Harassed by Assassin's Creed gamers, a professor fought back with kindness

HANOVER, N.H. — Sachi Schmidt-Hori has never played Assassin's Creed Shadows, but facing an onslaught of online harassment from its fans, she quickly developed her own gameplay style: confronting hate with kindness.

Schmidt-Hori, an associate professor of Japanese literature and culture at Dartmouth College, worked as a narrative consultant on the latest installment in the popular Ubisoft video game franchise. The game launched March 20, but the vitriol directed at Schmidt-Hori began in May 2024 with the release of a promotional trailer.

''Once I realized that I was by myself — nobody was defending me — I just decided to do what I knew would work,'' she said. ''It's very difficult to hate someone up close.''

Ancient history sparks modern-day harassment

Set in 16th century Japan, the game features Naoe, a Japanese female assassin, and Yasuke, a Black African samurai. Furor erupted over the latter, with gamers criticizing his inclusion as ''wokeness'' run amok.

They quickly zeroed in Schmidt-Hori, attacking her in online forums, posting bogus reviews of her scholarly work and flooding her inbox with profanity. Many drew attention to her academic research into gender and sexuality. Some tracked down her husband's name and ridiculed him, too.

''Imagine that! Professional #WOKE SJW confirms fake history for Ubisoft,'' one Reddit user said, using an acronym for ''social justice warrior.'' Another user called her a ''sexual degenerate who hate humanity because no man want her.''

Learning Yasuke was based on a real person did little to assuage critics. Asian men in particular argued Schmidt-Hori was trying to erase them, even though her role involved researching historical customs and reviewing scripts, not creating characters.

''I became the face of this backlash,'' she said. ''People wanted to look for who to yell at, and I was kind of there.''

Ubisoft told her to ignore the harassment, as did her friends. Instead, she drew inspiration from the late civil rights leader and congressman John Lewis.

''I decided to cause ‘good trouble,''' she said. ''I refused to ignore.''

Turning the tables on the trolls

Schmidt-Hori began replying to some of the angry emails, asking the senders why they were mad at her and inviting them to speak face-to-face via Zoom. She wrote to an influencer who opposes diversity, equity and inclusion principles and had written about her, asking him if he intended to inspire the death threats she was getting.

''If somebody said to your wife what people are saying to me, you wouldn't like it, would you?'' she asked.

The writer didn't reply, but he did take down the negative article about Schmidt-Hori. Others apologized.

''It truly destroyed me knowing that you had to suffer and cancel your class and received hate from horrible people,'' one man wrote. ''I feel somehow that you are part of my family, and I regret it. I'm sorry from the bottom of my heart.''

Anik Talukder, a 28-year-old south Asian man living in the United Kingdom, said he apologized at least 10 times to Schmidt-Hori after accepting her Zoom invitation to discuss his Reddit post about her.

On May 16, feeling surprised and disappointed about Yasuke as a protagonist, he posted a screenshot that included photos of Schmidt-Hori, her professional biography from the Dartmouth website and a description of a book she wrote.

''I felt like maybe they were doing too much of like racial inclusion and changing things,'' he said in an interview. ''An Asian male could have been the role model for so many people.''

Though he didn't criticize Schmidt-Hori directly, others responded negatively and the image was picked up and shared in other forums.

He was shocked the professor reached out to him and hesitant to speak to her at first. But they ended up having a thoughtful conversation about the lack of Asian representation in Western media and have stayed in touch ever since.

''I learned a massive lesson,'' he said. ''I shouldn't have made this person a target for no reason whatsoever.''

Ubisoft defends choices and commends its consultant

Ubisoft officials declined to be interviewed about the criticism of the game or the harassment Schmidt-Hori faced. In a statement, the company said it carefully researches historical settings and collaborates with internal and expert witnesses, but the games remain works of fiction and artistic liberties are taken.

''We do not condone harassment or bullying in any form,'' the company said. ''We are committed to creating a supportive and collaborative environment and we're constantly learning how we can improve this process. We commend and appreciate Sachi Schmidt-Hori for addressing these topics directly and are grateful for her approach and expertise.''

Unlike the professor at Dartmouth, in Hanover, New Hampshire, most people who become the target of online hate end up retreating to protect themselves, said Kate Mays, an assistant professor of public communication at the University of Vermont.

Online forums allow people to post anonymously without seeing how their words are received and algorithms boost more aggressive content, she said, creating a ''perfect storm'' for people to become hateful.

''The intervention that she did was pretty brilliant in terms of sort of stopping that toxic train in its tracks and putting another spin on how people are engaging with her,'' Mays said. ''She's sort of breaking the spell of that online disinhibition community involvement and forcing people to address her as a human and an individual.''

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Associated Press video journalist Amanda Swinhart contributed to this report from Burlington, Vermont.