Hindu Goddess in Overwatch game is not okay

NEW DELHI: US-based Hindu ‘leader’ Rajan Zed has urged Blizzard Entertainment CEO Michael Morhaime to take down the “Devi” skin from its popular first-person shooter game Overwatch. Zed is the president of Universal Society of Hinduism. Terming it “inappropriate”, he said that “it trivialized Hinduism’s highly revered goddesses.”

“In a video game set-up, the player controlled the movements of Devi, while in reality the devotees put the destinies of themselves in the hands of their goddesses. Moreover, Devi and its movements depicted in Overwatch did not match with characterization of the goddesses in the scriptures,” said Zed.

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The game was launched in May and is available for Xbox One, PlayStation 4 and PCs. The Devi skin in the game transforms Symmetra into a character with close resemblance to Hindu Goddess Kali.

“Hindus were for free speech as much as anybody else if not more. But faith was something sacred and attempts at belittling it hurt the devotees,” he added.

Overwatch makers are yet to release an official statement on the matter.

According to Zed, “controlling and manipulating Devi with a joystick/ button/keyboard/mouse was denigration. Devi was meant to be worshipped in temples and home shrines and not to be reduced to just a “character” in a video game to be used in combat in the virtual battleground.”

“Reimagining Hindu scriptures, symbols, concepts and deities for commercial or other agenda was not okay as it created confusion,” he added.