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[gogojira]

I didnt say its in good taste, but at its core the game is an educational game to teach children how bad slave trading was.

Really? That image is fucking gross and despicable.

 

[Spacejaws]

That was a few years ago and limited to a couple of idiots. Now there's an entire board on 4chan (pol) dedicated to raiding sites with spam and even organizing real life Nazi movements like Charlottesville. We all know better now. It's no longer an ethical problem today.

The only way to combat this is to get organized with left-wing review bombs. When the system is broken and the administrator is not interested in doing anything to it, the only way is to kill the system. If this turns Steam reviews into a political battleground, so be it - it's Valve's fault.

Honestly not against it. It helps if you actually like the game too. Rather than make it a political battleground just write reviews where you normally wouldn't really bother? I don't think every review bomb is political the reason seems to change from time to time. This one in paticular seems political and paticularly heinous but it's the same agenda of using some moral grey ground (the dmca takedown) to support their shitty beliefs and actions and yea I would actually be happier if users would be the one to combat it rather than hand the reaponsibility off to some higher entity.

Although Trump did get elected so I've not got alot of faith in the public in general these days.

 

[Nzyme32]

That was a few years ago and limited to a couple of idiots. Now there's an entire board on 4chan (pol) dedicated to raiding sites with spam and even organizing real life Nazi movements like Charlottesville. We all know better now. It's no longer an ethical problem today.

The only way to combat this is to get organized with left-wing review bombs. When the system is broken and the administrator is not interested in doing anything to it, the only way is to kill the system. If this turns Steam reviews into a political battleground, so be it - it's Valve's fault.

Why not just put the actual historical data infront of people and empower it with enough statistics to highlight what is going on. It won't solve bombing, but it will highlight it crystal clear.

For an open system the solutions are simply more openness and presenting the facts of any issue as clearly as possible. Forcing "politics" to combat one set of people's views is just the same nonsense.

 

[Guy.brush]

Off topic but where is this gif from?

That is Sherlock Holmes and Watson, but dunno what incarnation.

 

[besada]

I'm sorry but how stupid are you? That image is fucking gross and despicable.

Don't be a jerk. Jerks get banned. You can think of a way to express your opinion without being a jerk, I think.

 

[Spacejaws]

Why not just put the actual historical data infront of people and empower it with enough statistics to highlight what is going on. It won't solve bombing, but it will highlight it crystal clear.

For an open system the solutions are simply more openness and presenting the facts of any issue as clearly as possible. Forcing "politics" to combat one set of people's views is just the same nonsense.

I must say when Valve started including 'recently' and 'overall' review scores it helped to see if something had some kind of recent controversy surrounding it but also helps identify if a product has improved over time (like Slain which recieved substantial updates) honestly it works great for me.

 

[gogojira]

Don't be a jerk. Jerks get banned. You can think of a way to express your opinion without being a jerk, I think.

I toned it down. It's such a ridiculous thing to say that it seems borderline intentional.

 

[besada]

I toned it down. It's such a ridiculous thing to say that it seems borderline intentional.

Thanks.

 

[Nzyme32]

I must say when Valve started including 'recently' and 'overall' review scores it helped to see if something had some kind of recent controversy surrounding it but also helps identify if a product has improved over time (like Slain which recieved substantial updates) honestly it works great for me.

But it's not enough.

There was an obvious point with that change, eg seeing MKX and Batman AK clearly show that there had been a massive change in quality. The problem now is that system can be gamed by bombing - so the logical next step (that people have said from the start but Valve is only "soon" to implement) is putting the full time line in front of users, as in the previous post, so you can see what is going on. Ideally this should also incorporate a timeline similar to what other sites have done - including game updates and other events so you can see whats happening in a more friendly way than just numbers alone.

