The online game Monopoly Go has landed itself in a spot of controversy, after Indigenous Australians called it out for incorrectly spelling Uluru, as well as misrepresenting stories from the Dreamtime. Seems like the game titled after a major economic crime still has a thing or two to learn about names.
ABC Perth reporter Abby Richards, a Gubrun, Barngarla, Ngadju woman, noticed that the popular game had made massive fails in its inclusion of First Nations culture for its “Epic Myths” promotion in September.
“Did you even stop to consult anyone Aboriginal?” Richards questioned the creators of the game online.
But first, what even is Monopoly Go?
Monopoly Go is free-to-play mobile game that lets players enjoy the fun/fury of standard Monopoly without the need for a board, or in-person friends. Released globally in April of 2023 by US game studio Scopely, it has had almost 100 million downloads.
Gameplay is basically a digital version of the board game best known for ruining friendships. Players can roll dice, pick up cards, buy properties on a digital board, and make cash.
However it does differ from its IRL counterpart in some ways, most notably being the addition of collectables such as digital stickers. It also doesn’t allow players to utilise my favourite Monopoly-winning method: eating other player’s pieces.
It holds regular tournaments and promotions in-game, including the recently featured “Epic Myths” season which some Aussie users pointed out was problematic.
What Monopoly Go got wrong:
In one of the winnable in-game sticker collections, Monopoly Go depicted what was intended to be a Dreamtime story, and called it “Lizard Man.”
It featured a cartoon picture of an Indigenous Australian throwing a boomerang, and other “stickers” telling a tale from the Dreaming.
The Dreamtime story this was supposed to represent was the story of Alinga, also called the Lizard Man, who was a giant and powerful warrior known for his skill with his boomerang.
In the Dreamtime story, Alinga once threw his giant boomerang so far he lost it for weeks. When he finally find it, sandstorms had turned it into a huge rock. This is the Dreamtime story of the origin of Uluru.
And for an origin story about one of Australia’s most iconic landmarks and sacred sites, you’d think the Monopoly Go team would be able to spell Uluru correctly.
Unfortunately, the final sticker of the “Lizard Man” collection instead read: “Mount Ularu.”
When activist Caroline Cull pointed out the obvious error on a Facebook group page for Monopoly Go Australia, she found that the next day her post had been removed and she was kicked out of the Facebook group for having a “not positive enough” tone.
Response from Monopoly Go
Despite culling Cull from the the group, creators of the game did quickly correct the spelling of Uluru. They also changed the title of the sticker collection from “Lizard Man” to “Alinga” which was more consistent with other sets from the “Epic Myths” promotion.
A Scopely spokesperson said they “immediately took action to change the name” once the criticisms were made aware to them.
“At the time we did not fully understand the nature of the incorrect portrayal,” they said to the ABC.
“We are disappointed to learn that the inclusion of the Lizard Man overall in the album was not an accurate representation and did not live up to the standards we set for ourselves.”
