Jimquisition: Gamer Entitlement

[nuttshell]

I'm not sure Jim understands what entitlement is...
Attacking other people for having shit taste, pointing out to "critics" that they aren't always right or in some cases provably factually wrong or taking on Anita Scamkeesian has nothing at all to do with entitlement.

Yes, I am a little confused as well...these things have something to do with trust and dissapointment, you don't have to employ/buy someone to critisize them or their opinions and they can, in turn, decide if they want to listen to the critisism.

 

[dl_wraith]

I have to say that the way Jim handles this sort of subject and his own honesty about his opinions, beliefs and standpoint is the reason that I returned to watching the Jimquisition and have a lot of time to absorb Jim's own professed point of view.

I have to say that I HATED the early run of Jimquisition. I utterly despised Jim's over-the-top egotistical performance (delivered, as it was, with conviction and such vigour that made it difficult to separate parody, exaggeration and reality for me) and it undermined the entertainment of the show and any message Jim was trying to convey. Jim reacted to criticism (that was often unfair and overwhelmingly personal) and the show changed in small but important ways. Now, it's one of my staple diet of shows and is one that I find thought provoking and entertaining in equal measure (Thanks, Jim. Your efforts are appreciated even if it doesn't always appear so).
Jim's own dealing with the torrent of whining and complaint to get at the true criticisms and the way he improved the show based on the nugget of truth behind some of the feedback makes me all the more ready to listen to him and be convinced by his own point of view on this subject. As far as I can see, Jim's been on both sides of this equation (both being a source of criticism and a target for criticism as a provider of entertainment) and is well placed to comment upon it from a position of experience.

I see the same sort of 'entitlement' arguments come up not just in video games, but in my other hobbies too. As one example I offer unto you the ongoing unholy sh*tstorm surrounding the upcoming launch of the next version of Dungeons and Dragons - I'm sure you can draw your own parallels. Wherever unrestrained bile and fury appears it swamps and masks the legitimate criticisms that may be leveled in either direction.

It seems to me that the rise of an easy to use and nominally 'anonymous' way to level criticism at people (i.e. The Internet) has led to a decrease in the amount of consideration and restraint given to those self-same criticisms. Simply put as people have gotten used to the idea of hiding behind the shield of their screen names they've gotten into the habit of spitting more bile and fury than they otherwise might in person. Perhaps if we all just gave our criticism as we might if we were face to face with those we were criticising the situation of the perceived 'gamer entitlement' may improve for the better. I know it wouldn't be the only part of the solution but surely it would help? I realise I'm hugely simplifying the argument here.

The lessons the video gaming community learn during this phase of fury, backlash and dealing with crappy business practices (free-to-play I'm looking squarely at you right now....) could well help other hobby sectors. At least, I live in hope that it might given that video gamers are frequently also involved in other hobbies, sports and activities.

I wish for a day where legitimate criticism is given, received and acted upon with good grace and manners. What can I say? I'm a hopeless dreamer.

 

[Morkid]

How dare you discuss a topic from different perspectives and attempt to reach a reasonable middle ground? This is the internet, damn it!

 

[Aardvaarkman]

She was doing a internet video series and then started a kickstarter to fund said series (That she was already doing). After she got funded neither her equipment, nor research (the reason she was asking money for) was improved.

Wow, that's a very loose definition of "scammed."

How do you know that she didn't buy new equipment? And as you say, she has continued to release new videos, as she said she would. I'm not seeing the scam here. Plenty of Kickstarter projects don't deliver everything they hope to. That's inherent to Kickstarter, and anybody backing a project should be prepared for failures.

I'm curious - did you back her project? Are the backers of her project upset about being scammed? Or are you just using this as an excuse to attack Sarkeesian, and be outraged on their behalf?

I get the feeling that you don't really care about the Kickstarter backers or how they feel at all - you just want another reason to denounce her.

 

[Aardvaarkman]

Actually I can see where that argument is coming from.

Publishers will only sell games and things people want to buy.
People want to buy into the power fantasies and escapism.
Therefore people are to blame for influencing the publisher.

But is Sarkeesian actually making this argument? Not that I've seen. I've actually seen plenty of her videos, and they aren't even about blaming anybody. They are pretty standard sociology/cultural studies pieces.

The idea of "blame" seems to mostly be people taking her comments about games personally - "I like games, she is criticising games, therefore she must be criticising me." I think a lot of people are responding to this in inappropriate ways, possibly because they are unfamiliar with with this type of critical discourse. It isn't uncommon for those without a background in the humanities to have such inappropriate reactions.

