Multiple Crash Team Racing: Nitro-Fueled character skins see name changes following complaints of racial insensitivity

Quietly patched just a few days back

Crash Team Racing: Nitro-Fueled recently got an update, and there's something of note in the tweaks that wasn't mentioned in the patch notes. Some character skins have gone through name changes after some players pointed out that the names could be considered racially insensitive.

The biggest changes come to Tawna, Crash's former girlfriend. One of Tawna's skins was named 'Watermelon Tawna,' which some players took offense to, as Tawna has darker fur and was wearing a watermelon t-shirt. While artwork for the skin remains the same, the name has now been changed to 'Summertime Tawna.'

There are other skins which have been changed as well. The 'White Tawna' has been renamed to 'White Tiger Tawna,' and other skins with 'Black' or 'White' have been changed.


Top Rated Comment
Tue Jul 16 19 02:20am
Rating: 21 (Updated 1 time)

I would rather live in a world where adjectives of colors such as white and black can be used freely to describe, well, colors of anything, not always skin.

Looking at it from Europe, USA are pretty obsessed about "colors", uhealthily so.

They probably should have realised that "White Tawna" was not going to go down well. I wonder how much time companies spend checking for this sort of stuff, I imagine that's an important part of the localisation process.

Tue Jul 16 19 02:20am
Rating: 21 (Updated 1 time)



That might be true, but there are historical reasons for them to be obsessed.

Which is why this is something localisation teams need to be mindful of.

Definitely, it's sad that that's the conclusion people jump to.

Tue Jul 16 19 02:17am
Rating: 4 (Updated 2 times)

"One of Tawna's skins was named 'Watermelon Tawna,' which some players took offense to"

No shit that they did, it's a pretty stupid thing to name a skin like that considering the connotation of the word. Unless it's literally a shirt with the fruit on it and it's not on someone of darker skin, it's pretty much common sense to just not use that as a way to describe something. The shirt does seem to have a pattern based after the fruits seed though, which makes it not nearly as questionable as it would be elsewhere, but I still think that it's general courtesy to just not do that. Devs/localizer do a pretty damn good job at avoiding these situations but sometimes things slip through the cracks

So if it was a white, yellow or brown character with a watermelon shirt its fine to call them Watermelon? Also going by that thought process you do realize Fruity can be an offensive word too?

Tue Jul 16 19 06:09am
Rating: 2 (Updated 2 times)

I mean, yeah. There are pretty racist things tied to African American stereotypes; one of them being a watermelon. It’s the equivalent to having a dark skinned racer and calling it the “fried chicken” skin because s/he also happens to be wearing a shirt with a chicken bone on it. Maybe it’s unintentional, but it should be pretty obvious that most people will make the connection. That specific racist stereotype doesn’t apply to white or Asian people.


A university near me, many years back, had one of their dining halls celebrate Martin Luther King Jr. Day by serving fried chicken and cornbread.

It took a LONG while before peoplegrew tired of mocking them for that.

"Fruity" has its own issues.

Eeeegh, yeah. That I seriously had no prior knowledge of so i scrubbed that bit now that I looked it up

they should just refrain from using color and fruit names

Yeah outlaw all words, because anyone can get offended by any word.

Eventually new words will be used to offend people, it's just a temporary patch. One would assume we'll eventually retire offensive words as times change but it mostly feels like the opposite just piling words to be omitted.

With that said, it is a small change, just mainly annoying given the current trend to be more boldly PC. I do wonder what will be the straw that breaks the camel's back.

But then we'd miss out on gems like this.


Glad to see this thread is only 50% edgy people who consider not learning about language like this a point of honor

I do wonder how this works on other languages. With other types of cultural aspects.

Better to be tough and edgy than soft and dull I always say!

Sorry for my ignorence. But what does watermelon mean? Why is it racist? I just think of the fruit. English isn’t my native language though. Or maybe don’t tell me so you don’t ruin that lovely fruit for me.

I only learned about this today. At first, I thought it was a joke, because how on earth can a fruit be racist? For context: I'm german, we have a lot of problems with racism these days here, but I never heard about that watermelon thing.

I did some research and basically black people have been mocked as being totally obsessed with eating watermelons since those disgusting minstrel shows the US had decades ago. So a watermelon is used by racist as a symbol saying "these are stupid, primitive, animal like people". Apparantly, to this day blacks can't simply eat a watermelon without at least getting some remarks. Kinda comparable to bananas - which are sometimes used to symbolize "these guys are monkeys, not people". It's disgusting, really.

(If I got something wrong, please feel free to correct me!)

You are absolutely correct. The poster for the movie Bamboozled takes from that imagery:

(It's a very good movie that depicts how racism in the US has persisted through the 21st century, though it's anvilicious at times.)

Tue Jul 16 19 08:09am
Rating: 3

You gotta be as PC as possible. Don’t want to trigger anyone. This is the world we live in now. Censor everything! Stop bending the knee.

Tue Jul 16 19 08:29am
Rating: 2

"PC" is meaningless now, it just means "something I disagree with." Five years ago no one would have fought this, because think about it: you're mad that a racist stereotype was taken out of something. Why?

