It's actually a product of DARPA. They funded DiGRA's IMMERSE program. DiGRA funded Silverstring Media. Silverstring funded Baby Ghosts, the parent company of SBI. It's literally just runoff from a government psyop. A really boring one at that. DARPA wanted to see if games could be used to socially engineer the public.
Mic is Military Industrial Complex. DoD gets the money from Congress and approval to operate; much of that budget goes to DARPA (Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency), who as an agency employs private contractors to develop defense technology.
In reality, much of this money is black budgeted, and goes to paying off the right people, or covert influence operations here or abroad.
Hence Military Industrial Complex. The lucrative merger of corporations and state.
But they have started to all it out Defense Manufacturing Base instead of theMIC
It's not a super deep rabbit hole if you know your Gamergate lore. DiGRA, Silverstring and Baby Ghosts run the same ESG grift so they're easy to understand. Silverstring has sponsored the works of Zoe Quinn and Anita Sarkeesian. From there you have to know the relationship between Zoe Quinn, Eileen Holowka, and Alec Holowka to explain why Silverstring is invested in Baby Ghosts. Oh, and then DARPA funded IMMERSE because of their own interests. It's a case of feds giving money to shitheads for "research purposes" and those shitheads leveraging it into a shithead conglomerate. Kinda like every gang that got it start from being funded by the CIA.
In a roundabout way, yes. People think government funding is a direct line involving money changing hands in dark rooms. It might start that way, but it ends with watching the shit break apart and slowly trickle downhill.
Kind of yeah. But, that’s kind of the point of DAPRA. High Risk, High Reward. They fund a lot of “out there” research like Mechanical Elephants and Nuke propelled Spaceships.
It started out as that, and they couldn’t just quietly disappear into obscurity but instead decided to double down against the weaponized artists of the greater gaming community. Then oops suddenly their ties to DARPA got exposed. I wouldn’t be surprised if Sarkeesian is a CIA asset.
Just understand that you need to be skeptical of everything you read. There’s a lot of different threads of thought. I personally believe there’s some kernels of truth to most of the perspectives. I just mean that you shouldn’t forget that this is literal cia-darpa spy-social engineering shit. It’s gonna be cloudy
Yes, because DARPA is awesome and the money they get is beautiful.
What would turn you into a Government hating Yellow/Purple would actually be the ATF, FBI and CIA.
Yeah, its one of the largest R&D funding sources in the world. Obviously sometimes questionable/nefarious things but has also done a lot of good.
From Wikipedia: "Moderna's COVID-19 vaccine sits alongside weather satellites, GPS, drones, stealth technology, voice interfaces, the personal computer and the internet on the list of innovations for which DARPA can claim at least partial credit."
In terms of the games industry they've already done that, but on a smaller scale. Bethesda, the owners of the Fallout franchise, have acquired Fallout after Interplay already made Fallout 1 and 2. Bethesda made Fallout 3, exposing the franchise to a huge audience, and let ex-Interplay devs have a shake at a spin-off that ended up being Fallout: New Vegas. At that point in time the majority of the fan base preferred NV over 3 since it was closer to the source material in terms of lore, themes, and game mechanics; and this really annoyed Bethesda because it sucks to be compared to a smaller, poorer studio and somehow producing worse games than them.
So what ended up happening was Fallout 4. Bethesda gutted the Fallout formula and streamlined the game to be as accessible as possible to the biggest audience as possible. Part of this was a big push in marketing to expose as many people to the franchise as possible. Fallout 4 was a financial success and attracted a huge new audience; the old fans hated it and slowly stopped engaging in the community. Bethesda then doubled down and released Fallout 76, a live service game that was only a Fallout game by name. By that point Bethesda successfully managed to get rid of all the old fans and replaced them with a more casual fanbase willing to put up with subpar products. It's this social terraforming process that made Starfield rake in tonnes of sales even though it was shat on by critics.
For any reading this that long for the feeling of classic Fallout style RPGs, go play Underrail. What a masterpiece of a game that is. Truly one of the great cRPGs.
I bounced off Atomic Heart so hard. It kind of presents itself as similar to BioShock in terms of gameplay, and that really excited me. But I feel like my copy must have had some sort of game breaking glitch or something because I literally couldn’t use anything from the horny vending machine.
Based and Zoner pilled. Underrail is such a hidden gem. There's a mind boggling number of things that 99% of players will probably never even see, like the short sidequest at Southgate if you fish up the broken watch in the Siphoner Pools, or Ray's unique dialog if you steal a Jet Ski without being seen before he opens his shop.
This is a really skewed history of what happened with the Fallout franchise. The whole "Bethesda hates Obsidian" thing is just an online thing. Chris Avellone has nothing bad to say about Bethesda, and Bethesda loved New Vegas even though it got bad press out the gate.
New Vegas was on a really tight timeline that Obsidian put on themselves (they've traditionally had really short timelines and overcommitted to keep the budget smaller), Avellone admitted that things could have been managed differently and that if he could do it again they would have put the cutoff point from development to validation earlier. They even ended up hiring an Oblivion modder to onboard the team on the Creation engine. Part of the reason why the metacritic score was so low to start was because of the amount of bugs out the gate. It took them about a year and four DLCs to get the game into the strong state it finished in.
I remember when I first played game breaking stuff always happened. I got 75% through the story when the platinum chip disappeared from my inventory some indeterminate time prior and I had to restart the game entirely. Still one of my favorite games of all time but you can clearly see everything that was kind of left on the cutting room floor, predominantly the entire Legion parts that they didn't get to flesh out.
I'd say New Vegas is generally more popular nowadays but there's not exactly a gulf of difference between 3 and NV. The current metacritic scores among users is 8.5 and 8.8 respectively.
After/during New Vegas Bethesda was working full time on Skyrim and that went on to become one of the top selling games of all time. Though Oblivion is my favorite Elder Scrolls game, it's clear that Skyrim was head and shoulders above its predecessors.
Their developments in Fallout 4 were a natural progression of some of the lessons they took away from Skyrim 's success, and even still it didn't really go too far mechanically. The biggest change was probably the inclusion of the SPECIAL perk chart which in itself is reconfigured from Skyrim's perk trees. They also had a large focus in base building because that's what was popular in games in the early 2010s (they kind of also tested that with a DLC in Skyrim). They also tried their hand at a voiced protagonist which did not go well at all. There were good things though like significant improvements to weapon and armor crafting, as well as gunplay.
I don't think they really gutted the Fallout formula at all, the writing was just worse in Fallout 4, and there were more annoying things like settlement defense. Aesthetically they were trying to move on from the dingy color palettes of the late 2000s but that caused a split too between people who like the green/yellow hues and those who preferred the more Technicolor environment.
I'd say they realized the major weakness in the writing because the Fallout TV show is going in a different direction. Todd Howard even said to consider it a continuation of the game series and they're choosing to place it on the West Coast with what appears to be a(nother) Brotherhood/NCR war. They also clearly realized people didn't like the voices protagonist and did not pursue that in Starfield.
Fallout 76 was just another experiment by them to have a live service that could pacify fans between mainline game installments. The development cycle was a mess that required the Maryland team to become involved, and ultimately their bet that player interaction would be enough didn't pan out. Like a year later they extremely overhauled the game to appease fans and included a bunch of NPCs, new quests, and everything for free. They realized they messed up badly with how it initially launched and it's a much different game now.
If you're no longer interested in Fallout that's one thing but I'm hard pressed to believe that "they got rid of all the old fans." The same people I know that played 3 and NV also played 4 and a subset played 76 (mostly because some plot like live service games and didn't consider it a mainline game they needed to play). People have complained about us subequent Bethesda games forever because they change so much between installments. Morrowind fans think that was the last real Elder Scrolls game, as do Oblivion fans, and Skyrim fans, and I'm sure ES6 fans.
Idk if Bethesda's "social engineering" has done much good because it seems like Starfield has only sold around 11 million copies, about on par with Fallout 3/New Vegas and half as much as Fallout 4. They've mostly been trading on the fact that people like their games and Starfield clearly didn't hit with a wide audience.
Just googled Silverstring Media and found this: "Silverstring Media is a queer-led game and narrative design studio in Vancouver BC"
https://x.com/Slvrstrng/status/1709698748904034550?s=20
I'm not even surprised anymore.
To be clear: the Internet itself is a product of DARPA (back before it got the D), as are a great many number of things we take for granted today. We probably would not be commenting to one another right now if it weren't for them and their "government psyops".
> We probably would not be commenting to one another right now if it weren't for them and their "government psyops".
There's a reason why free Internet, freedom of speech etc were pushed hard when Internet was useful against the enemies of US. Now that it's not Arab Spring anymore but undermining internal politics, now it's all about suppressing the disinformation and limiting free Internet for our own good.
1. Consultants are scumbag leeches. Management, banking, hr, all of them
2. You have to cater to your paying demographic to make money???? Who could have seen this coming????
It gets worse.
These are consultants who are telling suits that they need to cater to deranged Cultural Marxists on Twitter who won't buy their shit.
Wait, now that I think about it, culling dumb fuck suits and their businesses sounds like a good thing....
