A Bar That Won’t Lead You Astray: The Stray Sheep
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Hard Corner: BERSERK special
Posted By Robert G. about 2 months, 4 weeks ago
Can we break away from this at all?
Warning. This editorial contains some foul and perverse language. It is not safe for work and may offend people. You have been warned.
I wonder sometimes why I proudly proclaim myself to be a lover of video games in public. Despite my love for the world of gaming, I often am afraid to admit that I am such a gamer, because it usually leads to negative stereotyping. It is a curious thing, because this nearly exclusive culture of interactive media that I, and many of those reading this, have vehemently defended by attackers from the outside would rally in a heartbeat to stop the likes of Jack Thompson, Craig Anderson or even Joe Lieberman when attempting to censor or belittle our industry.
But this week, I witnessed the absolute worst of us in action, a sort of mob mentality that has generated more harm than good for the industry, because it just reinforces stereotypical rhetoric we have heard before. And what’s worse, it feels as if, despite several articles by high profile writers such as Jim Sterling, David Nye Griffiths, or others commenting on the issue that has, for the lack of a more eloquent term, caused a media shit-storm over the gaming sphere.
I am of course referring the recent attacks against one Jennifer Hepler, currently a writer at BioWare who worked on both Dragon Age: Origins and Dragon Age II. On February 2nd, Hepler apparently signed up for a twitter account for the first time…only to request it to be taken down two weeks later after a flood of vicious attacks by what can only be described as an angry mob. Poking fun at her looks, gender and religion, making claims she needs to be raped and is comparable to Hitler, and calling her vile things like an “ obese cunt” or “whore” with little context or provocation.
Well, that is partially true. Apparently on Reddit recently, a thread (that has been taken down at this point by Reddit) titled “This woman is a cancer that’s killing Bioware” was the source of most of this rank vitriol. And what’s worse, it is mostly due to the cherry-picking of quotations made in 2006, as seen in the photo shown here. (I’m not reposting it because… well, its disgusting.)
The two quotes come from an interview by Helper for the site Killer Betties. Sadly, the link to the interview is no longer functional, but thanks to internet archiving, the full interview can still be seen right here. The two primary complaints were general quotations regarding her stance on video games. Specifically, the fact that playing the games was her least favorite thing about video games, and games should give players the option to skip fight scenes to make games much shorter than they were.
Of course, these are loaded statements already that contracted negative attention. But the context of these statements is just as important, because what people tend to forget is that there is more behind a sound bite than a just a blanket statement, something Fox News needs to learn still in the political realm.
In fact, the actual quotes, from the 2006 interview, are as follows in their entirety.
What is your least favorite thing about working in the industry?
Playing the games. This is probably a terrible thing to admit, but it has definitely been the single most difficult thing for me. I came into the job out of a love of writing, not a love of playing games. While I enjoy the interactive aspects of gaming, if a game doesn’t have a good story, it’s very hard for me to get interested in playing it. Similarly, I’m really terrible at so many things which most games use incessantly — I have awful hand-eye coordination, I don’t like tactics, I don’t like fighting, I don’t like keeping track of inventory, and I can’t read a game map to save my life. This makes it very difficult for me to play to the myriad games I really should be keeping up on as our competition.
And with a baby on the way in a few months, my minimal free time (which makes it impossible for me to finish a big RPG in less than six months already), will disappear entirely. If there was a fast-forward feature on games which would let me easily review the writing and stories and skip the features that I find more frustrating than fun, I’d find it much easier to keep abreast of what’s happening in the field.
If you could tell developers of games to make sure to put one thing in games to appeal to a broader audience which includes women, what would that one thing be?
A fast-forward button. Games almost always include a way to “button through” dialogue without paying attention, because they understand that some players don’t enjoy listening to dialogue and they don’t want to stop their fun. Yet they persist in practically coming into your living room and forcing you to play through the combats even if you’re a player who only enjoys the dialogue. In a game with sufficient story to be interesting without the fighting, there is no reason on earth that you can’t have a little button at the corner of the screen that you can click to skip to the end of the fighting.
Companies have a lot of objections, such as how to calculate loot and experience points for a player who doesn’t actually play the combats, but these could be easily addressed by simply figuring out an average or minimum amount of experience for every fight and awarding that.
The biggest objection is usually that skipping the fight scenes would make the game so much shorter, but to me, that’s the biggest perk. If you’re a woman, especially a mother, with dinner to prepare, kids’ homework to help with, and a lot of other demands on your time, you don’t need a game to be 100 hours long to hold your interest — especially if those 100 hours are primarily doing things you don’t enjoy. A fast forward button would give all players — not just women — the same options that we have with books or DVDs — to skim past the parts we don’t like and savor the ones we do. Over and over, women complain that they don’t like violence, or they don’t enjoy difficult and vertigo-inducing gameplay, yet this simple feature hasn’t been tried on any game I know of.
Granted, many games would have very little left if you removed the combat, but for a game like Deus Ex or Bioware’s RPGs, you could take out every shred of combat and still have an entertainment experience that rivals anything you’d see in the theater or on TV.
