Did anyone else see that article get pulled off Kotaku today?

@AngelN7: Seriously. This escalated and turned quite quickly.

@Turambar said:

@Napalm said:

@iAmJohn said:

@EvilKatarn said:

And what's wrong with Gundam?

Because they, like the rest of his stories, have nothing to do with video games?

To be fair, Kotaku hasn't been a true videogame news website since a couple of years ago.

To be extra fair, a life size statue of a Gundam should be relevant to everything.

To be tripley fair: shut up.

Twisted Metal came out on valentine's day and Jaffe said that his game is sooo good that if you play it with your girlfriend she will love you for it. He goes onto say that if you let her when you will even get a blowjob. The crux of the joke is that his game is both super good (in his entirely unbiased opinion) and coming out on valentine's day. Stupid but hardly offensive in context.

I knew there was a good reason I stopped reading them. Besides the on-and-off off-putting articles (for me anyway).

@Arker101 said:

It won't be a nail in the coffin*. Jim Sterling put up an article a few days ago about PS3 users being more sophisticated, and Destructiod isn't going under. I didn't actually read the story, so maybe it was a joke headline. That seems on the same level as this, to me at least.

*Unless you'r talking about Kotakus reputation, in which case, whatever, this isn't bringing anything new to the table on what they're all about.

The story was actually about a game designer and a rep under Sony saying PS3 users are more sophisticated because art games sell better there. (Flower, Journey, The Path etc) The only thing that would be considered trollish (whatever the fuck that means) is the jab against PS3 fanboys which isn't bad as far as I'm concerned.

@Ace829: What is The Path and why have I not heard of it?

Edit: I just remembered this site has a wiki. So my question is did it ever come out on PS3?

@Turambar said:

@Napalm said:

@iAmJohn said:

@EvilKatarn said:

And what's wrong with Gundam?

Because they, like the rest of his stories, have nothing to do with video games?

To be fair, Kotaku hasn't been a true videogame news website since a couple of years ago.

To be extra fair, a life size statue of a Gundam should be relevant to everything.

To be tripley fair: shut up.

@Turambar said:

@Napalm said:

@Turambar said:

To be extra fair, a life size statue of a Gundam should be relevant to everything.

To be tripley fair: shut up.

Are you saying life size statues of giant robots are not relevant to all areas of life? D:

No, you fucking creep.

@TentPole said:

@Ace829: What is The Path and why have I not heard of it?

Woah I just got my facts mixed up. It's actually a PC/Mac only game, but yeah it's basically one of those art games that try to convey a message to you in some sort of weird way. I wasn't a big fan of it personally.

@TentPole said:

@Ace829: What is The Path and why have I not heard of it?

The Path is great. I didn't know it was out for anything, but the PC. But it has eerie dreamlike atmosphere and a really great cast that raises a lot of interesting philosophical questions. The implications of the Wolf, Grandma and everything else in it is really thought provoking.

However, it's more a "game" in the sense of Dinner Date and Dear Esther than anything else

@Arker101 said:

@AngelN7 said:

@Arker101 said:

It won't be a nail in the coffin*. Jim Sterling put up an article a few days ago about PS3 users being more sophisticated, and Destructiod isn't going under. I didn't actually read the story, so maybe it was a joke headline. That seems on the same level as this, to me at least.

*Unless you'r talking about Kotakus reputation, in which case, whatever, this isn't bringing anything new to the table on what they're all about.

Actually that article had to do with Journey and Thatgamecompany games being kinda succesfull there, he doesn't take long saying that they may be "sophisticated" (not really) but a lot of them act like insecure childs when criticized that's really lightweight for some other stuff that he writtes really, but I've never take Destructoid for being shady and click-whores like Kotaku.

That's not as bad as I though then, but with the way "console fanboy-ism" works, that article seemed manufactured for page hits. In general I actually enjoy Destructoid, but it seems that a lot of the time Jim Sterling makes topics that come off a bit hyperbolic. Kotaku is the leader in the shady department for sure, but I think the weird nothingtodowithgames articles would hurt that site far more then console wars ones would.

Yeah he's really into contrarian arguments and such but under all that there's a genuine and interesting opinion on some games , to me his writting comes off as made by a real life human troll so it doesn't bother me that much when he says something "shocking" or something to cause anger.

