Gamer Sonny Truyen had recently moved to Singapore – where Pokémon Go isn’t yet available – from Australia, where it is.
Apparently distressed at being unable to play the new augmented reality (AR) game from Niantic Labs, Truyen hit Facebook on Sunday to express his anger.
“You can’t f*cking catch pokemon in this piece of f*cking shit country,” Truyen blasted, apparently oblivious to the fact that its lack of availability has more to do with Niantic than Singapore.
The hit game, which uses AR to let players move through the real world to capture Pokémon, launched in the U.S., Australia, and New Zealand on July 6. The planned global rollout was halted at the end of last week following massive download demand. Yes, the game is already huge, and is reportedly about to overtake Twitter in daily active users on Android.
With all the hype surrounding the new release, Truyen was apparently in bits when he realized he couldn’t get hold of it in Singapore.
Offended by the Aussie’s colorful description of her country, a Singporean Facebook user hit back at Truyen, with the pair entering into a heated exchange.
Other locals upset by Truyen’s outburst were quickly on his case, tracking down his place of work – a map-based real estate portal in Singapore – and hitting the firm’s Facebook page to make their feelings known.
Keen to avoid having its own reputation tarnished, the firm’s CEO fired Truyen on Sunday for his “rude behavior on a Facebook thread.” In a post on the company’s site, the boss apologized for the “reckless act of insult by one individual,” and urged all sides to refrain from “propagating messages of hate and division.” All this because of Pokémon Go.
Truyen, meanwhile, has apologized for his behavior, telling Mashable it was “a very big error of judgment to negatively label an entire country over Pokémon.”
At the time of writing, Pokémon Go still isn’t available in Singapore.
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