The creators of online shooter Battlefield 2042 have pulled a controversial in-game unlock that allowed players to fly around in a grinning Russian helicopter.
The 'Grin Reaper' was a limited edition unlockable skin reward for the game's Russian faction. It was designed to make attack helicopters look like they were smiling aggressively.
Battlefield developers DICE said they decided the unlock was in bad taste as Russia continues to attack Ukraine with helicopters.
"In light of current events we have disabled the Weekly Missions system for this week, and this weeks reward is no longer available to unlock," the company said in a tweet.
This is the second time Battlefield has had to pull an unlock because of Russia's military actions in Ukraine. In 2014, Battlefield removed a 'Little Green Men' skin which directly referred to Putin's special forces unit in Crimea.
In that conflict, Russia used unmarked forces, or soldiers with no flags or identifying marks on their uniforms, who Putin claimed were local insurgents rather than Russian military. Russia eventually admitted these were elite special forces that they used to annex parts of Ukraine.
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Battlefield 2042 has had a notoriously troubled launch. Despite a hefty price tag of up to £80 upon release, the game has been plagued by bugs, glitches, and balance issues, netting it a truly terrible response from gamers and reviewers.
It has a user score of 2.1 out of 10 on Metacritic currently, and there's even rumours that EA will make the game free-to-play in light of accusations that it released an 'unfinished' game.
Fans of the series were very disappointed following the previous instalments Battlefield 1 and Battlefield V, which were huge critical smash-hits.
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