Elon Musk is at it again, flexing his hundreds of billions for everyone to seeāthis time with a hint at acquiring yet another company, because apparently running a social media platform into the ground isn’t enough.
On Nov. 28, just days after ranting that Dungeons & Dragons (D&D)‘s new book “trashes” its original creator, Musk casually tweeted, āHow much is Hasbro?ā in response to a post on X about the latest drama in the role-playing games world. It was enough to spark speculation that Musk might actually want to buy Hasbro, the company that owns D&D.
The saga began on Nov. 22, when Musk publicly lashed out at Jason Tondro, a senior D&D designer at Wizards of the Coast (a Hasbro subsidiary). Tondro, in a recent book, critiqued the original 1974 D&D rules for using “insensitive and derogatory language” toward Black people, Indigenous people, women, and anyone who wasn’t a “white, middle-class man.” While Tondro stopped short of directly blaming D&D co-creator Gary Gygax, he noted that the language came straight from Gygaxās original drafts. This critique was apparently too much for Musk, who declared, “Nobody, and I mean nobody, gets to trash E. Gary Gygax and the geniuses who created Dungeons & Dragons. May they burn in hell.”
Muskās latest outburst was sparked by a Facebook comment where Tondro dismissed concerns about backlash from āgrognardsāāa term affectionately (or sometimes not) used to describe fans of old-school D&D. Naturally, Musk and his loyal fanbase interpreted this as a direct attack, further fueling the billionaireās self-proclaimed crusade against āwoke culture.ā Now, Musk seems to think buying Hasbro would be the ultimate mic drop, presumably to steer D&D back to 1974.
While Muskās comments thrilled some fans of his āanti-wokeā rhetoric, others were far less enthused. “Dude got bullied for being an annoying nerd and now he wants to single handedly ruin fun nerd culture,” a user wrote on X. Another chimed in, “This is the worst news ever. He would DEFINITELY ruin it.”
Given Muskās acquisition track record, itās not hard to see why many fans are skeptical he could keep Hasbro operating properly if he did buy it. After all, his acquisition of Twitter (now X) has been a downward spiral, with the platform reportedly losing 80% of its value since Musk bought it for $44 billion in 2022. āElon canāt run Twitter properly, and you want him to take Hasbro?ā one person asked. Another joked, āMusk isnāt going to buy Hasbro; he only bought Twitter because he was legally forced to.ā Itās not surprising people doubt Muskās ability to manage Hasbro without sending its $8.9 billion valuation spiraling into the abyss.
Despite the noise, thereās no indication Hasbro is actually up for sale or that Musk is making a serious move to buy it. For now, he seems more worried with his latest venture: an AI gaming studio to āmake games great again.ā Because if thereās one thing the gaming world needs, itās more Musk. Or so he thinks.
Published: Nov 29, 2024 09:37 am