Looks like Ni Hao was featured in the keynote of a Texas A&M symposium exploring race and ethnicity in new media:
Don't Hate the Player, Hate the Game: The Racialization of Labor in World of Warcraft [Conference Notes]
Ni Hao caught us a lot of flack for being racist against Chinese. We also got a lot of support from Chinese and Chinese-American players who found it amusing. Ni Hao does have many parts that could be viewed as racist if seen out of context, but the entire project is meant as a satirical look at the gold farming stereotype, not the race as a whole. Mad Cow Studios has nothing whatsoever against players of Chinese heritage. We hate gold farmers of any nationality. We also do not balk at a topic that we think would be funny, even if it is a bit risqué (case in point, Hard like Heroic). We were aware it was a risk. When Nyhm first wrote Ni Hao, he did debate whether it was too much. He did not wish to be seen as racist and recognized the questionable nature of some of the lyrics. We finally decided it was too funny to not produce, and we'd just take the risk of offending a few people in the name of amusing many others. At last count, Ni Hao was over 4 million views on YouTube, so I for one am glad we took that risk.
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I'm glad you took the risk also. Ni Hao has got to be one of the most well known and favorite machinima that has ever been produced. Plus the damn song gets stuck in my head ALL the friggin time......
ReplyDeleteSo I went to that "Don't have the player, hate the game" link and geez... they really went out of their way to make it sound worse than it was. I felt compelled to make a comment, and it is awaiting moderation. Should be comment #36 once it goes through, if the author allows it. IMHO, I pwnt the author pretty hard.
If anyone else can do better I suggest they go for it. :)
Ni Hao was the first video of yours I saw and it is what has gotten me hooked on your work. Ulduar has to be the absolute best, though. It's so much better than the actual song! And the vocals in it are perfect for your voice. I have to ask, having never played horde before - at 1:40 in the Ulduar video, where is that? The little mini zeppelin and Horde flag really threw me off.
ReplyDeleteKeep up the fantastic work, and know that while there will always be people without a sense of humor who are all too willing to be offended by anything they can, there are even more who recognize your work for what it is - delightful entertainment.
Thank you for sharing your talents with us.
To be honest watching the video there was alot of points that are actually happening in the real world. Where as some things could be seen (if taken to the literal sense) as racist. Personally I fear that this is another case and point of "Political correctness" gone to the extremes.
ReplyDeleteI loved the song and the video and in a weird way it made a valid point against Gold Farmers/sellers. Both yourself and Nyhm are very talented singers/songwriters
I agree though that Ulduar has to be one of the best Parodies that I have heard in a long time and both yourself and Cranius should be proud for the work you have done.
Ni Hao realy get stuck on my head. I was founding my self singin it one day on work. Lyrics are awesome job and Summergale's voice is smexy as hell =). Ulduar was a great job also. So keep a good work and make more videos.
ReplyDeleteDemoraz - Chamber of aspects (eu)
I'm happy that you decided to make this video and to be honest, I don't really see what the whole problem is. It is true that most gold farmers are chinese or from similar countries because they're the only ones that have an economy where it is a viable option to do this for a living. That's just facts, not racism. You aren't saying you hate all chinese, just that gold farmers are annoying for the regular players. Not your fault if people can't tell the difference >.<
ReplyDeleteI love Summer gale and Nyhm songs i listen to them all the time wind Wow is down i am and avid player of Wow on windrunner(us) know as nickaspally lvl 40.Anyhow me and my cousin go frikin crazy over that song. i see how they could think its racist. but im sure u did not shoot for a racist song from your past of songs Nick
ReplyDeletegreat post
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ReplyDeleteI know this is like hella old, but I'm writing a paper in college about the ways that online gaming beats down on minorities and women and this video is one thing that I've got in my list. I'm a white guy, so I have no personal experience with being harassed or marginalized, but I'm starting to understand what people are talking about when they say they're a victim. Saying that it was worth releasing the video because you got lots of views on it completely ignores the potential damage that it could (and certainly did) cause many people. I'm not saying that you are evil or anything like that, y'all are all just people like anybody else and the video is high quality, like y'all clearly put work into it and the song, but your measure of what success is might be a bit warped if you're willing to put down an entire group of people for some momentary mainstream popularity. I would say that I'm sure your video didn't truly hurt anyone, but I can't know that because I'm not everyone, and I don't know how every single individual feels. And to try and censor things to the point that no one is offended also makes no sense, because then nothing will ever be interesting or noteworthy; this song, more than anything, is interesting and well-known because of the controversy behind it.
ReplyDeleteI guess what I'm trying to say is I don't know how to feel about the song, I don't quite know how to feel about this age of "political correctness", but I think that for people to be in the best place, we need to collectively reach a middle ground where people can take a hit and afford to be offended every now and then, but also people aren't actively trying to offend each other. Anyways, anyone who reads this, hope it gets you thinking some and hope you have a great day. I'm cool with you whether you like the video or not; just don't hurt kids or animals and don't be a dick when you can help it and you're probably a good person regardless of how you feel about the video.