@AngelN7 said:

@Arker101 said:

@AngelN7 said:

@Arker101 said:

It won't be a nail in the coffin*. Jim Sterling put up an article a few days ago about PS3 users being more sophisticated, and Destructiod isn't going under. I didn't actually read the story, so maybe it was a joke headline. That seems on the same level as this, to me at least.

*Unless you'r talking about Kotakus reputation, in which case, whatever, this isn't bringing anything new to the table on what they're all about.

Actually that article had to do with Journey and Thatgamecompany games being kinda succesfull there, he doesn't take long saying that they may be "sophisticated" (not really) but a lot of them act like insecure childs when criticized that's really lightweight for some other stuff that he writtes really, but I've never take Destructoid for being shady and click-whores like Kotaku.

That's not as bad as I though then, but with the way "console fanboy-ism" works, that article seemed manufactured for page hits. In general I actually enjoy Destructoid, but it seems that a lot of the time Jim Sterling makes topics that come off a bit hyperbolic. Kotaku is the leader in the shady department for sure, but I think the weird nothingtodowithgames articles would hurt that site far more then console wars ones would.

Yeah he's really into contrarian arguments and such but under all that there's a genuine and interesting opinion on some games , to me his writting comes off as made by a real life human troll so it doesn't bother me that much when he says something "shocking" or something to cause anger.

Exactly. Jim's been doing it for a while, and as far as I know he's doing just fine. Totilo making one aritcle focused on console wars, while not the best example of games journalism, certainly isn't the most controversial thing to hit the internet. The most shocking thing to me is that they took down the article at all.

Heh, Kotaku might have standards of quality.

@Turambar said:

@CountMacula said:

@Crixaliz said:

@Trilogy said:

@MonetaryDread said:

@Doctorchimp said:

All I know is David Jaffe let Stephen Totilo know everything he thought about Kotaku, and that's good enough for me.

Damn that was a great listen. Go David Jaffe.

What was all of that over? I need a little context here. I'm so out of of the loop with all this Kotaku stuff since I never visit their site.

I would also like to know what they wrote about Jaffe

From what I recall, he said something stupid in the heat of the moment on Gametrailers during the lead up to Twisted Metal's release along the lines of "If your girlfriend beats you at TM, you'll be getting a blowjob for sure" (really paraphrasing there), and a new reporter at Kotaku called him a misogynist, and then in a follow up story where he tries to apologise and say how he fucked up, she basically cut up a bunch of the quotes. I'm a bit hazy on the details, but I remember that comment getting totally blown out of proportion.

There was some twitter war stuff between him and Leigh Alexander where she drunkenly tweeted that if she had worked on the game, she'd pretend she didn't out of embarrassment (not based on his blowjob comment, but on the game itself) which ended up getting pulled into the misogyny shitshow.

Specific to the original statement made by Jaffee, I can definitely see how it can be interpreted as misogynistic, and I have little issue with someone calling him out on that. Though since I have not heard anything about the follow up story, I'll leave my incomplete opinion off here.

I agree, (which is why i said it was stupid), but the difference is the way in which he was called out. As someone mentioned earlier, it was less of a "hey, what he said can be interpreted as offensive to women, we should all be a bit more careful" informative article and more of a "David Jaffe endorses misogyny! Someone needs to rescue his daughters from this monster" trashy attention grabbing article. And then the follow up crap shoot occurred leading to his outburst in the audio file.

One thing that really made me respect him though, was he only bumped into Totilo in the lobby after he finished an interview with the PA Report, and mid rant he actually told Kuchera that he should be recording everything.

@Turambar said:

@Napalm said:

@Turambar said:

To be extra fair, a life size statue of a Gundam should be relevant to everything.

To be tripley fair: shut up.

Are you saying life size statues of giant robots are not relevant to all areas of life? D:

No, you fucking creep.

@Arker101 said:

Heh, Kotaku might have standards of quality.

Nah, the article simply didn't have enough pictures of scantily clad cosplayers to satisfy their usual journalistic excellence.

And Jim Sterling's a smart man. He knows exactly which buttons to push to troll and rile up the nerds, resulting in more hits for his shitty website.

@Turambar said:

@Napalm said:

@Turambar said:

@Napalm said:

@Turambar said:

To be extra fair, a life size statue of a Gundam should be relevant to everything.

To be tripley fair: shut up.

Are you saying life size statues of giant robots are not relevant to all areas of life? D:

No, you fucking creep.

