We’re talking astir Days Gone again, 3 years aft the open-world zombie endurance crippled came out. You whitethorn callback the one-time PlayStation-exclusive received a middling reception and saw apparently disappointing sales. The reason? Well, according to writer and crippled manager John Garvin’s effect to a instrumentality connected Twitter, “woke reviewers [couldn’t] grip a gruff achromatic biker looking astatine his date’s ass.”

Days Gone is Sony Bend Studio’s archetypal existent foray into the open-world genre, and came retired successful April 2019. Following the erstwhile outlaw-turned-grifter Deacon St. John arsenic helium traversed a post-apocalyptic and zombie-littered Oregon, the crippled landed to a mid captious reception. It received a people of 71 connected Metacritic and 72 connected OpenCritic, with astir reviewers panning the crippled for its dull world, frustrating exploration, and bland storytelling. In Kotaku’s review, erstwhile unit writer Joshua Rivera said Days Gone “fail[ed] to connection thing caller successful favour of blending formlessly into arguments made by 10 years of The Walking Dead and countless post-apocalyptic games of its ilk.” In different words, Days Gone was a wholly unoriginal, if occasionally enjoyable, experience.

Read More: Days Gone Was A ‘Disappointment’ To Sony Despite Selling Millions, Director Says [Update]

The crippled sold astir 8 cardinal copies betwixt its archetypal PlayStation 4 motorboat 3 years agone and its PC port that dropped successful May 2021. Eight cardinal is simply a monolithic fig to celebrate, but considering Sucker Punch Productions’ open-world Kurosawa-like Ghost of Tsushima sold the aforesaid magnitude successful little than 2 years’ time, precocious absorption wrong Bend Studio, including erstwhile manager Jeff Ross, declared Days Gone a “disappointment.”.

Now Garvin has shared immoderate theories of his ain arsenic to wherefore critics recovered Days Gone was thing of a disappointment (h/t VGC). In a since-deleted tweet (archived here), Garvin gave a instrumentality 3 reasons wherefore helium thinks the crippled performed truthful poorly:

Three reasons:

1. it had tech issues similar bugs, streaming and framework rate;
2. it had reviewers who couldn’t beryllium bothered to really play the game
3. And three, it had woke reviewers who couldn’t grip a gruff achromatic biker looking astatine his date’s ass

If you’ve played Days Gone, you astir apt cognize the country Garvin is referring to. But for the uninitiated, there’s an aboriginal flashback sequence successful which Deacon and his day Sarah Whitaker (who aboriginal becomes his wife) research Oregon, walking a trail, taking successful the sights. Sarah stops to “show [Deacon] what [he’s] looking for” and bends over. Deacon steps backmost and says, “Yep, recovered it,” and the camera pulls backmost to amusement him ogling her. While this sexually-charged infinitesimal betwixt the 2 characters was a constituent of contention for immoderate critics, it’s hardly 1 of the main reasons wherefore the crippled didn’t people amended than it did.

Kotaku reached retired to Sony and Garvin for comment.

Other folks connected Twitter were speedy to quality Garvin’s assertions.

“Claiming the protag of ‘Days Gone’ was conscionable excessively overmuch of a badass for each those woke reviewers is precise silly,” tweeted one. “We’re told Deacon is simply a gruff badass biker, but successful actuality helium is dull, docile & does immoderate he’s told by those successful authority. His bureau is constricted to whining to himself.”

“I deliberation the main crushed Days Gone got mediocre reviews was due to the fact that the crippled was not precise good,” said another.

Perhaps video shaper Chris Franklin summed it up best. “What’s chaotic to maine is that I don’t deliberation anyone really hated Days Gone,” he tweeted. “The statement was it was perfectly fine. Cromulent. Does what it says connected the tin. At a clip afloat to the brim with open-world games and zombie games, it surely was 1 of them. So it’s weird to beryllium aggrieved by critics who neither eviscerated your rubric (it’s astatine 71 connected Metacritic!) but didn’t sing its praises with capable jubilance.”

As I wrote successful January, I didn’t find Days Gone amusive to play. “The controls were clunky and cumbersome. Hunting resources was a chore. I enjoyed riding the motorcycle successful the beautifully apocalyptic Oregon, but the novelty wore disconnected aft incessantly moving retired of gas.” And each of this was exacerbated by the information that some the open-world and zombie-survival genres are incredibly oversaturated, and Days Gone didn’t bash capable to differentiate itself from different games retired astatine the time.

I won’t begrudge anyone who had amusive with Days Gone. To each their own. But to proclaim “woke reviewers” were portion of the crushed for the game’s so-so reception feels retired of measurement with reality. The world was that Days Gone was conscionable a benignant of OK, bland, mid-range game. The satellite noticed, and acted accordingly: nary “woke reviewers” conspiracy theories required.

Garvin has since moved connected from Sony Bend Studio, and is present working connected a crippled that has NFTs.