excelsiorlef
Member
Wtf...
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Scumbags Harass Woman For Working On Mass Effect: Andromeda's Animations
- Thread starter fluffydelusions
- Start date
Wtf...
It was more of a rhetorical question, I understand capitalisms impact on business decision making. It's just indicative of the industry as a whole that it has to be really pushed for to see companies act benevolently towards the spaces they create.
JareBear: Remastered
Banned
Yea, this is undeniable fact. I guess I just always viewed being a gamer as the "anti-jock" mentality, if looking at it through a high school politics type lens, that the vast majority of gamers would be welcoming and accepting of anybody.
I know here will be exceptions, but I didn't think that GG people would have tens of thousands of followers backing them up. I figured they would be this super small, almost hard to notice minority who would get drowned out by all the non-hateful people anytime they tried to spout their crap.
I guess I shouldn't have even surprised that these people are gamers, but I am surprised that there are so many of them.
TetraGenesis
Member
You don't get it. Oh god, you don't get it at all.
Violence breeds violence. Lack of empathy and understanding breeds more of the same.
Hitting a child in disapproval does nothing to help them internalize concepts of empathy, understanding, kindness, and patience.
shawnbuddy
Member
Let's just burn it all down and start over.
TetraGenesis
Member
Do you even realize you're part of the problem saying things like this?
Lokimaru
Member
Well it thought me civility. What is civility but hiding what you really want to do from the people you really want to do it to. We all want to do or say bad things it's the fear of punishment (verbal, physical, emotional)that help keep us in check. Now take people who aready don't fear retribution and give the anonymity. It's why we're in this mess today.
Acerac
Banned
It's a real shame that so few major devs are willing to take a stand against people who act in this manner.
Poe's Law so hard in this thread.
Yep, and the industry is scared to death of upsetting the toxic group they nurtured. So we get nothing but milquetoast responses when this shit inevitably happens again.
It's known who some of these harassers are. EA should have their lawyers sue the shit out of them on behalf of their employee. They won't, but a response like that would go a long way towards shutting this vile behavior down.
broscientific
Member
Fuck that. You think the only thing that separates these twitter people and the rest of us is that they don't have the "civility" to keep it to themselves? Get a fucking grip.
Vigilant Walrus
Member
It's selection bias. An entire team works for years on these animations. If you wanted to give constructive critisticm, the ball is on the lead animator, the lead project designer and everyone doing hands on. This single woman(women) are not responsible for the shitty animations.
What happens is that you early on in the project you make a target renderer; A goal you set for yourself on how the game is supposed to look 3 years later when the game ships. Whatever happened, went through a lot of approval.
But here is what we know: MA:A seemed to have had a troubled development given the amount of talent who left the project; google Mass Effect leaving, and you'll see things like:
Weve learned that Casey Hudson, the former director on the entire Mass Effect series, has joined Microsoft Game Studios as creative director.
In a surprising announcement on Twitter, senior development director, Chris Wynn, announces his departure from BioWare and his work on Mass Effect Andromeda.
Chris Schlerf, who joined BioWare in late 2013 to take over the lead writing duties on Mass Effect: Andromeda, has announced on Twitter that he has left the studio, and is now working in the same capacity at Destiny developer Bungie.
Cameron Harris, a senior editor at Mass Effect developer BioWare, is leaving the studio next month, she announced on Twitter.
A recent twitter posting by BioWare writer David Gaider has revealed that the one-time Dragon age lore manager has left the RPG developer after 17 years.
There is no proper reason to say this isn't sexism. One woman doing animation is not responsible for this. And this bad animation work doesn't warrant personal attacks. Animation is hard and BioWare fucked up here. But we all know that this is due to poor management, and probably like with Dragon Age 2, a good timeframe and budget.
It's a surprise that the one area where the graphics are more important than anything else in a Bioware game, is so abysmal. Textures are insiginficant compared to the lack of reflection and shine in the characters dead eyes. The incompetent mo cap, the poorly drawn silhouettes and unappealing character designs.
My disappointment in this game is unreal. It's hard to me to divorce the fact that this game was shown publically not long ago. It feels almost like Bioware knew their game looked unfinished and decided to keep the games rough spot hidden in the marketing material so they could ride on the Mass Effect name one last time. Like with DA2, this feels like a half finished scam product.
These animations are not just bad, it's fucking terrible. Outrage is fine, but it should be constructive (personal attacks and insults do nothing to improve things and it hurts people who didn't fuck up on purpose) and concise.
It took a whole slew of animators to make this game. Trust me when I say that this woman had no real influence in the direction of this. This is a colossal fuck up. It has to be one of the largest fuck ups in recent memory, but it's on the studio and on EA. Not on some woman who did mocap.