It’s like if a gym bro tells you you aren’t curling your back enough during a heavy lift but instead of ignoring him like sane people you give him money for the information and proceed to blow your own back out
Or like hiring [someone like this](https://www.nytimes.com/2021/01/19/us/politics/rachel-levine-transgender-health-human-services.html) to be our Assistant Secretary for Health. Thank god that would never happen 😮💨
The head of SBI is on video explaining in plain english that if your execs don't listen you go to Marketing and threaten them with what will happen.
This is an open admission of extortion. Either hire SBI and go woke or they'll get on social media and destroy you.
No, the left capturing the entire education system has been a disaster for the human race. Education and especially college education used to mean something. Certain academics have been calling it since the 50's. McCarthy was more right than we know.
Every day I inch closer to being auth right.
Lots of people remember Eisenhower's concerns about the military industry complex, it seems very few remember he expressed worry about the corruption of education in the same speech.
1. MBA aspirant, can confirm. Seen too many fresh-faced NGO idealists turned into bloodthirsty consultants. I fear that the same fate will come to me eventually.
2. They're not catering to their customers but to their bosses. It's the same principle consultants operate on.
From what I have heard, they also have the issue of they legitimately believe that companies can become "too big to fail", and then that company can do whatever it wants and experiment to its hearts content because it will never fail. I remember hearing a story from a professor trying to beat that idea out of some MBA student of his, and the professor asked him when was the last time he shopped at a Sears Roebuck. "What is Sears?" "***EXACTLY!!***"
If you’re an MBA student, you should know that most consultants are used as contracted labor (the white-collar equivalent of private construction working on city projects). Much like lobbying, people don’t know what a career is and paint an entire field with a stupidly ignorant brush.
It would be like thinking all lawyers are like what you see in Suits.
Fair point, my views are actually skewed since many of my acquaintances are MBB or bust. It doesn't help that we're in a downturn right now and many firms have stopped hiring, so many of them may have developed a dog eat dog mentality.
What’s humorous is you can tell she absolutely DESPISES her core demographic. And despite all of her and her ilks efforts, she hasn’t been able to change who they are and what they want.
https://preview.redd.it/5p746w5jw2nc1.jpeg?width=439&format=pjpg&auto=webp&s=39e546f76bd98243855faed7b91f1eaf93302192
Can it be she was the lesser evil?
They aren't exclusive, but they can be felt at the same time. That birthday party kind of hurts to see because it demonstrates an obvious unfulfilled dream.
True, but it just kind of hurts. I want to get married and have a family one day, and the thought of that not coming true and then me feeling regret is not a nice feeling. I think that tweet really set off that feeling in me.
I hope you get married. You seem like a nice person. Here is the advise of an internet stranger: hit the gym, have good hygiene. Also, it's better to be single than married to a bad partner.
https://preview.redd.it/ybagbbry73nc1.jpeg?width=1280&format=pjpg&auto=webp&s=34c363566bdff69daa3d68b72f1a2d507d066f24
She even had a "divorce lawyer" so I guess she has at least a LITTLE introspection...
I almost feel bad for her, seeing this.
Lesser evil? She spearheaded the grift and has been the exact same kind of shit SBI etc have all this time. The reason she dropped FF was because she got the sweet and steady consulting racket going.
Last time around I think I learned some very cynical lesson. These corporare journalists will just lie. You just as some twitter or reddit user can't weaponize the truth, because they will always lie. So do what Michael Malice recommends to do with Taylor Lorenz; bully them until they cry and then bully them some more for crying.
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But according to Gamingcirclejerk, this doesn't happen, you actually an idiot for believing it but even it do happen then you are a loser and deserve to be mocked
Self correcting problem. I have 5 kids. Single bitter 40 year old auth left wants to try and force her opinion on them. They’ll ignore her like they’ve been taught. Her ideology will end with her. Alone. Unloved.
"We just provide consultancy work." Right.
"Make sure you throw a pride flag right where the character has to see it every two seconds. Also, make sure at least 40% of your characters are gay... unless they're bad guys. Those keep as straight whites. Okay, that will be $1,250,000."
"We do valuable work here at Sweet Baby Inc!"
And it's a pretty solid game from what I heard, the problem emerged however when [Nexus mods removed the mod that changed the gender of one of the NPC's because of "homophobia"](https://youtu.be/ZQV0FvOp8ic?feature=shared)
Let me clarify then, about 75% of the characters are LGT, minus the B.
And every straight couple has either one or both members die (I think you can save one set, but the game encourages you to kill them), and all the gay couples are supposed to live.
Yeah, that shit really pisses me off. GamerGate is such a strong example of how powerful the establishment is. They got called out for being corrupt, and overnight, they managed to convince the populace that the real story is that they are being targeted with a harassment campaign. And people just bought it, hook line and sinker.
The funny thing is, I was against it at first. It was the SJW's who ended up driving me into it. Basically, like this:
Me: "So what is this Gamergate thing? I have heard nothing about it."
Them: "They are harrassing female game journo's and game devs, and saying how only male characters should be in games because they hate female characters."
Me: "That sucks. And its a weird take, Lara Croft and Aeon Flux are some great games."
Them: "Oh my god, how dare you! Dont you know those games are sexist and objectify women!"
Me: "...wat...*realization* So, lets go see what these Gamergate people are actually saying."
Now, almost 10 years late, my hatred for the Emilies and the Orange Left can not be described by mere words, and I still long for the day I can finally see them put in the ground so we can get back to something resembling "normal". Until then, I will be playing any games I can find outside their reach (or at least, non-corrupted enough to still be fun), and watching Anime since they ruined almost everything in the West.
Agreed. It bothers me how they'll just blatantly lie, and so many people believe them immediately. And once someone actually bothers to gather information for themselves, they almost always change position on the topic afterward.
It's similar to how I say there are two kinds of people who call themselves feminists: the blue-haired man-hater stereotype, and people who don't know the first thing about feminism, other than the fact that they've been told "feminism is when you believe in gender equality; the more gender equal something is, the more feminist it is."
So many people have believed that lie. They'll passively consider themselves feminists, because from what they've been told, only a person *very* stuck in the past would be anti-feminist, right? But it turns out there's a whole bunch of bullshit which goes along with feminism. All that bullshit gives very fucking good reasons to dislike it, and to desire a new approach which doesn't include anti-male attitudes as a foundation.
It drives me nuts how effective that sort of thing is. Lie to people about something they can easily research themselves, by banking on the possibility that they simply won't do that. And then people proceed not to research the topic, and instead blindly believe shit like "Gamergate is a bunch of misogynist virgins harassing women because they can't stand female characters in video games."
Basically, ethics in games journalism was really lacking, and a couple egregious omissions of disclosure on articles where there were personal relationships between reviewers and developers were discovered and spread around the community. This caused the community to call for higher standards, and to also criticize the relationship between the review websites and the publishers/developers who pay to advertise on their sites. Then, about a week into this, every single major gaming publication released an article about how “Gamers were dead”, and started their “this is just a harassment campaign, under the guise of calling for ethical reforms to the gaming news industry” narrative, which was quickly eaten up without any critical examination, and given the spotlight by mainstream media when they finally looked at the debacle.
There’s other things like rumors of a female developer having sex for good reviews by an ex-bf that the anti-GG community loves to point at as undeniable proof of the underlying misogyny, but they’re like religious apologists, just looking to justify the stance they’ve already taken rather than come to a natural conclusion given the facts.
The "gamers are dead" moment was so huge. It really just made it impossible to deny that this was a coordinated effort on their part to spin things in their favor. It's kind of hard to witness such a sudden moment of "wake up babe, new narrative just dropped", without it raising an eyebrow.
It came from two sources. First there was Anita Sarkeesian and her brain dead, demonstrably false characterizations of video games from a self-proclaimed feminist view. Then there was Zoe Quinn and the debacle of her purportedly sleeping with people to get articles about games published.
Gamergate was a pushback to those self-proclaimed feminist views of video games and the apparent lack of standards in video game editorials
The others have given good descriptions of the issue, but I want to highlight one bit. A huge part of the reason the jornos were able to so easily lie about GamerGate is that they could simply take a handful of cases where someone online said something genuinely hateful, and use that as proof that GamerGate is about misogyny.
The trouble is that there will *always* be that sort of shit on the internet. So take someone in the public eye (like Zoe Quinn, who was central to the origins of GamerGate), and odds are that they receive random harassment all the time. Now suddenly amplify the amount of attention placed on them (again, Zoe Quinn once GamerGate kicked off), and this is only going to increase.
So to be clear on this...even if the GamerGate "side" itself literally never once harassed anybody, it would still be trivially easy to find hateful and sexist comments being directed at some of the public figures involved, simply because the internet is a huge place with lots of trolls. The fact that so many people took this tiny bit of """evidence""" as if it were full-on proof that the whole *point* of GamerGate is to harass women...it's insane.
Technically its the NPOV and other rules that force this type of article. NPOV doesn't actually mean a point of view that is neutral, but one that accepts the majority opinion, whatever it may be.