Tue Jul 16 19 09:15am
Rating: 6

No. I’m tired of censorship and people being mad for the most insignificant things possible. You can’t tell me with a straight face that devs made this skin and called it that way to be racially inappropriate. No. All it was, is that she was named after her shirt. “Why won't someone think of the children!”

The people calling it racist made it racist. When will it stop.

It's racist to have a dark character wearing a watermelon shirt regardless of what they intended. It's not insignificant. It's one of the most prominent racist tropes that can be thrown at a certain group. Getting rid of it even if it was unintentionally done makes sense.

Tue Jul 16 19 02:08pm
(Updated 2 times)

It's perceived racist....in certain cultures

It’s not universally racist, only racist in the country that used “watermelon” as a racist icon against black people. As a few have pointed out, never knew “watermelon” and black people had any negative connotation until today. Because the use of it as a slur doesn’t exist in my country.

Fun Story, I once witnessed a black mother get scolded by a white woman because the black mother referred to he child as “little monkey” because that “term” is offensive. If that wasn’t the most bat shovel crazy thing I’ve ever witnessed I don’t know what is.

For the record I get and understand the removal. You have to appease the lowest common denominator.

I feel like this frequent internet “outrage” over trivial things regarding fictional characters is the reason why the U.S. has an actual full blown racist running unchecked as president. Energy could be spent elsewhere at more important causes.

Sounds to me like the only people thinking about race above everything else are people like you. Just let it go and it has no power beyond being a joke.

Correction—it just means "something that anyone could potentially disagree with."

It does seem like a lot of things can annoy people these days. Here in Ireland, I'd never heard before of how watermelons can be offensive to the black community. I'm sure it wasn't done deliberately. It's just a coincidence most likely, at least I hope.

I remember a few years ago, I think it was a Benetton ad where a black kid wore a hoodie saying "Coolest monkey in the jungle". The ad got heavily criticised, had it been a white kid wearing it, nothing would have been said. It depends how you perceive things.

The irony is that in a way we're also reinforcing how different certain parts of the population are. Be careful when you add a woman, a different ethnic group or a person with a personal issue.

I think in media it should be about adding all sorts of people for the sake of making the work more interesting and diverse. The issue with that IMO is that all types of people can have dire flaws regardless of background, also too the possibility to do good. But people are very defensive about it and imply they should be as perfect and virtous as a person can be, which is ludicrous.

It just hit me. Even white is racist term. Can’t make this crap up. Lol

Tue Jul 16 19 12:04pm
Rating: 1

This world is truly getting ridiculous.

I'm fairly certain it wasn't intended to be racist but the change doesn't bother me. Carry on, everyone. Smile

Man people get offended way too easily...it was never meant to target them

Correction, it's "Tawna, "Crash's girlfriend"
Tawna with Pinstripe was only in the Japanese manual for Crash Bandicoot 2, This is meant to line up with the manga which was released at the same time which is non-canon and Japan only did that back then.

She still has Crash's icon on her shirt too and since Activision owns the franchise that has been changed and they never went with that past idea.

Some people really need to get a life!

Wed Jul 17 19 07:46am
Rating: 1

Fun fact: Watermelons are from Africa. West Africa actually.

Also, in Hungary (I'm half Hungarian) when someone is a bit "down" people ask "Mivan? Nem kaptàl dinnyeföldet?" Which basically translates into something like "Wha? Didn't you get your watermelon field?". It's a jest and people laugh at it, but back then I didn't get the point. I laughed with the others because I knew it was a joke, but the story is a bit sad actually.
Back in the day when the poor peasants needed some extra money they could rent a bit of a field from a rich person and grow watermelons to sell them. Thing is, if you were too late you were, well, too late so no watermelon field on you and thus no extra money to feed yourself and family, and thus the term.

Funny story that the PC/SJW crowd will hate, but here goes:

I went with an x-band member to his place before a bad session and there was this black guy there. I was a bit tipsy and I looked at him and just said "What's up, my nigga?". He looked at me first and then just laughed hard. I am a ginger and also pretty skinny, so my nick name was "bony ass" and "pale boi" and we laughed and we joked about stuff like that. Who got OFFENDED!!!!??? Well, white SJW/PC guy.He came to me (way later) and said "I'm offended! You should never have said that!". And for me, since it was all just a joke, I asked "What? Didn't you see that we were joking and having a good time? He is not offended, so why the phuck are you?" His answer was something like "I'm offended for him." This is the problem with the PC/SJW crowd: Attention seekers.

Anyway, a week later I went back and saw "my nigga" again and we just looked at each other with BIG smiles. The joke was still on ;) BUUUT, I didn't catch his actual name the first time, so I got a bit tricky and asked "Yo. I didn't catch your name last time. What do you WANT me to call you?" (A very intentionall question) and he just looks at me and says "Chocolate Boy!"

For the first time in my life I had no instant comebacks. He won. He won fair and square. DAMMIT!

Anyway, we laughed a lot. HAd a couple of beers and became good friends. White /PC/SJW boy still hates me though.



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