As for you comments about publishers, they are a bit off, because publishers sell what they think people want to buy. If they only sold what people do buy, then there would be no such think as a game that flops or loses money.

Also the attack on the idea of a male power fantasy is kind of redundant. As was pointed out by a writer on another site I frequent. Women will still buy harlequin romance novels with the somewhat generic male love interest because that's what they want to read.

How does that make the criticism irrelevant or redundant? Just because something sells, doesn't make it beyond criticism. This again comes back to my point about people not understanding critical or academic discourse. There are plenty of people who criticise romance novels and the people who buy them, or the social factors that lead people to buy them.

The argument being put forward is using an argumental technique I can't remember the name of (possibly an anachronism ?) where by it goes "You like these kind of games, these kind of games contain violence against women therefore you like violence against women".

When did Sarkeesian make that argument?

The biggest evidence for this argument is the use of "shock" statistics about domestic violence, however if you paid careful attention she only tells half the story, the half that supports her argument just for example of the omitted information did you know 40% of all domestic violence call outs are from men accusing their partner of abusing them ? Did you also know the conviction rate for domestic violence against a man is 80% lower than that against a women. Or did you know that for example Ross Kemp and Professor Steven Hawking have suffered domestic violence against them ?

How is any of that relevant to the topic at hand?

 

[Bara_no_Hime]

Tackling the myths and misusage of so-called Entitlement in the gaming world.

**slow clap**

Well said, Mr. Sterling. Well said.

I would like to say more, but you presented your points so well in your video that it is hard to do so. Thus, I will merely say that I hope your video encourages more people to consider either middle options or expressing their opinions in a civil fashion.

Once again, I thank the gods for you and for your excellent video.

 

[Bara_no_Hime]

But is Sarkeesian actually making this argument? Not that I've seen. I've actually seen plenty of her videos, and they aren't even about blaming anybody. They are pretty standard sociology/cultural studies pieces.

**sigh** I've been explaining this to people on the Escapist for ages. People are determined to see her as attacking video games or blaming people for things when she is doing exactly what you just said - writing "standard cultural studies pieces."

Anyone who has any experience in peer reviewed academia should see that immediately - but that doesn't actually describe most of the internet.

I have given point by point explanations, with quotes, showing that she isn't attacking but simply calling attention to patterns. And I've had people say "yes, but -" and repeat the same damn thing as if I hadn't said anything.

The really sad thing is that a lot of the "criticism" against Anita is based on her failure to support her "attacks" - of course she fails to support attacks, because she isn't writing attacks!

**sighs again** I've mostly given up. Once in a while I get roped in again, but at this point I feel like I'm shouting that Soylent Green is people, but no one is willing to stop snacking.

 

[ERaptor]

But is Sarkeesian actually making this argument? Not that I've seen. I've actually seen plenty of her videos, and they aren't even about blaming anybody. They are pretty standard sociology/cultural studies pieces.

**sigh** I've been explaining this to people on the Escapist for ages. People are determined to see her as attacking video games or blaming people for things when she is doing exactly what you just said - writing "standard cultural studies pieces."

Anyone who has any experience in peer reviewed academia should see that immediately - but that doesn't actually describe most of the internet.

I have given point by point explanations, with quotes, showing that she isn't attacking but simply calling attention to patterns. And I've had people say "yes, but -" and repeat the same damn thing as if I hadn't said anything.

The really sad thing is that a lot of the "criticism" against Anita is based on her failure to support her "attacks" - of course she fails to support attacks, because she isn't writing attacks!

**sighs again** I've mostly given up. Once in a while I get roped in again, but at this point I feel like I'm shouting that Soylent Green is people, but no one is willing to stop snacking.

She isnt directly attacking anything. But her..."Studies" if you can even call it that, are inherently flawed, not very well researched and generally just come off as the generic Sexism-accusation without many facts or much thought put behind them.

I will agree that the amount of demonizing she went trough is really over the top. You could've shut down almost all of her arguments in the very first vid she made, instead of treating her like shes the Antichrist of Videogames. Or you could've plainly ignored her from the get go (As Jim suggested in an earlier Video about her), as yet another "Feminist" who blurps unresearched, poorly thought out nonsense, because theres allways atleast SOMEONE that will listen.

She was doing a internet video series and then started a kickstarter to fund said series (That she was already doing). After she got funded neither her equipment, nor research (the reason she was asking money for) was improved.

Wow, that's a very loose definition of "scammed."

How do you know that she didn't buy new equipment? And as you say, she has continued to release new videos, as she said she would. I'm not seeing the scam here. Plenty of Kickstarter projects don't deliver everything they hope to. That's inherent to Kickstarter, and anybody backing a project should be prepared for failures.

