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[Dr. Claus]

Sophia Narwitz recently wrote an article and RT.com and posted a video version for those who wish to listen. In it, she discusses the current issues ongoing with the gaming space, the toxicity that comes from it, and the failures of the past in trying to hold gaming journalism accountable. She ends off with:

As it currently stands, mainstream journalists are far too comfortable ruining lives, pushing lies, and slandering others. They trashed Tim Soret for his milquetoast personal opinions and then celebrated when his game experienced developmental hardship. They tirelessly work to gatekeep and/or fire writers who express opinions that run counter to theirs. Right now they are labeling Troy Leavitt as ‘alt-right’ even though he so clearly is not. They protect their own friend who legitimately lied about transphobic abuse at the hands of a comedian on stage. They don’t hold their buddy Zoe Quinn to account even though she scammed people out of $85k. They dig through tweets to create controversies even when some of their closest allies have a history of throwing slurs. They chase after developers and try to ruin their careers for the most minor of slights, referring to them as bigots over huge misunderstandings. They cancel people for jokes even though their allies have made ones in poor taste too. They maintain no accountability within their own ranks. And the list goes on and on.

What are your thoughts on this, GAF? Do you think she has a point? Do you think she is being overly dramatic? Do you think she is on the right path?

Personally, I have to agree with her wholeheartedly. The gaming industry and the clique of journalists have created a hostile environment where you have to walk on eggshells or fear that your life will be ruined. Even something as minor as discussing whether or not something like authenticity in a game based around World War 2 or wanting to discuss a game about bloody wizards in school can have you shouted down, banned, and ostracized from communities for "misogyny", "bigotry" and other nonsensical accusations.

What I do disagree with is that we need a "gamergate 2.0" or a movement akin to it. What we need is just to make voices heard and stop providing these types with money from games they produce or clicks to their site. If folks who stop giving attention to the Schreier's and Alexander's of the world, they wouldn't be hired and wouldn't continue to enforce their views in the space. As with any company/corporation - they go where the money is.

Source: After Harry Potter game developer gets trashed for not being SJW enough, it's clear: We need GAMERGATE 2.0
Video: Why gaming needs a new consumer revolt

 

[Mr Hyde]

I just ignore big parts of the gaming media. I don't read their reviews. I don't click on their videos or links. I don't listen to their podcasts. I don't participate in the discussion around them.

They don't have anything remotely interesting to offer, whether it be their opinion, political stance or their knowledge around games. I have nothing to learn from these people.

 

[AV]

Just support the good content and stop paying for the bad content. Install an ad blocker and don't give the shitty sites clicks.

There's a good reason Colin Moriarty became wildly successful after leaving KF, meanwhile Kotaku UK is gone. Money talks. Vote with your wallet.

 

[GymWolf]

I just ignore them all together, they have nothing interesting to say.

 

[STARSBarry]

Quite simply I don't really engage anymore as I have written it off as pointless. Let them get on with it, il watch YouTube content creators who's tastes mostly line up with mine in terms of reviews.

I find I am playing more and more indie games rather than AAA which is where a large portion of these "issues" tend to be focused.

I would also shout out that I have enjoyed a fair few indie titles that have a social justice thrust, if only because they don't feel like tacked on pandering and rather a story the creator wanted to tell with those themes in mind, it makes a huge difference. It's the fact the community demands that only these sort of games should exist, and AAA should morph into them I take issue with.

 

[Guilty_AI]

i pretty much ignore them at this point, but i'm not going to pretend they do no harm with the shit they pull.

 

[Guilty_AI]

though, being real, this is a problem with journalism as a whole rather than just gaming

 

[Orta]

They're just typical millennial tossers. Marking games down because they are too hard, not inclusive, historically inaccurate, etc. Fuck off you cunts, at the end of the day they're pixels on a screen for Christ sake.

Remember the established games journalists from the 80's & 90's. They were so passionate about games, they were basically us. And their personality really shone throughout the pages of the magazines they wrote for. I'm speaking as a reader of C&VG, Mean Machines, Sega Saturn Magazine, etc. Those of you who read them too will know exactly who I'm referring to.

 

[reksveks]

Rt.com is the source here.... Running in the opposite direction

 

[brian0057]

GamerGate 2.0: Electric Boogaloo.

