Earlier this week, we helped publicize a fan-made petition that set out to get gay marriage support in the upcoming Nintendo game Tomodachi Life, which allows players to hang out and start relationships in a weird, surreal alternate universe habitated by Mii characters.


Nintendo has responded to that petition with a statement to the AP, and it's truly tone-deaf:

Nintendo never intended to make any form of social commentary with the launch of Tomodachi Life. The relationship options in the game represent a playful alternate world rather than a real-life simulation. We hope that all of our fans will see that 'Tomodachi Life' was intended to be a whimsical and quirky game, and that we were absolutely not trying to provide social commentary. The ability for same-sex relationships to occur in the game was not part of the original game that launched in Japan, and that game is made up of the same code that was used to localize it for other regions outside of Japan.


Of course, denying gay people the right to get married in a game about relationships and marriage is itself "social commentary."

Nintendo went on, according to the Associated Press: