Gamers Upset at Blizzcon's Slur-Ridden Speech

[Tiamat666]

Wow. I find it quite disturbing how excited and wound up that guy gets. And by the f-count. The guy seems genuinely retarded.

 

[Fbuh]

I don't think it's as bad as people make it to be. The band has been singing praises of the Horde since Warcraft 3. I play the Alliance, and my main is a Night Elf, and I thought that this was funny as hell. People just need to learn not to take things so seriously. It's just a game.

Indeed. I mostly play Horde, but my favorite Alliance race is Night Elf. I bet he did it for publicity. It seems that major interest in WoW has decreased over the last year or so, and this was a marketing ploy (along wiht Mists of Panderia) to boost play. Ironically enough, I just started playing WoW withing the past month.

 

[Mrmac23]

The tone of Blizzcon has been marred by the hatred that Horde players display against anyone who may be Alliance, and the Blizzard forums contain testimonials of actual violence committed by Blizzcon attendees this past weekend. "Leaving the [concert] event, two young guys probably in their early 20s came up behind us and pulled on my wife's lanyard seemingly trying to break it off and shouted 'Alliance *****' at her," recounted a Blizzard fan. "It did not break lose and instead my wifes' head and neck were jolted downward." The woman was not seriously hurt but her head and neck were sore for many days and the experience took an emotional toll.

Okay, normally i'm not too bothered by goings on in the WoW community, but that...

Seriously now, what the actual fuck is wrong with these people.

 

[Zeraki]

The tone of Blizzcon has been marred by the hatred that Horde players display against anyone who may be Alliance, and the Blizzard forums contain testimonials of actual violence committed by Blizzcon attendees this past weekend. "Leaving the [concert] event, two young guys probably in their early 20s came up behind us and pulled on my wife's lanyard seemingly trying to break it off and shouted 'Alliance *****' at her," recounted a Blizzard fan. "It did not break lose and instead my wifes' head and neck were jolted downward." The woman was not seriously hurt but her head and neck were sore for many days and the experience took an emotional toll.

Okay, normally i'm not too bothered by goings on in the WoW community, but that...

Seriously now, what the actual fuck is wrong with these people.

And Blizzard actually encourages stupidity like that. Fantastic isn't it? That game has one of the worst communities I've ever seen. It's one of the many reasons I stopped playing.

 

[KillKill]

I don't care for WoW at all really, but as a big metal fan it saddens me to now be associated with people such as him...

 

[chstens]

At first I thought, "the bastard!" And then logic kicked in, and I said to myself "Words aren't offensive by themselves, they're only offensive if you allow yourself to be offended, and he's not even talking about real people, just computer graphics" So chill the fuck out, man.

 

[Kasawd]

Well, that's okay, because nobody has ever, or will ever care what death metal 'musicians' have to say. These are people that have no concept of art, and only of controversy, so I'm really not surprised that they think they're all unique and special for talking shit like this.

Condemning a whole genre of artistic creation for the statements made by one musician is a great way to present an argument, I hear. Perhaps, before you try to consider such creation, you should keep your mind open about it, you might find something you like.

Ignorance is fun.

I've never really been a fan of Cannibal corpse, that said. Corpsegrinder doesn't really strike me as the brightest cookie in the death metal bunch, so, I'm surprised they even let him up there. I'd much rather have Paul Masvidal alongside me, on stage.

 

[UNHchabo]

The thing is, I don't know of anyone who uses it in a hateful way. It's just a word we throw around each other when we're messing around. Almost all of my friends say it and none of us wish any hate on gay people, it's just how we talk.

As long as the word is used by a substantial portion of the population as an insult towards gay people, it will retain its power. In terms of social impact, it doesn't matter if you don't mean offense while using it, what matters is that someone still does.

Also, never do that in a workplace, because the standard there is not whether you mean offense, but whether anyone else takes it as offensive.

 

[duchaked]

people sure are sensitive these days. there was even a rally near where I was. from what I heard, it was very moving, people were crying.

 

[CJ1145]

sounds like alliance getting way too offended by a person's comment. people need to lighten up.

There's kind of the part where a woman was assaulted for being Alliance. At Blizzcon.

I for one would break a man for attempting that, I don't know how that's whining to you.

 

[MysticToast]

The thing is, I don't know of anyone who uses it in a hateful way. It's just a word we throw around each other when we're messing around. Almost all of my friends say it and none of us wish any hate on gay people, it's just how we talk.

As long as the word is used by a substantial portion of the population as an insult towards gay people, it will retain its power. In terms of social impact, it doesn't matter if you don't mean offense while using it, what matters is that someone still does.

Also, never do that in a workplace, because the standard there is not whether you mean offense, but whether anyone else takes it as offensive.

I do understand that other people find it offensive. That's why I don't say it around people I don't know.

Also, my workplace is not the best example for that lol. Words like that and worse are thrown around and no one cares

 

[karloss01]

sounds like alliance getting way too offended by a person's comment. people need to lighten up.

There's kind of the part where a woman was assaulted for being Alliance. At Blizzcon.

I for one would break a man for attempting that, I don't know how that's whining to you.

okay...

1) i made no comment about the assault, i commented on a drunken death metalist not liking Alliance.

2) i didn't use the word whining, so please don't put words in my mouth.

i don't condone violence on anyone(unless their clearly trying to pick a fight). the guys who assaulted her are scum and a disgrace, and (if traceable) should have been thrown out.

 

[McNinja]

Wow, I didn't know people were actually stupid enough to start taking their horde/alliance rivalries into real life. I didn't appreciate when my friends would rant on about how the Alliance sucked, but this is just stupid, no question about it.