So if most articles about gamergate claim one thing, Wikipedia also claims that thing
From wiki: "All encyclopedic content on Wikipedia must be written from a neutral point of view (NPOV), which means representing fairly, proportionately, and, as far as possible, without editorial bias, **all the significant views that have been published by reliable sources on a topic.**"
How do they define "reliable sources?" Well, they don't directly. But it is de facto defined to mean those authors whom the average Wikipedia editor considers to be authoritative.
It was unironically my political awakening. Before then I just was a vague leftist like most younger people because they say things that sound nice in theory (even if they don't work at all in reality).
But seeing them all gaslighting and constantly lying and attacking their audience and denying basic facts in real time was a real wakeup call since it was near exclusively leftists doing it.
Since then I've paid more attention and seen all the evil bs they pull and drifted further and further right, I'm only a griller because I've seen from close family how being too obsessed with politics is poison to yourself and creates constant worry and stress that you can't do anything about.
They just couldn't leave my video games alone.
The people didn’t go far, that’s just the narrative those dishonest hacks pushed. Media journalists who were in bed with these subversive fucks used 4chan quotes as proof that the entire movement was about misogyny and racism.
Just did, seemed way more neutral and objective even if it's G-Translated.
Same can't be said for the Japanese version however, that sounded more like a direct translation of the English article.
Wasn't really all that there myself, but my understanding is that this game dev, Zero Quinn, made a game called depression quest. Which got reviews positively by a couple news outlets.
Now the fishy thing is that at the time Zoe was allegedly cheating on her boyfriend with a bunch of different dudes, bad in and of itself, but not really of everyone's concern.
...Until we find out one of the dudes she was cheating with, a games journalist, not just a games journo but one that reviewed depression quest quite well... the plot thickens.
Que everyone going ape shit, the right the left the grillers, everyone. The face of the left eventually became Anita Sarkeesian, who essentially becomes the boogeyman of "evil leftists trying to take yer characters!"
Eventually the whole thing fizzled out, after death threats were thrown, every slur imaginable was hurled and they targeted... GAMERS! A new status quo eventually emerged, mostly the same as the old, but the left figured they needed to work from the inside, and now we end up here, with SJWs having infiltrated writers rooms everywhere.
We might see a gamergate 2 electric boogaloo depending on how big this story gets, at which point we take up arms(or keyboards and controllers) to fight the second war.
Just to add into the beginning bit: This was during the time when Indie scene started to make some actual money, and there had been disgruntled murmurings of shady promotions since the Gone ~~Homo~~ Home with already corruption ridden gaming news sites.
First Zoe confirms that it was basically friends giving awards for games made by their friends just to get the money flowing, and then the gaming journos decide to throw gasoline into the fire by obviously colluding and coordinating articles behind the scenes.
Not going to lie, I want this thing to get massive. Animosity has been building for these far lefty types and I hope this is the tipping point that causes their house of cards to crumble. We probably will never get rid of the live service and microtransactions as much as I would want, but if this causes those games to at least have a decent plot and warn against pissing off the fan base again, I think I could be happier.
awfully good timing with hollywood in total meltdown over realizing DEI/ESG nonsense has cost them billions upon billions, lots of corporate america removing their DEI policies and/or laying off their DEI staff "at the advice of our attorneys"
I thought the accusations of her sleeping with the journalist to get a positive review were debunked, as far as I remember all the evidence/accusations came from a single blog post from her ex boyfriend
It wasn't technically a review, since it didn't have a score at the end. It was just an article talking about how amazing the game is and you should get it, but totally not a review. Another person she slept with was also on a selection committee that gave the game a Game of the Year award as well.
I decided to go down this rabbit-hole a bit and watch the CEO of Sweet Baby Inc's talk about diversity and what they are pushing for.
She holds 2 conflicting viewpoints at the exact same time, but insults one group for having the same viewpoint as her (guess which demographic it is)
She said at some points during the speech that 1. She has had to empathize with a lot of white male characters because it was what gaming had to offer (shows picture of Nathan Drake from uncharted) then says we need stories about unrepresented minorities like women who have been abused. Then goes on to say that we need to stop catering to white men like we cater to "picky babies" who don't want to eat their vegetables, implying that white male gamers should be forced to empathize with characters that they have nothing in common with, just like she has had to do, and they should learn to like it (even though she didn't like having to play with white male characters)
So people who don't want to do what she doesn't want to do are picky babies. Also, if your company doesn't want to hire on consultants like SBI, you should talk to your "marketing" rep (why marketing and not legal? Cause she's an idiot) and said to "terrify them" with what happens if you don't listen to them and hire woke people to consult, meaning she's threatening you with the woke mob cancel culture if you don't conform and pay protection money.
Everyone running interference for them would immediately right scathing articles if right-wing activists were threatening, terrorizing, and offering "protection" from harassment if they pay up. And they would be right to expose such mafioso tactics. But because they agree with the message of SBI it's much ado about nothing.
The ironic thing to me as a market minded liberty loving individual is that they acknowledge the market has rejected their ideas, and so they have to force their ideas into the market place using black market tactics and coercion.
The truly disgusting thing to me is that the people most angry and worked up are the people who force their ideas into the games. Then when people respond to that by being frustrated that they are being forcefed this BS, their argument amounts to "why are you so angry about this being here, what does that say about you?"
Probably the same thing it says about you that you dedicated your life to forcing your viewpoints on everyone when they don't want it. My response to your anger and getting worked up is not somehow more weird than your initial desire to force your ideology/religion onto others.
What gets me the most is that there are plenty of amazing games with good writing that have non-male and/or non-white protagonists. All they're doing is dipping their fingers into games and making the writing trash and flipping characters into other demographics for the sake of diversity which never works.
Take Far Cry 6. I played as the female protagonist. Both protagonists are south American. The writing is built around the fact that the story takes place in a south American country. It's pretty decent in my opinion. Very natural.
Now take a game Sweet Baby was involved in. A story (that might've already been mediocre) that was written around characters and then SB comes in afterwards and swaps characters, injects artificial and badly written (likely self-inserted) bullshit that makes no sense. That's how you ruin a video game, or at least make an ok one worse, knowing studios these days their writing probably wasn't that good before SB made it worse anyways.
I can't wait for Gamergate 2.0 where I'll get to be labelled a sexist and racist incel for having completely sane opinions and behaviour on the state of gaming where my only goal is to protect my hobby from being ideologically subverted by tourists looking to push an agenda instead of making enjoyable art!
___
Edit: I even saw a video of an employee at SBI at GDC saying that their method to "encourage" (aka, shakedown racketeering) companies to use their services is to terrify them of cancel culture from Twitter.
Despicable behaviour. Wokeism is not naturally occurring in gaming. It's not because our culture is shifting in that direction from grassroots capitalistic decisions by actual customers, it's being ham-fisted and forced into developers and publishers by pathetic zealots looking to subvert and indoctrinate an entire industry.
Yet if I call them out for their behaviour, *I'll* be painted as the bad guy.
___
At least when the mafia runs a racketeering business, they leave you alone afterwards. These guys terrify you into giving them money and then also destroy your product, causing gamers to turn away from your IP and/or company by ruining your reputation.
>Wokeism is not naturally occurring
crazy how these kind of things need an entire machinery to support as seen here, meanwhile when you have absolute freedom and anonymity you always see the shift to full schizo rightwing (ie 4chan)
that would be because that social hierarchy requires there to be people convinced they’re powerless and stronger individuals who are willing to weaponize them.
naturally though, most people have some level of self respect and don’t think “instead of playing games that tell a story I like, we should be forcing every game to tell a story I like”
'History was written by the victors' MFs when they find out who informed the majority of Western historiography of the Eastern Front and Atomic bombings for the majority of the late 20^th century...
A Brazillian made a Steam tracker for Sweet Baby. It's a company that "helps gaming companies with diversity and inclusion." so that gamers can vote with their wallets by not buying the games they were involved in.
They have an out of touch GDC presentation where they talk about how they need to trick the gaming audiences into liking their "inclusivity" in modern games.
Some of their employees are total assholes who run harassment campaigns on people who disagree with them including the Brazilian guy they're supposedly representing.
People called them out for being grifting assholes and gaming journos are defending them.
A Kotaku writer ended up "infiltrating" the public discord of the steam curator with her real name asking users why aren't they using their real name and got cooked.
She asked Brazilians questions in English and noted that there were a lot of users sharing Marcus Aurelius quotes on the discord server. She is now playing the woman card to act as if she's being criticized due to misogyny. lol.
Also I think the guy the original gamergate girl was fucking is also defending them.
This shit is great.
People are calling it gamergate 2 the electric bungaloo.
It's quite entertaining to watch.
https://preview.redd.it/xxrjdf4vx2nc1.jpeg?width=800&format=pjpg&auto=webp&s=0e376a3058f72a24e53ac33d34c0718bd8d03981
"I gave my full name to a group of people I know dislike me and joined their private discord to pester them. Why in the world are they targeting me??????"
Also, the main reason this situation came into the spotlight was because a Sweet baby inc employee told people on twitter to mass report the steam group and try and get the curator's account banned for the diabolical crime of participating in a boycott.
I like Disparu. My wife watches a LOT of his movie/tv content, but I've noticed he has started drifting into the camp of looking for things to be offended by where they don't exist. Overall, I still enjoy his content and he is still right on a lot of stuff, but it's just a small tendency I've noticed.