Relevant article: http://www.eurogamer.net/articles/2017-01-08-new-years-resolution
Silver Arrows
Banned
Mate, screw off with this 'weaponized autism' shit. I'm autistic, and I'm certainly not the mouth breathing jackasses that you seem to want to lump us with.
I've been saying this for years. It's a conversation that should be had, but many, many people don't want to have because they know the answer is going to be a loss of certain freedoms the internet enjoys now.
TetraGenesis
Member
No. The problem is you were never taught why those things are wrong. Only that they are. In which case, your behavior is based on an ingrained system of fear and punishment. This is unhealthy and ineffective. You need to talk with children and listen to them so that they learn that talking and listening are the most vital elements of relationships and society. Then, when they're older, they'll do it naturally. They'll understand that hate and violence are wrong and more importantly they'll understand why.
Hitting is a short term solution with long term detrimental results.
This isn't just a matter of opinion. It's studied and researched. It's science.
I'm sorry that you may have been hit and led to believe it's acceptable.
No we all don't. I've never made a personal attack or used slurs. It's called empathy.
JareBear: Remastered
Banned
The more I think about I, I guess I'm just too old.
We used to have LAN parties where anybody and everybody was welcome. I mean seriously there was no such thing as "not invited." The bottom line is we knew that if the "cool kids" walked by and saw us we would get laughed at. But we would get laughed at together, and that made it easy to deal with. I think of going to Comic Con, going to conventions, hanging out at GameStop for the midnight release of Halo 2, I never ever saw any hatred directed at anybody. Everyone there, we were connected by the same passion and there was no judgment or elitism. Maybe it was happening and I am just too naive to have noticed.
It does seem, to me, that its just easier and more acceptable to be mean to people now. Which still kind of confuses me.
My mom is a very successful business professional. My entire life she made a 6 digit salary and worked longer hours than my dad. I guess I just didn't grow up in a house where women were any different from men.
I'm probably wasting my time worrying about it, because I can't make a difference. I'm a loser with 15 twitter followers. But I really hope that women in all industries are afforded the same professional courtesy as men, and when harassed like this I hope it taken serousioisky by the powers that be and not "brushed under the rug." I feel like someone huge in the gaming world needs to make a big statement against harassment in general, especially this kind of nonsense
We used to have LAN parties where anybody and everybody was welcome. I mean seriously there was no such thing as "not invited." The bottom line is we knew that if the "cool kids" walked by and saw us we would get laughed at. But we would get laughed at together, and that made it easy to deal with. I think of going to Comic Con, going to conventions, hanging out at GameStop for the midnight release of Halo 2, I never ever saw any hatred directed at anybody. Everyone there, we were connected by the same passion and there was no judgment or elitism. Maybe it was happening and I am just too naive to have noticed.
It does seem, to me, that its just easier and more acceptable to be mean to people now. Which still kind of confuses me.
My mom is a very successful business professional. My entire life she made a 6 digit salary and worked longer hours than my dad. I guess I just didn't grow up in a house where women were any different from men.
I'm probably wasting my time worrying about it, because I can't make a difference. I'm a loser with 15 twitter followers. But I really hope that women in all industries are afforded the same professional courtesy as men, and when harassed like this I hope it taken serousioisky by the powers that be and not "brushed under the rug." I feel like someone huge in the gaming world needs to make a big statement against harassment in general, especially this kind of nonsense
benicillin
Banned
The game has been developed over the course of 5 years - people leaving the studio (not even related to their work on MA:A) is to be expected. People leave their jobs all the time and turnover is normal and expected.
Lashley
Why does he wear the mask!?
Urgh. Are you fucking serious?
Pie and Beans
Look for me on the local news, I'll be the guy arrested for trying to burn down a Nintendo exec's house.
Good topic title using scumbags rather than the tiresome "lol gamers" rhetoric. Yes theres more of a crossover of social media internet denizen scumbags due to it all being tech based, but a culture at large gets to decide what defines them not lazy broadstroke blogging.
I wouldn't even go that far, i would say it's just being a decent person.
JareBear: Remastered
Banned
I couldn't agree more. I hope we see stronger action from big wigs on behalf of their employees one day
KimonoNoNo
Member
Gaming has been mass-market entertainainment for some time now.
Raylan Targaryen
Member
No, it won't. It's been like this for decades now and it won't change because everyone is too worried about the money so they won't take the necessary steps. For every human with empathy, there's 10 JonTron's out there. Companies are going to take their chance on the latter.
The fuck?
broscientific
Member
It sucks, because I'm sure people have done that and I can predict the reaction now: they get called a cuck or a white knight and turned on and harassed by these people too. That's why it's important to never stop calling people out on this shit, no matter what your position is. One day some of them will learn that they're all alone in their hatred.