I'm curious - did you back her project? Are the backers of her project upset about being scammed? Or are you just using this as an excuse to attack Sarkeesian, and be outraged on their behalf?

I get the feeling that you don't really care about the Kickstarter backers or how they feel at all - you just want another reason to denounce her.

And I get the feeling you will defend Anita regardless of what points are being brought up. Considering the amount of cash she got, one could expect either huge improvement in quality or frequency of her work. Neither applied. Depending on what standards are applied, you could indeed call it a Scam. I've seen Kickstarter Projects catching flak for less subpar deliveries, only this time the project was about a very controversial issue from a person that got a LOT of attention over the Web. Its almost guruanteed that you get SOME people to back stuff in that situation, especially considering how many of her supporters just do the very same thing she does. Spout incoherent, badly researched nonsense, as long as Anita keeps waving the "Sexism"-Flag. Just like a ton of idiots responded to her videos with rape-threads and other stupidities.

The whole Anita thing can be neatly summed up by saying that it was mostly retards yelling at other retards.

 

[Aardvaarkman]

And I get the feeling you will defend Anita regardless of what points are being brought up.

No, I wouldn't. But did you see the post I was replying to? It called her a "lying scammer" (although he was unable to spell "lying" correctly). That poster also has a history of making attacks on her, and not exactly in a "nuanced criticism" way.

Don't you think that's rather over the top and unwarranted?

I don't really care that much for Sarkeesian's arguments. What I do care about is this bullshit aggression that's so common around these debates. I'm perfectly fine with people making reasonable criticisms of her work. But the majority of cases just seem to be people wanting to denounce her, personally. Which is why so much of the criticism is focused on the Kickstarter stuff - because it's easy to get people jealous and outraged about somebody getting "easy money."

Considering the amount of cash she got, one could expect either huge improvement in quality or frequency of her work.

But she did not promise either of those things in her Kickstarter. She did not ask for anywhere near the amount of money she received, and I don't think she was prepared to receive that amount.

Things like this don't scale linearly with the amount of money. Would spending $100,000 vs $10,000 in video equipment make any meaningful difference to a YouTube series of this nature? We're not talking a movie with SFX, it's a talking-head video.

How would having a lot more money than she asked for translate into a huge difference in the content? Would the money suddenly make her more insightful, or her arguments any more valid? Her backers knew what kind of video she makes, and basically funded her doing more of them. Why would having an unexpected windfall of cash suddenly make her videos radically different?

Moreover, why would the windfall make her obligated to do anything more than she initially promised?

Neither applied. Depending on what standards are applied, you could indeed call it a Scam.

I don't think it could be called a scam by any reasonable definition. Especially as she never asked for that much money in the first place. It doesn't retroactively become scam because it blew out of all proportion.

I've seen Kickstarter Projects catching flak for less subpar deliveries,

Yeah, there are a lot of irrational people when it comes to the topic of Kickstarter projects.

 

[Aardvaarkman]

Pretty much this. You can point out as many flaws in her arguments as you want, and can be as reasonable as you want. You will be dismissed as being a sexist pig.

Notice how in this discussion plenty of people have criticised Sarkeesian, and yet none of them have been called sexists pigs? You might want to look into revising this theory, as it doesn't seem grounded in fact.

 

[ERaptor]

Pretty much this. You can point out as many flaws in her arguments as you want, and can be as reasonable as you want. You will be dismissed as being a sexist pig.

Notice how in this discussion plenty of people have criticised Sarkeesian, and yet none of them have been called sexists pigs? You might want to look into revising this argument, as it doesn't seem grounded in fact.

The comment was indeed aimed mainly at Anita herself and her "Fandom" , trying to get some actual feedback trough to that end will result in you being labeled as part of the problem or just ignored, the latter being the friendlier variant. And on plenty other sites, or by plenty other people defending her work. Its basically the same like you said earlier in this thread, where a lot of people reacted to her Videos with screaming bloody murder and even shouting Rape threats. What im saying is, both sides werent exactly paragons of virtue when it comes to argumentation. And to be honest, considering what else was written on the escapist about Anita, neither are people on here. Again, once that name falls its one monkeycage yelling at another.

And I get the feeling you will defend Anita regardless of what points are being brought up.

No, I wouldn't. But did you see the post I was replying to? It called her a "lying scammer" (although he was unable to spell "lying" correctly). That poster also has a history of making attacks on her, and not exactly in a "nuanced criticism" way.

Don't you think that's rather over the top and unwarranted?