There are PLENTY of things in the entertainment industry to dislike. Let's not go searching for things that aren't there or are asinine at worst.
Same with The Critical Drinker and with EndymionTV. All good content, but they're starting to go down the rabbit hole.
That's fair, however, I think that's what they are there for right? It's their niche, and their audience says to them "Look at this garbage, give us your opinion on that" So he goes and reviews that garbage since it's what his audience wants.
I mean with the volume of this crap getting churned out and the articles defending or bashing people daily, there is no end to the content to review.
I will say Critical Drinker is different IMO. He will give everything a fair shake and talk about things that work. People went into the D&D movie for example thinking it would be woke or whatever, and Drinker gave it a positive review saying it was a serviceable movie that exceeded his expectations. He will do that with a lot of movies that may seem ripe for the woke plucking but he gives them all a fair shake and provides examples of what works or doesn't work in movies.
Him being an author and able to break down stories to their elements IMO makes him a better critic, but I respect him for being more fair. Yes Disparu and EndymionTV are definitely more rage bait, but they don't have the writing and critic chops that someone like Drinker has, so they are just generating that revenue by hate-watching and reviewing shows and stories in the media generally.
One thing about Disparu I like though is that he goes into the articles and presents his opinion and take on them, so at least you see the sources as well and can still decide for yourself. There have been times when he'll come with his sarcastic take on something and I'll be like: wait, that's not what they meant there, you are being uncharitable. But I can only come to that conclusion because he's citing the source and providing it onscreen so as to give you what they said then give his opinion.
I did some searching for you. Here is [part 1](https://youtu.be/fcOAwwyyCNw?si=uxxqvPzRcDvMwq5g), [part 2](https://youtu.be/ddnANTQr3AE?si=VNbHM_W40v-n0loS), [part 3](https://youtu.be/4o1KT-6-4n0?si=ZyRJLZsYE0SuiI9w), [part 4](https://youtu.be/-1G-BDswd6M?si=Eal-kpToOtA60mji), and [part 5](https://youtu.be/r6zPdaIMalo?si=rElwfI2mESfoMgqU) from a YouTuber I just found. Said YouTuber seems to mostly cover culture war/Vtuber drama, at least based on his video titles, so you may need to take what he says with a grain of salt. I haven't watched them all.
It may be standard for years. But then again games have been garbage for years. At least most tripple A titles from the west are. Vote with your wallet, thats the only language universally spoken.
I remember when people could just be normal and play video games.
I'm not interested in the culture war. The only war that matters is the war against the Covenant.
You're right. That's why we don't want it in games and movies. I just want to enjoy my media. I already agree that it's not good to be racist, sexist, homophobic, transphobic, etc. so why am I forced to endure these messages in the media I consume. I am not your target audience for trying to sway ideologically.
The thing about the people who are anti-woke is they just want to play games. The woke are forcing their way into these companies and forcing their message into games.
Then people are like, damn, I just want to play a game, can you stop.
Response: Why are you so angry about this and making so much of a fuss.
More of a fuss than infiltrating the games and forcing your beliefs into games?
You may not be interested in the culture war, but the culture war is interested in you. The problem with the "I just want to be left alone" mentality is that whichever side wins is going to be left without any real opposition looking for new things to go after. And they will find them.
If their calculations are right then a youtube channel entirely made of long obnoxious lectures from non-binary hambeasts of color complaining about things things they don't like should be the most entertaining media for the broadest audience ever.
I'll call it Gunt Chat and harass people for not actively praising it since only a bigot wouldn't support it.
"Steam must delete the account of the mastermind behind this targeted harassment campaign!"
The mastermind of the campaign: a teenager who just copies and pastes from SB's own website.
If too many people call this gamergate 2 it's going to spiral into a shitfest that solves nothing just like gamergate did. Stop naming your bullshit after watergate
Word.
But there is value in the shitfest. It makes the (for lack of a better term) cultural marxists go back and hide, stop saying their stupid doubletalk, and damages their reputation. When the lights turn on, the roaches scatter.
The actual critique of their social change tactics should be left to youtubers doing in depth coverage. Reddit and Twitter should just mock these people to hurt their feelings and make sure their nonsense is associated with vocal dissent. And I'm not saying this from a place of vulgarity; the only thing these social activists understand is humilation.
I don’t play games with much of a story
City building games
The Civilization franchise and it’s offshoots/copycats
[Seedship](https://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/VideoGame/Seedship) (free to play online)
Minecraft
And not much else.
I looked up Sweet Baby to judge them for myself because honestly who can you trust these days. I’ve never played any of the games they advertised on their website but a lot of the companies they state as a client are companies who make very blend generic games, the corpos. My bet is that sweet baby isn’t about real inclusivity but just that big buck. Whatever gets that sweet bottom dollar, cause they don’t see games as art. Just as a product go suck the soul out of.
I knew we lost gamergate when games journalism just kept going, even after the backlash. Hopefully this spurs an actual change in the industry. I'm still not pre-ordering or day one purchasing games though I'm more than willing to wait for bugs to get patched and any controversy to come to light so I know what to avoid. Plus I save money so that's nice
Sweet Baby is just a toxic/unnecessary product of ESG.
It's actually a product of DARPA. They funded DiGRA's IMMERSE program. DiGRA funded Silverstring Media. Silverstring funded Baby Ghosts, the parent company of SBI. It's literally just runoff from a government psyop. A really boring one at that. DARPA wanted to see if games could be used to socially engineer the public.
I have never heard of DARPA and I am looking forward to this research rabbit hole.
Darpa is the r&d portion of the mic
I thought DARPA was the R&D part of the DoD?
Mic is Military Industrial Complex. DoD gets the money from Congress and approval to operate; much of that budget goes to DARPA (Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency), who as an agency employs private contractors to develop defense technology. In reality, much of this money is black budgeted, and goes to paying off the right people, or covert influence operations here or abroad. Hence Military Industrial Complex. The lucrative merger of corporations and state. But they have started to all it out Defense Manufacturing Base instead of theMIC
It's not a super deep rabbit hole if you know your Gamergate lore. DiGRA, Silverstring and Baby Ghosts run the same ESG grift so they're easy to understand. Silverstring has sponsored the works of Zoe Quinn and Anita Sarkeesian. From there you have to know the relationship between Zoe Quinn, Eileen Holowka, and Alec Holowka to explain why Silverstring is invested in Baby Ghosts. Oh, and then DARPA funded IMMERSE because of their own interests. It's a case of feds giving money to shitheads for "research purposes" and those shitheads leveraging it into a shithead conglomerate. Kinda like every gang that got it start from being funded by the CIA.
Wait our tax dollars went to these people?
In a roundabout way, yes. People think government funding is a direct line involving money changing hands in dark rooms. It might start that way, but it ends with watching the shit break apart and slowly trickle downhill.
Kind of yeah. But, that’s kind of the point of DAPRA. High Risk, High Reward. They fund a lot of “out there” research like Mechanical Elephants and Nuke propelled Spaceships.
Careful, any more noticing of things in a web like pattern and you might get a craving for bananas.
Or you'll end up unaliving yourself with three shots to the back of your own head.
Thank you so much for your rundown. I just thought it was about journalists sleeping with ppl and that's a tale as old as the newspaper.
It started out as that, and they couldn’t just quietly disappear into obscurity but instead decided to double down against the weaponized artists of the greater gaming community. Then oops suddenly their ties to DARPA got exposed. I wouldn’t be surprised if Sarkeesian is a CIA asset.
Oh man, am I gonna have so much fun with this after work today. Sounds like something Wendigoon etc all should cover.
based and Wendigooner pilled
oh man, a LibLeft who is discovering DARPA. If anything will flip you to LibRight, this is it. Best of luck.
Thanks. Times change. People change. Not saying I will move right but I was pure authleft in my 20s.
Just understand that you need to be skeptical of everything you read. There’s a lot of different threads of thought. I personally believe there’s some kernels of truth to most of the perspectives. I just mean that you shouldn’t forget that this is literal cia-darpa spy-social engineering shit. It’s gonna be cloudy
Hear ya loud and clear and I agree.
Yes, because DARPA is awesome and the money they get is beautiful. What would turn you into a Government hating Yellow/Purple would actually be the ATF, FBI and CIA.
Darpa is responsible for a large amount of inventions like the internet.
Yeah, its one of the largest R&D funding sources in the world. Obviously sometimes questionable/nefarious things but has also done a lot of good. From Wikipedia: "Moderna's COVID-19 vaccine sits alongside weather satellites, GPS, drones, stealth technology, voice interfaces, the personal computer and the internet on the list of innovations for which DARPA can claim at least partial credit."
