The screencap above shows a discussion on the still-active #burgersandfries IRC channel about the media coverage of the recent death threats directed at indie game devveloper Brianna Wu.
Apparently any publicity is good publicity, even if your “movement” is getting media attention for being the likely source of death threats against a female developer.
Before some stray GamerGater comes by to inist that this guy “isn’t really a #GamerGater because that’s on IRC,” this seems to be the guy’s Twitter account. As you can see, @Thidran regularly Tweets and retweets comments using the #GamerGate tag or the abbreviation GG; he’s also obsessed with Zoe Quinn. BUT IT’S NOT ABOUT HER WE’VE ALL MOVED PAST THAT.
H/T — r/GamerGhazi for the screencap.
(Thank you, O Merciful WordPress Gods)
I’ve been giggling at that the gaters can’t seem to understand that different feminists can have different opinions on Bayonetta.
There’s way more to feminist criticism than “This game has Boob and Butt in it therefore it=bad” guys
Granted that I’m not a gamer, but presumably some games are crap, right? And you’d want to know this before you buy them?
They really have no idea what reviews and critique are for, do they?
Sarah:
Milo has actually been around for a while, and is pretty well-known for being an actual corrupt journalist – as in didn’t register his own tech news website under the Data Protection Act, didn’t pay his writers, and generally trades on gossip and controversy.
BLOCKQUOTE MAMMOTH WHY
What’s funny about this is that their complaint is supposedly about ethics, right? But to only review stuff that you know you’re going to like and refrain from negative commentary entirely would be deeply unethical. If you do that you really are functioning as part of the PR system rather than as a journalist.
Also, this is where I come to a firm opinion on the debate about calling people childish, because that behavior, demanding that if people don’t like a thing that you like they just don’t talk about it at all? Really fucking childish.
I’m just gonna guess they’re the ones complaining about the artwork in D&D 5 too?
Welcome to GoodReads, have a nice day.
Point of disagreement with the Mammothtariat:
I just want to know where this theoretical games journalism industry habit of assigning games to people who hate those kinds of games is happening. At least in the places where I read reviews, of course you give an action game to a fan of action games and a strategy game to a fan of strategy games, because that’s how you assess a game amongst the body of work that already exists within that genre. No different to music reviews – if someone hates classical you don’t get them to review orchestral stuff, because a) they have no working knowledge of the genre and b) there’s going to be more of an appreciation for the details among someone who does indeed enjoy that kind of music. Plus if someone hasn’t played the previous God Of War games, for instance, they can’t tell you why the latest one sucks in comparison to the last two. 😉
I think where the gamebros are losing their shit is that it’s getting harder and harder to keep games in specific genres (RPG elements in action games, strategy elements in FPSs, platformers with puzzle-solving emphasis). Add to that the explosion in indie games that don’t follow a set formula and the idea that you can find a reviewer that fits every niche gets a little ridiculous. Games reviewing is being forced to broaden its assessment criteria. Plus with “adult themes” being ever more prevalent, and the average gamer being in their 30s, it makes sense that concepts like narrative themes, setting, context within current events and social influences are becoming a part of what’s considered when reviewing a game.
Add to that the pervasive defensive crouch amongst a lot of gamers in that 30-something age bracket, who have never shaken the stigma surrounding gaming 10-20 years ago which is barely a thing anymore, and you get a little insight into why their assurance that Everything About Gaming Is Awesome is shaken when they see reviews that aren’t just cheerleading Gaming Itself but picking games apart with a critical eye – which they are mistaking for attack.
It’s a nesessary phase in the maturation of the medium. I still don’t really grok the howling opposition to games becoming Srs Bsns, except that it’s a convenient hobby horse for a certain strain of hippie-punching, How Dare You Tell Me I Can’t, tolerance=oppression! redpill-esque belief that geeks are still a persecuted class who are more enlightened and underappreciated but will some day rule the world.