 

[Ghengis John]

It doesn't matter what he called them. I couldn't care less. But the fact that a company like Blizzard does endorse it is the issue here. When You make a game that is so aimed towards casual fun, when You have very strict policies for harassment and offensive behaviour for both in game chats and forums, when You do it for a game that has a rating of 12+ You simply cannot allow Yourself for such mishaps.

It's pure lack of responsibility of someone on Blizzard side, and while people most likely did overact on the forums, it's better than just staying quiet.

Personally, why none of the insult over internet really get to me, because well... Why should they? I still try to understand why gamers so much like to use that type of insults so much? Why everything always is either "gay" or someone is a "fag" or "i hope you die"?
That's the image of gamers that does get outside, that's why gaming is considered as violence inducing, and that's why we can't have good things. Ever.

Minimal respect for the fact that there is a real person on the other end of the internet would go long way in making everyone's lives a little easier.

I wasn't excusing their actions by any means. Don't get the wrong idea. I recently spent a night on PSN playing soul calibur IV against random, unknown people. I was a ***** when I won and a fag when I lost and it was just disappointing to see this kind of mentality at all. I empathize, I do. That blizzard would endorse this sort of behavior is idiotic, I understand and I agree.

 

[McNinja]

I think it's clear by now that I hate death metal in most of its incarnations. I quite like Dimmu Borgir, but I don't know if they're heavy enough to be called death metal. Regardless, Cannibal Corpse is one whose image I can't stand. Also, their name I can't stand. And his name is Corpsegrinder. He sounds like a total dick.

"Most" is different from "all".

I don't like Cannibal Corpse, but there's a fair amount of metal that I do like, and it saddens me to see you make generalizations like that no death metal band has any concept of art.

If they had any concept of art, they wouldn't hide it behind disgusting growly shouts and lyrics that are clearly designed to get attention for being controversial.

It's interesting how I've managed to stay away from bands like that... well, lyrics-wise, anyway. I am a huge metal fan, but not so much "death metal" simply because I cannot stand either their sound or the lyrics. Usually the lyrics. There was a band called Red Funeral (I think) that had a fantastic song until I looked up the lyrics and realized the song was about raping a girl. After a quick NOPE I went and listened to As Blood Runs Black (their songs aren't exactly the pinnacle of music, but their drummer is awesome and the lyrics are surprisingly good. For the first album, at least).

I remember watching a documentary on metal (the history of it), and it just got sad when they turned to the black metal genre and its roots, because it went from false, controversy-creating shenanigans (in the US with bands like Black Sabbath and co.) to legitimate church-burnings and hate. I just realized that this is a possible metaphor for this article and the people who play WoW, some get that it's only a game and poke fun of people, others take it very seriously and ruin it for everyone.

 

[Ghengis John]

Blizz just couldn't give the alliance the damn pandas leading into Burning Crusade, no somebody insisted that the pandas were so good they had to be shared. So they pulled the plug on their announced plans and created the Dranei. But did anyone care that the elves would be super popular? Oh I'm sure they did.

Not true, there were problems with the original storyline for the Pandaren, namely China pitched a ***** fit, so the swapped in the Dranei because it was too late to wompletely rewrite the resources for the Pandaren, the Dranei being meant to be solely a plot race for BC. With the assets there Blizz swapped some writing around, and viola.

Yeah I don't really buy the whole "china pitched a fit" story. Sorry. At the time Blizz only said that they had "internal issues" with their development. The whole china angle was just "fanon" I figured. Most especially when there was an interview with Metzen and when asked about the last minute pull he said "of course Pandarian are coming to the game eventually, naturally for the horde." Makes it seem to me like it wasn't a government knuckling down on them as much as it was people on staff who really wanted to see the alliance hobbled. I would hasten to ask, with the chinese government becoming increasingly opposed to internet cafes why would they be more accepting of an MMO addition of their national symbol now than then? Does the Joyland amusement park simply possess that kind of pull?

 

[Beryl77]

Whether it's bad or not what Blizzard did, that apologize was really lame.

 

[Ghengis John]

I would hasten to ask, with the chinese government becoming increasingly opposed to internet cafes why would they be more accepting of an MMO addition of their national symbol now than then? Does the Joyland amusement park simply possess that kind of pull?

Originally the Pandaren storyline contained drunken samurai pandas, among other things. Essentially, the entire lore was much more Japan oriented than Chinese. Now we have Kung Fu Pandaren. One storyline is manifestly more acceptable to the Chinese government.

So the chinese government has a red phone to blizzard HQ then?

God forbid the singer from Cannibal Corpse dislike night elves! How dare he call the players faggots! I need to go have a good cry!

I think their problem stems from the fact that this was a video presented and endorsed by blizzard entertainment.

 

[RanD00M]

People are getting their panties in a bunch now? Over a video that's how fucking old?
Get a fucking grip and take that log out of your ass, it's doing no good for ya.

 

[RookwoodX]

The rant is fine as some little video floating around the Internet.

The problem is Blizzard endorsing it. This is a pathetic, offensive, and pointless rant that in no way should have been highlighted at their convention.

I've never understood why Blizzard has felt so free as to show their obvious disdain for Horde, when more than half their subscribers are Alliance. Do they not understand that such displays can lead to actual violence? Some people are easily motivated to such acts. I feel like Blizzard doesn't know when enough is enough and just how fervent their fans are over this "game" as others are saying.

Secondly, this is 2011, can a company still get away with such obvious bigotry? I just wonder what it's like on Proudmoore. That server used to be predominantly homosexual. Blizzard owes them and the whole community a sincere apology. Not this "we were just joking when we said that" deal. That's something only an 8th grader can get away with...