Zero Punctuation: Yahtzee Goes to GDC

[MrSod]

Anyone else get the feeling that Yahtzee is feeling a bit, er, overworked? or at least stressed out?
Maybe he should get a week off or something.

 

[vidiotz.com]

3) About the console wars thing, the XBox 360 showing up drunk thing was probably a stab at the reliability issues. If the Red Ring of Death thing wasn't as much of an issue, the PS3 would have had a harder time than it did last year.

The Ps3 has better graphics, better sound quality, has better controls, is just better.

I wouldn't go that far, the PS3 has a better CPU and is more powerful but the Xbox360 has a better GPU so in some if not most cases it can make games look much richer in colour on the Xbox360 and play them at higher resolutions. I will say now that the cost is coming down the PS3 is looking better especially because of its blueray player which is now the victor of the format war. At first though the Xbox360 had greater game selection so as soon as some of the better PS3 titles start coming out things should start looking better for the PS3. So from the start the Xbox360 was much better than the expensive PS3 but now that its price is coming down I can start to agree that the PS3 is better is some perspectives.

You both make valid points on the merits of the PS3, and there's something to the momentum that PS3 is getting right now. The PS3 is a truly next-gen package, and can last long term potentially for Sony (Sony gave the PS3 a ten year window, as opposed to the typical 5 for consoles).

On the flip side, as far as gaming experience (variety, multi- and single- player, etc) the 360 is considered the winner by the gaming industry at the moment. Case in point: Assassin's Creed, originally a PS3 exclusive, has sold 1 million copies for the 360, 200K for the PS3. Look at MetaCritic, and in most cases, you'll find that the average rating for the 360 version of a cross platform game is typically higher than that the comparable PS3 version. Game attach rate is also unusually high for the 360 compared to the PS3 and the Wii.

With all that said, my comments were not about fanboyism, but about selling. Last holiday season, the biggest barriers to entry for the PS3 were cost and lack of games, in that order. The largest barrier to XBox 360 entry was (and still is) the reliability issue. As a shopper, if you could buy a gaming console that's in stores for $20 more than the Wii (which is not in stock, of course), has hundreds of games already, including every game that you've read about on game sites for months, would you buy it and two games; or, would you buy a game system that is $140 more than you were planning to spend, with only a few of the games that you like available, then go home and watch a nice movie on it? If the 360 purchaser didn't have to worry about a buying a high-def paper weight, the choice would be obvious to someone who just wants to play games right now.

 

[kingflab]

im just speaking up because page after page of posts reflected an opinion i agreed with and then some moron got up on their bandwaggon and started the 'cant we all just get along' happy horseshit and calling people idiots because they had the nerve to make a post saying they hated the censorship.

i can assure anyone that is reading i am NOT a child, im a 36 year old United States Marine (retired) that actualy spent some time in the sand (in gulf 1) with a weapon standing a post to defend freedoms like freedom of expression. perhaps some of my hostility on this issue DOES come from an overreaction to what i do see and an over censoring of American media in all forms (im still pissed that the Witcher got cut down for American sale) but though that may be a part of this it is by far not the only part for me.

time after time i see posts on formus like this where the vast majority of people dont like something but when they say so there is allwayws a few turds that want to take exception, they allways come across as being holyer than thou and act like anyone that would have the gall to possably dissagree with them are just kids or feeble minded or what have you. well im here to tell you that in THIS case you have met your match, im not a kid and im certianly NOT feeble minded and in reguards to the actualy issue in question (censorship in case you missed it) if your for it at any level then you are the idiot. there is a right and a wrong way of doing things and censorship is the wrong way.