"It's Valve's fault" is a useless argument. "It's the internet's fault" is a little better but still pointless. If you want people to freely express themselves, you open up this kind of bombing and political crap in a space where people are anonymous and more free to do what they feel like. Censoring some things within reason is good but it simply isn't feesible to do that global unless going massively over the top. Give people data to prove a point and bombing just becomes demonstrable and filterable vs previous standard deviation within a range relevant (eg within the same game update etc)

 

[Gully State]

Exactly. That's why I'm always disappointed when people complain about a game being in Origin or Uplay, and also one of the reasons I'm a big supporter of GOG (besides DRM-Free).

I'm all for more platforms on the PC space but not shit like origins or uplay... GOG is awesome and I support them when I can.... especially since they keep older games compatible with newer OS

 

[Starwolf_UK]

Seeing these Valve "support" post mentioning Streisand effect and wishing the best reminded me of a time when google told someone whose kid had ran up massive bills on clash of clans to "think happy thoughts" while similarly offering no resolution to the problem (in the google case the family had bought it to the attention of the media and then suddenly google could not do more to help though reading the money sections of newspapers it's not just tech companies).

Thing about stopping buy games on steam in the article in the OP. This made me look at my steam account purchases and the last time I bought a game via steam was over a year ago so I guess I already have.

At this point I think we need to start counter-movements against this. Review bombs can be countered by going out by force, voting "Not useful" on every single review complaining about SJWs and whatever, and then mass voting "Useful" on every review that is actually about the game (even negative ones are fine if they're about the game, not drama).

It's an uphill battle as for example take the most helpful negative review in the past 30 days is like 1500 helpful out of 1800.

What about the positive one? 15/39 so a much lower percent.

 

[King Gilga]

Steam discussions are useful in that almost every time I have a query or problem with a game a steam discussion is one of the first links.

But yeah as a community it's trash.

 

[EviLore]

IT ISN'T MY JOB TO DEAL WITH RACISTS ON A GAME FORUM.

You're right. It's mine.

Not true, at all. There are many other tools, and this really doesn't do anything, just low hanging fruit. Conveniently no one was talking about Firewatch anymore (because it's a nearly 2 year old walking sim), so they decided to conflate both situations, and this is the result - no one's happy.

Sounds a lot like when a developer does something underhanded, and customers can't get their voice heard - that's never happened before though.



Again, I strongly dislike PewDiePie (his content is trash), but this is just extreme hyperbole.



Actions have consequence.

Edit--



"Legit tools" is a major stretch here, specifically when it really doesn't directly impact their game, as they seem to think. They disagreed with PewDiePie and looked for any method to impact him - boy that certainly sounds familiar, doesn't it?

I'm not fine with Steam harassment by users, but I'm also very much not fine with bullshit DMCA take-downs of fair use content due to a completely unrelated matter.

I'm not talking about punishment, I'm talking about consequence.

Edit2 -- Why isn't YouTube banning PewDiePie's entire channel then? And why aren't people boycotting YouTube, and Google?

Do better how?
You mean by playing nanny and censuring boards?

I'd say: let people post stupid shit online and report it to the police if it's legally finable.

Well, that's not better in my opinion.

If an online community can't do better than censure or ban everything that's slightly offendable or political incorrect in order to avoid conflicts and controversity among members, to me that means gaming communities still have a long way to go before getting called 'mature'.

I'd say leaving it to the developers to decide how to handle their own communities is the best approach Valve could take.

Yes, like I said: slightly offendable. I can't see the content of the discussions in that steamgroup but if it's just the swastika and hitler picture that offend you so much, beware of 'google images', you will find it there as well.

As a libertarian I say: unless is legally finable, it should be allowed and up to the developers how much they want their business to be potentially damaged by the community they allow to infest their boards. I know some people who have the weirdest interests and fascinations.
I've chuckled about people I know irl who are into indianism, and I do the same when I see this kind of fanatism. If a marginal amount of people adore WWII nazi's, hey, each to their own.


I think you are. Nothing's 'running rampant'.
Overly censorship is exactly what thrives such extremists into concentrated places and creates boards like stormfront used to be. It's better to dilute these kind of views in boards all around where they are challenged with their views instead of reinforced by like/worse-minded individuals in a vacuum.

