UPDATE: On 12/17,Dianna Lora released a statement to address the rumors that she was fired after her controversial PewDiePie tweet. As it turns out, she was not fired from her job, and is still working on The Division 2. The original story follows.
Dianna Lora’s Twitter is currently set to private, but earlier this month, she wrote a tweet saying that the gaming industry needs to “end this dude” in apparent reference to PewDiePie. She followed up that comment by advising developers to “cut ties with him,” but even so, some people took her tweet as a literal call for the YouTube star’s death, as opposed to an end to his career.
Some of PewDiePie’s fans didn’t respond well to Dianna’s comments, leading to some severe online backlash where many were calling for a boycott ofThe Division 2and Ubisoft products in general. Following this, Dianna removed any mention of Ubisoft from her Twitter bio, and some sources have claimed that she has been let go from the company.
Now, it’s worth mentioning that Dianna Lora’s firing from Ubisoft hasn’t been confirmed. It’s also unclear exactly how much she was involved in the development ofThe Division 2, if at all, and how her departure will impact work on the game moving forward. As far as we know,The Division 2is still aiming for itsMarch 15, 2019 release date, and so it seems like development will proceed as normal.
In the meantime, it’s worth pointing out that this isn’t the first time that a video game developer has called on the industry to cut ties with PewDiePie. In fact,Firewatchdeveloper Campo Santo famously did so in the past, encouraging companies to issue copyright strikes on his videos featuring their games.
However, consideringPewDiePie’s influence and fame, it’s unlikely that the video game industry will cut ties with him completely, regardless of how many controversies he finds himself in the center of.
