Video game culture and it's integrity.

[endoperez]

Yeah because that piece of crap Depression Quest has everyone's expectations soaring. Totally worth paying all of her bills for her. If her games were worth anything, she wouldn't need to be subsidized in this manner.

I haven't done the research on this, so do we know if there are any male developers operating in this manner?

She is releasing most of her stuff for free, and also doing other stuff.


Can male developers get funded on Patreon? Yes.

I searched for "games" on Patreon. Zoe Quinn was on the first page. So was Evil Hat Productions, started by Fred and Rob. They release FateCore RPG stuff on a pay-what-you-want scheme, funds coming from their Patreon. They might also have other jobs, I don't know, but it's kinda similar.

There's also someone making "ecchi flash games", no gender or name given. That counts too, cause he or she isn't getting money for being a girl.

There's also Robert Moran, who makes videos and is now working on a 2D co-op RPG.

So far I've reached page 3. I didn't include the guys making videos and stuff, because you asked about developers.


Also, according to her Patreon page, Zoe likes making small, tiny games, much smaller than what people are comfortable paying for, and when she finishes something she's excited and wants people to see it. So she makes lots of stuff, but not stuff that people want to buy. I guess many people support her just to see what she does next. I personally know someone like that, releasing a new game every month, and I'm sure he'd be happy to get paid to do that.

[OrcusMcP]

I've been watching this discussion with the sort of interest one typically reserves for witnessing a train derail. Having read the discussions and the links posted, I have just one question...

In the links that were posted about this, I saw a few references to Quinn using Robin Williams suicide as a means to advertise her "game". Is this true, and if so, could you please show me proof? If it is true, it's the most disgusting and vile thing I've heard in a long time.

I will paraphrase, but basically it went like this:

-It was ready to be fully released on Steam.
-Robin Williams committed suicide
-She posted about possibly not releasing the game out of respect on her personal dev blog
-She decided to release it as scheduled, but for free, and with no fanfare at all so that anyone who might get find some hope/closure/help/etc from it didn't have to pay for it.
-Literally said nothing about it afterwards

So unless you consider talking about such issues on the devblog and releasing something that used to cost money for free and was scheduled to release anyway as "using Robin's suicide to advertise", then maybe. The logic strains my brain, but apparently not those of others.

[GloatingSwine]

Have you played the game? Seriously, most of the programmers I know (and I don't know a lot) could have developed that "game" while working on the lunch breaks from their real job.

That literally does not matter*.

You say "my mate could do that", but he didn't did he?

*NB choice type games are p. ****ing popular, just not among 14-30 year old males.

[Olinser]

I've been watching this discussion with the sort of interest one typically reserves for witnessing a train derail. *snip*

[endoperez]

That literally does not matter*.

You say "my mate could do that", but he didn't did he?

*NB choice type games are p. ****ing popular, just not among 14-30 year old males.

You're giving off a pretty angry aura here. You might wanna play it down because this issue has many people taking sides already, and if people feel like you're on the opposing side, they look for faults in what you say instead of actually analyzing the message.


re:Crow

I know many programmers too, and only one of them regularly creates games in his off hours. The others create algorithms, programs, tools and experiments, or do stuff unrelated to programming. The creativity to make a game and the skill to create a game given a design aren't that often found in a single person.

[Scowling Dragon]

Crow the Quality of the game is not relevant. Don't derail the discussion.

She is much more of a professional victim then anything else, and the pro victim part is what matters.

I will ask: How much does everybody else make relative to her? She makes 25,000 a month.
Don't BS me. She isn't making 25,000 $ a month because she is a brilliant game developer that caters to a small niche of gamers.
She makes 25,000 dollars a month because she is a professional victim.

If there was a way to track Patreon similarly to Kickstarter, I bet 10 bucks that spikes in payments coincide with articles being put up, and her damseling herself.

[Crow]

Crow the Quality of the game is not relevant. Don't derail the discussion.

It is relevant, and actually reinforces the image of her as a professional victim. Nobody but a professional victim could put out work of that quality and expect to pull in what her Patreon does. A lot of people who use it put out good products. She doesn't. She gets paid off of her victim status.

To be fair though, she only asks for $600/month.

[endoperez]

Crow the Quality of the game is not relevant. Don't derail the discussion.

She is much more of a professional victim then anything else, and the pro victim part is what matters.

I will ask: How much does everybody else make relative to her? She makes 25,000 a month.
Don't BS me. She isn't making 25,000 $ a month because she is a brilliant game developer that caters to a small niche of gamers.
She makes 25,000 dollars a month because she is a professional victim.

If there was a way to track Patreon similarly to Kickstarter, I bet 10 bucks that spikes in payments coincide with articles being put up, and her damseling herself.

Do you have the source on 25 000 dollars a month?