This is absolutely disgusting but sadly I'm not even surprised that it happened (again!). Laughing at some goofy animations is all good by itself but once a discussion (spanning several web sites) reaches critical mass it can turn ugly real quick. These creep are always ready to be outraged, someone with enough twitter followers just has to light the match and point at a target. It's not really the fault of those who started the first threads or those having fun in them but it's why I try to stay away from them once they pick up speed. After a while I'm just adding noise.
This article is on point.
And 40 million followers who either partake or at best are willing to ignore their horrible views.
Vigilant Walrus
Member
I agree. You're right. My mind is simply trying to find connections on how this failure was possible. Mass Effect might be my favorite gaming series.
I don't care about graphics in the sense of post-processing marvel or the latest in hairworks.
I simply cannot understand the oversight at work here. Because it's not even about graphics really. The characters look dead and deformed. It's not just how they move and how they look. It's the simple things like having dead eyes with articulate shine and reflection (eyelight is basically 101). I don't see how it was possible that they eye tracking has ended up so disastrous.
I need to find out they fucked up this bad. Bioware more than anything is their characters. It's why you play their games. They don't have the best levels or explorable areas, the best combat, the best RPG elements. They don't have the best stories. All Bioware games are is their characters. Those are the ones that give weight and meaning.
I am flappergasted at this. Why would I give a fuck about the texture work of the ships or the pp work of the combat or the texture detail of the levels? You don't interact, build empathy or immersion with those things anywhere near as much as you stare the fucking characters right in the face. they build context, juxuedposition, world building, they give clues on game mechanic, narrative threads and they are the anchor. The trademark of Bioware itself is its conversation system.
Who the fuck wants to play a bioware game for their combat or for their levels? Characters are their standout feature, nothing else.
I'm salty as fuck :I
This isn't about not liking the game, but that we have professional harassers in gaming culture who will latch on to anything in order to rile up their followers and paint a target on someone who's a woman or a minority.
Pie and Beans
Look for me on the local news, I'll be the guy arrested for trying to burn down a Nintendo exec's house.
Learning that a game is made by people and not by a brandname is perhaps an important lesson to take out of this. Follow directors, art directors, talented engine people, etc, not labels or franchises.
You were correct in realising this project had a higher turnover than normal because I remember hearing about that throughout and warned as such a while ago. ME:A was cobbled together by amateurs and people new to the industry in a classic cash-grab while the real team are off making a new IP. Happens a lot in videogames and it always tarnishes a brand. Sonic Boom for instance was a recent big profile one.
They arent really gamers but people looking for opportunities to harass, i am not even sure they enjoy gaming, if it wasn't video games they would turn their hat eover cinema,books,anything else.
U am not sure Bioware can do much since harassment happenson twitter, even if they assumed people who harass have a bioware account, they would have to make sure ip matches(assuming twitter provides ips).
And since thosetweets can be from al over the world, that makes all this more complicated.
As old school as it looks, i would be for teaching morality at schol, basic and obvious things but that need to be said(like respect people)
U am not sure Bioware can do much since harassment happenson twitter, even if they assumed people who harass have a bioware account, they would have to make sure ip matches(assuming twitter provides ips).
And since thosetweets can be from al over the world, that makes all this more complicated.
As old school as it looks, i would be for teaching morality at schol, basic and obvious things but that need to be said(like respect people)
Mr. Mister
Member
My dude - it's a silly grindy RPG space opera with some buggy / janky animations. If it really bothers you this much I'd suggest finding another game to play or maybe a different hobby. Obsession to this level can't be healthy.
Internet Fuckwad Theory and safety in anonymity.
For certain situations and horrible Tweets/posts/whatever like these I would love for Twitter to be able to somehow coordinate with certain ISP's and reveal who exactly the user is who posted or said something horrible like that. So that persons girlfriend, wife, mother, friends, and employer know exactly what kind of person they are. People would keep themselves in check if there was a risk of being outed for saying these kinds of things.
For certain situations and horrible Tweets/posts/whatever like these I would love for Twitter to be able to somehow coordinate with certain ISP's and reveal who exactly the user is who posted or said something horrible like that. So that persons girlfriend, wife, mother, friends, and employer know exactly what kind of person they are. People would keep themselves in check if there was a risk of being outed for saying these kinds of things.
Heckler456
Banned
Man, if only actual cash-grabs were 100+hour RPG's with 1200 voiced NPC's and amazing multiplayer.
Silver Arrows
Banned
And yet it has been proven by Facebook, time and time again, that even with their names exposed into the open, you will still have people saying misogynistic, racist shit. So now you're back at square one.
internet fuckwad theory was disproven by their own authors. Anonymity doesn't matter, people will say and do vile shit even with their full name on display. Just look at the people responsible for this, the people associated with Gamergate, etc. Or look at the shit people post on facebook with their full name and picture about politics.
Anonymity doesn't matter.
Vigilant Walrus
Member
My anger is unfair and justified. And you're right- It's also premature. I'm just venting.
