stone Games has still not addressed players who are rightfully upset about the introduction of African and Asian player avatars. I suspect the reason they have not is because what they have done is intellectually indefensible. What they have done to vandalize Tolkien’s lore is impossible to justify.
There was a massive thread about players concerned about the new avatar choices and it’s been erased now that SSG has introduced new forums. How convenient for them!
I simply refuse to believe that anyone at Standing Stone Games really wanted this divisive and ill-advised change. I believe these changes were mandated by corporate drones from above. They came either from EG7 or Daybreak Games. Nevertheless, the people at SSG who give a damn about lore and role-playing could have resigned in protest. Someone at SSG could have spoken out to the public about this and stood up for the integrity of Tolkien and his legacy. That developer would have been a hero for the ages. Instead, they kept their useless mouths shut and took their 30 pieces of silver.
African and Asian peoples do not exist in Tolkien’s universe. Period. No amount of sophistry can justify it. Most LOTRO players love and respect Tolkien and his legendarium; they would never want something that does not belong in Middle-earth to tarnish his universe. LOTRO players never asked for this and they never wanted this.
Given the flawed ideology of representation, SSG could make the same arguments and justify introducing pride month, LGBGQ characters, and drag queens in LOTRO’s Middle-earth. If anyone thinks this is improbable, please take a glance at the pride logo that they displayed in June 2022:
Standing Stones Games is no stranger to wokeness, moral exhibitionism, and radical leftist causes. They retweeted this statement from Daybreak Games on the U.S. Supreme Court decision reversing Roe vs. Wade by sending the question of abortion back to the individual states:
Here’s a video montage of underrepresented black people who might soon be coming to play Lord of the Rings Online. If you see them, please do your best to welcome them with kindness:
The Fallacy of Representation
Beyond the serious lore reasons for not allowing this insanity, the financial logic behind representation is dubious. There is simply no evidence that African and Asian players will suddenly take an interest in playing characters in fantasy virtual worlds that “look like them” and start filling Daybreak Games’ coffers. It is wishful thinking.
The ideology of representation which attempts to pander to people to convince them to use your product is theoretical, specious, and obviously political in nature. The only people that want this are activists who have latched on to video games to garner attention and clout from the woke media.
In a participatory entertainment medium like fantasy virtual worlds, representation directly contradicts the escapism that is being offered to players via role-playing. In a virtual world, you do not bring your real-world persona, you instead are obligated to play a role that fits in with the setting created by the studio.
The meager return on investment in incorporating representation minus the cost of creating new avatars is a pittance compared to the lost revenues from players that will quit in disgust because Standing Stone Games butchered the lore to make non-whites feel more welcome.
Finally, we must consider the cost to the reputation of SSG. This shameful act of political grandstanding has irreparably damaged the studio’s credibility. What owner of intellectual property would ever trust them after how they have butchered Tolkien’s lore?
Standing Stone Games Does Not Respect Tolkien’s Lore
Adding in races that do not belong in Middle-earth, is insulting to the intelligence of bona fide Tolkien fans, many of who happen to be African and Asian.
Instead of being a positive thing for SSG, this will be a negative thing in the long run. They have demonstrated that they don’t care about being faithful to Tolkien’s lore, and they could care less about disrespecting their own players. They are willing to insult their loyal fans all so they can pander to people that don’t even play their game. The same lack of logic and reason was behind the decision to feature transgender woman Dylan Mulvaney on cans of Bud Light. This identity politics foolishness cost Anheuser-Busch billions.
Conclusion
Standing Stone Games could have added African and Asian avatar choices discreetly but instead, they made a big deal about it and are proud of it. Their new promotional graphics which spotlights African and Asian characters is ample proof of this and it gives us insight into the real reason they did this.
People are coming to Lord of the Rings Online to escape to an authentic, respectful facsimile of Middle-earth; they aren’t coming to be lectured by woke globalist game designers who shove real-world political activism shoved down their throats. Standing Stone Games knows this but they did it anyways. Eternal shame on them.
There is simply no excuse. None.
Anyone that continues to play Lord of the Rings Online is indirectly paying the salaries of the cowards who work at SSG. Those that do, are traitors to Tolkien and the authenticity of his universe. If you think this is even remotely okay, then you are probably the kind of Bill Ferny quisling that would side with Sauron if push came to shove. You should hang up your sword and board and find a corner to hang your head in shame, you don’t deserve the genius of Tolkien and the only place you belong in Middle-earth is in a dark, fetid pit in Mordor.