Whether you agree or disagree with what was said by Hepler is honestly irrelevant to the fact that she is someone working in the industry as a writer, not a game player. Despite what she says, she loves playing games, but her tastes show games with story emphasis over anything else. Throughout the interview on Killer Bettie she mentions Jade Empire and Deus Ex as among her favorite games of all time, as well as several pen and paper RPGs including Pre-third edition Shadowrun, Book of Five Rings and World of Darkness games. In fact, Hepler has a background in writing pen and paper RPGs before signing on with Bioware, penning several Shadowrun companion books, and works for RPG tabletops Earthdawn and Paranoia.
And for reference sake, Hepler is the author of almost all of the Dwarven content found in Dragon Age: Origins, including the origin stories in both, the Anvil of the Void Questline, and the Orzammar side-quests. She also wrote parts of the mage-templar conflict in Dragon Age II, the characters of Sebastian, Grand Cleric Elthina, Leandra, Bethany, Anders and a majority of the Legacy DLC for that game. While I shall not claim that everything Hepler was involved in was five star material, her resume before and after BioWare is fairly extensive and impressive, in particular the work done in Origins and the Legacy DLC, in my opinion.
Yet, she is still apparently a cancer killing BioWare, according to the user who decided to post a scathing attack against her. And like any quote out of context, neglecting to mention the fact that Hepler has little time to play games anymore because she is a mother with bigger responsibilities, punctuates the attack with words of non-wisdom and a distasteful photoshop job to make fun of her weight.
And I thought 4chan was out of style now a days, apparently people are still immature.
While I don’t agree with her opinions (if all you really care about is story then read a book) but that doesn’t make it right for me or anyone else to say such hurtful and venomous things.
How much did bilEwAre pay you?
nothing, actually.
and it is spelled BioWare, not generic hatred statement number 5.
This is the internet. If you cant stand the heat then get out of the kitchen.
Realistically Hepler should only get 50% of the hate and David Gaider should get the other 50% as they are both to blame for what’s going on in Bioware.
Ultimately though, Hepler should not even be there as she didn’t get the job off her own merits, but rather through the efforts of her husband who allready worked there. Anyone who’s read Hepler’s one published graphic novel can see she is bad at the craft of writing, unfortunatly because she’s a woman she’s gets all these people charging in to prove their liberal cred by white knighting a woman wether or not she deserves the defense.
Biodrones gonna drone, I guess.
“…wether or not she deserves the defense.”
Are you serious? You think she deserves people telling her these horrible things?
Well I’m not going to try and change your mind as you seem to already know what you need about this lady and have judged her accordingly.
Though anyone else find it a bit ironic a comment critiquing her writing skills has so many spelling errors?
Again, stay classy internet.
I certainly don’t agree with Helper on the whole, trimming a game to just dialog makes it interactive fiction, and while those are fine and dandy it would be a sad world if every game were like that. Not that there’s no weight to her words, certain aspects in games would be great to trim like needless grinding and repetitive fetch quests.
Perhaps this lady should rethink her career and write books like she was doing beforehand?
Calling her names and attacking her is just silly though.
Stay classy internet.
Why should playing games be a requirement for writing them? Experiencing the writing is certainly important, and in my opinion playing them is the best way to do that, but if you write the dialogue and the flavour text, then why should playing games be a requisite?
No one would expect the composers to have to play games in order to write the music for a game, in fact, you can learn everything there is to know about why Nobuo Uematsu or Koji Kondo’s music works so well in an interactive medium, and how to apply that same level of lite motif driven music to bigger pieces without ever having to pick up a controller. Why is writing text any different?
Don’t get me wrong I don’t agree with her idea, but I can see the validity in the concept, and I can understand where she’s coming from, because she’s not hired to play games, she’s not hired to develop games, she’s hired to write the dialogue.
That’s true but don’t pretend that this is a none issue. She gives a reason why playing games is a problem for her.
That problem is that she can’t keep up on their competition she can’t play the games and review what she’s up against.
That’s like an author not being able to read other peoples books.
It’s a problem. Don’t pretend it’s not.
Perhaps more gamers should watch shows like “Nostalgia Critic,” “Angry Joe,” and “Spoony Reviews.” Although these shows do resort to crass humor, ironically I’ve found them to have solid criticisms of the shows and movies they review. I think gamers can definitely learn how to be constructively critical from these shows, and how being such can get their points across better than verbal attacks.
The good thing about the internet: We get to see people fully express themselves.
The bad thing about the internet: We get to see people fully express themselves.
http://www.auntiepixelante.com/?p=912
Jim Sterling is a guy who, when accused of being a misogynist, told a lesbian woman to ‘ask her husband for permission’ when using the computer. he’s full of shit whenever he complains about something like this, he can act like just as much of a dick as the 4chan people this article is about (yeah, 4chan started it, Reddit just joined in to be wacky)
I watched the whole thing unfold the other day. Honestly, I’ve got no opinion on it; it just happened. That said, both sides have some degree of faults, regardless of who started it.
