Who Zoe Quinn sleeps with is between her and her partners. Unless you know any of them personally, it’s none of your business.
The quality of Depression Quest is immaterial. Making a crappy game is not grounds for harassment.
If you’re worried about integrity in the gaming press, attacking Zoe Quinn is the wrong way to go about it. Say the absolute worst people are saying is true – that she did sleep with reviewers to get good press. Then you should be going after the unprincipled reviewers, not the indie developer who manipulated them.
Over 2400 game developers (myself included) have signed a letter condemning the recent round of threats and harassment. Games as a medium will only thrive if we are open to all types of critique and all types of creative expression. Critics (like Sarkeesian) and developers (like Quinn) should feel free to comment and express themselves with being threatened, doxxed, harassed, and smeared.
The big news yesterday was that apparently since this all started three weeks Quinn has been lurking in the 4chan irc channelwhere the harassment campaign against her was being orchestrated and forwarding all the chat logs to the police and FBI.
Of course it’s subjective . That’s why I said “if someone got something out of it, great.” I was just contributing to the tangent.
E: As others have said, the quality of the game has no bearing on her character, and is definitely not grounds for harassment or condemnation of her. But other people were talking about it and thought it was harmless to chime in.
No one (here at least) is excusing any harassment based on the quality of her game. But since a significant facet of the whole “Five Guys/Quinnsperacy” thing was about her game’s media coverage, talking about her game is completely appropriate. My own comments were made in the context of “I feel that reviews of the game have failed because they are praising a terrible game purely on its ‘it’s about depression!’ angle rather than on any of its merits as a game” (or even ‘game deconstruction’, ‘interactive fiction’ or whatever deflective term people use to lamely excuse its many shortcomings)
In fact, in this thread, it’s been said that all the negative player reviews were fakes, that people only talk ill of it to tear Quinn down, etc. The repeated “Stop talking about the game, it doesn’t matter!” sounds more like “Let’s only have this conversation on the grounds I feel most comfortable on”.
We’re talking mostly indie devs, and there was a bit of back-and-forth about whether or not they legally have the right to DMCA TotalBiscuit’s critique. Within their “company”? Sure. Legally? Probably not. And I agree completely - they’d have to be complete fucking idiots to boycott an incredibly popular and extremely well-trusted form of free advertisement. Oh wait…
I browsed through some of it but a bunch of random fake-names with no actual attribution wasn’t especially interesting. That and most of it wasn’t really evidence of anything, just some people saying something mean and a remark from Quinn like “I thought they said they had integrity!”
The police/FBI thing sounds more like bluster. I believe she was forwarding logs but that doesn’t mean that they’re actively interested in them. I find it difficult to imagine a scenario where the FBI eagerly takes three weeks of IRC logs to build a case and then says “Ok, now make a website gloating about it all over the internet and letting them know exactly what you sent us! There’s no better way to help us build a case then tipping everyone off!”
Yeah, pro tip: if you actually care about getting these people, and not just throwing a huge internet-wide pity party, shut up and let the feds deal with it. You can still have the pity party after the investigation is done.
A) Not THIS time it isn’t, and B) That’d be Gameragate, totally different covert action.
Regards,
-Bouncer-
PS: Didn’t even have to look that shit up! I KNOW my Godzilla!
PPS: As to the OP, TLDR, Don’t know or care, and really, Depression Quest?
PPPS: Mothra rules. Because.
Goes to professional ethics. And if they have the ability to affect the opinions of others and result in monetary gain… then it does sort of become my and everyone’s business, because we all have a stake in the marketplace being as honest as is possible.
Concur. Generic ridicule of the product aside, personal harassment is wrong.
You should be going after both equally. It goes both to the credibility of the press as well as her ethics as a developer/businessperson. If it were a male developer buying golf junkets for the press for favorable (thus money making) reviews, you’d call it for what it is, bribery to deceive the public for financial gain. Whether she’s strokin’ checks or strokin’ cocks, she’s still buying a favorable review.
Good for you. I hope that letter also expresses that you have no desire to buy favorable reviews by getting on your knees financially or physically.
Here’s how big a news deal this was. Until I read the OP I had no idea any of this crap had occurred. And I’m a news junkie. /shrug
Not even then. Unless you are this Quinn woman (whoever the fuck she is) or one of her partners (whoever the fuck THEY are) it’s none of your business.