To every shill journalist and craven blogger that thinks the cultural vandalism that SSG did is a “good thing” and continues to promote the apostatic LOTRO with vapid softball articles, I’m calling you out. You have no integrity whatsoever and you should be ashamed of yourselves.
–Wolfshead
When I saw this article, I immediately fell in love with your blog. When I first saw the thumbnail before reading the headline, I was concerned “it’s one of those woke self-righteous websites where they delete your comments if your opinion differs from theirs”.
I got banned on their old forums for speaking out against this. I used the same picture with the black woman with the blonde hair and beard and a quote “go woke, go broke” – instant permanent ban, to be lifted – never. I haven’t played the game since.
Some people think those against it are against black or yellow skin tones, I’m not, I like them, I just don’t like beards on women and female hairstyles on male characters and vice versa.
It’s just wrong and messed up. It ruins the lore of Middle Earth and it has no place there. People in real life can dress up as clowns for all I care, this is a game built around an established lore that is very well regarded, but ruining it just to promote woke propaganda is wrong. Same happened with Star Wars – they use a big franchise and ruin it to promote their deranged world views.
Some defenders try to use the “modern 2020s” as an argument that in modern days it’s normal to have this king of bile into every media. It’s not normal, because the whole thing is not normal. Kids get brainwashed since they start going to school into believing these things are normal, no they aren’t. I read a comment on some parent on YouTube, who said their child told them that it was a popular fad in school for kids to come out as gay or trans or something just to get attention and people to call them “brave and strong” and when everyone came out, there is nobody to praise them so they get bored and go back to normal.
The world is pretty messed up and it’s sad that not many people want to hear the word of God and turn from their depraved ways. Now people who honor God are mocked as some weirdos and outdated who aren’t welcome in the “modern 2020s”.
I forgot to add something in my first comment, because I was too fired up.
I think Asian and African people and dark skinned dwarves exist, but…
They are not in Middle Earth. The Asian looking people, I believe exist on the Eastern end of the continent of Arda, opposite of Middle Earth and travelling to Middle Earth just to go adventures with Middle Earth folk is stupid, because the distance is massive, they live in something like the Middle Ages and means of transportation don’t allow for such a long travel. Also these people have never seen each other, know nothing about each other and Middle Earth folk are scared of them. I believe they are called Easterners and live under the leadership of some evil guy who I can’t remember. Two Blue wizards went there, but nobody knows what happened. In the past the Easterners were led by their evil guy to attack Middle Earth, but failed and thats why Middle Eath folk fear them and don’t like them. So there is no reason for them to be chummy with Middle Earth people.
The African people I think were called Southrons and they live in Harad and Khand and are ruled first by Morgoth and then Sauron and they are also fighting people of Middle Earth who fear and dislike them so they can’t be friends.
As for the black dwarves, there should be one of the Seven houses or whatever they were called that migrated very south and are somewhere on the southern side of Mordor and they have lots of sand. They are depicted like Babylonians or Phoenicians and they although not evil have no business in Middle Earth.
So in two words, those people have no place in Middle Earth as it breaks the lore.
I would have been much happier to see standalone game about all of them, except where human women have beards, dwarf women with beards are OK since Uncle Tolkien said it.
The problem is that every nee game that is made will also be woke since the right to make Middle Earth games is in the filthy hands of big corpos that still will not think twice to add woke propaganda.
The goal is not so simple as to just do it for money, it’s to brainwash uneducated people and taint their minds with filth. This is on a larger scale to make society retarded. I think the movie Idiocracy is now becoming the reality and people who are still not completely stupid are being silenced. A friend of mine said recently: “If you post something and it gets deleted, or you get banned, it’s because you were correct.”
Thanks for your kind comments. I completely understand what you are going through.
Most of these older MMOs are run by despicable companies like EG7 and Daybreak Games. They take advantage of the loyalty of their players. They hire morons and woke idiots to staff their studios. They routinely ignore players and their concerns. Then when someone like yourself defends the integrity of Lord of the Rings Online and the honor of J.R.R. Tolkien, they ban you for your trouble.
I’d like LOTRO fans to know that there will always be a place where they can speak their minds and tell the truth. That place is here.
I don’t have sponsors, ads, or affiliate links. I’m not beholden to anyone. I can speak my mind while other MMO news sites can’t.
Every major MMO site is corrupt. If you don’t tow the woke line, you’ll get silenced and banned. There’s an ill wind of censorship that is blowing across our world right now. Powerful people who run powerful corporations are running the show right now. Most video games journalist are spineless, sniveling cowards.