I've been on my soapbox long enough about MEA. Maybe some distance and then reevaluating when the game comes out will do me some good.
I really liked Dragon Age 2, Inquisition and Mass Effect 3- Because I got so much out of the characters. I didn't need them to be pretty. I found them interesting and I enjoyed talking to them whenever they had something to say. And besides the Witcher, I don't know of any games that allow me with a cinematic fixed camera angles to be able to do what Bioware games does.
The characters break the monotone gameplay. They are side characters and side arcs in of themselves. When the story in Mass Effect 3 went nowhere, I had the companions to tell compelling tales. When the main villain of Inquisition did nothing for me, I had characters like Dorian who had narrative structure I've never seen in a video game before. I've never played a video game where a character is being rejected by his evil father because he is gay- And it's so bizarre to see it play out in a fantasy setting. These characters were well designed and imperfect.
I try really hard, but it's really hard to imagine that Cora, Liam and the others will grow on me. I almost want to hate them.
But I guess it is possible. Games have won me over before. I guess it's possible I'll grow used to it, and come over at the other side just rolling with it. A measured response should reflect that.
In the end, the only one losing is people like me who cannot get over their hangups. The people who win this, are people who can get over the imperfections and still find enjoyment in the products and stories. Nothing is perfect, and the rest of us won't have better lives by complaining that the sky isn't always blue.
Complaining and being angry at how things should be, is only a byproduct of my own expectations and that is all on me.
So fuck you Walrus. You expectatious shit.
SmoothBrain
Member
I disagree.
At some point it gains a traction of it's own and degenerates to a simple "hate wave".
Colin Moriarty for example didn't just got criticized, at the end a news outlet said he resigned for a racist tweet against women (paraphrasing here). That even got defended here to some degree. Here on NeoGAF some said at one point "Fuck Colin Moriaty", while disassambling who he was following on twitter, going through all the stuff he ever said or wrote and even saying that Niel Druckmann should watch out who he goes to dinner with.
Of course, it's not completly comparable to the current situation as the actual origin for the outrage is different and - the more important factor - Colin isn't a woman. At least I don't think he identified himself as one. But it's still a good example how fast "valid criticism" turns to bullying.
A better example is Anita Sarkeesian, right after/with Zoe Quinn and Brianna Wu. With the ongoing gamergate affair, Anita became the next target for the "hate wave". People just got obsessed to disprove the points she made with her videos. Pointing out how she misrepresented games in her videos was something some people just had to do, just as they had to dig through old recordings of her, where she (probably, don't know if the videos were actually legit) said, that she doesn't even play games, questioning her actual credibility. I think Anita, Zoe and Brianna, as well as their family and friends, are still being harassed and threatend regularly.
So, "valid criticism" on social media has the tendency to degenerate very fast, as most of the participants probably believe they are JUST pointing out their targets mistakes/wrong doings/whatever. Other individuals take it a little bit farther and call the victim at work, while jerking off.
The political climate with Trump being president, a person who openly discriminates people for race, gender and disabilities, is the fucking cherry on top. If the president does it, why shouldn't I?
ronaldthump
Member
not surprised that this is a climate that we live in; completely unacceptable even if ME:A has these issues. I mean, its a whole team - no one in it ever stopped to say "this looks like shit?, lets get someone onboard who can fix this?"
its not the one woman (and its not even the right woman either). The blame squarely falls on whoever was in charge of producing this game. but that's a wholly different topic
its not the one woman (and its not even the right woman either). The blame squarely falls on whoever was in charge of producing this game. but that's a wholly different topic
Ragnar Blackmane
Member
The question is which 'popculture' culture doesn't. You'll find those people in 'movie' culture as well as 'literature' culture etc.
Assholes don't respect medium/subculture boundaries.
This sort of dismissal of the source of the problem is completely unhelpful.
The gaming community has a sexism / racism / homophobia / generalised bigotry problem. It has a harassment and abuse problem.
Ignoring this, pretending "oh, it's just society" or "oh, these aren't real gamers" does nothing to solve these problems, it just enables the abuse and harassment to continue because "hey, they're not part of my community, not my problem."
If, as we're so often told, the majority of the gaming community is not sexist, not racist, and is opposed to harassment and abuse, then we should be able to stop this through sheer force of numbers. The lack of direct action suggests this majority is either not as large as believed, or does not care as much as it likes to think it does about this clear and present problem. See also the 45th President of the United States.
Hmm, maybe. But only because there are zero repercussions to their behavior. If they aren't ostracized by their own peers and family then we as a society need another avenue to fine them somehow for their behavior. The fact that they get away with saying these things is like society indirectly telling them it's alright to do it.
Mr. Mister
Member
You're right. It's nerd culture and it's associated mediums that has the problem of which games are a huge portion.