Again, searching Patreon for "games":

At this moment Zoe is making 2.5k $ a month, assuming all the supporters she has right now will stay.

Patreon seems to sort users by number of supporters. The other supported people or groups on the front page get 1.9k, 2.2k, 3.0k and 3.7k dollars monthly.

There's 15 pages. Page 8, which might or might not be the median, currently has people or groups receiving from 212$ to 687$ dollars.

Edit:
There's also a "Games" category on Patreon. A Matt Lees, whose latest article is titled "Why the games press won't talk about ethical corruption", receives about 3.0k $ monthly, assuming all the supporters stay. Don't you think that's kinda tasteless, making money out of this thing about journalistic integrity discussion?

[Avilan the Grey]

"I don't know how any of this works but it must be illegal because Zoe Quinn is a bad person who does bad things!"

Not feeling like arguing the finer points with you anymore but... um no.

1. She uses the same account for both her personal crowdfunder and her charity game jam. If she at any time mistakes what money came from which, this will be a legal problem. Even in America, I'm sure. And as far as I know, as long as you pool all the moneys in one spot, she cannot tell them apart.
2. To have a charity event tied to your personal account is a huge problem because if you say use some of the money to buy food you might use some of the charity money for personal stuff. That is illegal.

[GloatingSwine]

She is much more of a professional victim then anything else, and the pro victim part is what matters.
.

Is she bollocks.

Point out, with evidence, a time before the last couple of weeks (now of course she is the actual victim of an internet hate campaign based on misrepresentations, bull****, and lies) when she was attempting to portray herself as the victim of anything and did so for her own financial gain (NB you must also provide evidence of this part, not speculation as to motive, actual evidence, starting a campaign, no matter how successful to replace a bad gamejam with a less bad one does not count as evidence of financial malfeasance which is what you are alleging).

She's making $25,000 a month because there are enough people willing to give her money to reach that figure, that's how crowd funding works.

Remember that this is the same system where someone raised $55000 to make potato salad.


Seriously, it seems that literally no matter how many of the allegations made about Zoe Quinn are demonstrated to be horsecrap people will come up with a brand new reason to hate her because she can do no right get these wimmens out of games!.

[OrcusMcP]

It is relevant, and actually reinforces the image of her as a professional victim. Nobody but a professional victim could put out work of that quality and expect to pull in what her Patreon does.

I'm sorry, what? In what world anywhere does "quality" of art directly correlate to wealth of artist?

[Olinser]

Is she bollocks.

Point out, with evidence, a time before the last couple of weeks (now of course she is the actual victim of an internet hate campaign based on misrepresentations, bull****, and lies) when she was attempting to portray herself as the victim of anything and did so for her own financial gain (NB you must also provide evidence of this part, not speculation as to motive, actual evidence, starting a campaign, no matter how successful to replace a bad gamejam with a less bad one does not count as evidence of financial malfeasance which is what you are alleging).

She's making $25,000 a month because there are enough people willing to give her money to reach that figure, that's how crowd funding works.

Remember that this is the same system where someone raised $55000 to make potato salad.


Seriously, it seems that literally no matter how many of the allegations made about Zoe Quinn are demonstrated to be horsecrap people will come up with a brand new reason to hate her because she can do no right get these wimmens out of games!.

You know, you keep throwing that strawman out there. Literally not a single person other than YOU has said any such thing about women.

For most people, Quinn herself is actually rather irrelevant. This is about 2 major things that she has simply brought to the forefront:

1) The fact that for years video game 'journalism' has been shown to be heavily biased and easily bribed by game developers. In this particular case it was sex. There have been numerous other demonstrated instances of 'journalists' taking money or perks to write favorable reviews. I recall one particularly laughable incident where a review was written and the writer was forced to admit that they had never actually even played the game.

2) The outright widespread CENSORSHIP of any discussion of the matter (which, due to the Streisand effect, only makes most people want to talk about it more).

[OrcusMcP]

Seriously, it seems that literally no matter how many of the allegations made about Zoe Quinn are demonstrated to be horsecrap people will come up with a brand new reason to hate her because she can do no right get these wimmens out of games!.

It's an extinction burst. The gamer identity is so threatened by the "Dreaded SJW Agenda!^tm" that it's looking for something, ANYTHING to get its desired fix of "Yes, you are important, white-cis-hetero-male, your power and sexual fantasies are all you shall see!"

[OrcusMcP]

1) The fact that for years video game 'journalism' has been shown to be heavily biased and easily bribed by game developers.

Red herring. If this were the real reason for the outrage then it shouldn't have taken yet another instance of "WOMAN IN GAMES! SHUN!" to break.

[TheSummoner]

Or maybe, and I know this is crazy, just maybe people don't want the people making games and the people reviewing them in bed together. Metaphorically or literally.