ive seen several replys now that seem to want to say that the censorship was done on purpose. bull shit. thats all i can say about that. simply because of its true than Yahtzee is a hack and we all know hes not. if the censorship was put in by yahtzee himself as a part of making some kind of a statment then it fell flat, it played like a fart in church and hes just not that bad that he could screw something like that up. so that means that the censorship was imposed. making all the arguments about how its 'not that bad' wrong. its not your work first of all so your judgment about how it 'did hurt anything' is meaningless, second of all it DID hurt the clip as page after page of replys attest to here. and 3rd if this was yahtzees "big break" do you really think that this clip gives a good reflection of his work? with a screaming BEEP every couple of seconds to totaly jar you out of the flow?

yahtzee got his 'big break', im sure he dusted off his thong and his push up bra, spent days in his basement working it on his home made stripper pole, choosing just the right song to dance too, and the right boa to use for the tease portion, perfected his act only to arrive and be told 'ohh yeah you cant take your cloths off because this is an awards show'

and to the person that said in effect it was an awards show made for TV so censorship is to be expected, ill just say again then why bother to get someone for that show knowing that what he does wont be suitable for TV? if you want yahtzee then take what comes along if you want Ward and June Cleaver then get THEM instead.

dont take our $20 hooker slap more than a few Beeps on his work and try and make him Queen of England just because its on TV. just because a cat has a kitten in an oven dont make it a muffin.

This isn't a restriction of freedoms, and censorship in this case is not the wrong thing to do. We're not censoring information here and to compare the censorship of curse words -in a presentation aimed at a professional audience for a one-off special- is a dangerous idea. Its not a matter of impeding on our personal rights, its a matter of common courtesy. Political censorship is a dangerous tool, this is not the same case... its not even censorship, its just making foul words less powerful. Turning this very subject into a topic of freedom of speech is just insulting to that very principle, freedom of speech is a political idea giving citizens the right to open constructed opinion, their right to stand up to their values, and a basic common respect when expressing our views ... this has nothing to do with not swearing. Had this been a video where Yahtzee spends most of his presentation insulting the USA, would that have been acceptable? No, because its possibly offensive to a good majority of the audience, the same applies for foul language.

Censorship is not a 'wrong' way to do things, abuse and missuse of censorship is. Theres a massive difference between censoring information and political ideas, than there is in bleeping out a few foul words in order to make a decent video acceptable to a mixed audience.

As for Yahtzee's position in this censorship, I doubt he cares, the jokes and puns he made were brilliant nonetheless, bleeped swearing doesn't really divert from that. Its no coincidence that the only presentation he's made to go infront of a live audience also happened to be censored.


I should point out, I don't have anything against swearing, but I also accept that some professionalism needs to be maintained from time to time, there are times when the target audience may not all be the sort of people who find foul language acceptable - such as a massive conference -, where as viewers of Yahtzee know what to expect the people in that audience might not be too happy to here foul language booming through the nearby speakers.#


-edit- Oh, and I forgot to mention. I fully agree with your position of censorship of the media, although I live in the UK. However, I think there is a large difference between censorship of adult material in video games as opposed to censorship of swearing in a presentation aimed at a mixed audience. A video game is targeted at a specific audience, it has warnings of adult content on the back and the buyers are at their own discretion as to whether or not they want to use a product with such content, in the case of Yahtzee's presentation at GDC the audience may not have all appreciated Yahtzee's style, they cant simply shut their own ears and make the noises go away. You get exactly what you pay for in a game/dvd, the same as we get exactly what we expect from one of Yahtzee's videos on this website - lots of the people in that audience may have been there strictly for professional reasons; not to have some crude English guy rant and swear in a short presentation (apologies Yahtzee). Which is why I understand censorship in this case. What I don't like is when people try to impose their morals onto my lifestyle, despite them not having used anything that they try to change. If an organisation that didn't play video games campaigned for foul language to be censored in 18+ rated games, I would be highly annoyed, on the other hand if somebody showed Apocalypse Now on daytime TV I could fully understand censorship.

 

[Drong]

If you want a none-biased opinion based on equality, fairness and a decent moral standard go read the Daily Mail.

errr non biased? have you ever read the daily mail?