Everything I want to say has already been said and I’m happy that the discussion has actually been started (not about whether the people who verbally assaulted were right or not, as far as I’m concerned they should all have their gaming privileges removed).
But what strikes me as absolutely backwards and shows just how stuck the gaming community is in its macho bullshit is that the second someone suggests taking the combat out of a game and suddenly it’s no longer a game.
So if you removed the combat from a game like Mass Effect, it’s suddenly a novel? Despite the fact that a majority of the choices you make in Mass Effect are done out of combat, removing the combat would suddenly strip it of its place a game?
Picking dialog choices, exploring a city or solving puzzles and similar are all completely viable gameplay. The toted “interactivity” hasn’t gone away just because you no longer aim down a gun and shoot. Whether you accept it or not, visual novels are games. You choose your dialog options (interactivity), each choice has a different consequence (effect) and is totally reliant on the player to make the next move or it does not progress.
A movie or book or music goes on whether the play wants it to or not. They’re not interactive because we don’t have a choice in how it unfolds. Interactivity does not automatically mean that you need to be shooting or moving around, those archaic concepts that are holding the game industry back. Her ideas are fresh, I say give her a chance to come up with something.
There isn’t just one kind of gameplay, there are infinite amounts and they’re just waiting to be explored. Give it a chance, you just might be surprised. Or don’t but let other people take a chance, it doesn’t hurt YOU.
Also, do people just forget that she said option? She’s not suggesting to remove combat, she’s saying that there should be an option to skip it.
Well thought out article. After reading some of her comments I can see why a lot of folks would be upset, and they do indeed have the right to share an opinion. Where it gets murky though is when someone starts mixing in personal threats. When you start implying something bad is going to happen to someone famous or not, not only does it make your case look bad, if taken seriously you could see jail time.
I don’t think most people who utter “I’m gonna kill you” literally mean it mind you, but all of us should remember horror stories about people ostracized from social networking groups going on the lam. Or horror stories about crazed fans of actors/musicians/other popular people.
If you say something over the top someone somewhere may indeed take it seriously.
Speaking of taking things seriously, sometimes we take our hobbies a little too seriously. There are all sorts of bigger problems going on right now be they social, political, or moral. Whatever side of an issue you may fall on though it’s probably more important than a writer not liking writing for games as much as other mediums.
It shit like this that give gamers a bad name. hell it gives fans everywhere a bad name when they pull this shit.
LOL, Bioware. They may be a bunch of incapable twats but I think we shouldn’t attack this woman. Why don’t we do something productive like, get a job?
This is the kind of thing that makes me feel ashamed and the need to apologize, despite having done nothing wrong personally. I suppose that’s what you get when you attach yourself to a certain culture and it disappoints you this much.
To the person in the comments that said they are screwing up lore … it’s their damn game, the lore is what they make it. They are not screwing up anything, well for you perhaps, but if you react like this, it is a pretty selfish reaction. Really, what’s the big deal anyway about her being a WRITER & that her LEAST favorite part of her job is to play? BEcause, I mean … she wasn’t hired to write lore & crap for the game? Really, I worked at UBISOFT & I am surprised to read BIOWARE’s writers play the games, well I mean as part of their “job” we had people paid specifically for that … Do you really think that a book/novel writer’s favorite part of his job is to watch the book he wrote get printed ? I honestly doubt it. Pretty sure is favorite part of the job is to write the book … Anyway, no matter what you all think she ws hired as a writer … who give a flying f*ck if she plays or not …
Theres one thing that really bothers me about her interviw: “for women” – “because I am a women”
wth?
I understand what she wants to say BUT what is a GAME without GAMEplay(?) – I would say it is a movie – maybe she should try out going into the movie industry
But in the end its her work to write good stories and intresting characters etc. so w/e – she has her opinion
I found that comment pretty offensive to. She basically has the stance that us girly girls and our womanly brains can’t handle or don’t enjoy long, deep, complex, or challenge games cause we’re too busy cooking and shooting out kids. If she wants that, fine, but don’t start making broad statements like that and saying they would make games more enticing to women at large. It’s insulting to the entire gender.
If you just want a story, read a book or watch a movie. That’s what those mediums exist for, ffs.
Also, really, if she hates games so much, why is she in the game industry? There’s plenty of other mediums where a person can be creative and not have to suffer through all those annoying “gamey” bits that you don’t like in order to stay on top of the industry. I see her as someone who’s taking a job away from a person who would appreciate it far, far more than her.
Not to mention, she made the situation what it is. She responded, quite smugly and aggressively, to a lot of the comments directed at her. She made it escalate.
I wouldn’t take it too offensively. Maybe she just has a difference stance on video games then we do.
Some of the greatest gameplay thats hit people by surprise haven’t had much combat in it. 999 and Corpse Party come into mind. Those two games have a great compelling gameplay that tells a story with minimal gameplay other then puzzle solving.