You're gonna have to show your logic path of "giant statues of robots are pretty awesome" and "creep."

You don't know me too well, because I wasn't being serious, but I wasn't the one in that quote train to say, "robot statues are awesome." I prefer mechs, anyway.

He's 100% right to question the poll. The Wii in a lot of ways blew the competition out of the water this generation. It's not my personal favorite console this generation but in terms of sales, market reach, and innovation the Wii could easily be considered the greatest console among the three. Further, two of the games (Galaxy 1 and 2), were two of the greatest games to have ever been released, if not ever then certainly this generation, and showed that platformers can still innovate in meaningful, incredible ways.

@Turambar said:

@Napalm said:

@Turambar said:

@Napalm said:

@Turambar said:

To be extra fair, a life size statue of a Gundam should be relevant to everything.

To be tripley fair: shut up.

Are you saying life size statues of giant robots are not relevant to all areas of life? D:

No, you fucking creep.

You're gonna have to show your logic path of "giant statues of robots are pretty awesome" and "creep."

You don't know me too well, because I wasn't being serious, but I wasn't the one in that quote train to say, "robot statues are awesome." I prefer mechs, anyway.

I've been losing interest in their site for a while now. The extended definition of "game culture" didn't bother me at initially but it started being more of the real focus (or lack thereof) for the site. First they were getting a little too obsessed with anime, then the sexy cosplay (ok, maybe I didn't mind that as much), then they just got carried away from there.

Lately their arrow bullshit has really put me off. It's like they said, "Hey, a lot of you complained that we were constantly going on tangents that had little or nothing to do with games or game culture...so we decided to do it MORE, only now on a schedule with arrows highlighting which tangent we're on."

There's Kotaku "core" now but I believe that simply illustrates my point. When the original focus of your site has become a small, hidden branch, you probably need to pull it back a little.

Add to all that the Gawker-style of "journalism" creeping in again a little more and you have a recipe for a fairly shitty experience.

@JasonR86: To be fair, the Wii "blew the competition out of the water" largely because it was aimed squarely at a market outside of the one the 360, PS3, and PC were fighting over. Add to that the lower price of entry many a kid undoubtedly cited in their request for one as a Christmas/birthday gift and the draw of nostalgia that brought many of those 360, PS3, and PC owners in as well (like me) and yeah, they'd have to screw something up royally not to do well.

It's like saying Taco Bell is significantly more popular and successful than Chili's. Of course. I can drive 2 minutes away and grab some shitty cheap "Mexican" food a lot easier than my 30 minute drive to the nearest Chili's for some more expensive yet not necessarily significantly better "Mexican" food. And unless Taco Bell is busted for mixing fecal matter mixing more than the limit of fecal matter into their ground beef, they will continue to do so regardless of the actual quality.

@Doctorchimp said:

All I know is David Jaffe let Stephen Totilo know everything he thought about Kotaku, and that's good enough for me.

My respect for David Jaffe gained a level after hearing that.

@TeflonBilly said:

@Arker101 said:

Heh, Kotaku might have standards of quality.

Nah, the article simply didn't have enough pictures of scantily clad cosplayers tosatisfy their usual jurnalistic excellence.

And Jim Sterling's a smart man. He knows exactly which buttons to push to troll and rile up the nerds, resulting in more hits for his shitty website.

Some of his articles do have a tidbit of interesting data in them, like that the devs of Flower and Journey think that the PS3 audience is more in tune with their games, but saying "PS3 owners are more sophisticated." is just asking for trouble. I read that comments section, and it was exactly what I expected. He just seems to really enjoy riling up the internet.

One time I showed my friend my Pulse account (it gives you headline news from various websites) and he compared every other video game sites articles to Kotakus. It didn't stack up well. It was funny, but sad.

@Turambar said:

Ironically, when Jaffe got to the statement of "It's not misogyny. Misogyny is mistrust of hatred of women.", I lost another notch of respect for the guy. If he doesn't realize what he said is can very fairly be interpreted as denigration of women, there's not much that can help him. That said, how Kotaku has apparently spun the follow up story does not surprise me one bit.

@AngelN7 said:

@Arker101 said:

@AngelN7 said:

@Arker101 said:

It won't be a nail in the coffin*. Jim Sterling put up an article a few days ago about PS3 users being more sophisticated, and Destructiod isn't going under. I didn't actually read the story, so maybe it was a joke headline. That seems on the same level as this, to me at least.