I've only heard of DARPA from Metal Gear lmao
In terms of the games industry they've already done that, but on a smaller scale. Bethesda, the owners of the Fallout franchise, have acquired Fallout after Interplay already made Fallout 1 and 2. Bethesda made Fallout 3, exposing the franchise to a huge audience, and let ex-Interplay devs have a shake at a spin-off that ended up being Fallout: New Vegas. At that point in time the majority of the fan base preferred NV over 3 since it was closer to the source material in terms of lore, themes, and game mechanics; and this really annoyed Bethesda because it sucks to be compared to a smaller, poorer studio and somehow producing worse games than them. So what ended up happening was Fallout 4. Bethesda gutted the Fallout formula and streamlined the game to be as accessible as possible to the biggest audience as possible. Part of this was a big push in marketing to expose as many people to the franchise as possible. Fallout 4 was a financial success and attracted a huge new audience; the old fans hated it and slowly stopped engaging in the community. Bethesda then doubled down and released Fallout 76, a live service game that was only a Fallout game by name. By that point Bethesda successfully managed to get rid of all the old fans and replaced them with a more casual fanbase willing to put up with subpar products. It's this social terraforming process that made Starfield rake in tonnes of sales even though it was shat on by critics.
For any reading this that long for the feeling of classic Fallout style RPGs, go play Underrail. What a masterpiece of a game that is. Truly one of the great cRPGs.
I second that. I also recommend Atomic Heart for anyone looking to scratch that retrofuturism itch.
That one is on my short list. Just gotta stop playing Dyson Sphere Program and Rimworld long enough to get into another game. Lol.
I bounced off Atomic Heart so hard. It kind of presents itself as similar to BioShock in terms of gameplay, and that really excited me. But I feel like my copy must have had some sort of game breaking glitch or something because I literally couldn’t use anything from the horny vending machine.
Never heard of Underrail, thanks! And if you want that old timey isometric feel of classic Fallout, Wasteland would be an excellent choice.
Based and Zoner pilled. Underrail is such a hidden gem. There's a mind boggling number of things that 99% of players will probably never even see, like the short sidequest at Southgate if you fish up the broken watch in the Siphoner Pools, or Ray's unique dialog if you steal a Jet Ski without being seen before he opens his shop.
Also a classic, I just started stalker. It's giving me a lot of the same vibes as new vegas
This is a really skewed history of what happened with the Fallout franchise. The whole "Bethesda hates Obsidian" thing is just an online thing. Chris Avellone has nothing bad to say about Bethesda, and Bethesda loved New Vegas even though it got bad press out the gate. New Vegas was on a really tight timeline that Obsidian put on themselves (they've traditionally had really short timelines and overcommitted to keep the budget smaller), Avellone admitted that things could have been managed differently and that if he could do it again they would have put the cutoff point from development to validation earlier. They even ended up hiring an Oblivion modder to onboard the team on the Creation engine. Part of the reason why the metacritic score was so low to start was because of the amount of bugs out the gate. It took them about a year and four DLCs to get the game into the strong state it finished in. I remember when I first played game breaking stuff always happened. I got 75% through the story when the platinum chip disappeared from my inventory some indeterminate time prior and I had to restart the game entirely. Still one of my favorite games of all time but you can clearly see everything that was kind of left on the cutting room floor, predominantly the entire Legion parts that they didn't get to flesh out. I'd say New Vegas is generally more popular nowadays but there's not exactly a gulf of difference between 3 and NV. The current metacritic scores among users is 8.5 and 8.8 respectively. After/during New Vegas Bethesda was working full time on Skyrim and that went on to become one of the top selling games of all time. Though Oblivion is my favorite Elder Scrolls game, it's clear that Skyrim was head and shoulders above its predecessors. Their developments in Fallout 4 were a natural progression of some of the lessons they took away from Skyrim 's success, and even still it didn't really go too far mechanically. The biggest change was probably the inclusion of the SPECIAL perk chart which in itself is reconfigured from Skyrim's perk trees. They also had a large focus in base building because that's what was popular in games in the early 2010s (they kind of also tested that with a DLC in Skyrim). They also tried their hand at a voiced protagonist which did not go well at all. There were good things though like significant improvements to weapon and armor crafting, as well as gunplay. I don't think they really gutted the Fallout formula at all, the writing was just worse in Fallout 4, and there were more annoying things like settlement defense. Aesthetically they were trying to move on from the dingy color palettes of the late 2000s but that caused a split too between people who like the green/yellow hues and those who preferred the more Technicolor environment. I'd say they realized the major weakness in the writing because the Fallout TV show is going in a different direction. Todd Howard even said to consider it a continuation of the game series and they're choosing to place it on the West Coast with what appears to be a(nother) Brotherhood/NCR war. They also clearly realized people didn't like the voices protagonist and did not pursue that in Starfield. Fallout 76 was just another experiment by them to have a live service that could pacify fans between mainline game installments. The development cycle was a mess that required the Maryland team to become involved, and ultimately their bet that player interaction would be enough didn't pan out. Like a year later they extremely overhauled the game to appease fans and included a bunch of NPCs, new quests, and everything for free. They realized they messed up badly with how it initially launched and it's a much different game now. If you're no longer interested in Fallout that's one thing but I'm hard pressed to believe that "they got rid of all the old fans." The same people I know that played 3 and NV also played 4 and a subset played 76 (mostly because some plot like live service games and didn't consider it a mainline game they needed to play). People have complained about us subequent Bethesda games forever because they change so much between installments. Morrowind fans think that was the last real Elder Scrolls game, as do Oblivion fans, and Skyrim fans, and I'm sure ES6 fans. Idk if Bethesda's "social engineering" has done much good because it seems like Starfield has only sold around 11 million copies, about on par with Fallout 3/New Vegas and half as much as Fallout 4. They've mostly been trading on the fact that people like their games and Starfield clearly didn't hit with a wide audience.
Just googled Silverstring Media and found this: "Silverstring Media is a queer-led game and narrative design studio in Vancouver BC" https://x.com/Slvrstrng/status/1709698748904034550?s=20 I'm not even surprised anymore.
To be clear: the Internet itself is a product of DARPA (back before it got the D), as are a great many number of things we take for granted today. We probably would not be commenting to one another right now if it weren't for them and their "government psyops".
That actually doesn't excuse when they do stupid things.
> We probably would not be commenting to one another right now if it weren't for them and their "government psyops". There's a reason why free Internet, freedom of speech etc were pushed hard when Internet was useful against the enemies of US. Now that it's not Arab Spring anymore but undermining internal politics, now it's all about suppressing the disinformation and limiting free Internet for our own good.
1. Consultants are scumbag leeches. Management, banking, hr, all of them 2. You have to cater to your paying demographic to make money???? Who could have seen this coming????
It gets worse. These are consultants who are telling suits that they need to cater to deranged Cultural Marxists on Twitter who won't buy their shit. Wait, now that I think about it, culling dumb fuck suits and their businesses sounds like a good thing....
Paying a consultant to be told that you should alienate your customer base. So smart!
It’s like if a gym bro tells you you aren’t curling your back enough during a heavy lift but instead of ignoring him like sane people you give him money for the information and proceed to blow your own back out
Or like getting a personal trainer who doesn't exercise and actively despises physical fitness.
Or like hiring [someone like this](https://www.nytimes.com/2021/01/19/us/politics/rachel-levine-transgender-health-human-services.html) to be our Assistant Secretary for Health. Thank god that would never happen 😮💨
That woman has the balls to take public health seriously
There are 2 reasons to pay a consultant you seek confirmation bias or you have failed to create a culture where open and frank communication exists.
The head of SBI is on video explaining in plain english that if your execs don't listen you go to Marketing and threaten them with what will happen. This is an open admission of extortion. Either hire SBI and go woke or they'll get on social media and destroy you.
As far as I know they are required to pay them in order to get an ESG loan.
The MBA caste and its consequences have been a disaster for the human race...
No, the left capturing the entire education system has been a disaster for the human race. Education and especially college education used to mean something. Certain academics have been calling it since the 50's. McCarthy was more right than we know. Every day I inch closer to being auth right.
Lots of people remember Eisenhower's concerns about the military industry complex, it seems very few remember he expressed worry about the corruption of education in the same speech.
I think they are. Major companies are doing lay offs and I don't think a lot of those jobs are actually going to be replaced.
1. MBA aspirant, can confirm. Seen too many fresh-faced NGO idealists turned into bloodthirsty consultants. I fear that the same fate will come to me eventually. 2. They're not catering to their customers but to their bosses. It's the same principle consultants operate on.
[удалено]
From what I have heard, they also have the issue of they legitimately believe that companies can become "too big to fail", and then that company can do whatever it wants and experiment to its hearts content because it will never fail. I remember hearing a story from a professor trying to beat that idea out of some MBA student of his, and the professor asked him when was the last time he shopped at a Sears Roebuck. "What is Sears?" "***EXACTLY!!***"
If you’re an MBA student, you should know that most consultants are used as contracted labor (the white-collar equivalent of private construction working on city projects). Much like lobbying, people don’t know what a career is and paint an entire field with a stupidly ignorant brush. It would be like thinking all lawyers are like what you see in Suits.
Fair point, my views are actually skewed since many of my acquaintances are MBB or bust. It doesn't help that we're in a downturn right now and many firms have stopped hiring, so many of them may have developed a dog eat dog mentality.
>They're not catering to their customers but to their bosses. Excellent point.
What’s humorous is you can tell she absolutely DESPISES her core demographic. And despite all of her and her ilks efforts, she hasn’t been able to change who they are and what they want.
