The early access Steam game Valheim has taken over the gaming world, but not one person has managed to say the quirky word correctly yet. You'll never guess how!
Valheim is an online survival crafting game with an 11th century Scandinavian Viking aesthetic that shares identities with Minecraft, Terraria and Dark Souls — all squished into a $20 early access title. Since its launch in February on Steam 3 weeks ago, Valheim has accumulated over 4 million copies sold and is set to become a cultural phenomenon if that pace continues. Not bad for Iron Gate Studios. A company with only 5 employees!
Sometimes the graphics give the employee count away.
It's not without caveats for the Swedish company. One issue that is on top of the developers list is the public's disrespectful miss-pronunciation of the game's title Valheim. Co-founder of the studio Henrik Törnqvist explains the correct method and why they find it important people get it right.
"I've heard several terrible attempts of people trying to spit Valheim out. Val-Him. Val-Hyme. Val-ium. One fuckwit even tried to call it Va-Lee-I-Am. I wont even begin about the people who can't spell the word right after literally reading the name from forum posts or the title screen."
"It's now 2021 and we will not tolerate this kind of disrespect. We're a Swedish studio and people need to stop being racist to our culture. My colleagues and family are shook to their cores, scared to leave their homes or glance on social media in fear of being subject to such bigotry. There's more to the world than obese, cheeseburger munching Americans. "
"If you're ready to denounce your toxic sectarianism, let me explain how to correctly say Valheim. I'd recommend a quick trip to Ikea to incorrectly read some of the product names before allocating your 2 brain cells to this intense theory."
"English speakers should translate the Swedish word so it is spoken with the syllables Hi-Men. The reason being is that in Swedish, the syllables of words are spoken back to front. In this instance Heim, then Val. Val in Swedish is pronounced with the Hi sound, which creates the word Hymen in English."
"Now for all of the space cadets out there, let's break this down to an elementary level and utilise the correct way to say Valheim in a few sentences."
"Hi Men, would you like to play with my Hymen? Our Hymen's cherry has been popped over 4 million times already."
With the correct pronunciation of Valheim understood, players can now enjoy the game in a safe place without fear of offending anyone until the next faux rage over nothing can be created — generating revenue for media, self-gratification for accusers and disdain for others.