Being a writer myself, I can see her stance. Her passion is telling a story. Not playing games. She wants to write and tell a story. She’d rather let the others do their thing in the game stuff herself. I think all she really wants is to just skip parts so she can observe her work.
If writers only wrote by what they are interested in only? Then you’d have a lot of games like Duke Nukem Forever and many more after that. And only them. You don’t need to be a gamer to write a compelling story. She’s a writer. She writes stories. Thats her job.
We shouldn’t have to expect them to be gamers too. Look where THAT has given us in terms of piece of games that have so much to it but lack a compelling story.
Firstly, I do not consider myself attached to this group in any form by enjoying video games. That’s like lumping together all sports fans. These people are not me and do not represent me nor my beliefs.
Secondly, attacking someone personally will never get a point across. I do not condone Saul Alinsky tactics. You make a strong argument to get through to people and be heard. Being mean spirited and hateful, no matter how right you think you are, completely invalidates whatever point you’re trying to make. This may be the internet, but I really wonder how self-righteous people can act at times. I think this whole smear movement is cowardly and reprehensible. Bullying someone is probably one of the worst things you can do to a person.
To get to my other point, Jennifer Helper is working in the wrong industry. I do not always enjoy games with long stretches of cutscenes or dialogue. I buy video games to interact with them. Stories should develop as you play them and not just take control for you. Half-Life 2 is a great example of a game that has events unfold in front of you while you’re still playing. Having a fastfoward button for the very reason I buy games for completely defeats the purpose. A story compliments a game, nothing more. A bad game can still have an excellent story, but that doesn’t change the fact that is still a bad game.
Jennifer is obviously working in an career field that she has no interest in. That’s just my opinion on the matter, but I do not begrudge her for feeling the way she does.
I listen to the Keith And The Girl podcast and there on of the hosts always says he do not like playing multiplayer on-line because people in there (xbox live) just make the most homophobic and racist comments. Gamers on the internet have a bad reputation, the only way to change that is to speak out and maybe also disassociate from the gamers that indulge in unacceptable behaviour.
Maybe we could also form some sort of public PR organisation that speak out against bad behaviour and support people under attack.
And I can understand her points, in fact I would wish I had that button when it came to fighting games.
HOW DOES IT FEEL!
The internet is full of trolls (even on this site) and she just fell into their trap. If you get easily offended, then just stay offline.
Of course you realize, sir, that that statement follows dangerously close to the logic of this infamous defense, “If she didn’t want to get raped, she shouldn’t wear that skirt. She was asking for it.”
Nothing justifies trolling.
Oi, this rampage against Hepler so badly did not need to happen! Most video game companies are large enough to employ all kinds of talent; and not all enjoy games the same way. Sometimes, a job’s a job. This unnecessary and embarrassing outrage makes me want to rant at my own subculture like Smeagol at the MTV awards (the clip that Nash uses.) “Shame on you!”
i think it is wrong how she has been treated by the internet mob. but honestly if she says things like that she should not be working in the gaming industri as a writer and rather be making a book or a movie.
if you do not like and enjoy every part of a game how are you meant to learn from that to grow as a writer within the medium
it is like saying as book editor that you don’t like books
I’m not going to comment on the morality of and justification of this twitter war, partly because I didn’t keep up with it much and partly because I don’t really care either way (although I do think there are other Bioware writers more deserving of ire, like Gaider or Walters). However, I do feel the need to pose this one question to you:
What other weapon do we have?
Bioware is completely and utterly flippant to criticism. The writers think they’re geniuses and act like jackasses, all but flat out saying that the players are too stupid to appreciate their works. They screw up lore and defend doing so, delete threads calling out glaring flaws, and make statements about not liking the “game” part of video games and how “pure” RPGs aren’t viable anymore.
So the writers are idiots, Bioware/EA upper management doesn’t care for whatever reason, the games are increasingly repetitive and dumbed down, automatic high sales from the brand name makes Voting With Your Wallet useless, add on the general rising frustration with game companies being indifferent to customers and the piss poor state of RPGs nowadays… and yeah stuff like this is going to happen. What’s the alternative, shut up and bend over?
If you care enough to call out people on their behavior then, please, care enough to suggest some other viable path of protest.
Grow up and move on. It’ll accomplish about as much as throwing tantrums on twitter will.
“If you care enough to call out people on their behavior then, please, care enough to suggest some other viable path of protest.”
Lawsuit. failing that:
How about not playing their games, how about that? It’s how normal people feal with stuff.
I said in the editorial an alternative is to actually be calm about things and either stop buying the games, or take issues directly to the source.
Although considering blind hatred sometimes, and the state of the BioWare forums its difficult. Like when they announced that Dragon Age III will be more open world and will change armor customization to allow companions to wear new armor without removing the “iconic look” they wanted to give them, everyone cried foul saying that’s not good enough, thats a cop-out, you are not addressing my issues with the way the graphics are, etc. It boggles my mind that a majority of the people decide to bemoan a compromise based on complaints from the second game.