*Unless you'r talking about Kotakus reputation, in which case, whatever, this isn't bringing anything new to the table on what they're all about.

Actually that article had to do with Journey and Thatgamecompany games being kinda succesfull there, he doesn't take long saying that they may be "sophisticated" (not really) but a lot of them act like insecure childs when criticized that's really lightweight for some other stuff that he writtes really, but I've never take Destructoid for being shady and click-whores like Kotaku.

That's not as bad as I though then, but with the way "console fanboy-ism" works, that article seemed manufactured for page hits. In general I actually enjoy Destructoid, but it seems that a lot of the time Jim Sterling makes topics that come off a bit hyperbolic. Kotaku is the leader in the shady department for sure, but I think the weird nothingtodowithgames articles would hurt that site far more then console wars ones would.

Yeah he's really into contrarian arguments and such but under all that there's a genuine and interesting opinion on some games , to me his writting comes off as made by a real life human troll so it doesn't bother me that much when he says something "shocking" or something to cause anger.

Exactly. Jim's been doing it for a while, and as far as I know he's doing just fine. Totilo making one aritcle focused on console wars, while not the best example of games journalism, certainly isn't the most controversial thing to hit the internet. The most shocking thing to me is that they took down the article at all.

Heh, Kotaku might have standards of quality.

@Turambar said:

Ironically, when Jaffe got to the statement of "It's not misogyny. Misogyny is mistrust of hatred of women.", I lost another notch of respect for the guy. If he doesn't realize what he said is can very fairly be interpreted as denigration of women, there's not much that can help him. That said, how Kotaku has apparently spun the follow up story does not surprise me one bit.

@TentPole said:

Twisted Metal came out on valentine's day and Jaffe said that his game is sooo good that if you play it with your girlfriend she will love you for it. He goes onto say that if you let her when you will even get a blowjob. The crux of the joke is that his game is both super good (in his entirely unbiased opinion) and coming out on valentine's day. Stupid but hardly offensive in context.

@PandaBear said:

Well no ... I don't think they'll be out of business. I meant more on a personal/credibility level. Lies and rumours ... it's worse than Destructoid.

You may or may not like Destructoid, but they don't claim to have any real air of professional legitimacy. Kotaku publishes total bullshit, things which are false or things that are barely tangentially related to videogames, all day long. I stopped going there about a year ago.

@dudeglove said:

Also, someone, like, just get rid of Tim Rogers. Just delete him off the internet and never speak of him again.

HA! I have been saying this for a decade and he is still around and gaining steam. Rogers is so full of Hipster BS and "new age journalism" that it makes Patrick look like an IGN editor,

@TentPole said:

Twisted Metal came out on valentine's day and Jaffe said that his game is sooo good that if you play it with your girlfriend she will love you for it. He goes onto say that if you let her when you will even get a blowjob. The crux of the joke is that his game is both super good (in his entirely unbiased opinion) and coming out on valentine's day. Stupid but hardly offensive in context.

The real question is: what happens when I play Twisted Metal on Steak and a Blowjob Day?

@allworkandlowpay said:

@TentPole said:

Twisted Metal came out on valentine's day and Jaffe said that his game is sooo good that if you play it with your girlfriend she will love you for it. He goes onto say that if you let her when you will even get a blowjob. The crux of the joke is that his game is both super good (in his entirely unbiased opinion) and coming out on valentine's day. Stupid but hardly offensive in context.

The real question is: what happens when I play Twisted Metal on Steak and a Blowjob Day?

You get the Ur-Blowjob.

@Turambar: The definition he laid is not so bananas since it is in fact the actual definition.

Also if a blowjob doesn't happen on valentine's day (twisted metal or no) then things have gone terribly wrong.

@Turambar: The definition he laid is not so bananas since it is in fact the actual definition.

Also if a blowjob doesn't happen on valentine's day (twisted metal or no) then things have gone terribly wrong.

@Turambar: Oral sex hasn't been denegration since the 50's.

@CountMacula said:

You get the Ur-Blowjob.

The more I think about the implications of this the more I am disturbed:

"all players who inflict damage on the Ur-Dragon will receive great spoils. The person who inflicts the final blow will receive the greatest reward of all"

@Turambar: Oral sex hasn't been denegration since the 50's.

@Turambar said:

@TentPole said:

@Turambar: Oral sex hasn't been denegration since the 50's.