 

[TVexperto]

I mean just look at what Schrier is doing. His articles are so barebones and so short I really wonder how he earns his paycheck by writing 4 short articles a month. He is probably too busy blocking everyone he disagrees with on twitter.

 

[makaveli60]

Yeah, get rid of evil sjw scumbag terrorists and start hiring real gamers then I might return to them.

 

[AV]

Rt.com is the source here.... Running in the opposite direction

... The "source"? Of what news? Which part of what was written is factually wrong?

 

[TheGejsza]

The problem with far-leftism in game journo is that when something "LGBT+ progressive" does not add anything to the game or just not working withing the story/context/gameplay and someone tries to point that out (or even worse - criticize it), that criticizing person is being calling a BAD PERSON becouse he is "against" LGBT and minorities. Just a label is put on that person. In hollywood and movie industry its even bigger problem.

So poorly executed LGBTQ+/miniorities themes are now geting too much of a FREE PASS because ppl are afraid to cirticize it because if they do, they are labeled as a "bad person". So if someone don't know how to write/create interesting character they just do a "chick with a dick" and then they are safe from critics, thus making the whole problem bigger. This is fucked up.

 

[Puskas]

Ignore and make them irrelevant. Just laugh at the clowns and their mentally ill supporters.

 

[Dr. Claus]

They're just typical millennial tossers. Marking games down because they are too hard, not inclusive, historically inaccurate, etc. Fuck off you cunts, at the end of the day they're pixels on a screen for Christ sake.

Remember the established games journalists from the 80's & 90's. They were so passionate about games, they were basically us. And their personality really shone throughout the pages of the magazines they wrote for. I'm speaking as a reader of C&VG, Mean Machines, Sega Saturn Magazine, etc. Those of you who read them too will know exactly who I'm referring to.

Those were good days. Folks were truly passionate about the industry. Why they loved the games they loved, why they were frustrated and what games they were excited for. It was addictive seeing all these folks so hyped up in the industry. If they had political views, they weren't important to state and they kept them to themselves as it should be. Now so many are bending over backwards to push their socio-political views and come across as slacktivists in their content. I used to enjoy folks like The Completionist, but even when discussing something as simple as Gex 2, he had to cry about how the jokes were harmful/hateful and have his head far up his own arse.

I blame so much of this change on social media platforms. The hatred, vitriol, and absurdity of this social media-influenced landscape we find ourselves in is frustrating. Doesn't help when we have folks R reksveks promote this sillyness with the childish tribalism instead of actual discussion.

 

[KiNeMz]

Well it's now journalistgate. Gatekeeping their club. This is the real gatekeeping that cropped out of it. They always project.

Start a movement called
it's ok to be a real gaming journo.

It's ok to be good at games

If a gaming journalist ever calls a game bigoted, call it a dog whistle to raise their followers to assualt Devs.

 

[turtlepowa]

Just ignore them, i don't give a shit about what they say.

 

[Aurelius]

I choose to ignore them. I mostly get my gaming news and opinions from this site, YouTube and friends. Nobody I know actually reads reviews anymore. Only by generating rage clicks do these people still make money.

What gets annoying is when those woke politics of forced diversity start to impact media that I enjoy. Although in games it is less annoying than in TV shows or movies since it usually involves some optional character creations options you can ignore. Pandering garbage like TLOU2 I happily leave on the shelves.

 

[Inviusx]

They are eating themselves alive while trying desperately to cling to an ever shrinking peace of pie. Gaming journalism will die at the hands of enthusiast communities on YouTube and streaming services.

Hell even the studios prefer to deal with their fans directly now instead of passing off news to the press.

Its all sinking before our very eyes but the end won't be pretty.

 

[drganon]

Modern games journalism is a sad joke. The sooner the likes of polygon, kotaku, vg247 and the rest of em go under the better.

 

[dyergram]

The only decent stuff I’ve seen is edge and sacred symbols I’m sure there’s other stuff that’s ok but I just try and ignore everything else. That Harry Potter stuff the other day was so pathetic a nothing story then every website writes the same story and every dweeb on twitter has exactly the same opinion. Thank god wb just ignored them I hope the game turns out great and sells a shit load just so these fake activists have to ignore it.

 

[cormack12]

To be honest, this shit will always happen. What's more disconcerting is the studio's listening.