[Scowling Dragon]

Jack Thompson was a joke, made fun of and mocked on the internet for years. There is a mod for Mortal Combat (or its a character creator, not sure), to kill him in a myriad of different gruesom ways.

And despite all that, despite all the crap he tried to levy on the gaming, He never made himself a damsel. Nobody ever came to his defense. I bet you never came to his defense, claiming how much of a poor victim he is in all of this.

And OK, Il turn the burden on you. What do you think is bumkus? Why do you think the evidence is flawed?

We where presented with this: She had relations with a bunch of people who she worked with and those same people gave her very favorable coverage.

Most of those relations have been confirmed, and it has been confirmed that Internet Journalists printed slander against Wizardchan was just on HER WORD, and THOSE people proceeded to get harassed and mocked.

The rest is very logical speculation, speculation which no evidence has been provided to call into question. We know Zoe is a person who WOULD use personal connections to target other people. So why wouldn't it also be logical that she would have used these connections to get other favors?

And I know. People made a LOL out of funding a potato salad. People have elected comedians and Donkeys for mayor. But if I see a Politician fake an assassination attempt to get votes that doesn't make their actions less reprehensible.

But that doesn't distract from the main point that she made a Damsel of herself, and probable and very likely intent of making cash.

She hasn't turned to the FBI (Or has and nothing came out of it), and made the worst possible actions to sort out any "Real Problems" what she has done only makes sense if she is trying to raise her own publicity.

[OrcusMcP]

Or maybe, and I know this is crazy, just maybe people don't want the people making games and the people reviewing them in bed together. Metaphorically or literally.

You mean how that actually didn't happen? People just wanted it to be true so that they could be angry about it?

[Crow]

I'm sorry, what? In what world anywhere does "quality" of art directly correlate to wealth of artist?

Heh. "Art".

That is fine. I can accept that we will have a difference in opinion on this.

[GloatingSwine]

1) The fact that for years video game 'journalism' has been shown to be heavily biased and easily bribed by game developers. In this particular case it was sex. There have been numerous other demonstrated instances of 'journalists' taking money or perks to write favorable reviews. I recall one particularly laughable incident where a review was written and the writer was forced to admit that they had never actually even played the game.

Except it wasn't, because that NEVER ****ING HAPPENED!

She is accused of sleeping with a journalist to influence coverage of her game, but the journalist never actually covered her game during the period she is alleged to be sleeping with him (by a jealous ****ing ex oh look that's a reliable source!). The journalist quoted her in an article about something else.

The people using that as a rallying cry for "journalistic integrity" themselves lack integrity because they have allowed prejudice against Zoe Quinn to replace fact.

[TheSummoner]

You mean how that actually didn't happen? People just wanted it to be true so that they could be angry about it?

Yep. Not like she admitted it did. And the earth is flat and the sun revolves around it as well. Quinn can do no wrong because she doesn't have a penis and anyone who thinks she did something bad must hate women.

[GloatingSwine]

Yep. Not like she admitted it did. And the earth is flat and the sun revolves around it as well. Quinn can do no wrong because she doesn't have a penis and anyone who thinks she did something bad must hate women.

You know why Zoe Quinn did no wrong?

Because the article you are claiming was influenced by her relationship with a journalist never ****ing existed.

You are literally complaining about a thing which did not happen and attempting to produce evidence that it did.

[ObadiahtheSlim]

Except it wasn't, because that NEVER ****ING HAPPENED!

She is accused of sleeping with a journalist to influence coverage of her game, but the journalist never actually covered her game during the period she is alleged to be sleeping with him (by a jealous ****ing ex oh look that's a reliable source!). The journalist quoted her in an article about something else.

The people using that as a rallying cry for "journalistic integrity" themselves lack integrity because they have allowed prejudice against Zoe Quinn to replace fact.

She slept with the an Indiecade judge and I see an Indiecade award proudly displayed on her game's webpage. That's about as unethical as it comes.

[OrcusMcP]

Yep. Not like she admitted it did. And the earth is flat and the sun revolves around it as well. Quinn can do no wrong because she doesn't have a penis and anyone who thinks she did something bad must hate women.

AHEM

But I get it. All evidence against the conspiracy is just evidence of how deep the conspiracy is.

[Ziren]

It's an extinction burst. The gamer identity is so threatened by the "Dreaded SJW Agenda!^tm" that it's looking for something, ANYTHING to get its desired fix of "Yes, you are important, white-cis-hetero-male, your power and sexual fantasies are all you shall see!"

Now, I don't think this is accurate for the users of this forum. Sure quite a large amount of the members of the anti-Quinn-camp are either blatant misogynists, but I don't think any of the posters in this thread has shown signs to belong to that group.

