Multiple reports have come in that gamers are unable to delete their Blizzard accounts in the wake of error messages, which immediately appears suspicious given the major backlash the developer is facing. Blizzard has landed itself in hot water recently after disciplining Asia-Pacific Grandmasters Hearthstone tournament the winner, Chung Ng Wai, following comments he made about liberating Hong Kong on an official livestream. Since then, a number of fans have expressed their disdain for the decision.

The backlash has been so intense that ‘#BoycottBlizzard’ began trending on Twitter, with vocal gamers largely aligned that the publisher should have handled the situation differently. Blizzard employees have remained quiet during the controversy, but fans remain very unimpressed. So much so that players have begun closing their Blizzard accounts–or at least attempting to.

Several users that were in the process of closing their accounts are reporting that they’re simply unable to. As one Twitter user by the name of Charlotte Mather reports, all four authentication methods for closing a Blizzard account are disabled. Provided that this wasn’t a system error as indicated by the text, then it means the publisher is or was actively preventing players from closing their accounts. That’s not a good look if that’s the case.

There have been some reports circulating that players are once again able to close their Blizzard accounts. At this point, that remains unverified. It’s entirely possible that there was simply a system error in place that caused the issues, so it’s best not to jump to conclusions until the situation is clarified. Blizzard’s BlizzCon 2019 event is set to kick off on November 1st, and there’s no telling how that will turn out if it is unable to shake the current mindset consumers have towards the company.

Since the news dropped, other developers like Epic Games has stated that it will never ban players for political speech. These sorts of comments aren’t doing Blizzard any favors, as the company sits back and assesses what its next moves will be. In response thus far, Blizzard has yet to issue a statement addressing much about the controversy and even closed down its own subreddit in order to limit the fan backlash. All things considered, it’s just not a good situation for the company to be in.

Next: Blizzard Looking into Cross-Play for Overwatch

Source: Twitter - Charlotte Mather