I hate to say it, but the fanbase brings it upon themselves sometimes. But this does not condone this type of reaction. As I said, people like this are not entitled to act like children because of anonymity. Simple as that.
If you want to help change it, send letters or don’t buy the products. Thats how you do it in other businesses. If you are not a fan of the writers, don’t play the games and let it go. That doesn’t excuse anyone for this though, I am sorry.
I fully acknowledge there’s a smear campaign turned bandwagon revolving around Bioware hate, largely headed by Black Isle fanboys infuriated by the series’s shift away from the Baldur’s Gate style that was promised, and Witcher/Obsidian fanboys trying to make their game/company look better. And yes, it’s hard to find a more hateful, elitist, and half-mad group of gamers then RPG fans.
But there’s a lot of layers to this. Very few RPGs are made compared to other genres, and most of them simply are not as involving and sophisticated as games made ten-fifteen years ago. Too many devs spout the dreaded “We want the >popular FPS< playerbase", and too often this is followed up with neutering or removing the RPG elements. When people call bullshit on announcements and hype (lets see if I remember for those listed… open world = ripping off the more popular and successful Skyrim, armor customization = shoving awful impractical armor designs down our throat) it's not because they want to nitpick, it's because the nitpicks are all too often true.
If people have legit grievances that are being ignored or barely pandered to, and they can't outvote success, and success creates further stagnation or downgrading, then they get frustrated. And frustrated people have breaking points.
Lets look at something else. The bloated, useless, impotent, and very stupid Occupy Wall Street, which achieved absolutely nothing beyond hurting legit businesses and turning a section of several cities into a garbage dump. I didn't happen because people thought it would work, it happened because they broke. They're suffering, Wall Street and the Gov don't care, and there are no forms of protest that produce results. So they went on a raging spree. That's what happened here. After years of being mistreated and ignored RPG fans broke and went on a twitter war against some small-time dialogue writer.
So yeah, companies are asshats, gamers are turning into asshats, and the end result of all that is the further spiraling quality of games. And I dunno about you, but that makes me mad.
It’s still no excuse.
For one thing, comparing the video game industry – an industry that exists solely because we spoiled Americans have way too much spare time on our hands and way too much money in our pockets – to legitimate economic oppression strikes me as a bit over-the-top. While I certainly don’t agree with Occupy’s methodologies – or even their ideologies in some cases – I can at least sympathize with some of their concerns: we’ve been in an economic recession since the Bush administration, and things don’t seem to be getting any better any time soon. Like with the video game industry, some of their concerns – particularly when it comes to technology and other luxuries – are way overblown. But at least some of them are genuinely concerned with real necessities – food, clothing, shelter, being able to make some sort of living in a faltering economy and such. By comparison, technology seems trivial, or at least should if people were thinking straight.
Video games are luxuries, people, not something worth getting this upset about. Being upset because game designers aren’t giving you exactly what you want – right now there’s a guy in Iran about to be executed because he refused to renounce his religion and become a Muslim. Being upset because a video game company is trying to sift through the sheer cacophony of contradictory voices of gamers while trying to decide how to design their next game – I know of a family that have been living in a FEMA trailer since this time last year because their house was destroyed in a flood. Perspective, people.
And using your own example of Occupy: how much did all that rage really accomplish toward addressing their real frustrations? Somewhere between nil and zilch. So how much do you think gamers breaking and acting like buttholes will accomplish? Also somewhere between nil and zilch.
So what recourse do we have? First, as they constantly tell me, you can attract more flies with honey than vinegar. Although why anyone wants to attract flies is beyond me. But the point is this: be civil and explain your issues in a polite manner. That will accomplish far more than name-calling and trolling.
Second, don’t buy their products. If they really want your dollars that badly, sooner or later they will do what they need to get them. If they don’t want your dollars, then no amount of griping will change their mind. Instead, turn your funds toward other avenues that will provide you with enjoyment. True, electronic RPG’s may suck these days, but you could always buy some D%D books and go the paper-pencil-dice route.
Third, get involved in the gaming business. Become a designer/writer/tester. That way, you can actually become one of those insiders who can then listen to customers and try to give them what they want as best you can. If you have a perfect ideal in your mind as to what a game should be, you can help bring that ideal into reality. Heck, become successful enough at it, you might even put some of the people you don’t like out of business.
Here’s one: don’t buy their games.
Get this: the gaming industry is a free market. If you don’t like a company or their products, no one is forcing you to buy them. So if BioWare’s products are so substandard, then why waste money on them to start with? Why not direct your money toward games you actually enjoy?
The point isn’t just about voting with your wallet – it’s also about making smart buying decisions that are going to result in your own personal enjoyment.
Case in point: I hate most sports games like Madden and such. So instead of protesting EA for continuing to crank out sports titles I hate, I just make a point not to buy sports titles. Problem solved – life continues – everybody’s happy.
The fact that their games do sell demonstrates one thing: that not everyone agrees with your assessment of their quality, either of the company or of their products. If buying or refraining from a game is voting with your wallet, then just admit you’re being outvoted and move on.