Wyatt i respect everything you have said on this but personally mate dealing with some of the people on here you are wasting your breath and as for the censorship well i certainly didn't like it but providing it's a one off for an awards show then i'm not gonna get my panties up in a bunch. But the way alot of people on here spit venom you would think they had to sell their grandmothers to get their weekly slice of Yahtzee not it was something that they got for FREE!

 

[kingflab]

If you want a none-biased opinion based on equality, fairness and a decent moral standard go read the Daily Mail.

errr non biased? have you ever read the daily mail?

It was satire mate, that was the point I was trying to get across in the post.

 

[poonsniff]

Has anyone put forth the thought Yahtzee knew beforehand that his video would have been censored at least by G4 and he censored the piece poorly himself so what was bleeped was still easily figured out? I mean why would G4 bother to try to censor an already censored piece?

I think it might have been his sly way of defeating the censorship of his work by doing such a poor job.

I dunno just my theory.

The biggest problem I had with the censorship was the fact that his speech is very fast and while processing what the bleep was I lost what was said directly after the bleep. No big deal though I just rewound it a bit and listened again.

 

[Chappy0]

Yahtzee will always be funny, epsecially the "hand that shoots bees" part for this video, but I hope the censorship doesn't become a regular thing, it was really annoying! Like some people have said it made funny things less funny(I know it was because this was shown in public), but other than that great job

 

[Imhatepie]

Oh yes I almost forgot:

Prick= censored

*****= fire away Yahtzee!

Take THAT female kind lol.

 

[Limasol]

I actually found the bleeps painful and jarring on my ears, lower pitch is required if bleeping is necessary.

I also have been rather disappointed with Sim city societies and this vid, its no crysis or Guitar Hero thats for sure.

Ps: English(UK) spellings rule, but i'm biased

 

[Specopsc]

out of curiosity, but does anyone know the application that yahtzee uses to make his visuals? I wanted to use them for a project at school, but I don't know what it is

 

[kingflab]

out of curiosity, but does anyone know the application that yahtzee uses to make his visuals? I wanted to use them for a project at school, but I don't know what it is

I have to apologise. I just went to quote your post, and due to habit of always clicking on the left I instead reported it... sorry!

I think he just uses Windows Movie Maker.

 

[Wyatt]

for the last time i hope, the problem with censoring yahtzee in the context of the GDC is about the fact that the GDC invited him to make a video/presentation. its not about where the video will be shown its not about who it is being shown too its about the fact that THEY invited HIM to make one of HIS videos.

if they felt that his work was going to be a problem for ANY reason then they shouldnt have invited him, or at WORSE they should have informed him when they issued the invitation that his work needed to be cuss free due to the venue. NOT, repeat NOT edited his work after he compleated it.

all the talk of what the venue was and who may or may not have been there to see this is missing the point totaly. the point is you dont higher a stripper to entertain your croud then object when they take their cloths off and rush the stage with your coat and cover up her naughty bits during the show.

Jesus this isnt a hard idea to get is it? what they should have done at the GDC instead of censoring his work was ask him to not produce a work that needed censoring to begin with. im 100% certian that yahtzee could produce a video with no cussing and have it be just as funny as his 'normal' stuff is. instead they asked him to make a video then pushed THEIR 2 cents in and censored it. for what reason?

all the talk about how its OK because they had to censor it due to the venue is not getting my point. the problem isnt the venue or the need to keep a TV program 'clean' the PROBLEM is that they chose yahtzee KNOWING his work isnt fit for an average TV program. and rather than ask him to clean it up they just stomped on it afterwords changing HIS message to THEIR message by doing so. that video isnt about yahtzees opinions anymore its about giant ass BEEPS every 10 words that someone else decided too add in.

think about this. Yahtzee had a chance to reach a larger group of people with that GDC than hes been exposed to yet. he got a chance to jump into the 'lime light' with that clip and get his name known other places than here. when they censored his videos it changes how people see him that arent familiar with his work like we are. it makes him at best look like just another foul mouth gamer idiot (by drawing attention with screaming censorship to the cussing that otherwise would have gone unnoticed for most people) and at worse just a flash in the pan moron who the GDC got too fill a couple dull minutes in their awards program.
it makes him look bad, it makes him look like hes so stupid that he didnt relize he couldnt cuss at that venue and that the GDC had to take steps to get him under control.

