{"id":19195,"date":"2025-06-18T14:37:15","date_gmt":"2025-06-18T12:37:15","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/costops.com\/index.php\/2025\/06\/18\/the-maga-flavoured-faux-pas-that-shook-the-games-industry\/"},"modified":"2025-06-18T14:37:15","modified_gmt":"2025-06-18T12:37:15","slug":"the-maga-flavoured-faux-pas-that-shook-the-games-industry","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/costops.com\/index.php\/2025\/06\/18\/the-maga-flavoured-faux-pas-that-shook-the-games-industry\/","title":{"rendered":"The Maga-flavoured faux pas that shook the games industry"},"content":{"rendered":"

Splitgate 2\u2019s Ian Proulx thought his Musk gag was funny \u2013 but what it revealed was the major blind spots still in the business<\/p>\n

One thing most game developers can agree on in the modern industry is that it\u2019s hard to drum up any<\/em> awareness for your latest project without a mammoth marketing budget. Last year, almost 20,000 new titles were released on the PC gaming platform Steam<\/a> alone, the majority disappearing into the content blackhole that is the internet. So when a smaller studio is offered the chance to get on the stage at the Summer Games Fest, an event streamed live to a global audience of around 50 million people, it\u2019s a big deal. Not something that you want to spectacularly misjudge.<\/p>\n

Enter Ian Proulx, cofounder of 1047 Games. His short slot at the event earlier this month had him walking on stage with a baseball bat to promote the online shooter Splitgate 2 by announcing that he was \u201ctired of playing the same Call of Duty every year\u201d, while wearing a cap bearing the slogan \u201cMake FPS great again\u201d. It did not go well. Gamers and fellow developers criticised his decision to diss another studio\u2019s game as well as his politically charged use of a Maga\/Trump meme, especially with anti-ICE protesters<\/a> being beaten and arrested just across town. Proulx defended his actions, denying that his use of the cap slogan was political, but four days later he made an apology<\/a> via X explaining: \u201cWe needed something to grab attention, and the honest truth is, we tried to think of something and this is what we came up with.\u201d<\/p>\n

Continue reading…<\/a>
\nSplitgate 2\u2019s Ian Proulx thought his Musk gag was funny \u2013 but what it revealed was the major blind spots still in the business
\nOne thing most game developers can agree on in the modern industry is that it\u2019s hard to drum up any awareness for your latest project without a mammoth marketing budget. Last year, almost 20,000 new titles were released on the PC gaming platform Steam alone, the majority disappearing into the content blackhole that is the internet. So when a smaller studio is offered the chance to get on the stage at the Summer Games Fest, an event streamed live to a global audience of around 50 million people, it\u2019s a big deal. Not something that you want to spectacularly misjudge.
\nEnter Ian Proulx, cofounder of 1047 Games. His short slot at the event earlier this month had him walking on stage with a baseball bat to promote the online shooter Splitgate 2 by announcing that he was \u201ctired of playing the same Call of Duty every year\u201d, while wearing a cap bearing the slogan \u201cMake FPS great again\u201d. It did not go well. Gamers and fellow developers criticised his decision to diss another studio\u2019s game as well as his politically charged use of a Maga\/Trump meme, especially with anti-ICE protesters being beaten and arrested just across town. Proulx defended his actions, denying that his use of the cap slogan was political, but four days later he made an apology via X explaining: \u201cWe needed something to grab attention, and the honest truth is, we tried to think of something and this is what we came up with.\u201d Continue reading…Technology | The Guardian<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Splitgate 2\u2019s Ian Proulx thought his Musk gag was funny \u2013 but what it revealed was the major blind spots still in the business One thing most game developers can agree on in the modern industry is that it\u2019s hard to drum up any awareness for your latest project without a mammoth marketing budget. Last …<\/p>\n

The Maga-flavoured faux pas that shook the games industry<\/span> Read More »<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":0,"featured_media":19196,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[1],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/costops.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/19195"}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/costops.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/costops.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/costops.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=19195"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"http:\/\/costops.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/19195\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/costops.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/19196"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/costops.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=19195"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/costops.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=19195"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/costops.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=19195"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}