Before i begin:
http://images.encyclopediadramatica.ch/2/20/Rules_of_the_internet1.png
i refer you to rules 12, 14, and 20 of course, but here’s the main rule you need to learn
“06: Anonymous can be a horrible, senseless, uncaring monster.”
Replace anonymous with “Gaming culture” and you finally will understand something here.
Gamers are fed up with people who go “ewww, gameplay” as writers, indeed, half of the retarded bullshit you see in a video game’s story (FF7′s lack of revives for aeris anyone?) is due to a steadfast refusal to understand and appreciate the gameplay mechanics of a video game. And quite frankly if all you care about is writing stories, then you should be writing a novel, or a script for a movie, or a scenario for a pen and paper game, not writing for video games.
Now on to Jennifer’s current situation.
We’ll start off by pointing out that A. Dragon age 2 had some of the shallowest characters in gaming to date, and B. this woman was partly responsible for that. However, the reason she is considered a “Cancer” has little to do with what she has actually done, and more to do with what she represents, a writer who’s position is NOT tied to the quality of their work.
She reacts as if all the people who disagreed with her were worthy of only contempt (granted, some left vile comments, but A. rules 14 and 20, and B. there were PLENTY of posts that were only leveled at her abilities as a writer.) Seeing as how Bioware is currently going through a PR problem of completely not caring about it’s fan’s or their concerns (The empty promises of Mass Effect 3, the way they blow off people who criticize Dragon age 2 as evidenced by them banning people who posted Video Reviews tearing the game asunder.) This isn’t helping matters at ALL.
All of this, while the last man with any REAL talent on Bioware’s writing staff (drew karpyshyn) leaves bioware to pursue other endeavors, and in the background the completely bitter aftertaste of the Mass effect 3 demo still fresh in their minds. Then comes this woman who’s said some controversial things that fit in with what i was talking about (writers acting like gameplay just gets in the way of things) and see an easy target to vent at.
After holding the “moral high ground” (WAAAAAH what did i do?) She reacts as if all the people who disagreed with her were worthy of only contempt (granted, some left vile comments, but A. rules 14 and 20, and B. there were PLENTY of posts that were only leveled at her abilities as a writer.) Seeing as how Bioware is currently going through a PR problem of completely not caring about it’s fan’s or their concerns (The empty promises of Mass Effect 3, the way they blow off people who criticize Dragon age 2 as evidenced by them banning people who posted Video Reviews tearing the game asunder.) This isn’t helping matters at ALL.
I neither condemn or condone what was done, what i will say is this, when you are on the internet, you accept that you will interact with some of the lowest forms of human life we have to offer. They WILL do unspeakable things to you just because they can. If you aren’t able to handle that, you might want to rethink joining in the closest thing we have to a global mind.
The fact that Robert makes no attempt at all to figure out WHY people are angry, makes me conclude that he really didn’t research this incident. And thus, misses the point.
yeah skip over the 3rd major paragraph, the edit button isn’t letting me fix it, it’s not supposed to be there
I’m sorry that I can downrank you only once.
and i’m sorry you and the rest of this forum automatically assume that anyone who doesn’t goes “RAWR HOW DARE YOU ATTACK THIS WOMAN!!!!!11111″ is a monster who is just looking at this from a standpoint of cold objectivity
Everyone has their own opinions. Thumbing up or down doesn’t change that.
Oh I did my research, the point though is the “why” is irrelevant to the actions taken. You just don’t do this, plain and simple.
And honestly, we are better than those ridiculous rules of the internet, and we need to be because the outside world is watching us with disgust every time this happens.
Hear hear!
These so-called “rules of the internet” have absolutely no bearing on what is to be considered civil discourse by any stretch of the imagination. If anything these “rules” simply describe how the horrid backwash of the internet chooses to conduct its business, and reflects nothing of how human beings ought to interact in any medium of communication.
In society, you wear a mask to hide what you truly think, because society would condemn you for a lot of what you honestly believe. The internet is a place to take off the mask and let your “true self” run free. The “rules” are in place to aid in understanding how things work on this “series of tubes”
What’s funny, is that last time we used “civility” against Fox and others we always just came out the other side no better then when we went in, but when we used the internet to “harass” the person who said that Mass effect was a “sex simulator” she recanted and gave us insight into the practices of various news organizations.
and i say you haven’t done your research because you include a quote by Jim Sterling, which if you had bothered to do research you would realize that he has defended this practice in the past
http://www.escapistmagazine.com/videos/view/jimquisition/3799-Fight-in-the-Name-of-Childishness
You want to have moral outrage, fine, but to say that an action is always wrong is naive at best. If i told you that i murdered a man you would probably condemn me, but what i told you that man abused his wife, murdered 3 people in cold blood and got off scott free, and lead a lynch mob against a homosexual? you probably wouldn’t judge me that harshly would you?
