• Hey, guest user. Hope you're enjoying NeoGAF! Have you considered registering for an account? Come join us and add your take to the daily discourse.

Ion Fury devs patch out non-PC jokes and force all employees & contractors to undergo mandatory sensitivity training

brap

Banned
Over the weekend, developers at Voidpoint who made the recent throwback 3D shooter Ion Fury found themselves at the center of a firestorm of controversy. Like most indie developers, Voidpoint had a Discord for Ion Fury's development wherein developers of the game would have conversations with fans. Screenshots emerged on Friday wherein developers of the game would joke about subjects like gender identity and transgender people, suggesting that the latter are mentally ill for it.

After these screenshots hit social media and video game message board ResetEra, Ion Fury took a defensive tact by saying that the full context of the screenshots were missing. Upon investigating the Discord, which had not deleted anything as of Friday evening, it was not clear what context the Voidpoint developers were referring to. The developer's Twitter, which showed a number of public Favorites of similar viewpoints, reiterated that context was missing and stated that they did not understand how Twitter works.

Players then discovered that the game itself would feature some off-color jokes, like lotion that says "Ogay," likely wordplay on "Olay," and a developer message in an out-of-bounds area that uses a homosexual slur. The message stated "Heere's SECRET F**bag LAAWRAAH Unholy Fanfare."

"Members of Voidpoint’s Ion Fury team have made sexist and transphobic comments, and included homophobic language in Ion Fury," the statement sent to Game Informer reads. "We recognize these statements are insensitive, unacceptable, and counterproductive to causes of equality. We unequivocally apologize both for these comments and language as well as for any pain they have caused the gaming community, particularly women and members of the LGBTQ community. We take full responsibility for any damage that has been done to the relationships we've worked so hard to build.

"Moving forward, Voidpoint will institute a zero-tolerance policy for this type of language and all employees and contractors will undergo mandatory sensitivity training. As part of our efforts to contribute to the work that must be done to further support these communities, we are donating $10,000 from Ion Fury's release day proceeds to The Trevor Project. We are also patching Ion Fury ASAP to remove all unacceptable language."

 
Last edited:

Kagey K

Banned
Whats the point of even trying to make a funny or satirical game anymore? Too much bullshit to deal with because the internet has a giant collective stick up it's ass.

I'd love to see 3D realms take a shot a Duke Nukem trying to navigate this modern world, but I don't think they'd have the balls say some of the stuff that needs to be said.
 

McCheese

Member
Anti-PC content removed from Duke Nukem tribute game, what a fucking clown world this is.

Had a bunch of respect for whoever had the balls to defend themselves on Twitter before the upper management bent them over. Bet the bullies over on Resetera are smug about another victory over common sense.
 
Last edited:

Ivory Blood

Member
Anti-PC content removed from Duke Nukem tribute game, what a fucking clown world this is.

Had a bunch of respect for whoever had the balls to defend themselves on Twitter before the upper management bent them over. Bet the bullies over on Resetera are smug about another victory over common sense.
There was twitter defense from developers? Got some links? Just interested in seeing it.
 
Last edited:

Paracelsus

Member
Gaming took the route of wrestling: there wasn't anything more cool and testosterone-driven than it, now you have people actually excited for vanilla midgets like Johnny Gargano.
We don't need sensititvity training, we need bullying squads. I totally know how bad bullying can be, and we definitely need it, the lack of it is very much responsible for the current state of affairs.
 
Last edited:

brap

Banned
Gaming took the route of wrestling: there wasn't anything more cool and testosterone-driven than it, now you have people actually excited for vanilla midgets like Johnny Gargano.
We don't need sensititvity training, we need bullying squads. I totally know how bad bullying can be, and we definitely need it,. the lack of it is very much responsible for the current state of affairs.
We went from peak man to 15 lookin year olds dressing up in video game costumes and doing circus tricks in the ring.
 

Ivory Blood

Member
Wow, they are deleting all mentions of this from RPGCodex of all places. Never thought that cesspool would cave in.

Is GAF and 4chan are the only places left to actually speak your mind about it?

edit: as was already mentioned further in the thread - I was wrong - they simply cleaned the general thread about the game, and made a new one to discuss this. Just like we did it here on GAF.
 
Last edited:

Dada55000

Member
Looks like the review bombing on Steam has started in earnest. This whole thing is childish and stupid, across the board. There's no helping ResetEra, but try to be a bit more mature than them in your approach, guys.
You kidding? They got what they wanted. Evidently, it's the correct way to treat developers, they rewarded it once.
 
Last edited:

#Phonepunk#

Banned
so do we have any confirmation about what is getting patched outside of this one, poorly written article that says nothing specific?

"patch out all ____" WHAT? what are they patching out? ah, OP is an underwritten as this entire "controversy"

this just feels like reactionary shit swinging the opposite direction. are they removing the lotion and that one out of bounds texture? then who cares. are they removing all the jokes in the game? the article doesn't say either way, it's just there for clicks.

basically at this point the story is so unformed anyone can pretend it means whatever they want to imagine. the same people that hate REE made the game in the first place. lol don't be fooled into some lame reactionary stance to punish them. this is probably just the PR department issuing apologies to calm shit down.

also mandatary sensitivity training is like, a thing in every job ever. but yeah everything got to be hyperbolized in these culture wars. if you are boycotting this game, punishing the creators for how they are handling what is essentially a PR situation, then congrats, you are now on the same side of REE.
 