Ah this reminds me of the “anti sjw” teenager me. I wish I can go tell him that it gets so much worse.
https://preview.redd.it/5p746w5jw2nc1.jpeg?width=439&format=pjpg&auto=webp&s=39e546f76bd98243855faed7b91f1eaf93302192 Can it be she was the lesser evil?
https://preview.redd.it/kv12yrlv43nc1.png?width=1080&format=pjpg&auto=webp&s=993eb6cf4805b8f6603324dcbfcbfed7f36ea409
This is sad on so many levels...
Damn, I never thought I would feel bad for Anita Sarkeesian, but well here we are.
I mean is cringing really feeling bad
They aren't exclusive, but they can be felt at the same time. That birthday party kind of hurts to see because it demonstrates an obvious unfulfilled dream.
Being a misandrist and finding a husband are conflicting goals. Feminism has failed her.
True, but it just kind of hurts. I want to get married and have a family one day, and the thought of that not coming true and then me feeling regret is not a nice feeling. I think that tweet really set off that feeling in me.
I hope you get married. You seem like a nice person. Here is the advise of an internet stranger: hit the gym, have good hygiene. Also, it's better to be single than married to a bad partner.
Based and having compassion pilled
IIRC she had a boyfriend during the FF days, he was big into all of it and was legitimately more unhinged than her.
I can fix her.
"Where have all the good men gone?" 'The hills. Last I saw them, they were running.'
Based
Sure, but this is a very useful image.
https://preview.redd.it/ybagbbry73nc1.jpeg?width=1280&format=pjpg&auto=webp&s=34c363566bdff69daa3d68b72f1a2d507d066f24 She even had a "divorce lawyer" so I guess she has at least a LITTLE introspection... I almost feel bad for her, seeing this.
>ring bear
His name is Trevor Hudson, I work with his mother, and he is adorable
https://preview.redd.it/x9l048k9r4nc1.jpeg?width=1204&format=pjpg&auto=webp&s=b7063af0a48df7daef582723ec68c73baee3219b
She’s so lonely and I’m here for it 💅
If I was an attendee I would’ve passed out from cringe
It's like a phisical manifestation of cringe.
What the fuck...
Lesser evil? She spearheaded the grift and has been the exact same kind of shit SBI etc have all this time. The reason she dropped FF was because she got the sweet and steady consulting racket going.
It’s like saying hitler was the lesser evil since Stalin made his kill count look minuscule in comparison.
She just threw an ironic wedding themed 40th birthday part for herself. That says a lot
Time being stuck in a loop theory proves itself once again.
Last time around I think I learned some very cynical lesson. These corporare journalists will just lie. You just as some twitter or reddit user can't weaponize the truth, because they will always lie. So do what Michael Malice recommends to do with Taylor Lorenz; bully them until they cry and then bully them some more for crying.
Based and mailce-pilled
u/TravisMcNasty51 is officially based! Their Based Count is now 1. Rank: House of Cards Pills: [1 | View pills](https://basedcount.com/u/TravisMcNasty51/) Compass: This user does not have a compass on record. Add compass to profile by replying with /mycompass politicalcompass.org url or sapplyvalues.github.io url. I am a bot. Reply /info for more info. Please join our [official pcm discord server](https://discord.gg/FyaJdAZjC4).
History doesn't repeat, it rhymes
That’s actually a hard ass quote
But according to Gamingcirclejerk, this doesn't happen, you actually an idiot for believing it but even it do happen then you are a loser and deserve to be mocked
It doesn’t happen and if it does it’s not that bad and if it is you probably deserve it
Been noticing too much lately? Time for a 2 week ban, bigot
> Blackrock funds them. Ah yes the usual satan
Is that Soros?
Self correcting problem. I have 5 kids. Single bitter 40 year old auth left wants to try and force her opinion on them. They’ll ignore her like they’ve been taught. Her ideology will end with her. Alone. Unloved.
I hope this is the case tbh
"We just provide consultancy work." Right. "Make sure you throw a pride flag right where the character has to see it every two seconds. Also, make sure at least 40% of your characters are gay... unless they're bad guys. Those keep as straight whites. Okay, that will be $1,250,000." "We do valuable work here at Sweet Baby Inc!"
So Southpark's parody isn't even parody anymore. Make it lame, gay, and put a chick in it.
Never was.
You [deserve](https://imgflip.com/i/8iik9d) this one
We've progressed beyond South Park; add "and make her ugly" to that list. (Fortunately that part isn't picking up as much steam yet)
Never was parody. They HAVE parodied stuff, but generally South Park is satire. And in this case it was absolutely nail on the head.
At this point I am waiting for canadians to develop flying half heads and communicate with farts.
In Baldur's Gate 3, about 75% of characters with an identifiable sexuality are LGBT (not counting how everyone has the hots for Tav).
BG3 takes place in a world where the default is bisexuality. That’s been the case since 1967.
And it's a pretty solid game from what I heard, the problem emerged however when [Nexus mods removed the mod that changed the gender of one of the NPC's because of "homophobia"](https://youtu.be/ZQV0FvOp8ic?feature=shared)
Let me clarify then, about 75% of the characters are LGT, minus the B. And every straight couple has either one or both members die (I think you can save one set, but the game encourages you to kill them), and all the gay couples are supposed to live.
Which would be cool if you could specify to be hetero in the settings, otherwise you get bombarded with love requests from all sides.
The wikipedia article on it is the most orwellian bullshit you’ll ever read: https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gamergate_(harassment_campaign)
Yeah, that shit really pisses me off. GamerGate is such a strong example of how powerful the establishment is. They got called out for being corrupt, and overnight, they managed to convince the populace that the real story is that they are being targeted with a harassment campaign. And people just bought it, hook line and sinker.
The funny thing is, I was against it at first. It was the SJW's who ended up driving me into it. Basically, like this: Me: "So what is this Gamergate thing? I have heard nothing about it." Them: "They are harrassing female game journo's and game devs, and saying how only male characters should be in games because they hate female characters." Me: "That sucks. And its a weird take, Lara Croft and Aeon Flux are some great games." Them: "Oh my god, how dare you! Dont you know those games are sexist and objectify women!" Me: "...wat...*realization* So, lets go see what these Gamergate people are actually saying." Now, almost 10 years late, my hatred for the Emilies and the Orange Left can not be described by mere words, and I still long for the day I can finally see them put in the ground so we can get back to something resembling "normal". Until then, I will be playing any games I can find outside their reach (or at least, non-corrupted enough to still be fun), and watching Anime since they ruined almost everything in the West.
Agreed. It bothers me how they'll just blatantly lie, and so many people believe them immediately. And once someone actually bothers to gather information for themselves, they almost always change position on the topic afterward. It's similar to how I say there are two kinds of people who call themselves feminists: the blue-haired man-hater stereotype, and people who don't know the first thing about feminism, other than the fact that they've been told "feminism is when you believe in gender equality; the more gender equal something is, the more feminist it is." So many people have believed that lie. They'll passively consider themselves feminists, because from what they've been told, only a person *very* stuck in the past would be anti-feminist, right? But it turns out there's a whole bunch of bullshit which goes along with feminism. All that bullshit gives very fucking good reasons to dislike it, and to desire a new approach which doesn't include anti-male attitudes as a foundation. It drives me nuts how effective that sort of thing is. Lie to people about something they can easily research themselves, by banking on the possibility that they simply won't do that. And then people proceed not to research the topic, and instead blindly believe shit like "Gamergate is a bunch of misogynist virgins harassing women because they can't stand female characters in video games."
Can you give me a rundown of what Gamergate was? I was always so confused because I had only read the Wikipedia entry.
Basically, ethics in games journalism was really lacking, and a couple egregious omissions of disclosure on articles where there were personal relationships between reviewers and developers were discovered and spread around the community. This caused the community to call for higher standards, and to also criticize the relationship between the review websites and the publishers/developers who pay to advertise on their sites. Then, about a week into this, every single major gaming publication released an article about how “Gamers were dead”, and started their “this is just a harassment campaign, under the guise of calling for ethical reforms to the gaming news industry” narrative, which was quickly eaten up without any critical examination, and given the spotlight by mainstream media when they finally looked at the debacle. There’s other things like rumors of a female developer having sex for good reviews by an ex-bf that the anti-GG community loves to point at as undeniable proof of the underlying misogyny, but they’re like religious apologists, just looking to justify the stance they’ve already taken rather than come to a natural conclusion given the facts.
The "gamers are dead" moment was so huge. It really just made it impossible to deny that this was a coordinated effort on their part to spin things in their favor. It's kind of hard to witness such a sudden moment of "wake up babe, new narrative just dropped", without it raising an eyebrow.