Obviously they didn’t get the fucking memo that geeks do rule the world now. 😉
@cassandrakitty
*eyes glaze over thinking of how much she used to spend on crummy games before reviews became more easily accessible*
I’ve been watching Game Informer’s Replay show, and they’ve had full playthroughs of games that would have made me afraid to ever buy a game again if I had ever mistakenly picked them up. Yes, games need bad reviews. Movies, books, music, every other piece of media is reviewed. That this one little group of greasy snowflakes can’t handle hearing that people didn’t like their pet game (which, among the “hardcore” subset, is usually a terrible fucking game that they only like because they see themselves as especially skilled for having completed a “difficult” game that is usually only made so by clunky mechanics/miserable graphics/unnecessarily complicated battle systems) should not halt the medium in its tracks. It is incredibly selfish of these people to do so just because they don’t like seeing an extra girl or two in their game that they wouldn’t “bang”. I want one of my favorite things in the world that has had a massive impact on my life but that I DO NOT DEFINE MYSELF WITH to continue evolving, continue telling me new stories and letting me see a more varied world and identify with different characters that are more fascinating than Buff Whiteman v.73459205.
@strivingally, I don’t fully disagree with you, but if you haven’t already you should read Tevis Thompson’s insanely good essay On Videogame Reviews – it’s very long, but you can skip straight to section 5 for the relevant paragraph:
But really you should read the whole thing. In fact everyone who cares about games should. It’s just barely a year old, but every single word of it is more starkly relevant than ever in the wake of #GamerGate.
@strivingally
My partner was telling me about the guy from No Mutants Allowed reviewing Fallout 3. It definitely happens, but they make it sound as if reviewers are purposely targeting games they feel are free from the evil SJW influences. They really think people are going to stop making games with buff power fantasy dudes and scantily-clad, sexual fantasy scientist because “people will whine enough”. They apparently haven’t been watching beer commercials lately. You see some going in a more everyone-friendly direction (Heineken featuring Neil Patrick Harris instead of robot women), and others just hamfistedly doing the same things they’ve always done. The same will happen–IS happening–with video games.
And really, if they want those kinds of games so bad, why don’t they….I don’t know…start their own studios? Got a weird deja vu flash there for some reason, hmm.
Sexual..fantasy…women. Sexual Fantasy Scientist sounds like a Tecmo outfit.
By the way, here is an article that perfectly sums up my feelings about GamerGate now that I have both read about it AND interacted with it:
http://techcrunch.com/2014/09/07/the-gamergate-question/?fb_comment_id=fbc_771324876242369_789811631060360_789811631060360#f3f390cd64
@Shaenon, I’d tell you to give that to any GGers you know, but I have the sad feeling that it would just float around a bit and disappear, not become a central, oft-repeated example of corruption like ZQ has. If they’d even circulate it for you, and not tell you to do it yourself because it’s not their responsibility.
They know about it. It was all over the game sites they’re currently spamming.
Roundup of articles, while the *gaming* press is hardly covering Gamergate at all.
http://www.zenofdesign.com/the-games-press-isnt-attacking-gamergate-its-ignoring-them/
Porridge Beard London “can reveal”? Oh, bite my farts.
I think it’s amazing that none of these gamerdudes have been doxxed in retaliation. Should they have the spine to wander into meatspace spouting their hateful shit, they may know what it feels like to be tazered and handcuffed.
Stop the effing presses! PR flacks have lists of people they contact to announce new and exciting happenings in their industry so those peeps can share that info with the public. Corruption
Shiraz,
Some gamergaters are claiming some of them have been doxxed but I’ve only seen evidence free statements so I remain skeptical.
Um, yeah. When I had weekends off, I’d come back to the office on Mondays and groan over my inbox count. It would take me up to three hours to weed through the shit I knew my editors wouldn’t be interested in.
weirwoodtreehugger,
Yeah, I’m skeptical too.
I have heard of some gaters that I would consider credible that say they have been doxxed.
But the thing with these incidences is, they only got doxxed once people started talking about how both sides aren’t equal and only the gaters-side are doxxing and harrassing.
Then suddenly big names on the gater-side are getting doxxed and have since been held up as examples of “see, they are doing it too! They’re just as bad as us!”.
Given that 4chan has been proven to impersonate feminists and “SJW” for months now on Twitter in order to discredit their “enemies”, count me in on being sceptical about the source of the doxxing here.
Plus, if there’s one thing I learned in all of this, it’s that if they are creating conspiracy theories about the other side doing something (e.g. sending threats to themselves for attention and to make the gaters look bad), it’s usually cause they are currently doing it themselves and want to deflect from that.