I don't really care that much for Sarkeesian's arguments. What I do care about is this bullshit aggression that's so common around these debates. I'm perfectly fine with people making reasonable criticisms of her work. But the majority of cases just seem to be people wanting to denounce her, personally. Which is why so much of the criticism is focused on the Kickstarter stuff - because it's easy to get people jealous and outraged about somebody getting "easy money."

To be fair, considering how many non-arguments she throws around its not surprising people are belittleing her at least a bit. I Will agree tough that most of it is ridicolously over the top. I still hold the opinion that it would've been the best approach to just let this whole thing die down before it even starts, we wouldnt even be having her as a topic every other week if Gamers could just let sh*t like this go.

Also, dont jump on him for grammar. Some people (Like myself) arent native speakers of the English language. Altough I will agree that some could put at least SOME more effort into writing their posts correctly.

And, jsut for clarification. Not defending the poster in question. Just adding on the "Scam"-thing.

Considering the amount of cash she got, one could expect either huge improvement in quality or frequency of her work.

But she did not promise either of those things in her Kickstarter. She did not ask for anywhere near the amount of money she received, and I don't think she was prepared to receive that amount.

Things like this don't scale linearly with the amount of money. Would spending $100,000 vs $10,000 in video equipment make any meaningful difference to a YouTube series of this nature? We're not talking a movie with SFX, it's a talking-head video.

How would having a lot more money than she asked for translate into a huge difference in the content? Would the money suddenly make her more insightful, or her arguments any more valid? Her backers knew what kind of video she makes, and basically funded her doing more of them. Why would having an unexpected windfall of cash suddenly make her videos radically different?

Moreover, why would the windfall make her obligated to do anything more than she initially promised?

Shes not obligated to anything. But its my personal opinion that if you Kickstart something, then the money should go towards the improvement of said project, even after you reach the goal. And I as an observer felt that she didnt really deliver on that. I mean, yes its more money than she wanted. But its still for the same project. Shouldnt she at least try to invest some of it? Shouldnt she try to either deliver some extra for the amount of money she got? Shes not obligated at all. But the attitude "Its your own fault for giving me MORE." is one that i'd take rather personally, if I were a backer. But thats just my opinion, if the Backers are satisfied, theres no ground to argue. I just wanted to note that I can at least see where someone could see a scam in the thing.

Neither applied. Depending on what standards are applied, you could indeed call it a Scam.

I don't think it could be called a scam by any reasonable definition. Especially as she never asked for that much money in the first place. It doesn't retroactively become scam because it blew out of all proportion.

I've seen Kickstarter Projects catching flak for less subpar deliveries,

Yeah, there are a lot of irrational people when it comes to the topic of Kickstarter projects.

By definition, you'd probably be right. But again, if she gets more money and just keeps it for shits & giggles, I get the feeling that shes just in it for the attention and potential cash.

And "irrational". Keep in mind, this is entrusted money you give someone for something that poentially fails horribly, or does not meet your standard. This is a risk Backers are aware of, but there is no reason to be a Dick towards people who question Kickstarter Projects. Its something that, imho, should allways be looked at in a very critical light. With the whole "Early Access"-Bullshit flooding the Market with half-assed ripoffs, people should be allowed to question that stuff. Anita being in it or not.

 

[Lightknight]

*see below*

Spoiler: I'm really enjoying this conversation. Spoiled for space

That's one of the points Anita talked about as well. The issue isn't so much the trope itself, but the issue of laziness in writing when it's relied on too often.

But laziness in writing isn't a moral issue. It's just laziness. That's a non-argument, especially when motivations are actually quite limited. Love, lust, duty, money, fear, revenge, etc. There's not the biggest list of reasons for why we do things.

Powerful people end up in trouble too. However, there's an obvious disproportion in the number of women who end up in such trouble, regardless if they are actually quite powerful.

The same is true in real life. This is a real issue women have when more powerful men take advantage of the disparity of power. This is why we see groups of women finally escaping from kidnappers 20 years later. In real life, it is women and children who so regularly get kidnapped or raped or any other manner of terrible thing. Not so much with men. To demand that literature depart significantly from the way things actually are is somewhat nonsensical.

So if it wasn't weakness, or foolish mistakes, what is one to believe when the only other thing they seem to have in common is their sex?

Why not weakness or foolish mistakes of the individual? Is it really now sexist for a female character to have a lapse in judgement and for the evil to take advantage of it? I see it like a girl walking alone in a dark alley at night. She made a poor decision but it doesn't mean she's an idiot or responsible for something someone else decides to do in response to it. In her mind, she was just going home. You know?

