A controversial Doom mod has been taken offline after its latest update included references to the Holocaust and transphobic mockery of Marisa ‘Randi’ Heit, the transgender creator of the popular ZDoom source code used by many other modders.
The mod is titled Wolfenstein: Blade of Agony, and is a pastiche of ’90s era Wolfenstein, Call of Duty, and Medal of Honor titles with Doom-style gameplay. It first launched in 2015, but has recently released a third episode, leading to controversy within the modding community.
While the Holocaust itself does not appear to be explicitly mentioned, players explore a death camp complete with a furnace and mass graves. ‘The Final Solution’, a phrase used by the Nazis to describe the Holocaust, also appears in the game. The victims of the death camp come back to life as undead zombies and must be killed by the player in order to progress. One of these zombies is named Itzhak Stern, the same name as the Jewish Holocaust survivor who worked with Oskar Schindler.
There is also a projector with a slideshow containing real images of gore, including footage of the infamous Dr. Mengele experimenting on prisoners. Mengele himself later appears as an in-game boss. The mod also contains features what appear to be Nazi-era propaganda caricatures of Jews.
As for Heit, there is a male character named in ’tribute’ to her - a burly drunk who repeatedly talks about his large penis. Heit retired from the Doom modding community in 2017, but her ZDoom code still forms the foundation of the QZDoom and GZDoom source codes that are used today.
These incidents all occur in the third episode of the mod - the first two episodes were released without controversy. On June 9, Blade of Agony was taken down by its creator, Daniel “Tormentor667” Gimmer, who released a statement explaining the decision. “Blade of Agony is a fictional scenario based on the alternative narratives of the Wolfenstein game series by id software and Bethesda and the corresponding canon,” the statement reads. “It does not represent accurate history, our political stance or thinking of the development team. We reject any form of racial hatred, discrimination, (Neo-)Nazism, anti-Semitism or glorification of the Second World War.”
A revised version of the episode will apparently “correct” the controversial content.