Last edited:

Ivory Blood

Member
I know; maybe I wasn't totally clear. I'm just saying, it's fine to be annoyed by this, and really... we probably should be. But we shouldn't be as shitty as Reset is in making our point.
How should we be making our point? It's not an ironic question or anything, I'm kinda at a loss here at what we, as customers, can actually do here, if we want to be heard.
 

Petrae

Member
Video games are dead, and overly-sensitive groups are collectively holding the murder weapon.

This is yet another reason why I’m retreating to retro, non-internet connected video games. They come from a time when developers could make pretty much any game they wanted, and people’s “fee-fees” weren’t hurt by it. Sure, there were times when video game violence was called into question, but those times were infrequent.

Now, any group of purportedly maligned individuals can posse up on social media, gain favor with the liberal/SJW-controlled “games press” group to get a wider platform... and POOF! Games get changed on the fly, followed by either “sensitivity” wastes of time or mass firing/exodus periods.

There’s no hope for the modern video game industry. None. Zero. Less than zero, actually. It will continue to be driven and governed by the overly-sensitive, who will constantly and aggressively demand that games be the way THEY want them to be. They’ve gained allies in all the right places to ensure compliance.

It’s sad to see the mass of quivering, spineless, soulless jelly that the video game industry has become, kowtowing to the minority that social media and “games journalists” have given unfortunate rise to.
 

Danny Dudekisser

I paid good money for this Dynex!
How should we be making our point? It's not an ironic question or anything, I'm kinda at a loss here at what we, as customers, can actually do here, if we want to be heard.

Tell the devs directly you don't like it, post on forums - the usual. As far as what you can do to fix it? Nothing. 3DRealms made their decision, and they're going to stick to it. What doesn't help is resorting to the same vitriol that Resetera and the usual suspects employee. Make your case for this being a bad decision, but be better than the other side.
 

crumbs

Member
Tell the devs directly you don't like it, post on forums - the usual. As far as what you can do to fix it? Nothing. 3DRealms made their decision, and they're going to stick to it. What doesn't help is resorting to the same vitriol that Resetera and the usual suspects employee. Make your case for this being a bad decision, but be better than the other side.

I agree with you for the most part, but the devs keep deleting all the threads on this topic over on the Steam forums, so users are going to find less agreeable ways to communicate.
 

JimmyRustler

Gold Member
Tell the devs directly you don't like it, post on forums - the usual. As far as what you can do to fix it? Nothing. 3DRealms made their decision, and they're going to stick to it. What doesn't help is resorting to the same vitriol that Resetera and the usual suspects employee. Make your case for this being a bad decision, but be better than the other side.
Sounds like a good idea.... oh wait, you can't. Take a look at the Steam forums mate. Threads and comments are being removed in lightspeed.
 

Ivory Blood

Member
Tell the devs directly you don't like it, post on forums - the usual. As far as what you can do to fix it? Nothing. 3DRealms made their decision, and they're going to stick to it. What doesn't help is resorting to the same vitriol that Resetera and the usual suspects employee. Make your case for this being a bad decision, but be better than the other side.
And if they delete any and all comments and threads on steam, their own discord and 3drealms forums? They don't even want your voice to be heard.

Sadly you are right that there is nothing that can realistically be done about it. So the only little bit of power people have - steam reviews and refunds is already being used.
 
Last edited:

Danny Dudekisser

I paid good money for this Dynex!
I agree with you for the most part, but the devs keep deleting all the threads on this topic over on the Steam forums, so users are going to find less agreeable ways to communicate.

At the same time, though, if the devs are deleting threads, they're seeing the message.
 

Dada55000

Member
so do we have any confirmation about what is getting patched outside of this one, poorly written article that says nothing specific?

"patch out all" WHAT? what are they patching out? ah, OP is an underwritten as this entire "controversy"

this just feels like reactionary shit swinging the opposite direction. are they removing the lotion and that one out of bounds texture? then who cares. basically at this point the story is so unformed anyone can pretend it means whatever they want to imagine.

lol, how about you try more than not at all to find out what happened before giving up and declaring superior neutrality, this happened like half an hour ago

here, bulletpoints:
- some dev said deciding your toddler is transgender and immediately starting pumping hormones is fucked up, and sjws in general suck in discord
- ree lost their shit, as the developer literally murdered transgenders and started to fish for boycott, further fueled by like 2 easter egg jokes in the game, which amounted to like 15 people reviewbombing the game, proving how worthless and small a minority they really are
- 3drealms cucked to absolutely nobody of value and clearly no actual threat to their bottom line, said they'd reeducate their employees that committed thoughtcrimes, remove the offensive content in the 90s nostalgiawank shooter and promised to donate 10k to a child mutilation organisation as an act of virtuesignalling
- ree is still not satisfied since thoughtcrime employees aren't fired, and normal people are shocked 3drealms/voidpoint decided to go out of their way to pander to the proven irrelevant 0.00X% pedoforum audience

C? not that hard
 
Top Bottom