 

[kingflab]

for the last time i hope, the problem with censoring yahtzee in the context of the GDC is about the fact that the GDC invited him to make a video/presentation. its not about where the video will be shown its not about who it is being shown too its about the fact that THEY invited HIM to make one of HIS videos.

if they felt that his work was going to be a problem for ANY reason then they shouldnt have invited him, or at WORSE they should have informed him when they issued the invitation that his work needed to be cuss free due to the venue. NOT, repeat NOT edited his work after he compleated it.

all the talk of what the venue was and who may or may not have been there to see this is missing the point totaly. the point is you dont higher a stripper to entertain your croud then object when they take their cloths off and rush the stage with your coat and cover up her naughty bits during the show.

Jesus this isnt a hard idea to get is it? what they should have done at the GDC instead of censoring his work was ask him to not produce a work that needed censoring to begin with. im 100% certian that yahtzee could produce a video with no cussing and have it be just as funny as his 'normal' stuff is. instead they asked him to make a video then pushed THEIR 2 cents in and censored it. for what reason?

all the talk about how its OK because they had to censor it due to the venue is not getting my point. the problem isnt the venue or the need to keep a TV program 'clean' the PROBLEM is that they chose yahtzee KNOWING his work isnt fit for an average TV program. and rather than ask him to clean it up they just stomped on it afterwords changing HIS message to THEIR message by doing so. that video isnt about yahtzees opinions anymore its about giant ass BEEPS every 10 words that someone else decided too add in.

think about this. Yahtzee had a chance to reach a larger group of people with that GDC than hes been exposed to yet. he got a chance to jump into the 'lime light' with that clip and get his name known other places than here. when they censored his videos it changes how people see him that arent familiar with his work like we are. it makes him at best look like just another foul mouth gamer idiot (by drawing attention with screaming censorship to the cussing that otherwise would have gone unnoticed for most people) and at worse just a flash in the pan moron who the GDC got too fill a couple dull minutes in their awards program.
it makes him look bad, it makes him look like hes so stupid that he didnt relize he couldnt cuss at that venue and that the GDC had to take steps to get him under control.

But you're basing your entire argument on conclusions you've obviously jumped to. Firstly for all we know Yathzee was well aware of the content he was and wasn't allowed to publish without censorship, secondly what kind of fool would refuse to host a mock awards presentation (and a career +1) just because his swear words would get bleeped? You're making a massive fuss over nothing, a couple of foul words were bleeped so the video could be published at the GDC, the audience probably don't care, Yahtzee probably doesn't care, it isn't some massive blow to freedoms or values, its just people complaining because you want to make it look like the GDC have just slapped him in the face. Yahtzee was given this oppertunity to entertain, he took it. The GDC hired him to give a funny ranting award mock up, and thats EXACTLY what he did.

And how the hell can you compare this to a stripper? Unlike a stripper who's career is entirely dependant on her removing her clothes; Yahtzee doesn't get his reputation only because he swears, otherwise we might as well have PcGamer Magazine written by Stella drinking chavs. He gets his reputation because he knows how to write funny constructive rants which underneath the humour actually raise some pretty good points, to say he's been restricted in any way is just bloody ridiculous... the content is still there, we can easily understand what words he's using, and the bleeping was probably only added so the video could be shown in the first place. I mean heres a question, had the video had no swearing, simply because GDC rules hypothetically forbade it (say because it has an audience which includes children) - would you still be complaining then?

