Los Angeles-based Riot Games has made a commitment to change.
In a post on its website entitled 'Our First Steps Forward', the League of Legends maker has laid out its plan to overhaul its working culture.
This kicks off by apologising to members of staff and contractors both past and present, saying it is sorry that the studio was not "the place we promised you". The firm also takes ownership for taking so long to publish a proper response. In addition, Riot apologies to its fans, people looking to work at the LoL firm in the future and its current and prospective partners.
Looking to the future, Riot says that the steps it has taken to date have not been enough, according to its own employees. It is now taking new steps to improve the working culture.
These include building a new team to lead Riot's "cultural evolution". This group will be reporting directly to the CEO, and will be looking to speed up the firm's "existing cultural and inclusion work".
Furthermore, Riot will be going back to brass tacks on its "core cultural tenets", including its manifesto and how or whether it'll be using terms such as "gamer" and "meritocracy" moving forwards.
In addition, Riot has hired two leading consultants to provide their insight into making sure the game maker's working culture is rebuilt the right way.
Riot is also overhauling its investigation process to make sure that staff have the means to raise issues or submit complaints anonymously. The firm has also said it will be making its recruitment system more open and changing how it discusses the roles it is looking to fill. That's on top of training all managers in anti-harassment training as well as interview technique.
And finally, the League of Legends maker is recruiting a new chief human resources officer, who will join the chief diversity officer that Riot recently began hiring for.
"We’ve always believed that Riot should be the home for the very best talent in gaming," the company wrote.
"It’s clear we’ve fallen short of that goal. But we’ve never backed down from a challenge before and we don’t plan to start now."
This follows a scathing critique of Riot's working culture being published by Kotaku, painting the game maker as having a sexist office environment.