I see where your going with the examples of how men and women are different. That does give an advantage in some cases to men over women. However, like many things in our world, we have kind of countered that with our "tools".

Not really. It still happens all the time, even with said "tools". A fully armed and trained woman can be every bit as dangerous as others. But even then you've got to admit that females express a lesser eagerness to engage in those kinds of activities for whatever social or biological reasons (for better or worse). Would you rather the women that are captured be incompetent or do you consider it a lesser evil to make them competent individuals who merely fell pray to bad fortune? I'd consider the incompetence to be a greater evil, if you will.

The argument you made sounded like because women do have a disadvantage normally in real life, that is why it is shown in games as a reflection, in the from of D.I.D.

Yes, this is a reason why it shows in games as a reflection. It's also because it is a quick and easy motivation for men (the average gamer). It's not bad that it exists as a plot mechanism. I'd think men should want to be trained to rescue those in need. The important distinction is to note that the DID should actually be in distress and not merely apparent distress.

That said, the end goal is not to have NO games that use tropes. Rather, it's that there should be more variety. And there is more coming every day.

In order for there to be more variety, there would have to be more human motivations. Take the Uncharted games, the motivation is everything from discovery, wealth, and fame to the D.I.D. scenario AND the women are competently written. But even then, there are few better motivations than the desire to save someone's life. That is simply one of the best and it's going to keep showing up. Like I stated, D.I.D. exists all over the place and there are tons of scenarios where the "damsel" is a captured soldier or group of soldiers or men (like Sully from Uncharted to keep with the example). Complaining about D.I.D. because women are often the damsel is a little off for that reason.

Even if we have tons of new games coming out not using the old stories, will still have quite a few still using them, and we'll have all that came before as long as we keep the data held safely. Thus, we need not fear that a change in trends will cause us to lose our "moral lessons", as long as we make sure they are safely stored. Plus, it's not like games are the only ones to ever use these tropes anyway. Even in the present.

This won't happen, all stories are told and retold in millions of different ways. Give me any plot or scenario and I can likely tell you about hundreds of other pieces of literature or film or whatever where that element was used. The Greeks were already aware of the finite number of scenarios that are possible. The culture and tools/tech may change across the generations, but there will only ever be so many main Genres with so many possibilities.

As for the Male vs. Female demographic in gaming. I would say that looking at it from a stand point of "well not all of them are playing this or that game, on this or that system, so we don't need to worry about them." Is both a financial, and creative mistake.

Not really. It's catering to your audience. It is good business sense to understand your audience and to respond accordingly. Frankly, this is the building block of "the customer is always right". This does stimmy creativity, but it makes financial sense. Especially when women actually do exhibit different interests than men in other forms of media too. Why do you assume that this is somehow untrue in gaming? That there is necessarily a huge untapped market for action games for women when the truth is more likely to be an untapped market in something like a true romance game or a "chick flick" variety of games. Not a genre that women in general haven't expressed as much an interest in regarding other genres. But when hundreds of millions of dollars are put into an action flick, everything is going to be done to maximize the return and that includes catering to the mostly male audience and that isn't a bad thing. Males should be catered to like any other customer demographic.

But as far as it being morally wrong to use the D.I.D., I don't see the argument except in the kind of scenarios you and I agree on.

 

[hexFrank202]

5:15
And what she has to say is,

"Video games are sexist, and you are sexist and want to exclude women from gaming for liking them unless you approve of me and my videos."

She doesn't usually say it explicitly and all at once, but if you ever once just pay attention to the words she says and the phrasing she uses, it's hard to miss.

It's entitled as shit, and people have given her shit about it.

 

[Bara_no_Hime]

She isnt directly attacking anything. But her..."Studies" if you can even call it that, are inherently flawed, not very well researched and generally just come off as the generic Sexism-accusation without many facts or much thought put behind them.

... I don't even know why I'm going to bother, but here goes.

Her studies are not flawed - they are consistent with any number of essays within the fields of Women's Studies and Literature. It's an INTERPRETATION. That's how literary analysis works.

I get that a lot of gamers are science geeks who believe there must be Facts, but lit analysis doesn't work like that. You can choose to not like analysis, but you can't change how the field works because you dislike it.

Which is why every single "critique" of Anita falls on its face. Because those of you who attack her methodology don't actually understand that methodology. If you did, you'd see that A) you're wrong (her work is researched and presented just fine) and B) it is harmless.

Now, as I've said before, all the attacks on Anita being wrong doesn't make Anita RIGHT either. That's the thing - in Lit Criticism, it's all about interpretations. You can have two entirely opposite interpretations that are both supported by research and facts in the source material, and neither one is wrong.