I’ll admit, the comments with regards to Jennifer’s weight, and gender bother me. But Bioware is using this flame war as an excuse to censor any dissent against Jennifer’s writing style (and make no mistake, there are PLENTY of people who only complained about that) under the gise of protecting her against “harassment”
I don’t watch Jim’s stuff because I never cared for it, the only reason I have him quoted is because for once he said something I can agree with. You also need to keep in mind that video was made in 2011, peoples opinions can change over time.
Your example is also a false argument because its dealing with a more horrendous crime. But it doesn’t matter, he should go to jail for it anyway. Doesn’t matter if he murdered a guy who killed three people, in the real world he would get no leniency, barring a police officer or public figure or something. Actions are morally gray based on our perspective, but some actions are not justified, irregardless of why we do it or how we may see it.
Call it naive if you like, I call it living in the real world. If she was on the street and had twenty or so people verbally assaulting her like this, why can’t she say something back? Or even better, the gamespot article says they should actually bring them to court for this. This is the problem with the entitlement, in the end the fanbase brings it upon themselves and makes everyone look bad. Kind of like how the OWS protests went during the winter in New York.
And don’t give me a line that its an excuse to ban people against her writing style. While I hate the BWS forums for the high-panic mode they are always in, sometimes there is decent discussions going on.
http://social.bioware.com/forum/1/topic/141/index/9382456
The vitriol against Hepler is definitely over the line, and it went over that line long ago. I still don’t think she is a good writer, mind you, but only hateful writers deserve that kind of treatment, not simply bad writers.
I’d personally rephrase your first statement to be “I wonder sometimes why I proudly proclaim myself to be a fan of BioWare in public”, because of both the rampant, overblown sense of entitlement and control the fans have and the sometimes questionable things the company does.
How fitting, I personally believed plot and writing were the best parts of Dragon Age, and thought it’s combat that dragged them all down too. I wouldn’t mind if it was a visual novel equivalent with little to no boring MMO-like (only single player) fights.
Fuck fanboys. As a casual 4chan user let me tell you – 4chan is usually more mature than this.
But yeah, welcome to the internet. Anonymity plus audience means raging assholes will be at their loudest. Tools like twitter which let them address whomever they want directly only make it worse.
So, once again, fuck fanboys. The second worst thing you can do is to argue with them. The worst thing you can do is to listen to them.
Is it wrong of me to think that I just don’t care anymore? They’ll fade into the obscurity of their own sad, pitiful little insignificant lives soon enough anyways. They were gamers? So? I’m a human. Does that stereotype me with the rest of society. Them being gamers has no baring on the fact that they are the anal refuse of human society…There simply is no correlation outside of the fact that the topic in question was about a game basically.
There are few things I am a firm believer in though, one of those things just so happens to be karma. What goes around, comes around. The anonymity of the internet may hide the face from retribution but at the end of the day, no one escapes the karma they bring upon themselves.
People like that, the trolls, trogs, and scum of the net…hiding in a basement beneath the screen while waiting for the next victim? Thinking to themselves that they have some sort of gateway to the rest of the world in front of them with infinite possibilities? …Yeah, no.
News flash, they mean nothing. They are nothing. I often think to myself that’s why they shout and scream so hard, a desperate cry, a need for attention, anything to add something, anything to their own pitiful non-existence in this great, wide world we live in. It doesn’t. It just adds to the pile of the proverbial feces and excrement that will be left when they pass on, a pitiful, forgotten speck in the annuls of history.
I don’t know Hepler myself but I do know that what happened is just an insult to the gaming community. Shame on them for doing this. If you don’t agree or like what she writes, fine, but don’t throw it out like this! Thats just… ugh.
This is why I tend to never admit I’m a gamer girl. 1) They expect me to look like a hot model and 2) They expect me to be in the basement with a terrible temper who trolls things as a hobby.
Great article, Robert.
Ad Hominem attacks are pathetic if only because they clearly indicate the offender’s inability to offer a rational argument or legitimately prove a point.
A person only deserves an Ad Hominem attack if they truly deserve it (ie: Hitler), whom some of the offenders appear to admire.
Beneath the vitriol, what’s truly sinister is these miscreants’ belief that they are entitled to whatever kind of video game their whim desires, and that other human beings like Ms. Hepler are merely chattel whose exist to serve and carry out these whims. It’s this sense of entitlement to objects at the expense of others that engenders such hatred; growing out of the idea that we are our brother’s keeper, these awful people on twitter conclude that Bioware, specifically Ms. Hepler, has committed a morally condemnable act by not fulfilling their every desire.
What else could motivate such venomous impunity?
As a rationally self-interested person, I don’t believe that Bioware is my keeper. I don’t believe that Bioware or Ms. Hepler have acted immorally by not making Dragon Age II as good as Origins. I just shrug and pick up another game.
After all, the world of gaming is a deep sea, and there are always more fish out there waiting to be caught…
Girl, why don’t you make visual novels then? Seems more like your sort of thang.
