Nightmare Forge Games has announced a name change from Infestation 88 to Infestation: Origins. The decision was taken after controversy over the use of Neo-Nazi reference number 88. Nightmare Forge Games said on X that the reason for that title was a reference to the game taking place in the year 1988. The video game developers claim that they were not aware of any other meaning of that number. They thanked those who brought it to their attention and announced that they had changed it.
Infestation: Origins is a cooperative horror game in which a character, just like Mickey Mouse from the 1928 movie Steamboat Willie, stalks and attacks the players. This sudden increase in Mickey Mouse-inspired content is because the version of Mickey Mouse from Steamboat Willie has entered the public domain recently. However, many other versions are still protected by copyright. This multiplayer game, Infestation, makes the player deal with the infestations led by a zombified version of Mickey Mouse. This was the first project announced since this version of Mickey entered the public domain; it also gathered attention for having anti-Semitic references.
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The number 88 is listed as a white supremacist code, standing for “Heil Hitler,” according to the Anti-Defamation League. It is a dog whistle, just like the number 14, which means a code used to show that you support something without directly saying it. 88 comes from the English alphabet, with H being the 8th letter of the alphabet, with 88 meaning HH, like Heil Hitler.
Many claims state that the number 14 was also used as a reference. With the number of characters being 14 in its previous title and the game being suitable for 1-4 players, Nightmare Forge games have been engulfed in controversy. Additionally, their website has only published Infestation and made no previous announcements of any games. The company was founded in 2010, and the copyrights were filed in 2024. The number 14 is another white supremacist code, due to the 14-word quote by David Lane.