 

[u2rocksbaby]

If you call your opinion (i.e. that 360 is better than Ps3) fact, then you are, by very definition, wrong.

Listen to yourself, Indigo Dingo. You're no better.

 

[Specopsc]

i actually have to say that some of the words were not censored such as when he says ***** about bioshock, besides you can here what he says through the beeps

 

[smileyboybob]

didnt like it. Made me laugh, but I still laugh when someone says "poop" around me

 

[stacia123]

You keep your hands off him/her, homewrecker.

It wasn't me, I swear! Those aren't my boots under your bed!

...bleeped swearing doesn't really divert from that.

In your opinion. I wish everyone on both sides of the issue would remember that. YOU weren't distracted by it, but others are, and if The Escapist wants to hold viewers and not drive them away, it's in their best interest to listen to both complaints and praise. I see nothing wrong with people saying they didn't like the bleeping, for whatever reason.

I understand that you're frustrated with people who use the phrase "freedom of speech" in situations like these, and I am too, but I also understand people use the phrase in regards to any censorship, governmental or not. There's nothing you can do about it.

 

[m_jim]

for the last time i hope, the problem with censoring yahtzee in the context of the GDC is about the fact that the GDC invited him to make a video/presentation. its not about where the video will be shown its not about who it is being shown too its about the fact that THEY invited HIM to make one of HIS videos.

I see your point, but I have one of my own. You've contributed several treatises to this thread about the censorship issue, but have you heard the Y-man say as much as a peep about it? Sure, maybe he doesn't want to bite the hand that feeds him, but he seems like the sort of fellow that would let it be heard if he has complaints about a topic...and lord knows, he has a few complaints. You (and a number of other posters) seem to have taken this rather hard, but if the guy who was "censored" (if he didn't choose to have the bleeps in the first place) isn't getting bent out of shape, why should everyone else?
P.S.: I'm not trying to hate on you specifically, Wyatt. I've read your other posts and I cracked up when you nailed the "kiddy diddler." No hard feelings?

 

[BrainFromArous]

"Summary: The Escapist, make up your mind. If you want to be edgy, the stop with the censorship. If you want to be kid-friendly, don't have a review section featuring a foul-mouthed Aussie. Simple as that. Straddling the fence makes nobody happy."

Well said, Czech.

Alas, The Escapist has already made their choice. Not so much "kid friendly" - not too many kids at GDC, after all - as "ever more mass-market friendly."

Look forward to more fence-straddling, in other words. More intrusive ad content, too.

The best part of this whole thing is that the spoken word "shit" is censored but the written appearance of it at 03:56 is left intact.

Not just censorship... incompetent censorship!

 

[Spitz]

I personally disagree with Yahtzee's assumptions on Guitar Hero and Rock Band. Oh sure, Guitar Hero III : Legends of Rock is a kick in the soft dangly bits for all concerned, but before that, the games (1, 2 and 80's) supposedley drummed up more business for Guitar teaches and sales of real Gibsons, Yamaha's and all other makers of the instant coolness machine than they'd been seeing in years, as well as increasing the number of Headbangers (My cousin and one of my friends among them). And as for Rock Band, half of the game (Vocals and Drums) require actual talent in order to not suck completely at them, and the guitar and base are getting closer to the real deal with the addition of 5 new buttons.

Guitar and BASS are getting closer to the real deal? I have been playing guitar for 15 years or so and I'm pretty sure a smaller plastic version of a guitar with buttons for frets, NO MATTER HOW MANY BUTTONS will never be "closer to the real deal." Until the day I can plug in my real guitar to my PS9 or Xbox1080xxx, it will never be like the real deal.

The Rock Band guitar is a piece of trash and the solo buttons were a complete waste of someone's brain power and the companies development time.

Oh and the review was good, I didn't think it was his best by at all. He was funny and definitely spoke - I think - at times faster then usual. It's really amazing how many people are getting upset about the censorship... but are we really surprised?... Na..