The videogame sector has traditionally struggled with variety, and various studios have attempted to confront the problem over the years. However, not all attempts, no matter how well-intentioned, are successful. Activision Blizzard announced a choice to employ a custom engine in a blog article "One such statistic that seems particularly weird, if not obnoxious, is a protagonist diversity method of evaluating ethnicity, looks, cognitive aptitude, and other characteristics that imply "you're different."

This diversity tool, created by MIT Game Labs, and King   was designed to "establish and oversee criteria for avatar creation and execution." Jacqueline Chomatas, project leader at King globalization, elaborated on the tool's goal, stating, "The Diversity Space Tool is a means of determining how diverse a set of character attributes are and in comparison to the 'average,' and thus how varied that figure and group are." Ethnicity, cultural class, cognitive capacity, facial structure and appearance, and other areas are all rated on a scale based on how much they deviate from the standard of "typical attributes," as shown in the graphic below. "Measuring new character models versus [the ongoing basis] to evaluate their diversity," the tool says.

The application was allegedly beta tested and found to be useful by the Call of Duty: Vanguard and Overwatch 2 development teams. The response has been "rapid and positive," and Activision Blizzard aims to roll out the tool internally this summertime and in Q3.

Twitter users seem less than happy with Activision Blizzard's diversity tool, to say the least. It's a touch too similar to science, a bogus field in which personality qualities are determined by examining people's skulls. There are various problems such as how the "normal" baseline is chosen. Activision Blizzard has good intentions when it comes to diversifying its avatars, but trying to convert diversity into numeric data appears to miss the mark.

This year, Activision Blizzard is in the media a lot, and not for chief things. In 2021, the state of California accused the corporation of purportedly creating a sexist workplace, and a story from the Wall Street Journal claims that CEO Bobby Kotick hushed up misdeeds at the firm. The corporation is also accused of being anti-union, having asked its Raven Software QA personnel not to join a union. The trade is getting investigated by the FTC.