So a lot has happened with me being in gamer-gate. Don’t worry, this will not be a piece bagging on Anita or Zoe as I feel like the movement (feels weird calling it that) has evolved so far beyond its’ initial roots it‘s no longer about them. If anything, I wish Gamer-Gate had started on a more positive note other than a hurting ex-boyfriend airing his girlfriend’s sex-life. Don’t get me wrong, overall I’m sure Eron is a nice guy but like the rest of us sometimes do, I think he did something kind of questionable in the heat of his emotions. The only good thing about The Quinnspiracy is it “did” bring up the issues of nepotism and cronyism. Everything else is throw away garbage for me.
Not that was the start of all this for me personally. I remember when Bob Mackey (a game journalist) first wrote “This Month In Misogyny” for 1up. It was the first time the “shame narrative” was in full swing and Bob seemed to take a perverse glee out of hitting gamers where it hurts. I recall him slandering J-rpgs especially, saying games like Hyperdimension Neptunia were just for pedophiles. (At the time I knew several female game friends who “loved” J-rpgs too, including the ones with racier, sexier, and cuter content.) Rape-culture was used as a catchphrase a few times as well. Many 1uppers were offended or outright furious and I was one of the loudest voices against Mackey.
The feud between Bob and I continued on and off from that point on. Eventually Bob was so pissed at me he got members from the forum Bo News to descend upon my 1up blog. Yes, this was a professional journalist recruiting “mercenary friends” to troll me. Among them was K. Thor and his loathing of gamers seems pretty apparent even to this day.
To the credit of 1up, Jeremy Parish eventually stepped in, apologized, and put Mackey in his place. It’s a rare gesture I don’t see often (As in an editor siding with the readers) and though Jeremy and I had our disagreements as well I still respect him for trying to keep the ethical standards of being non bias and fair to everyone. Has Jeremy clung to those standards? I hope so though after I read Kat Bailey’s article comparing Lords Of Shadow 2 to Rape-lay, I simply could not stomach sticking around on US gamer any longer.
But if you think that’s my only initiation into how these people work you would be a bit wrong. Not too long ago I made a little rpg using rpgmaker VX ace.(With pixlbit's resident blogger Blake contributing some of the music) I’m certainly not endorsing it as anything special. It told the story I wanted it to yet was not that ambitious when it came to bells and whistles. Sure, I made original sprites for each character (Using a sprite editor) and chose a more urban modern setting but the battle system was right out of the first Dragon-Warrior and once you collected all the soulmorphisis cards the difficulty became way too easy.
I released the game too early before changes were added later to make it more user friendly. This got me some very well deserved criticism and helpful feedback that I would later use to revise the project further. But even then the atmosphere was tense. There were complaints about my art being “objectifying to women” and once it was known my game dealt with rape and depression (And yes, I’m bi-polar irl) the sentiment was “Oh, it’s okay to address sexual assault and depression but we know you’re going to botch it up anyway because you’re a white cis shit-lord who has never known hardship in your whole life!’.
With that particular rpgmaker site being filled to them brim with cynicism and nepotism, I decided to give game-jolt a try. The people there were a lot nicer and Gutter-delve seemed to skate by on positive scores for awhile. Then came the whirlwind of negativity that is Gliz-Caldo. Gliz had done a whole series of videos mocking my game on you-tube. Granted, it was the earlier build so a good portion of his grievances were probably legitimate. However, he took his impressions from that early build and scored my updated game based on that. Eventually I convinced Gliz to do another review and get back to me. Had he been a reasonable person he might have complimented the improvements but instead he found new things to bitch about and the list goes as follows.
1. Instead of being happier there were no more random battles Gliz complained the enemies seen on screen did not have aggressive enough AI to seem threatening and that they re-spawned after a few seconds. First of all, the enemy sprites are just there to eliminate the need for random battles. Their point is for gamers to touch them to be whisked into the battle-screen. That’s all, really. Had I made an action game Gliz’s critique would have been more valid but this was an rpg instead. Rpgs are known more for their story and they handle fights very differently from action games. (At least turn based rpgs do) Also, it takes awhile for the enemies to respawn, enough time for the player to move on with no troubles.