However, I believe that some of the posters base their antipathy towards Quinn on issues that have nothing to do with the allegations of fraud or corruption. They rather seem to stem from her

- cheating on her boyfriend
- creating a game that the poster perceived as bad or a trivialization of depression
- some other reason unrelated to the topics of actual ethical relevance

As I see it, people that didn't like Quinn even before this whole mess got started (or disliked her because of her cheating) are faster to also believe other accusations against her, even if the supporting evidence is shaky.

From what I've seen so far, the only ethical misstep by Quinn that has been proven beyond reasonable doubt is her affair with her boss.

[OrcusMcP]

Now, I don't think this is accurate for the users of this forum. Sure quite a large amount of the members of the anti-Quinn-camp are either blatant misogynists, but I don't think any of the posters in this thread has shown signs to belong to that group.

Fair enough, but yes I was commenting more on the movement at large.

[GloatingSwine]

She slept with the an Indiecade judge and I see an Indiecade award proudly displayed on her game's webpage. That's about as unethical as it comes.

Depression Quest was a selected game featured in 2013's Indiecade Night Games. (Night Games is an exhibition/festival event)

With 23 other games.

It did not win an Indiecade award. It was not even in the running for an Indiecade award.

here are the Indiecade 2013 award winners.

You will note that Depression Quest is not on that list.

Here are the overall finalists.

You will note that Depression Quest is not on that list either.

What a surprise, this is another lie about Zoe Quinn!

She sure is getting value out of sleeping with the right people, it's almost as if she isn't using her womanly wiles to corrupt videogames at all!


I don't think, despite my dripping sarcasm, people here are being "misogynist", but they are uncritically accepting allegations with no factual basis over and over again.

[JadedDM]

There is a lot of misogyny on the anti-Quinn side of things, though. Of course, they are mostly quite careful to not be outright blatant about it. They claim it has nothing to do with Quinn, it's all about the integrity of game journalism. Despite the fact that game journalism has already been as corrupt as a two-bit politician for as long as I can remember and nobody really cared before now.

The whole thing reminds me strongly of the Anita Sarkeesian thing. Nobody with any brains outright says, "I hate her because she's a woman." No, no, they carefully couch their irrational hatred of her by latching on to whatever sounds at least somewhat reasonable. Otherwise they would be dismissed as sexists.

They claim she's a thief or a liar, that she's a 'professional victim' that she scams people from their money, that she supports censorship, that she makes up all those rape and death threats just to get attention, that she's not a 'real gamer' and wow, is any of this sounding really familiar to the whole Zoe Quinn thing, too?

It's also not a coincidence that among the loudest and biggest opponents of Quinn (and Sarkeesian) are really big misogynists, too.

That's why, if you pay close attention, you'll notice the anti-Quinn folks will immediately believe anything negative about her, even if there's no proof at all. But anything positive about her is immediately dismissed as needing proper citation.

[Jayngfet]

And just as before, its cost is also irrelevant.

Zoe Quinns Patreon has spiked to twice its original support after all this happened. Its not what this is all about.

Edit: I mean it is, but its part of the story. Zoe is a professional victim. Id say the game is the minimum "Foot in the door" you take in order to qualify as a game maker.

It wasn't even really made by Quinn. If I remember correctly her boyfriend did the coding and some other dude helped with writing.

I think it's insulting to call her a game developer because I'm friends with actual people in game design. These guys spend years studying modeling and coding and game theory and work their asses off to earn that title.

For someone like Zoe Quinn to get that same title robs it of it's integrity, since she hasn't done anything of that caliber.

[GloatingSwine]

The whole thing reminds me strongly of the Anita Sarkeesian thing.

Anita Sarkeesian currently forced to leave her home after even more death and rape threats.

Hows that integrity going, video game culture?

Just kidding, it's probably Zoe Quinn's fault somehow.

It wasn't even really made by Quinn. If I remember correctly her boyfriend did the coding and some other dude helped with writing.

I think it's insulting to call her a game developer because I'm friends with actual people in game design. These guys spend years studying modeling and coding and game theory and work their asses off to earn that title.

For someone like Zoe Quinn to get that same title robs it of it's integrity, since she hasn't done anything of that caliber.

Because everyone knows a woman can't really have done any work on a videogame. She must have just been shagging the person who did the real work (ps. wasn't) and anyway it wasn't work anyway because you don't think it counts.

You are in absolutely no position to talk about integrity.

[JadedDM]

Anita Sarkeesian currently forced to leave her home after even more death and rape threats.

Hows that integrity going, video game culture?

Just kidding, it's probably Zoe Quinn's fault somehow.

Ugggh, there are people who are claiming Sarkeesian 'made up' the threats in order to push her own agenda and the entire thing is just a 'scam.' So yeah, lots of integrity up here in this culture.