Ubisoft Apologized For A ‘Tom Clancy’ Game That Suggests Black Lives Matter Is A Terrorist Plot

Ubisoft apologized Monday and pledged to remove a video from its Tom Clancy’s Elite Squad mobile game after internal and external outrage for it connecting Black Lives Matter imagery to an in-game terrorist organization.

In the mobile game, you take on a terrorist organization that uses a symbol very similar if not an exact copy of the raised black fist image that has become synonymous with the Black Lives Matter movement. The “faceless organization” Umbra is characterized in the video as an organization that incites riots and protest through social media. Many felt the imagery and description of the organization was familiar enough to a cynical view of the current landscape of Black Lives Matter protests and calls for racial and social justice to call it out on social media.

Over the weekend many fans showed disdain for the video and called it offensive. Eventually, Ubisoft took it down, but not before many employees also made their thoughts on the video clear. The employee outrage was so fierce that, according to Bloomberg’s Jason Schreier, the director of the game apologized.

This incident is another unforced error for a company that seems to have too many of these kinds of incidents. According to Schreier, the continued frustrations with Ubisoft’s higher ups has led to employees showing open frustration with the company.

Earlier this year multiple Ubisoft execs resigned following sexual misconduct allegations alongside reports from employees that Ubisoft had mishandled reports of sexual harassment in the workplace. Ubisoft promised “sweeping changes” after this, but how those sweeping changes are being implemented we have yet to see. Ubisoft released a statement before its Ubisoft Forward event in July, but did not address the allegations or its promised changes during the event itself.