Genshin Impact: Dori controversy explained
Last Updated on: 5th September 2022, 05:11 pm
Dori’s character demo has recently arrived in Genshin Impact. Suppose you’ve been following the community in the last few days. In that case, you may be aware of some of the Dori controversy that has arisen, as it came back even stronger with her release trailer being filled with negative comments.
This issue has been around since the first Sumeru character designs were revealed, with players expressing how displeased they are with some of them. This has been taken a step further with Dori, to the point where fans started to harass her English VA personally.
This is not the first time fans have chosen to attack VAs, and it’s sadly something recurrent in the community. Paimon’s VA case is an example in which fans attacked her because her character “sounded annoying and childish.”
Dori controversy explained
The problem lies with Sumeru on its own. While the scenery and ambient have received praise from most players, the characters themselves (which is Hoyoverse’s main selling product) have been accused of not correctly reflecting the Middle Eastern regions from which they are supposedly based.
While some characters like Dehya, Cyno, and the upcoming Candace have darker skin tones, some players claim that they are “not dark enough,” accusing the company of colorism (when you favor lighter skin tones instead of darker ones). At the same time, characters like Alhaitham, Tighnari, and Dori herself have lighter skin tones.
READ MORE: Genshin Impact 3.0: Dori Character Demo is out!
This was one of the ignition points for the Dori controversy, but the other issue lies in her general character design. Her general theme is based around the Jinns (or Djinns), but both her outfit and personality are claimed to be made around racist stereotypes from these same mystical beings.
This has led her VA Anjali Kunapaneni to receive hate attacks from those unsatisfied with their character. They announced their dissatisfaction with the situation in a Tweet after it all happened.
Luckily, this seems to come only from a specific part of the community. Youtuber fobm4ster noticed the big difference in comments between platforms.
It’s clear that not all members of Genshin twitter are responsible for the attacks and hate, but most toxicity has been aimed at the platform, so it’s hard not to judge them. It’s ok to dislike a character and demand changes, but some players have historically done it in the worst way possible.
Other VAs have also been attacked by their mispronunciation of certain names like Tighnari and Alhaitham, which they don’t have control over as Hoyoverse also decides it. Imagine being attacked by simply doing your job as demanded.
Candace has also lifted some negative feedback, as many believe she should have a darker skin tone to be more historically accurate, which led to many edits of how she should look. Here’s one by leaker BLANK.
It’s very difficult to see the company addressing any changes to avoid similar cases like this Dori controversy. Hoyoverse has always been very inflexible with its decisions. The only documented occasion in which they drastically changed an already released character was with Zhongli, who was considered very underpowered in his debut.
READ MORE: Genshin Impact: Dori’s Abilities and Talent Descriptions
Many players approved of Dori’s character as a whole and don’t feel offended by any other design, but Hoyovese could do a better job of leaping into diversity. And this is both about race and appearances in general. All characters have five base models, and NPCs look mostly the same.
The good news is that Sumeru seems to have slightly different NPCs, which may be some good signs for the future. There’s still hope for new, different characters in the future.
Genshin Impact is available now on PC, PS4, PS5, iOS, and Android.