What you actually mean by that is 'it isn't my job to confront these people with their extremist and narrow political views because I prefer the comfort of not having to deal with them'.


So racists are fine, as long as they're not on your board. You're basically being a digital 'nimby'.

 

[tim.mbp]

So the people who spam racist and vile shit in the forums/review only get banned from the community? There's no VAC ban equivalent.

 

[Hamster Plugin]

It's an uphill battle as for example take the most helpful negative review in the past 30 days is like 1500 helpful out of 1800.

What about the positive one? 15/39 so a much lower percent.

That's because there is no organized counter-troll movement. That is what I was suggesting we should do.

The 300 people who voted Not Helpful are just randoms who stumbled upon the garbage and did the needful. This isn't useful when they're up against a big /pol/ nazi movement.

 

[Fantastapotamus]

That Slave Trading game is the weirdest thing cause it seems like the people genuinely wanted to make an educational game about the horrors of slavery but fucked up in pretty much every way possible.

 

[flaxknuckles]

Exactly. That's why I'm always disappointed when people complain about a game being in Origin or Uplay, and also one of the reasons I'm a big supporter of GOG (besides DRM-Free).

Valve basically only cares that Steam is running and receiving the money. They don't care about anything else, which is disappointing. And as long as they continue having that monopoly and not a competitor that is actually threatening them, they will continue with that attitude.

I will complain forever about Origin and Uplay but GOG are good people.

 

[funroll-loops]

I vaguely remembered something hearing bad things about Hatred, but going back to look at the games mentioned in the articles: Hatred doesn't look any worse than Postal or Grand Theft Auto, the Slave Trade game is obviously an extremely inept attempt at making an educational game for children, and House Party looks like a bad comedy. I feel like you could find worse things at your local bookstore.

Allowing Nazi groups on steam is pretty gross though

 

[SmokedMeat]

Ehhhh



And that was just from the first page of results by searching for 'Nazi'. Who knows how many slightly less obvious Neonazi groups (say, without Nazi in the title) there are.
There was also one that was calling on people to kill all Jews.

Maybe this picture should be Tweeted to Valve? Seriously, I can't be the only regular Steam user who had no idea this stuff existed. I think if this is brought out into the light, that Valve is allowing this to exist, they'll shut it down. It'd be great if these people were then banned.

 

[Steeped in a Sea of Games]

You're right. It's mine.

Apparently their bodies broke before their spirit.

 

[OrlanisWorks]

Valve is still completely lazy on their handling of customer support.

But Valve is just rolling corporate like Google, Apple, or any other platform that happens to host others' products: if you can, push the responsibility of moderation onto others. Valve is just particularly bad at it in comparison.

They appear to only care about making sure their platform is (a) up and running, (b) pulling in money, and (c) avoiding the limelight of controversy enough that it doesn't interrupt points (a) and (b).

Valve won't ever get its shit together until something truly threatens points (a) and (b).

 

[Ganado]

So the people who spam racist and vile shit in the forums/review only get banned from the community? There's no VAC ban equivalent.

Why would they be? If they misbehave in the community, they get banned there. Is it also up to Valve to make sure no one is saying nasty stuff online in the games they sell on their platform?

 

[Mooreberg]

I have had a steam account for 14 years but have never used the forums, and rarely write reviews. Is a game required to have a dedicated forum on Steam? Nobody is going to bother to hire people to moderate forums for games that are not routinely making them money. Meaning if it is not a multiplayer game or something like Skyrim or GTA V, there is no financial incentive. In these cases, the developers would be better off hosting their own forums with their own guidelines. Valve is not going to suspend routine customers who are not actually violating a TOS.

 

[GillianSeed79]

Doing anything besides buying or launching a game on Steam is basically like going to 4chan

The community is a toxic cesspool and their support sservices/moderation sucks. Maybe I'll start using GOG since its clear Valve gives zero fucks about moderation or curation .