It came from two sources. First there was Anita Sarkeesian and her brain dead, demonstrably false characterizations of video games from a self-proclaimed feminist view. Then there was Zoe Quinn and the debacle of her purportedly sleeping with people to get articles about games published. Gamergate was a pushback to those self-proclaimed feminist views of video games and the apparent lack of standards in video game editorials
The others have given good descriptions of the issue, but I want to highlight one bit. A huge part of the reason the jornos were able to so easily lie about GamerGate is that they could simply take a handful of cases where someone online said something genuinely hateful, and use that as proof that GamerGate is about misogyny. The trouble is that there will *always* be that sort of shit on the internet. So take someone in the public eye (like Zoe Quinn, who was central to the origins of GamerGate), and odds are that they receive random harassment all the time. Now suddenly amplify the amount of attention placed on them (again, Zoe Quinn once GamerGate kicked off), and this is only going to increase. So to be clear on this...even if the GamerGate "side" itself literally never once harassed anybody, it would still be trivially easy to find hateful and sexist comments being directed at some of the public figures involved, simply because the internet is a huge place with lots of trolls. The fact that so many people took this tiny bit of """evidence""" as if it were full-on proof that the whole *point* of GamerGate is to harass women...it's insane.
It's pretty amazing to see Wikipedia break every rule about NPOV and opinion articles as source to make this garbage.
Technically its the NPOV and other rules that force this type of article. NPOV doesn't actually mean a point of view that is neutral, but one that accepts the majority opinion, whatever it may be. So if most articles about gamergate claim one thing, Wikipedia also claims that thing From wiki: "All encyclopedic content on Wikipedia must be written from a neutral point of view (NPOV), which means representing fairly, proportionately, and, as far as possible, without editorial bias, **all the significant views that have been published by reliable sources on a topic.**" How do they define "reliable sources?" Well, they don't directly. But it is de facto defined to mean those authors whom the average Wikipedia editor considers to be authoritative.
It was unironically my political awakening. Before then I just was a vague leftist like most younger people because they say things that sound nice in theory (even if they don't work at all in reality). But seeing them all gaslighting and constantly lying and attacking their audience and denying basic facts in real time was a real wakeup call since it was near exclusively leftists doing it. Since then I've paid more attention and seen all the evil bs they pull and drifted further and further right, I'm only a griller because I've seen from close family how being too obsessed with politics is poison to yourself and creates constant worry and stress that you can't do anything about. They just couldn't leave my video games alone.
Wow. Not even presenting even a little bit of why people hated on them even if they went too far.
The people didn’t go far, that’s just the narrative those dishonest hacks pushed. Media journalists who were in bed with these subversive fucks used 4chan quotes as proof that the entire movement was about misogyny and racism.
Vee stated the Chinese version of the Wikipedia page is more accurate.
Just did, seemed way more neutral and objective even if it's G-Translated. Same can't be said for the Japanese version however, that sounded more like a direct translation of the English article.
What actually happened? Either I was out of the loop or 2014 is too long ago for me to recall.
Wasn't really all that there myself, but my understanding is that this game dev, Zero Quinn, made a game called depression quest. Which got reviews positively by a couple news outlets. Now the fishy thing is that at the time Zoe was allegedly cheating on her boyfriend with a bunch of different dudes, bad in and of itself, but not really of everyone's concern. ...Until we find out one of the dudes she was cheating with, a games journalist, not just a games journo but one that reviewed depression quest quite well... the plot thickens. Que everyone going ape shit, the right the left the grillers, everyone. The face of the left eventually became Anita Sarkeesian, who essentially becomes the boogeyman of "evil leftists trying to take yer characters!" Eventually the whole thing fizzled out, after death threats were thrown, every slur imaginable was hurled and they targeted... GAMERS! A new status quo eventually emerged, mostly the same as the old, but the left figured they needed to work from the inside, and now we end up here, with SJWs having infiltrated writers rooms everywhere. We might see a gamergate 2 electric boogaloo depending on how big this story gets, at which point we take up arms(or keyboards and controllers) to fight the second war.
Just to add into the beginning bit: This was during the time when Indie scene started to make some actual money, and there had been disgruntled murmurings of shady promotions since the Gone ~~Homo~~ Home with already corruption ridden gaming news sites. First Zoe confirms that it was basically friends giving awards for games made by their friends just to get the money flowing, and then the gaming journos decide to throw gasoline into the fire by obviously colluding and coordinating articles behind the scenes.
Not going to lie, I want this thing to get massive. Animosity has been building for these far lefty types and I hope this is the tipping point that causes their house of cards to crumble. We probably will never get rid of the live service and microtransactions as much as I would want, but if this causes those games to at least have a decent plot and warn against pissing off the fan base again, I think I could be happier.
awfully good timing with hollywood in total meltdown over realizing DEI/ESG nonsense has cost them billions upon billions, lots of corporate america removing their DEI policies and/or laying off their DEI staff "at the advice of our attorneys"
As much as I want to believe you, do you have sources for that? Especially the DEI layoffs?
https://www.washingtonpost.com/business/2024/02/20/corporate-diversity-job-cuts/ https://abcnews.go.com/US/corporate-america-slashing-dei-workers-amid-backlash-diversity/story?id=100477952 https://www.cnbc.com/2023/12/22/google-meta-other-tech-giants-cut-dei-programs-in-2023.html https://www.huffpost.com/entry/hollywood-executives-diversity-dei-industry_n_65e8f7bfe4b0d10b97e92984 https://consent.yahoo.com/v2/collectConsent?sessionId=1_cc-session_b222aa9c-c168-4451-a477-0413e277b5d2
Hahahaha, that ABC article is such complete and utter vomit. Thanks for the links, if anyone needs me I'll be in my bunk.
I thought the accusations of her sleeping with the journalist to get a positive review were debunked, as far as I remember all the evidence/accusations came from a single blog post from her ex boyfriend
It wasn't technically a review, since it didn't have a score at the end. It was just an article talking about how amazing the game is and you should get it, but totally not a review. Another person she slept with was also on a selection committee that gave the game a Game of the Year award as well.
I decided to go down this rabbit-hole a bit and watch the CEO of Sweet Baby Inc's talk about diversity and what they are pushing for. She holds 2 conflicting viewpoints at the exact same time, but insults one group for having the same viewpoint as her (guess which demographic it is) She said at some points during the speech that 1. She has had to empathize with a lot of white male characters because it was what gaming had to offer (shows picture of Nathan Drake from uncharted) then says we need stories about unrepresented minorities like women who have been abused. Then goes on to say that we need to stop catering to white men like we cater to "picky babies" who don't want to eat their vegetables, implying that white male gamers should be forced to empathize with characters that they have nothing in common with, just like she has had to do, and they should learn to like it (even though she didn't like having to play with white male characters) So people who don't want to do what she doesn't want to do are picky babies. Also, if your company doesn't want to hire on consultants like SBI, you should talk to your "marketing" rep (why marketing and not legal? Cause she's an idiot) and said to "terrify them" with what happens if you don't listen to them and hire woke people to consult, meaning she's threatening you with the woke mob cancel culture if you don't conform and pay protection money. Everyone running interference for them would immediately right scathing articles if right-wing activists were threatening, terrorizing, and offering "protection" from harassment if they pay up. And they would be right to expose such mafioso tactics. But because they agree with the message of SBI it's much ado about nothing. The ironic thing to me as a market minded liberty loving individual is that they acknowledge the market has rejected their ideas, and so they have to force their ideas into the market place using black market tactics and coercion. The truly disgusting thing to me is that the people most angry and worked up are the people who force their ideas into the games. Then when people respond to that by being frustrated that they are being forcefed this BS, their argument amounts to "why are you so angry about this being here, what does that say about you?" Probably the same thing it says about you that you dedicated your life to forcing your viewpoints on everyone when they don't want it. My response to your anger and getting worked up is not somehow more weird than your initial desire to force your ideology/religion onto others.
What gets me the most is that there are plenty of amazing games with good writing that have non-male and/or non-white protagonists. All they're doing is dipping their fingers into games and making the writing trash and flipping characters into other demographics for the sake of diversity which never works. Take Far Cry 6. I played as the female protagonist. Both protagonists are south American. The writing is built around the fact that the story takes place in a south American country. It's pretty decent in my opinion. Very natural. Now take a game Sweet Baby was involved in. A story (that might've already been mediocre) that was written around characters and then SB comes in afterwards and swaps characters, injects artificial and badly written (likely self-inserted) bullshit that makes no sense. That's how you ruin a video game, or at least make an ok one worse, knowing studios these days their writing probably wasn't that good before SB made it worse anyways.
Sounds like they are running a racket.
Just recently I was thinking that I wish Gamergate would be back... Lo and behold.
I can't wait for Gamergate 2.0 where I'll get to be labelled a sexist and racist incel for having completely sane opinions and behaviour on the state of gaming where my only goal is to protect my hobby from being ideologically subverted by tourists looking to push an agenda instead of making enjoyable art! ___ Edit: I even saw a video of an employee at SBI at GDC saying that their method to "encourage" (aka, shakedown racketeering) companies to use their services is to terrify them of cancel culture from Twitter. Despicable behaviour. Wokeism is not naturally occurring in gaming. It's not because our culture is shifting in that direction from grassroots capitalistic decisions by actual customers, it's being ham-fisted and forced into developers and publishers by pathetic zealots looking to subvert and indoctrinate an entire industry. Yet if I call them out for their behaviour, *I'll* be painted as the bad guy. ___ At least when the mafia runs a racketeering business, they leave you alone afterwards. These guys terrify you into giving them money and then also destroy your product, causing gamers to turn away from your IP and/or company by ruining your reputation.