I really hope this woke nonsense in the video game industry dies a quick death. Until then all we can do is stop playing/paying. We need to hit them in the pocketbooks.
When I heard EG7 was acquiring LOTRO, I was happy about it, because I thought this will bring more funds into the game and improve it, because before this woke scandal, LOTRO was suffering for years from bad server lag that affected everyone and the game client, which is built on the engine of Asheron’s Call 1 from 1999, the client is so bloated and the engine is so much pushed to its limits that it can’t handle itself and it’s constantly leading to frame drops, something that happens even if you have an overkill gaming PC, because the game engine is so ancient, it can’t even make use of new hardware.
So I was hoping EG7 will fund SSG so they will fix the performance and lag issues, because it gets so bad at times (you can rubber-band or be stuck in combat with a mob both of you just looking at each other for 15+ seconds) it’s straight up unplayable and it made me want to quit.
In fact, I remember hearing last year about an “avatar update”, which they explained would make characters look better. The irony is that they don’t look better. They made existing faces and other features somehow uglier. I saw on the old LOTRO forums a picture of the 3 stages of avatars – original, last, current.
Original looks like a 40 year old dude with a Snake Plissken jaw and is pretty badass but kinda outdated, last one was 30 year old dude that looks fine all around and the current one is some why 15 year old Ron Weasley that looks like he’s about to cry when he sees his biggest fear – a spider. So this avatar update that was meant to beautify characters actually uglified them. I’m not even talking about giving female hairstyles on men and beards on women, which besides being messed up is also lazy, because it doesn’t change anything, just swaps existing assets around.
Hi, I am late a few days. Read your most recent articles and you were truly on fire. Particularly about the missing white men. Germany is currently looking for “specialists” and expert workers of all kind. But not among the native population but among African and Middle Eastern migrants. Most Ukrainian refugees often rather want to go home or elsewhere but Germany. The African specialists rather just take free social benefits instead of doing anything. No surprise, actually. Society is indeed falling apart. I would like to point out that Asian people are often incredibly productive and smart and also subject to discrimination by blacks. China itself is limiting its potential by still clinging to the government methods of communism.
I think there is a conspiracy to collapse Western society both from within and from without.
From within is with the SJW/woke propaganda brainwashing that starts in kindergarten and school for kids where they decide they are transgender at age 12. At age 12 all I wanted to play was Counter-Strike, Serous Sam and Heroes of Might and Magic in internet cafes cause I didn’t have a PC at home or play outside with other kids.
From without is where a lot of conflicts are artificially created in 2nd and 3rd world countries and then the immigrants from those countries to the West. And the West enables them because it allows them to live on benefits. There are some competent immigrants who practice respectable professions such as doctors or teachers, but there are a lot of incompetent people that are really Sand Monkeys and I’m not saying it to be racist, I just don’t know a better term to describe them with, they don’t know how to do anything, they can’t be beneficial for anything, they don’t want to integrate in the new country they go into, they want to change everybody and everything around them so it can become the same dump they escaped from. They don’t want to work, they don’t want to contribute to the new society, they are usually involved in crimes, most of them ending with rapes and murders of the native residents who pay their benefits.
Then they want to bring Islam with them, to have mosques built in cities with rich history and everyone to tolerate them and fund them while they continue live like Sand Monkeys.
There was recently a case about such an individual in Sweden – raped and brutalized several Swedish women, but because it (it doesn’t deserve to be called “he”) was 17 years old, it just got fined for a comical amount of money, no jail time, no nothing.
If this is not some ploy to destroy the Western civilization, I don’t know what else to call it.
As for Asians, whether they are abroad or in their native countries, they seem to be really hardworking people, as far as I know they don’t try to start conflicts, they try to keep their head low and become mathematicians or scientists or doctors or whatever, all respectable professions.
I saw some video about some statistic – Western kids want to be YouTubers, Asian kids want to be astronauts or scientists…
Can only be either dumb or evil decisions. If you combine the two, then it is the symptom of furthering away themselves from the qualities of God, where they have put their Babylonic Pride above God, from that start confusion then to the mess today. You are not wrong using that term in a way, because they have not retained the knowledge from building up or at least maintain any size of civilization.
Each country has their curse, each ethnicity too has their sins. They have squabbles of sand, no foundation of empire, nor the acumen to plan ahead, living in complete squalor. They live ONLY for physical needs, thus they are trapped in the satanic communist material world.
