Apex Legends Game Designer Fired After Discriminatory Remarks Resurfaced

Respawn Entertainment has dismissed Daniel Z. Klein, the former lead designer of Apex Legends, for “racist and sexist” blog entries he authored in 2007.

Klein announced in a thread from Tuesday that he was fired by Respawn on August 6. He added that while he is “heartbroken and depressed,” he believes Respawn was within his rights to fire him.

You may or may not have seen the awful, bigoted things I said in 2007. I wholeheartedly agree that THAT guy should have been fired.

— [email protected] (@danielzklein) August 10, 2021

Battle Royale Legend

• Upon being hired in January 2020, Klein became a notable member of the Battle Royale Legend balance team. He was one of Respawn’s most active voices on Reddit, interacting with the community in discussions about playable heroes.
• Klein has received a lot of criticism from the community over the last year for his reserved approach to polishing Wattson. While gamers may argue that their experiences with Legend demonstrated the need for change, Klein frequently cites pick rate and win rate analysis as evidence.

Discriminatory Remarks

Late in July, videos of Klein’s previous discriminatory remarks began to surface and circulate throughout the community, eliciting reactions from other participants in the study.

“I said racist and sexist things, not because I deeply believed in any of them, but because I knew that it could provoke a reaction in people,”… “That doesn’t excuse anything I said; the impact of my words was the same regardless of what I believed. ” – Daniel Klein

Following the disclosure of the state of California’s sexual harassment lawsuit against Activision Blizzard, video game companies local and global are evidently on full alert. Workers continue to criticize Ubisoft’s leadership for their inaction, which was embroiled in a similar scandal just last year.

https://twitter.com/Apex_Sherrif/status/1420195253097832448

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