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Nation•Cymru A news service by the people of Wales, for the people of Wales.

Culture

'The apology made it worse': Video game news platform slammed over Welsh jibes

By NationCymru

A video game review news platform has been criticised after apologising for a joke about Wales, but then changing it to something that annoyed fans even more.

While covering the announcement of the video game Made of Sker, which is made by Wales Interactive and inspired by Welsh folklore, Push Square opened the review by saying "There are scarier things in Wales than the accent".

After a backlash by fans they apologised and changed it to "there's more to Wales than lovespoons and sheep, apparently".

"I’d say that makes it worse," Hannah Lewin replied. "It’s condescending."

Games Wales, an organisation that champions game development in Wales, criticised the news platform, saying: "The updated headline and non-apology is still pretty lame, especially with the tweet still in circulation."

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'Supernatural'

Maid of Sker is a first-person survival horror made by Wales Interactive, a video games company based in Pencoed near Bridgend.

The company's owners and founding members are David Banner MBE, Managing Director and Richard Pring, Technical Director.

The game is set in a remote hotel with a macabre history, inspired by the story of Sker House near Bridgend.

According to the legend, the father of a woman called Elisabeth Williams locked her in a room of the house to prevent her from running off with her lover. Legend has it she died in that room of a broken heart.

"Set in 1898 and inspired by the haunting Welsh tale of Elisabeth Williams, this is a story of a family empire driven by torture, slavery, piracy and a supernatural mystery that suffocates the grounds of the hotel.," Wales Interactive said.

 

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12 comments

Michael McGrane

It seems that it's fine to make comments about Cymru/Wales and Cymry/Welsh people that would never be tolerated by any other national, racial or faith group. It's time we struck back!

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Tom Cosson

Struck back against Welsh computer games makers based in Wales?

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Rhosddu

No, the reviewers. Read the article properly.

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John Evans

try reading the article instead, then comment.

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Carol Loughlin

I agree. I was watching Mastermind the other day and John Humphrys welcomed back a contestant to the general knowledge round by saying he was from an unpronounceable Welsh village. I seem to remember some years ago by BBC newsreaders were bending over backwards to pronounce the name of an Icelandic volcano.

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Huw J Davies

Anyone else more bothered that Nation Cymru's article starts off referring to the game as Made of Sker? I've read the responses on http://www.pushsquare.com/news/2020/04/maid_of_sker_proves_there_are_scarier_things_in_wales_than_the_sheep Surprisingly encouraging, I thought. Some people genuinely surprised to learn there is a different language as well as accent. Still the overwhelming belief remains that nobody speaks Welsh other than one man and his dog (presumably a sheepdog). For me a scary Welsh accent is the generic one heard on many TV shows that have a 'Welsh' character! As the Nutrimatic machine in the Heart of Gold produced a liquid that was 'almost but not entirely unlike tea' we have non Welsh actors producing an accent that is almost but not entirely like Welsh. Given the vast number of real Welsh actors available isn't getting someone to fake a dodgy Welsh accent a bit like 'blacking up'? Just asking, after I recently endured DCI 'Taff' Jones on White House Farm! Still. Brilliant publicity for Maid of Sker. I'm now going to buy it for my son who lives in the Bridgend area. Worth it just for Tia Kalmaru's version of Suo Gan. I'd also add that the last time I stopped to look down at the Horseshoe Pass I was accosted by a sheep who jumped up and tried to steal my sandwich. So the scary sheep comment is not entirely without foundation! There are much scarier things over the border than people who poke fun at our accent and at least someone realises the Welsh still have a different accent to the rest of the world, which has to be a good thing.

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Rhosddu

This could be a new sport. Have a listen to Roger Lloyd Pack's lamentable attempt in the TV drama 'Dandelion Dead' (on YouTube).

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Huw J Davies

I watched The Vikings last week. (The 1958 film with Kirk Douglas and Tony Curtis). I was 10 the last time I saw it. The plot revolved around the abduction and ransoming of Morgan, fictional daughter of 'King Roadray of Wales' who was betrothed to the king of Northumberland. I assume it was meant to be Rhodri Mawr. No trace of a Welsh accent attempt by anyone. Not sure whether to be disappointed or relieved! The Hollywood view of Wales as one big coal mine/tip (as in How Green Was My Valley) was demonstrated by Ernest Borgnine's Viking King Ragnar sneering "Wales? That slag heap..." Perhaps Hollywood and L.A.never liked the idea that it had benefited greatly from the money of an alcoholic deranged Welshman, Griffith Jenkins Griffith from Bettws, and treated anything to do with Wales with disdain. Shakespeare's caricature, Fluellen, remains the default Welshman for some to copy. I just found that 'Dandelion Dead' you mentioned. Nefoedd wen! 1994 so they could have found plenty of real Welsh accents. Then again I expect the Cornish natives shake their heads at Doc Martin!

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In reply to Huw J Davies

Rob Evans

We should be pleased there was no cod-Welsh accent. I’m glad the producers didn’t expect characters in a 10th century drama to be identified by their speaking English with modern-day local accents. After all, contemporaneously Morgan would have spoken Welsh, King of Northumbria a Northumbrian Saxon dialect, and the Vikings early Norse. There’d have been a lot of gesturing! (Very fond of the film - but now I’m going to have Dee Daa-da, ..., Dee Daa-da,, .., Dee-da Dee-dum Dee-dum Dee-dum Dee-dum running through my mind for the rest of the day).

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Carol Ann Hayes

I rather like being described as "scary". I love the way Shakespeare presents Owain Glyndwr as exotic and magical in Henry 1V. It would be rather nice to be exotic and magical. As a Welsh speaking Welshwoman whose grandparents were flogged for speaking their own language, I take no offence. Prefer "scary" to sheep and love-spoons.

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Huw J Davies

Shakespeare did create the joke Welshman, Fluellen, but he did also have Henry V describing himself as a leek wearing Welshman, so good evidence to use should England attempt to annex Gwent again!

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Brynmor Hughes

Some times we can be confident enough to laugh , an call them cont .

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We should be pleased there was no cod-Welsh accent. I’m glad the producers didn’t expect characters in a 10th century drama to be identified by their speaking English with modern-day local accents. After all, contemporaneously Morgan would...

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