Perhaps Gliz’s oddest statement in all this was that he said he felt guilty killing the monsters because they were too easy. Yes, the “too easy” remark is a valid concern but feeling “guilt” over dispatching the enemies? The game is not violent. It has mature content and swearing but the battles are the least offensive thing in Gutterdelve. (Beyond the monsters saying some pretty messed up dialogue but that is meant to keep the player aware they’re fighting a dark force that represents the ills of humanity.)
2. At one point the female characters have a conversation in the kitchen. You would think this would not spark anything negative in the audience but Gliz tried to spin it as “They’re females in the kitchen=sexist symbolism!” And my gawd, it worked too. Soon other complainers mentioned this very scene and accusations were flung I simply cannot write female characters very well. Keep in mind these characters were introducing themselves to a new female character. They were not “making sandwiches” for their boyfriends or anything nonsensical like that.(The game even let’s you know earlier on the male character Liam is the best at cooking) It just so happened they were hanging out in the friggin kitchen!
3. Gliz complained the “new music” put in the game was “too generic”. Keep in mind he was the same guy to harshly get on my case for using copyrighted music when he first played the game so I changed it based on his feedback. Yeah,he made the game worse for himself! Beyond that, I’m happy with the new soundtrack anyway and I’m glad you-tubers doing let’s plays of my game will not get flagged. That’s the beauty of using open source music!
Regardless I was fucked after that. Once one asshole decides to shit on something it encourages other assholes to shit on something. Yet all through this abuse I did not flag comments or even flag Gliz’s videos.
Assuming my game is still at Game-jolt you can go there and see the comments. (Good, bad, and inflammatory) If anything ,at least I was anti-censorship through it all. I let people air their grievances even though I thought many of them were overly sensitive hipster douche bags. (I think I complained to a mod once. I just cannot remember how that went exactly.)
Before you think I’m a martyred saint don’t jump to that assumption just yet. Admittedly I have made some pretty nasty blogs about Gliz and I confess some of the stuff I said about him was unjust and uncalled for. Still, this was pent up frustration after the guy had followed me around and camped on my game page a lot! Yes, I pulled an “Eron” and I hope I will handle this kind of crap better in the future!
This all happened pre-gamer-gate and I think it is a good indicator on how developers and gamers both experience pressure from a toxic politically correct environment. It’s one thing to critique a game for having bugs or being too easy but it is another thing to rally against design choices and “creative expression” just because they do not fit some preconceived notion of social acceptability and moral superiority.
How gamer gate has made me a better person.
I never would have guessed feminists of all people would have spoken up on my behalf but they have. Yes, there are feminists that are pro #gamergate. Granted I still prefer the term “egalitarian” for myself but it’s still great to see people like Christina Sommers and Liana Kerzner helping us out. Because of this my narrow-minded views of feminism have changed. I’m having to re-evaluate and re-examine my personal beliefs about them and that is a good thing. I “want” to keep growing as a person. An epiphany like this one helps me do that while simultaneously making me into a better human being.
Then there’s #notyourshield, a phrase that spawned from lgbts and other ethnic groups fed up with game journalism using them as an excuse and a diversion to cover up their own corruption. There are just so many wonderful people from all walks of life nicely mingling on twitter right now it makes me almost tear up. To me “this” is diversity. “This” is true harmony. Make no mistake,#gamergate is not just a bunch of pissed off straight white dudes attacking people like Anita Sarkeesian. It’s a rainbow collective of gamers from around the world of all colors, all beliefs, all genders, and of all sexual preferences. And I’ll be happy to ride that rainbow right down the throats of corrupt games journalism and politically correct Marxism until they choke on us!
Just my derptastic opinion,Chris. lol.
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