The Game Awards is hosting a Players' Voice category where fans can choose their number one game out of five choices, including Elden Ring, Genshin Impact, God of War Ragnarok, Stray, and Sonic Frontiers. And while this seems like an innocuous poll to compliment the main event, it has turned into an online feud, primarily between Genshin And Sonic fans, that has led to several people getting harassed.

Content warning for suicide, racism, and self harm.

Initially, it started out as a meme, with many people posting something along the lines of "Vote for Frontiers!" with the hashtag "SonicSweep", playing on the viral Morbius gags from earlier this year. But it quickly devolved into crude private messages and racist artwork. One string of messages on Reddit from an alleged Sonic fan said, "Fuck you, and your dumb cash grab game... The world is better off without genshin, and is better off without you. So take my advice and go jump in front of a train."

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Another set of messages shared to the same person said, "Just go hang yourself and make it so that there's one less pedophile in the world". That's a recurring theme, as many Sonic fans are labelling Genshin players as pedophiles. They are also posting racist comments and slurs that play up Chinese stereotypes and stigmas - such as China being responsible for COVID-19 - and sharing racist and sexist art.

Things got so bad on the Sonic subreddit with spam posts about voting in the Players' Voice poll - and rampant harassment - that the moderators banned all mention of it. However, in this post, the moderators still put down Genshin Impact, saying, "We get it. You're upset because a 2020 mobile gacha game is likely going to win." Putting down Genshin is a huge part of the toxicity as many people have been posting comments such as, "Genshin fans should know their fucking place" and "All they care about is whaling whenever the next walking sex toy of a character is released."

However, in a follow-up edit, the moderators added, "We have received reports of racist attacks being perpetuated against Genshin fans in the wake of this poll controversy. I want to reiterate that racism is not tolerated in this community."

As things continue to heat up and spiral out of control, there has been no word from Sonic or Sega's socials, leaving this a rampant community problem. However, the vote ends in 16 hours, but if Sonic fans don't win, whose to say the problems will end there? Many are already anxious about continued harassment if Genshin Impact manages to pull the number one spot in the end, and with how much has been going in during the poll while its been open, that's more than understandable.

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