You can only overcome if you let the Lord Jesus Christ humbly without any perversions. Evil knew it could not outright destroy Christianity, so it corrodes over time to pervert the spirit and teachings. There is pride of every sorts, sin dressing itself as virtue many a time, it is why we see the evil run amok in every corner of the Earth.
The world has been ruled over, not slowly infiltrated the past few hundred years, but rather Satan has accomplished it when Jesus Christ 40 days in the desert. It has been going on since the beginning. The physical world is dying, but also the fallen angels know their time is almost up, hence the acceleration. The Wheat and the Weeds, they grown, they have taken their sides: the Wheat is taken up to the master’s barn, the Weeds are bundled up and burned up. With that parable, as Christ explained it, “As therefore the tares are gathered and burned in the fire; so shall it be in the end of this world.” the last word used is aion, can either means world or time period, so end of this World or Age.
Yes, it is very concerning how much satanistic values are being pushed through every media outlet and making people stray from the word of God. I admit, I was a victim of this too. I was raised a Christian, but around the time I was 14 and entered high school there were bigger kids who saw me wearing a cross on my neck and muttered something to themselves “Oh, he’s one of “them”…” and as a naive, stupid kid, I thought that being Christian is uncool so I renounced my faith for probably 15 years, I even went to the camp of people mocking religion of something stupid people do and let me tell you, during that time, only bad things happened to me.
Only recently a friend of mine that I really respect reintroduced me again to God and it’s been so much better and enlightening.
Everywhere I look, people are are self-righteous pricks who openly mock religion and in particular Christianity, they don’t want to touch Islam or Judaism, because it would be considered “discrimination”, just like how Jews nowadays hide behind the term “antisemitism” every chance they get. On forums, in video games, everywhere I see people mocking Christianity like they are some big brained techno geeks who are too smart for God.
It’s really sad, because it’s everywhere – in music, movies, video games, news, events, it’s like someone is trying to root out Christianity from people and turn them into mindless consumerist husks who just repeat what they’ve been told.
It really feels like there is a war being waged against whatever civilization has been established for thousands of years and also against Christianity.
I’m one of the (now former) LotRo players who get banned for the critique of the last ‘avatar update’. The topic regarding this issue was the most burning hot one and probably containing the most posts on entire lotro forum. I was hoping, that after such an unrest from players, the game developers would appeal to common sense and will reconsider those drastic changes to the game. I expected in the worst case for this topic to be closed, but I did not suspect, that I would be permanently banned. I’m still in shock and the more I read and see about the rampage targeting the world of Middle-earth in today’s show business the less I understand this madness. What on earth is going on with Tolkien’s legacy? It supposed to be the most sacred fantasy universe, the classic compared to the ancient Greek mythology. It looks like Morgoth himself has returned from an exile to destroy everything once and for all.
If you don’t mind, I will quote the post on LotRo forum I was banned for:
************
As a naive man, I used to believe, that this game would treat the world of Middle-earth seriously and respectfully from the beginning to the very end. Despite many minor or major immersion breaks (bears and other creatures jogging in settlements, Elves openly walking in cities of mortals, some bizarre character classes, etc.) we were still provided quite deep and coherent world, fair enough faithfully reflecting our beloved prime fantasy universe.
No more.
This update breaks any standards. Disrespecting a Tolkien’s legacy in such a manner is a disrespect to player base which keeps this game alive. As many people stated, there are elegant and immersive ways to introduce other races into the game (Haradrim, Easterlings). No contemporary ideologies are required, as we do not need to represent ourselves in this universe. We are here to dive and adjust into the most unique fantasy creation, written by inspired genius. That is so simple.
As for the bearded women, I’m sure there are plenty of websites dedicated to the ladies of all sorts of appearance, including special features for the fetishists’ enjoyment. I kindly ask anyone interested to stick to those sites and stay away of Middle-earth. Pretty please. Dwarven women are enough.
The problem however, as some of you mentioned, is much bigger. The RoP series irrefutably proved that Tolkien Estate is really no more. There is no one to protect this unique legacy, there is nothing to keep Mordor at bay and things go wild.
I believe that there would be some reasonable solution to the game for these changes to come; a separate server dedicated to ‘woke’ players of all kind (or those who just don’t care). Name it Azog/Nurn/Gothmog/Thangorodrim (choose one like that) so anyone interested could expect any perversion and bizzarity in it, regardless of the original lore and immersion. And then go ahead, don’t let us stop you – enjoy such a curiosities park. But as long as the worlds are open for all players to interact with, I demand these changes to be reverted from current servers, for I do not wish to meet other players which do not belong to Middle-earth.