Most of these people who are frustrated people who can pen 1000-2000 words of coherent English and can't understand why they aren't novelists or writing for the NYT. They want to use something like the game industry as their 'breakout' moment because they are really an undiscovered writing prodigy. So they try to make what they are writing about sound so much more important and profound. It reads like diary entries in most cases. And even worse you can see they've latched onto something and worked backwards to manufacture an article from it. It's amateur 101.

It will all come full circle. There's only so much you can do before people start turning away and going elsewhere. The only way to differentiate yourself from the youtubers is credibility, honesty and scoops. And they are doing a laughably terrible job of thinking having crowd sourced 600 word articles apepar under a known web banner makes that true.

 

[ZehDon]

The only revolt needed is apathy. They post click bait and run the outrage circus because it’s what generates the most clicks. Stop reading it, and they’ll have to find another angle to generate the traffic. Read and share the good stuff, ignore the bad stuff. Anything else is just repeating what they’ve done: trying to cancelling people who cancel others is just perpetuating cancel culture.

 

[Hendrick's]

The first one worked out so well that I don't see why not.

 

[Stray Parts]

Until average person stop reading these sites then they will continue their petty and spiteful practices.

The woke militant control higher education and the social strata of games journalists is indoctrinated in woke ideology, (critical race theory, inter-sectionalism, language is violence etc) and from that comes the cancel culture and desire to supress speech they hate (not hate speech) in violation of former liberal principles (woke ideology is anti-liberal, not many realise).

Until the woke movement is confronted at the education level then nothing will change and it will take many years to undo the damage. in the UK the government has stated to make some changes at the university level, at lot the far left woke game news outlets have UK writers.

In USA woke ideology is main stream in many areas including government so there is always that to contend with, though lawsuits are bring brought again it so hopefully they prevail and curve its spread.

 

[Majukun]

can't you just, like, ignore them?
haven't read an article from a videogame website in the last 8 years give or take

 

[Dr. Claus]

can't you just, like, ignore them?
haven't read an article from a videogame website in the last 8 years give or take

I would generally agree. However, the issue is that on an individual level, this doesn't change anything. These regressive minded folks will still have pull within the industry and continue to exert that power to make harmful changes to the games we love. If we can make this change at a societal level, things would improve tremendously.

 

[Hypereides]

While its easier to ignore them, and what they say, its harder to ignore that they occupy influential positions. They obviously know this. I quite frankly think they're abusing their power and they've misused it one too many times.

So, yeah. I lean towards their integrity should be thoroughly grilled.

 

[Arkam]

Gaming journalism is so terrible. Has been for many many years. One outlet reports something and all the rest shit out a damn near copy/paste articles of their own. It’s embarrassing how they chase clicks. Zero Shame.

Then there is the fucking opinion pieces all the time. Sorry bro, I don’t care what you think about how a studio operates. You are not a game developer, you don’t know what you are talking about. Anyone who would talk to you is clearly someone you shouldn’t be listening to.

Then there is this recent reliance on tweets as the basis of an article. All media outlets have fallen into this stupidity. Make a claim and then go find a half dozen randos on Twitter to bolster your argument.

I think it’s time we (metaphorically) kill off these superfluous “expert” jobs as they are proving they are not in anyway needed. Regular folks can do it themselves without the baggage.

 

[FreedomOfSpeech]

Anyone who talks about 'allies' can be ignored, for they have been soaked in woke and therefore only push agenda.

 

[Reality Czar]

Indeed. GG never solved anything and things have only gotten worse. Shit stirrers like Jason Schit have only gained in power. Something needs to be done.

 

[Raekwon26]

Just ignore them.

These 'people' are pathetic. Everything apart from playing the games in gaming seems real shitty.

 

[Valonquar]

Kotaku's layout looks like someone sprayed shit all over the screen, and that's before you start reading.

 

[ReBurn]

I don't read opinion or analysis from journalists. How they feel about anything is completely irrelevant.

 

[HTK]

I've given up on gaming news media awhile ago, most of it is just clickbait trash.

 

[Bumblebeetuna]

I thought this would be about shilling for obviously shit games like Avengers. We should have shunned most journalists after that fiasco. This is just more cancel culture bullshit zzzz

 

[worldwithpyramids]

gaming journalism lol

 

[ScaryBrandon]

Modern games journalism is a sad joke. The sooner the likes of polygon, kotaku, vg247 and the rest of em go under the better.

But they are like a nasty weed. I can't get rid of them and when I do they always seem to come back. They are in my phone feed, browser feed, windows feed and even pop up first on my google searches.