If people were simply disagreeing with her analysis, then I'd have no problem (I disagree with some of her analysis too). However, over and over people attack her research methods and presentations, which are fine. Good even. Because she is a Women's Studies Major doing Literary Analysis which both follow a special set of rules because it is literally impossible to actually be right.

For example:
Person A says that Elsa in Frozen is a lesbian and represents the gay community.
Person B says that Elsa in Frozen is asexual and represents the asexual community.
Person C says that Elsa in Frozen is a cypher for the Jewish community, specifically Jewish women.

Every single one of them is right. And every single one of them is wrong. Because Elsa can be interpreted as any of those things with the evidence presented in the movie.

And that is why every single argument I've ever seen against Anita is wrong. Because no one says "my, what an interesting interpretation - I disagree for these reasons". What they say is "she's a bad researcher" - which is dismissive of her entire opinion. Now, if only one or two people said that, I could buy that it is simply someone who felt that way - but almost everyone who dislikes her claims that. I'm guessing because one of the early anti-Anita videos claimed that. The fact that everyone echoes it makes me think that it is simply a convenient way for a lot of people to try to dismiss or shut her up.

**sigh**

I've said all this before. I'll probably end up saying it all again. Because people want to find an excuse to ignore everything she's saying. And all the logic and knowledge in the world won't stop people from ignoring things they don't want to hear.

 

[Infernal Lawyer]

Oh nice, I missed Jim actually sticking up for the "gaming community" after however long of calling us children who need someone else to dictate what we're allowed to buy or not and insulting us for pointing out that we're not misogynists to people calling us misogynists.

I remember that. I dunno, I don't think it's wrong to say "there needs to be someone making sure people aren't selling objectively broken games while still letting people buy subjectively bad games" (note this is ignoring the Early Access stuff).

What are we, children? Do we need a baby sitter? Is expecting people to actually read the description of the game they're about to buy too much to ask that we need someone deciding what is allowed or not? Sorry, but I'd rather have financially irresponsible idiots spend money on something they shouldn't have then risk this authoritative "person who decides FOR US" possibly black list a game that might have been really awesome.

For every Ride to Hell and 7 Days to Die, there's a Day Z, Rust, Minecraft, or even Fallout New Vegas that might end up on the chopping block as well. And hell, how do you know this supposedly trustworthy "someone" wouldn't be like this guy http://whatculture.com/gaming/10-blatantly-unfinished-video-games-that-were-released-anyway.php/10 who would have denied you FF 7 had they the choice?

I trust myself to make correct responsible purchasing decisions better than I trust anyone to make them FOR me, WITHOUT my consent. Frankly it flabbergasted me that Jim would made such a suggestion when he's usually so supportive and defensive of the community. To say "you don't know better, here's someone to decide what's good enough for you" is something I'd except to hear a pundent like Jack Thompson to say, no Jim. But like I said, glad to see he's gone back to making sense and being reasonable.

I see you didn't bother to read my post before blowing your top off.

Yes, it's the consumer's job to decide whether they like a game or not, because that's all subjective opinion, but it is REALLY too much to expect that a game fucking WORKS when you try to run it? Is it really MY job to check if a game doesn't make my PS4 catch fire? I would have thought I should be able to assume a game I buy will be able to at least RUN without having to look up fifty different sites.

 

[karkashan]

I've never understood why people hate Mass Effect 3 so much. It made sense, and wrapped up the story of Cmdr. Shepard quite nicely. Also the gameplay/mechanics were worlds above/better than Me2 and 1 (don't get me started on the broken morality system in 2 that pretty much forced you to shove Shepard into 1 of 2 roles in order to get anything of worth done).

What are you talking about?ME3 took out the neutral options and basically hamfisted Shepard into being a depressed character.Even Renegade Shep who has done alot of terrible shit is forced to feel bad because that kid died.If you think the conclusion to ME3 made sense then that's your opinion,however there are several people who took apart ME3's story and pointed out flaws most game journalists willfully ignored.

Shepared has been a character who at their heart has always been the same, the rest (romance, Para/Rene, and the other minor little choices) have always been nothing more than window dressing.

Also: Paragon Shepard could have done just as much terrible shit as Renegade, the "morality" in that regard doesn't always pan out that way.

 

[Icehearted]

I knew where this was going the moment I saw her face in his video. There are obviously people that cannot either seriously consider much less articulate their disdain for her or her message in a constructive manner, however there are a good number of men and women that have shared facts and expressed their disdain for her and her lies, mostly because of how she attempts to pass false information, rhetoric, and assumption as fact. As a matter of fact...

