Possible racist words in complete Scribblenauts word list @ Gaming Target

Written by John Scalzo on September 17, 2009

News: IGN has compiled a complete word list for Scribblenauts and one of the words might cause some controversy.

Scribblenauts has been making waves among the gaming press ever since it's strong showing at this year's E3. The combination word problem/puzzle game/platformer encourages players to summon items by writing words on the DS' touch screen to solve the game's puzzles.

After spending a little time with the game, IGN has compiled a complete word list for Scribblenauts containing all 20,000+ words found in the game. It's quite the feat and I really want to know what the "Devil's Hair" item does.

However, not everyone is happy with all of the words found in the list. While the sheer amount of devil imagery ("Devil's Plague" is another item I want to see in action) might make some religious folks uncomfortable, the current controversy is actually about the inclusion of the word "sambo" and the watermelon-like item it summons. "Sambo" has been used as a racial epithet against African-Americans, particularly in connection to blackface and watermelons.

Kotaku contacted the game's publisher, Warner Bros. Interactive, who had this to say: "We deeply regret the unfortunate oversight that led to the word being included in the game. The word was included as a reference to a Spanish based term for a fig leafed gourd but clearly upon review the word should have been excluded entirely."

Developer 5th Cell says the word was included with no racist intent, but whether it was intential or not, someone was clearly asleep at the switch when the word list was being compiled. Scribblenauts creative director Jeremiah Slaczka admitted to Kotaku that he was not familiar with the word "sambo", which is unsurprising as the word is not a commonly known word today. However, the word is linked to controversy, especially over the publication of the children's book Little Black Sambo (which features several characters in what looks like blackface) and the battles that continue over that book even today.

WBIE has not said whether or not they plan to remove the word from future copies of Scribblenauts.