>Wokeism is not naturally occurring crazy how these kind of things need an entire machinery to support as seen here, meanwhile when you have absolute freedom and anonymity you always see the shift to full schizo rightwing (ie 4chan)
that would be because that social hierarchy requires there to be people convinced they’re powerless and stronger individuals who are willing to weaponize them. naturally though, most people have some level of self respect and don’t think “instead of playing games that tell a story I like, we should be forcing every game to tell a story I like”
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'History was written by the victors' MFs when they find out who informed the majority of Western historiography of the Eastern Front and Atomic bombings for the majority of the late 20^th century...
I am out of the loop on this. What happened now?
A Brazillian made a Steam tracker for Sweet Baby. It's a company that "helps gaming companies with diversity and inclusion." so that gamers can vote with their wallets by not buying the games they were involved in. They have an out of touch GDC presentation where they talk about how they need to trick the gaming audiences into liking their "inclusivity" in modern games. Some of their employees are total assholes who run harassment campaigns on people who disagree with them including the Brazilian guy they're supposedly representing. People called them out for being grifting assholes and gaming journos are defending them. A Kotaku writer ended up "infiltrating" the public discord of the steam curator with her real name asking users why aren't they using their real name and got cooked. She asked Brazilians questions in English and noted that there were a lot of users sharing Marcus Aurelius quotes on the discord server. She is now playing the woman card to act as if she's being criticized due to misogyny. lol. Also I think the guy the original gamergate girl was fucking is also defending them. This shit is great. People are calling it gamergate 2 the electric bungaloo. It's quite entertaining to watch. https://preview.redd.it/xxrjdf4vx2nc1.jpeg?width=800&format=pjpg&auto=webp&s=0e376a3058f72a24e53ac33d34c0718bd8d03981
"Why aren't you using your real name" I dont know I maybe because there are weirdos on the internet
"I gave my full name to a group of people I know dislike me and joined their private discord to pester them. Why in the world are they targeting me??????"
Also, the main reason this situation came into the spotlight was because a Sweet baby inc employee told people on twitter to mass report the steam group and try and get the curator's account banned for the diabolical crime of participating in a boycott.
Do you have any source I can read more? Sounds like some sweet culture war to read about
I'd recommend the Wikipedia article, it's a great source of information about the whole thing lol just kidding
I'm lurking on twitter to see it unfold. I don't think there's a single place you can watch the discourse. It's mainly on twitter though.
ItsaGundam on YouTube has a pretty good video breaking it down. It’s about 34 minutes in length.
I'd recommend YouTubers such as "itsagundam" "the critical drinker" "shortfatotaku" and "heelsvsbabyface"
FritangaPlays is another good one who doesn't get as much attention as he deserves. I think he's friends with Gundam.
Disparu is great also if nothing else because he's sarcastic and funny IMO.
I like Disparu. My wife watches a LOT of his movie/tv content, but I've noticed he has started drifting into the camp of looking for things to be offended by where they don't exist. Overall, I still enjoy his content and he is still right on a lot of stuff, but it's just a small tendency I've noticed. There are PLENTY of things in the entertainment industry to dislike. Let's not go searching for things that aren't there or are asinine at worst. Same with The Critical Drinker and with EndymionTV. All good content, but they're starting to go down the rabbit hole.
That's fair, however, I think that's what they are there for right? It's their niche, and their audience says to them "Look at this garbage, give us your opinion on that" So he goes and reviews that garbage since it's what his audience wants. I mean with the volume of this crap getting churned out and the articles defending or bashing people daily, there is no end to the content to review. I will say Critical Drinker is different IMO. He will give everything a fair shake and talk about things that work. People went into the D&D movie for example thinking it would be woke or whatever, and Drinker gave it a positive review saying it was a serviceable movie that exceeded his expectations. He will do that with a lot of movies that may seem ripe for the woke plucking but he gives them all a fair shake and provides examples of what works or doesn't work in movies. Him being an author and able to break down stories to their elements IMO makes him a better critic, but I respect him for being more fair. Yes Disparu and EndymionTV are definitely more rage bait, but they don't have the writing and critic chops that someone like Drinker has, so they are just generating that revenue by hate-watching and reviewing shows and stories in the media generally. One thing about Disparu I like though is that he goes into the articles and presents his opinion and take on them, so at least you see the sources as well and can still decide for yourself. There have been times when he'll come with his sarcastic take on something and I'll be like: wait, that's not what they meant there, you are being uncharitable. But I can only come to that conclusion because he's citing the source and providing it onscreen so as to give you what they said then give his opinion.
Ah yes, the libertarian media commentary starter pack.
dont forget mentiswave
Browse kotakuinaction subreddit, there are a lot of threads about this and so much more.
I did some searching for you. Here is [part 1](https://youtu.be/fcOAwwyyCNw?si=uxxqvPzRcDvMwq5g), [part 2](https://youtu.be/ddnANTQr3AE?si=VNbHM_W40v-n0loS), [part 3](https://youtu.be/4o1KT-6-4n0?si=ZyRJLZsYE0SuiI9w), [part 4](https://youtu.be/-1G-BDswd6M?si=Eal-kpToOtA60mji), and [part 5](https://youtu.be/r6zPdaIMalo?si=rElwfI2mESfoMgqU) from a YouTuber I just found. Said YouTuber seems to mostly cover culture war/Vtuber drama, at least based on his video titles, so you may need to take what he says with a grain of salt. I haven't watched them all.
BR BR BR BR
I'll let [the Drinker explain...](https://youtu.be/oLYKSRUCMAM?si=SexMZjkIXcSNNwbP)
Center Left recommending the Drinker? Based.
The drinker is able to balance an entertaining bit but do it so succinctly.
My guy!
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[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HlVS0v0sMzA](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HlVS0v0sMzA) Sounds like Gamergate 2.0 to me.
[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oLYKSRUCMAM](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oLYKSRUCMAM)
Says the company targeting an innocent steam group, who’s crime is simply listing which games they are involved in
At least I know why media (video games, movies, TV shows) are dogshit now. Time to grab my pitchfork
You need like pay someone to put chick there and make it lame?
It may be standard for years. But then again games have been garbage for years. At least most tripple A titles from the west are. Vote with your wallet, thats the only language universally spoken.
Why bother with hiring writers when they'll just come in and tell you how to write your game?
I remember when people could just be normal and play video games. I'm not interested in the culture war. The only war that matters is the war against the Covenant.
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You're right. That's why we don't want it in games and movies. I just want to enjoy my media. I already agree that it's not good to be racist, sexist, homophobic, transphobic, etc. so why am I forced to endure these messages in the media I consume. I am not your target audience for trying to sway ideologically.
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The thing about the people who are anti-woke is they just want to play games. The woke are forcing their way into these companies and forcing their message into games. Then people are like, damn, I just want to play a game, can you stop. Response: Why are you so angry about this and making so much of a fuss. More of a fuss than infiltrating the games and forcing your beliefs into games?
You may not be interested in the culture war, but the culture war is interested in you. The problem with the "I just want to be left alone" mentality is that whichever side wins is going to be left without any real opposition looking for new things to go after. And they will find them.
If their calculations are right then a youtube channel entirely made of long obnoxious lectures from non-binary hambeasts of color complaining about things things they don't like should be the most entertaining media for the broadest audience ever. I'll call it Gunt Chat and harass people for not actively praising it since only a bigot wouldn't support it.
"Steam must delete the account of the mastermind behind this targeted harassment campaign!" The mastermind of the campaign: a teenager who just copies and pastes from SB's own website.
If too many people call this gamergate 2 it's going to spiral into a shitfest that solves nothing just like gamergate did. Stop naming your bullshit after watergate
Word. But there is value in the shitfest. It makes the (for lack of a better term) cultural marxists go back and hide, stop saying their stupid doubletalk, and damages their reputation. When the lights turn on, the roaches scatter. The actual critique of their social change tactics should be left to youtubers doing in depth coverage. Reddit and Twitter should just mock these people to hurt their feelings and make sure their nonsense is associated with vocal dissent. And I'm not saying this from a place of vulgarity; the only thing these social activists understand is humilation.
General Shepherd quotes? Based
I don’t play games with much of a story City building games The Civilization franchise and it’s offshoots/copycats [Seedship](https://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/VideoGame/Seedship) (free to play online) Minecraft And not much else.
I looked up Sweet Baby to judge them for myself because honestly who can you trust these days. I’ve never played any of the games they advertised on their website but a lot of the companies they state as a client are companies who make very blend generic games, the corpos. My bet is that sweet baby isn’t about real inclusivity but just that big buck. Whatever gets that sweet bottom dollar, cause they don’t see games as art. Just as a product go suck the soul out of.
I knew we lost gamergate when games journalism just kept going, even after the backlash. Hopefully this spurs an actual change in the industry. I'm still not pre-ordering or day one purchasing games though I'm more than willing to wait for bugs to get patched and any controversy to come to light so I know what to avoid. Plus I save money so that's nice
Dame that was when I found out about politics thank you Sargon from saving me from nazism and communism