She isnt directly attacking anything. But her..."Studies" if you can even call it that, are inherently flawed, not very well researched and generally just come off as the generic Sexism-accusation without many facts or much thought put behind them.

... I don't even know why I'm going to bother, but here goes.

Her studies are not flawed - they are consistent with any number of essays within the fields of Women's Studies and Literature. It's an INTERPRETATION. That's how literary analysis works.

I get that a lot of gamers are science geeks who believe there must be Facts, but lit analysis doesn't work like that. You can choose to not like analysis, but you can't change how the field works because you dislike it.

Which is why every single "critique" of Anita falls on its face. Because those of you who attack her methodology don't actually understand that methodology. If you did, you'd see that A) you're wrong (her work is researched and presented just fine) and B) it is harmless.

Now, as I've said before, all the attacks on Anita being wrong doesn't make Anita RIGHT either. That's the thing - in Lit Criticism, it's all about interpretations. You can have two entirely opposite interpretations that are both supported by research and facts in the source material, and neither one is wrong.

If people were simply disagreeing with her analysis, then I'd have no problem (I disagree with some of her analysis too). However, over and over people attack her research methods and presentations, which are fine. Good even. Because she is a Women's Studies Major doing Literary Analysis which both follow a special set of rules because it is literally impossible to actually be right.

For example:
Person A says that Elsa in Frozen is a lesbian and represents the gay community.
Person B says that Elsa in Frozen is asexual and represents the asexual community.
Person C says that Elsa in Frozen is a cypher for the Jewish community, specifically Jewish women.

Every single one of them is right. And every single one of them is wrong. Because Elsa can be interpreted as any of those things with the evidence presented in the movie.

And that is why every single argument I've ever seen against Anita is wrong. Because no one says "my, what an interesting interpretation - I disagree for these reasons". What they say is "she's a bad researcher" - which is dismissive of her entire opinion. Now, if only one or two people said that, I could buy that it is simply someone who felt that way - but almost everyone who dislikes her claims that. I'm guessing because one of the early anti-Anita videos claimed that. The fact that everyone echoes it makes me think that it is simply a convenient way for a lot of people to try to dismiss or shut her up.

**sigh**

I've said all this before. I'll probably end up saying it all again. Because people want to find an excuse to ignore everything she's saying. And all the logic and knowledge in the world won't stop people from ignoring things they don't want to hear.

A) False, almost comically so... please consider the following, from her mouth to your ears. Not an argument, Anita's very own words, unedited, bullshit aplomb.

B) It is harmful. When an ideology based on misinformation used to further a cause or exploit others, such as the oft referred to "damseling", which she had clearly utilized to her advantage (don't ask me, google's got you covered and then some) not only has she successfully made the conversation more about her than her so-called message, but she has misinformed others, misrepresented and therefore hurt the cause she has claimed she supports. She had an agenda, it was not about equality or even about feminism, and as the aforementioned video demonstrates she is anything but well researched or remotely knowledgeably on the topic of video games or their depictions of females.

Unless you haven't played Bayonetta, in which case she got the whole game pretty much totally wrong, the annotations kind of explain it, albeit wryly. This is just one of many, but one of the best because it demonstrates how assumption, manipulation, and flat-out lying have been her tools of choice throughout her work dating back before her kickstarter and subsequent rise in infamy.

Then again, who needs actual facts when you can just shout everyone else down or bury your head in the sand after a big swig of the kool-aid.

 

[Imp_Emissary]

*see below*

Spoiler: I'm really enjoying this conversation. Spoiled for space

Space reasons. :/ Sorry.

http://www.escapistmagazine.com/forums/jump/6.842576.20740921

Spoiler: :/ Eh, I have had better....... xD Nah! It's been pretty alright. :)

I would argue that laziness is, is some cases, quite immoral.
If a company isn't doing all they can to give you a fine, and unique experience, then I'd say they are doing themselves and their customers a disfavor.

Now I feel I need to make something more clear. I'm not saying companies need to re-invent the wheel whenever they make a new game. That's unreasonable, and I'd dare say inconceivable.

However, simply by changing up the formula of how characters are represented in a game, or just "who"
you play can be enough.

And it's not as though it hasn't been done before.

A bigger complaint about most Mario games is that the characters are more archetypes than characters in their own right.
It's not that they have NO character at all, but it's not something that taken by description alone could tell you a lot about them, or differ them personality wise from others who play the same "roles".

Some would say this is bad in ways, but for the Mario games it's almost something of a necessity. This is because the games are more often then not, more about game [sub](Fun)[/sub]mechanics than about long and in-depth character development. Not that it would be impossible to make a "traditional" Mario game that had a bigger emphasis on character and story.

