The 5.0 update to Phantom of the Phantom will introduce a new region, Natran, this August. However, after the sudden surprise teaser dropped, several of the game's voice actors have said that the design is disrespectful to the new character, who shares the name of an African deity.

Valeria Rodriguez, the voice actress for Skroth in “The Phantom of the Phantom,” wrote a lengthy post on X about the issue. 'If you're going to use real-world deities, please respect that,' Rodriguez said. 'If you're basing it on a real-world culture, please respect that. It's okay to have things inspired by different cultures. It's great to express yourself. But at the very least, please do your research with cultural appreciation.”

Rodriguez notes that one of the new characters is named after Ọlọrun, the supreme deity of the Yoruba people of West Africa, but this is clearly not the case. Other voices and players agree that the character does not represent or honor the deity it is based on.

“If a game is heavily influenced by real-world culture and makes Batman, the supreme deity of the Yoruba religion, into a character, and the character comes off as a pale Sasuke Batman, then people have every right to demand better representation,” Genshin's Albedo Koy Dao, a voice actor, tweeted.

“Especially when the game is clearly stating its commitment to a global audience.”

In 2022, miHoYo, the creator of “Phantom of the Phantom,” announced that it would be rebranding itself to HoYoVerse in a reorganization to accommodate the “metaverse” and a shift to cater to a more global audience.

However, some players are unsure how well this pledge to be a “progressive” global brand is working. 'If even the basic audience, the Chinese fans, want characters with better representation and different shades of melanin, then who are we creating characters for?' And who are we creating characters for?” says Zeno Robinson, who voiced Sethos in ”The Phantom God.

This is not the first time players have spoken out against the lack of representation in “Phantom God. Phrases such as “boycott phantom impact” have regularly graced X's trending screen. One of these occurred in 2021, when a clip appeared showing developers using Native Americans as inspiration for a class of enemies labeled as unintelligent and uneducated.

There is still time before the new regions are released, and many hope that some changes will be implemented by August. Anne Yatko, the voice of General Raiden, says, “I sincerely hope that the game companies will listen to their fanbase when they have been rightfully criticized for years on end for their execution of their research and inclusion of cross-cultural elements/aspects.”