I realize that the videogame business is big, but as near as I can tell from skimming this thread it’s NOT about big players, but is instead about bloggers and third rate designers on the periphery of the business. Wake me when Electronic Arts or Activision get involved. For now it’s just about people and games at the Mom’s basement level, with many of the players in the Comic Book Guy cliche mold. I am annoyed with people who live a cliche.
…yeah, because Depression Quest, being a free game and all, is going to make Zoe so much money.
Back in reality, the internet didn’t loose its collective shit on actual real scandals in the gaming world. No one cared about Dorito-gate. Why do they care about this?
If you had been following along you would be well aware that what you have written is generally regarded to be a lie. There is no evidence that the relationship was motivated by a financial desire. There was no and will be no favourable review.
Its a big enough story for you to feel the need to comment on it, even if it was to make allegations that are simply not true.
She’s soliciting a “pay what you want” approach for it, with a “portion” of the sales to go to charity. I’m not implying that she’s wrong to do so – it’s her choice what payment method to use for her game – or that she’ll make a mint (though I’m sure the controversy helped) but she is taking money for it.
…its a free fricken game. You can pay what you want if you want. But you don’t have too. There are no “financial stakes” at play here. Stop pretending this is about corruption and the integrity of the gaming industry. Its just a chance for people to be an internet bully and they excuse their behaviour with the pretence of fighting corruption.
Exactly. It would be like a bunch of people suddenly deciding to send death threats to a student director who had a film that showed well at Sundance because they found out he started dating a film reviewer after the movie came out.
Look, there are plenty of things to talk about if you want to talk about the ethics of game journalism. There’s a lively discussion going on on Twitter right now under the hashtag #gameethics if you want to be part of the conversation. But the real discussion is about how the industry press reports on AAA titles, not on the sex life of one indie developer.
GamerGate has nothing to do with journalism ethics. It’s just old-school slut-shaming mixed with prurient conspiracy theories and covered with a thin veneer of ethical posturing to make it seem less scummy.
I claimed no such thing but have fun running around, waving your arms in the air.
You made it sound as though she had nothing to be gained. You were wrong. When you’re done throwing your hissy-fit, try to be gracious about your error.
…the post I responded to, and to which I answered and to which you disputed did make that claim.
You make it sound like her choice of who she had a relationship with is important.
Not at all.
What hissy fit?
Its a free game. The free game business model pretty much guarantees there isn’t a financial stake here. Why are you having a go at me, and not the guy who claims she is “she’s strokin’ checks or strokin’ cocks” for financial gain? You don’t think the OP is one gigantic hissy fit? Have you gone after him yet?
Never said any such thing. 0-2 but keep making those wild throws in your outrage and one might yet hit.
I actually said the complete opposite thing: That the positive press for her game wasn’t because of anyone she slept with but because the gaming press industry is so frantic to prove themselves “worthy” to the mainstream and still so pissed that Ebert said that games aren’t art five or six years ago that they’ll fawn all over any piece of supposedly socially relevant crap that they think can elevate that standing. Regardless of its actual value as a game (by any definition).
But by all means, keep flipping your shit and raging on blindly. Your inability to read does wonders for your cause :rolleyes:
This has nothing to do with Ebert. The gaming press is not so frantic to prove themselves worthy to the mainstream and this has nothing to do with the art. The narrative that you think is correct is a load of shit.
You’ve got a members of the gaming community posting in this thread from both the press side and from the developer side. You don’t have to listen to me. Start listening to them. They didn’t sign that open letter because they are desperate to prove anything. They signed it because they believe it. The harassment has got to stop.
Funny, because you kept getting it wrong and accusing me of calling “corruption” and “who she has relationships with” but if you need to backpedal now, have at it.
My Magic 8-Ball says “All signs point to YES”
Oh Golly! They took the brave stance of signing a letter saying Harassment is Bad!? Stars and garters, I can just FEEL change in the world. Maybe next they’ll really go all out and Like a Facebook status. Take that, 4Chan meanies!
What does any of that have to do with fawning over a shitty game like Depression Quest? Admitting that it’s crap isn’t exclusive to saying harassment is wrong.
. That’s why I said “if someone got something out of it, great.” I was just contributing to the tangent.