This is where we get a deviation from the formula in the Paper Mario games. They move the world over to the genre of RPG, and put more into showing the characters personalities. Making a wonderful experience.

Granted, it's not a COMPLETELY new story, or game (The first was a turn based RPG after all).
But as I said, you don't need to create something out of the ether never before seen by human kind. Just looking at something established (like the Mario universe) from a different angle (Mario as a RPG), or from the view point of another character (play a Zelda game as Zelda).

As for demographics; It may just be the way you wrote it, but it sounds like you don't think that men and women have any overlap in interests. If we are talking about motivations, what about exploration, adventure, challenge, or an experience of catharsis(for example; playing a scary/sad game to get scared/"The Feels".

I'd say that these are strong motivations to play a game, and are hardly gender divided.
Besides, why can't a competent company cater to both men and women? It's not like it's the most difficult thing to do, nor has it never been done. As you said, incompetence is the greater evil, and I'd consider not being able to cater to both men and women.
I mean, if one lone dad can mod the Zelda: Wind Waker game so his daughter can play a female Link, just by changing the pronouns, then why can't Nintendo do the same for some of there games themselves?
It's just a small feature, but things like that do add up over time.

Saving someone you care about is indeed a very powerful thing. However, the issue with it is that it's taken as a given far too often for my tastes that the player will want to save the person.
This is where the laziness comes in as a problem for games. Yahtzee and others have expressed this complaint before.

"This is your love interest. You really care about them, because we say so. On no! They're in danger go save them."

The most recent example of this I can remember is the first Infamous game. We know Cole's girl Trish for about 10 minutes(with not much more than a few minutes of actually talking), and we're expected to be so devastated when she leaves us. Then expected later to possibly sacrifice 6 other people to save her even though she's been out of the whole game for most of the time.

Yahtzee put it best in his review of the second game. Cole's friend Zeke made a better love interest(in both game's I'd say) because we may not have known him as long as Cole but they give us time with him to learn his personality, and become attached to him. Which is why you don't hear people complain about the mission where you have to save him once from the evil gang's base. I didn't do it because "I'm suppose to, or because it was the right thing to do." I wanted to save Zeke because it felt like he was a friend I care about.
Meanwhile, while having to chose between saving Trish, or the other doctors. I couldn't help but ask, "Why would I save her over 6 other men and women?"

This is what's bad about OVERUSE of D.I.D. People get lazy and expect you to bond with the damsel without actually telling the story in a way that can give you a chance to actually care for them. Even if your not a man you can want to save a women if she's a likable person that you've sent a fair amount of time with them and know them as more then "that girl I got to go save, because reasons".

The problem isn't D.I.D., but rather D.I.D. being misused as a stand in for actually caring about a person, or to add artificial motivation.

As for reflections of reality [sub](women being abused/raped/ect)[/sub] in games being a big reason. While that does have some weight, I don't find it to be an adequate, or completely actuate excuse/explanation for the abundance of women D.I.Ds.

The sad thing is, while it happens for sure more to women than men, I'd hardly say that men don't have to deal with things like rape in the real world.
Take this disturbing report about the U.S. military for example.
*below the spoiler. didn't work inside.*

"26,000 military personnel estimated to have experienced sexual assault"
"12,000 were women" "14,000 were men"

Indeed, men do make up a larger portion of the military's numbers so it's still means more women are being raped then men in general when you look at whole populations. However, this clearly shows that men are not free from the risk of rape. Even when highly trained, such as soldiers are.

http://thinkprogress.org/security/2013/11/06/2898711/report-sexual-assault-military/#

To quickly sum it up;

I would say laziness does lead to immorality if it causes decreased quality of a game, when people avoid a reasonable amount of work.
Games don't have to "re-invent the wheel" to be a "new idea". Sometimes a change in perspective is all that's needed to make it fresh. This has been done before, a lot, and successfully.
Gender demographics are not completely separate in their interests. We all can be motivated by things like exploration, challenge, an experience of catharsis, or the call of adventure. It would be smart to take advantage of these.
D.I.D. can be fine if planned well, but because they are so overused, people sometimes forget to actually make the people where suppose to care about and save, actual characters that we care about.
I don't see how the unfortunately high rate of women being raped in the real world explains the high number of women as D.I.D.s in games. I see your logic, and the WAY earlier stories were a bit more "involved" with that, but in most games it just seems to be used as a easy way to give motivation without always trying to build character. Also, while it's not nearly as high as women, men get raped too.

Hope you stay warn, and don't get buried in snow!