Undead Labs, the developer of State Of Decay 2, has apologized to James Seow, the developer of Steam Marines 2.

Seow has been live-tweeting his State Of Decay 2 play for the past month. At least until this week, when he discovered that one of the survivors has the trait of "punching Nazis."

The idea, apparently, is that strongly held beliefs make a character more combative and more likely to express those beliefs. However, as the trait system evolved and became more rationalized, the system began to erase much of the nuance. All forms of assertion became tied together under one negative banner, and all kinds of strongly held beliefs became punished.

When Seow asked the Twitter accounts of both Undead Labs and State Of Decay why the game had "Nazi shit" in it, he was blocked by both.

Since this post, Undead Labs has issued an explanation and apology to Seow (reportedly the same as what was communicated a few hours earlier via DM). Apparently the block was applied by an automated system set up by the developer to hide offensive language during Black History Month. Also, the feature itself predates "State Of Decay 2" by a short time and was never meant to be anything other than positive.

"We created the unusual 'beaten Nazi' characteristic long before SoD2 was released," wrote Undead Labs.

"One of our designers told us firsthand that he had actually punched a Nazi in the underground music scene. We loved it, boom, the trait was born.

"It was designed as an overall positive trait with a skill bonus - it grants 4 stars of fighting experience and makes it easier for the character to passionately assert his beliefs (we figured someone who would punch Nazis in a mosh pit would have strong emotions).

This is a sad end for one fan's playthrough, and a frustrating reminder that even simple mechanics can be politically perverted by context. we asked Seow for comment, but as his thread suggests, Undead Labs' apology seems too little, too late.

"Eight days ago I would have accepted the design explanation and 'we'll fix it,' but now it sounds like corporate damage control. I'm glad it only took a week for me and others to yell at them."