And what if I belong to the minority? Make a honest poll please. If most people vote for changes, then I will humbly ask for at least one separate server with an option to free transfer for all my characters to an exile – to the original, immersive Middle-earth without “modern representation”.
*************
Thank you for your attention.
Welcome Robert!
I read the reprint of your comments on the official LOTRO forums and I find nothing in the slightest that violates the letter or the spirit of the forum regulations. Most MMO forum rules are so vague that if the moderators do not like you, they can interpret them to censor and/or ban you.
The rule they are banning people in is this one:
“We are a Politics and Religion-free zone. That also includes political language and discussions about political or religious debates.”
What SSG did was to introduce a change in LOTRO (the non-Tolkien avatars and female beards for humans) that was done for purely political reasons. Then when a LOTRO player complains about the change, the criticism can be seen as a violation of the rule. It’s similar to how the left reacts when someone criticizes something that is about race and is instantly labeled as a “racist”. Since they make the rules, it’s heads they win and tails we lose.
I can guarantee you that J.R.R. Tolkien would have been horrified at this cultural vandalism of his universe and he would have strenuously complained. He would have been banned from the forums as well.
The woke mind virus is everywhere. They are like mindless zombies. They have no intellectual or wisdom. All they do is parrot bumper sticker slogans.
Ultimately, the buck stops with Embracer Group and the Tolkien Estate. They have a duty to uphold the authenticity and veracity of Tolkien’s legendarium. Standing Stone Games has gone too far and crossed the line. Embracer and the Tolkien Estate could easily shut this down. I believe that is where the pressure needs to be applied. I’m doing a lot of brainstorming on how to take this to the next level.
Welcome to the club of the banned, the irony is as the old forums are archived, on the new forums, I was able to pick a different nickname and post. I guess they don’t even suspect it’s me, since I logged in through both the TOR network as well as a VPN to minimize my footprint. But I don’t plan to partake in that community or play the game anymore.
What I find hilarious is that they explained why they add this stuff, especially beards for women and female hairstyles for me with a few words “diversity, representation, inclusivity” and that’s the end of the story, anyone who wants to discuss this and is not praising this as the best addition to the game, is going to be permanently banned, because that’s discussing politics and they just at the same time announced that anyone discussing politics will be banned. So … nice double standards, I guess – if you only write positive comments, you’re in the clear, if you’re posting negative comments, you are discussing politics and will be banned. How perfectly convenient.
I found some channel on YouTube that was covering just those double standards: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Pnd0k2n6wE0
How there is this one defender of the new changes literally insulting everyone who is against it and telling them to “go to therapy” is allowed to exist, but that’s only because he’s defending the changes, doesn’t matter if he’s insulting people, as long as it’s in support.
Here’s a comment I posted on the Steam forums, before I got a temporary ban on the LOTRO Steam forums followed by a month-long Steam-wide community ban that expires on May 16:
https://steamcommunity.com/app/212500/discussions/0/5738190785828148378/showpost.php#c5738190785832958865
It talks about those things exactly. It’s sad how desperate they are to cover up all the negative reactions and make it look like 95% of the LOTRO community enjoys the changes and there are like 5% basement dwellers who are seething at the new changes, because it hurts their fragile feelings.
Hello again!
We need to raise as many banners as possible. I’m going to start a discussion on my local ground to stand against twisting and perverting our beloved universe. I know some pretty large community hub devoted to the world of Middle Earth in my country – if they became too treeish and unhasty, I will find the way to change that.
I’m not a lawyer, but have you considered suing SSG? They drastically change the content of the goods we pay for. They ban players who spend money on their product. They violate the principle of free speech and oppress the gaming community. Aren’t these grounds to face them legally?
All options are on the table with how to proceed. Since I’m not a current or recent LOTRO player I would not have any grounds to sue SSG. But I’m sure current players could and should contemplate a class action lawsuit.
There are quite a few players that are responsible:
Standing Stone Games
Daybreak Games
Enad Global 7
Then we have the licensing of the Lord of the Rings IP which is faciliated by:
Middle Earth Enterprises
Embracer Group
Tolkien Estate
The best strategy would be to go after the second group. They have the power to stop the insane avatar changes in LOTRO.
I personally believe that the avatar change was ordered by Daybreak Games that has their HQ in San Diego. They are a bunch of evil woketards eager to embrace critical race theory and alphabet soup idealogies.