I never get articles or videos from sources that I do follow and watch. They are promoted by big tech, the whole thing is like a cartel.

 

[Umbasaborne]

Games journalism is all But dead. The only people out there doing actual quality investigative games journalism still are jason schreier, and the folks over at venturebeat, klepek did good work as well. Most of them have now turned into “influencers” or mouthpieces who suck on publishers teets for lucrative sponsorships.

 

[BaneIsPain]

Gaming journalism is a joke. Feel free to ignore most of the time.

 

[Arimer]

I would think the revolt would be just don't go to their articles/websites at all and write other places that use them as reference to tell them you don't approve. When they've gone from games journalism, to having a bias, to now straight up political activism then their time and usefulness has come and gone.

 

[Imru’ al-Qays]

The problem has spread far beyond games journalism. This is deterioration of standards is inevitable under capitalism: you see it everywhere from hobbyist publications to the erstwhile pillars of the media like the NYT. The news is controlled by algorithms and oligarchs, we're just along for the ride. If you want to change that, you'll need to join a political organization that fights for workers' rights in order to rebalance the economy.

 

[Svengoolie007]

I'm reminded of the great game Kingdom Come: Deliverance, and how Giant Bomb just acted like it didn't exist. They never once mentioned it once it came out, even though it was the top seller on Steam. Why is that? Well, apparently because of the controversy of them not having black people in the game. The reason for that is that it is a realistic representation of medieval Bohemia. There weren't black people there. But that drew the ire of the left, because the developer wouldn't back down from that stance. Then they went through his Twitter history and found support for Trump, and it was game over. They were set on destroying the game and his career.

 

[Aion002]

Gaming journalists ideally should focus on things that actually matters for the industry, like: devs getting underpaid/overworked and shitty practices that fucks consumers... But that doesn't bring sponsors and the sjw mob, so they don't care.


There's no difference between most gaming journalists and influencers that are paid to promote stuff. They all follow guide lines from their sponsors and they all have their personal feuds.

 

[Evil Calvin]

Shouldn't this be a Resetera topic?

 

[Reality Czar]

I thought this would be about shilling for obviously shit games like Avengers. We should have shunned most journalists after that fiasco. This is just more cancel culture bullshit zzzz

How about Cyberpunk? If journalists were doing their damn job they would have demanded real footage. Or they would have pointed out that they had only seen PC footage, and maybe the hype train was out of control. Did any MSM journalist talk about Cyberpunk last gen performance prior to release? I didn't see a single one, despite all the constant discussion of the game. But they were happy to feed the public lies for months, hyping up a product they would not even investigate.

These people had all year to come up with that story. What were they focusing on instead? Tweets from years ago? The lack of some fringe trans character creator options? They didn't do their jobs.

None of the hundreds of AwArD WiNnInG JoUrNaLiStS investigated this at all. Why did nobody point out a lack of real previous gen footage? Oh, they were more than happy to give us stories about studio crunch. Just wait for disgruntled employees to email you a rant and your connections write the article for you. No need to actually investigate anything. Seriously, this was one of the biggest scandals of the year and... crickets??? Where is the "journalism" you phoneys?

Just utterly, utterly useless. I don't even hate read Kotaku anymore.

 

[Humdinger]

I don't think arguing with feminists or lefty progressive types is ever useful. It never goes anywhere. They don't deal in reason and truth. They deal in emotion, simplistic ideology, and public image.

So no, I don't think a revolt against game journalism is going to be helpful. When I see a broken system, I don't try to argue against it in order to reform it. I just walk away. In some cases, I might try to fight, but not in this case. Games journalism -- people with liberal arts degrees writing about videogames for a living (temporarily) -- is not a cause worth expending time, attention, or energy on. Let it fester in its own fetid pool of political correctness.

 

[harmny]

You are not paying attention. The problem is not about you personally ignoring gaming media. The problem is developers are literally getting canceled everyday for nothing and the journalists are constantly demanding studios to change things they don't like and they have to do it or they'll be the ones getting canceled.

However, this happens everywhere in america/uk not just gaming. Seeing it from the outside is pretty funny and sad. I don't think we can do a lot. It will continue getting worse and worse until it explodes and things go back to normal. Just be careful until then.

 

[Reality Czar]

When I see a broken system, I don't try to argue against it in order to reform it. I just walk away

If you want to be a coward, that's fine. You do you.