Also, there is no “us” in gamers, atleast not anymore. There are too many types of gamers for us to be put in a single category, and I don’t think the Angry Bird crowd even care of how this “ruins their reputation” because it doesn’t, as they didn’t say it. I didn’t say it, and if you are complaining on those who did, you didn’t either. I am not offended by this because I am supposedly part of a group who attacked a person on something trivial. Instead, my already low level of respect for the human race as a whole has gone further down the drain, as it does on daily basis. Status quo.
Also, if you lack an argument and downvote, your penis gets smaller.
“Also, if you lack an argument and downvote, your penis gets smaller.”
… great. Now a new age version of Pinocchio where exactly that happens is stuck in my head.
Downvoting is easy; a cut-and-run type of action. I just ignore it because all it does is mold certain opinions, and alienate others.
Welcome to the internet? Really there ought to be a guide that comes with computers that teaches basic things like “Don’t feed the trolls”. The more you fight back the more enjoyment they get out of the exchange. And I believe that “the cancer that is killing X” is a common saying among 4chan so perhaps this is some coordinated troll campaign and this is a situation far different from the usual player feedback. Just block, ignore, whatever, and move on.
I keep reading this article and the only thing I can think of is that people who’d do this are the same that think teabagging is a legitimate way of greeting someone… Prolly need to stop trying to read thought provoking arguments at 5am…
But seriously, I might disagree with the woman, but who in their right mind would ever think something good would come out of this? Sad part is… there’s a very interesting conversation hidden somewhere under that pile of hate. Interactive novels breaking into the western would be interesting to observe for example. No, I myself wouldn’t be interested, but I do know people that would. Just one argument off the top of my head, really…
Heard about this earlier today, and (not making a generalization here, but…) this is the main reason I stopped hanging out in Bioware’s forums, too many people like this were there almost too eager to start a flame war at the drop of a hat. I’d love to rail against these entitled crybabies, but I honestly lost the energy for that long ago. Instead, I urge anyone to take a look at the segment of this video beginning at 2:50; it pretty much sums up what should be the general feeling towards this:
http://www.escapistmagazine.com/videos/view/the-big-picture/4969-Words-for-Nerds
I still go to BSN but I intentionally avoid 90% of the forums and polls for the very reason that there is always a shit storm going on.
Whether you like someone’s work or not, or agree with someone’s opinion or not, doesn’t mean you should personally attack someone. I may not agree with everything Ms. Hepler said nor do I like all of her writing contributions to Dragon Age: Origins or Dragon Age II; but I absolutely will not threaten her with physical harm or criticize her looks or personal beliefs. Was it really necessary for people to do this to her? Why can’t we just be civil and respect each others’ opinions or professions?
I agree that it’s shit like this that gives FOX News and Jack Thompson fodder for portraying the typical gamer. It is also a shame though that Jennifer and even some of the staff at BioWare are falling into the trap by lashing out at the haters, but I don’t blame them for it. They are quite visibly upset over this ordeal and I can only imagine how Ms. Hepler is feeling right now.
If you don’t agree with something, that’s completely fine. You are free to disagree along with stating why you disagree. But please, don’t attack someone for not sharing the same views as you or anyone else. And just because it’s the internet doesn’t mean you are entitled to attack someone because you’re not saying it to their face. Words hurt a lot, more than a lot of people realize.
Also to add onto this, I remember Spoony saying in one of his old V-logs that in the end it really boils down to what kind of gamer are you. So Jennifer Hepler doesn’t like certain games, gameplay, or genres. As Robert pointed out, it does seem that she enjoys the type of games that place more emphasis on story than combat and gameplay. For certain games and genres I will admit to appreciating the story and characters over the gameplay. And there are just some series or genres that I completely avoid because they don’t interest me at all. I can also ignore weak plots and characters if the gameplay is really good and exciting. That’s just the type of gamer I am. I know there are a lot of people who won’t agree with me on certain things, and I’m fine with that. To each is their own.
I think we should all just learn to let thing go. I mean is it really worth attacking someone like this for what for having an different point of view than you in the end your actions will make us look bad.
She’s, in my opinion, an awful writer. However, the verbal abuse she had to endure wasn’t justified on any level. One must not forget that it is just the small, but vocal group of people that behave this way and the old generation of politicians and general population will soon be gone and this witch hunt of gamers will be over. We’ll find someone to start a witch hunt for.
I am glad I didn’t write this article, because I could never have been as nice/constructive with it. My identity as a gamer was really hurt over this clusterfuck. I have nothing nice to say about anyone who was involved.
I also quite frankly don’t get the outrage. I understand certain things people freak out about even if I am not bothered. This one was just petulant children going after a woman for no reason. So she may not be the quintessential gamer….SO THE FUCK WHAT?!?!?! If we found out that Martin Scorsese loves making movies, but hates watching them would Goodfellas [or insert your own favourite Scorsese movie here] be any less of a good movie?
This was an absolute disgrace of the gaming community and it really pissed me off.
Thank you, Robert. I was unaware of this insane shit-storm until yesterday, and I was disgusted by the idiocy and bile directed towards Ms. Hepler. It’s nice to see some reason cut through this nonsense.