Commenting if you let your girlfriend beat you at video games, it'll trick her into putting out can certainly be fairly interpreted as denigration.

He said if you let her win she would give you a blow job, But he never said (or implied) it was to trick her.

Those are you words and it is fucking wrong to put them in someone else's mouth.

He didn't mean that you should trick women into giving you sexual favors, and you and Kotaku fucking know it.

@TentPole said:

@Turambar: Oral sex hasn't been denegration since the 50's.

@CountMacula said:

You get the Ur-Blowjob.

The more I think about the implications of this the more I am disturbed:

"all players who inflict damage on the Ur-Dragon will receive great spoils. The person who inflicts the final blow will receive the greatest reward of all"

I think the cause of death on the coroner's report would be fluid loss.

@Turambar said:

@TentPole said:

@Turambar: Oral sex hasn't been denegration since the 50's.

Commenting if you let your girlfriend beat you at video games, it'll trick her into putting out can certainly be fairly interpreted as denigration.

He said if you let her win she would give you a blow job, But he never said (or implied) it was to trick her.

Those are you words and it is fucking wrong to put them in someone else's mouth.

He didn't mean that you should trick women into giving you sexual favors, and you and Kotaku fucking know it.

That site seems to be more about shitty japanophile stuff than regular videogame stories these days.. Idk maybe that was the point of the site before, but lately I feel like it has gotten out of hand.

If he put up that article because it would get him some shady money.. well, it kind confirms my suspicions that they´ve hit rock bottom.

They even tried to put more of their sister site´s content on their page. Well, I deleted any bookmarks I had left and don´t really care about that place now.

Just like Gizmodo, Kotaku is losing readers and has decided that being more off topic will help differentiate them from the growing competition. Unfortunately for them, they're terrible at that as well. Thanks for bringing that Jaffe sound bite to my attention, he's the man for calling them out like that.

Why do you guys hate Destructoid so much? I like to look at them sometimes, they're nowhere NEAR as terrible as Kotaku. Crecente leaving was the final straw for me.

Also, I quit Kotaku and went straight to Giant Bomb around last December. Love this place <3

@Turambar: Oh...well yeah, that's way super shittier then articles designed for page hits. That's not shady, that's just a jerk move.

I didn't realize that, sorry for my reading comprehension.

I09 and deadspin are the only gawker sites worth visiting.



Owen good is the only redeming thing about kotaku

@Turambar: Oh...well yeah, that's way super shittier then articles designed for page hits. That's not shady, that's just a jerk move.

I didn't realize that, sorry for my reading comprehension.

I see no problem whatsoever. He complained that the competition leaves out the Wii, so what?

Console wars are fucking pathetic.

God that site has become a embarassment. I just hope GB starts covering more news so I dont have an excuse to go their. All the "Japanese coverage" is 99% about cosplay and dating sims for dudes who are into cripples.

@Turambar said:

@Arker101 said:

@Turambar: Oh...well yeah, that's way super shittier then articles designed for page hits. That's not shady, that's just a jerk move.

I didn't realize that, sorry for my reading comprehension.

Well, the thing is, as far as I can tell, Totilo has always been pretty much the most stand up staffer at Kotaku. Part of me would very much like to believe that this was just a complete error on his part. But the fact that the article was completely taken down, and not just altered as far as the source link went makes me doubt that.

Unless they release something saying otherwise, it really does look like it. It's not like he's making his millions off of this, but that's still dirty.

@Bourbon_Warrior said:

God that site has become a embarassment. I just hope GB starts covering more news so I dont have an excuse to go their. All the "Japanese coverage" is 99% about cosplay and dating sims for dudes who are into cripples.

Wasn't there something about dating pigeons as well? Maybe it was a pigeon simulator or something. That's the weirdest one I can remember, but not the creepiest.

I09 and deadspin are the only gawker sites worth visiting.



Owen good is the only redeming thing about kotaku

@Hailinel: i like his sports stuff, what problem do you have with him?

I haven't browsed Kotaku in a few years now. Feels good.

@dudeglove said:

@Doctorchimp said:

All I know is David Jaffe let Stephen Totilo know everything he thought about Kotaku, and that's good enough for me.

Okay I now dislike less (edit: sorry, typo) Jaffe after hearing that rant.

That was exactly my thought after listening to that. Well, minus the typo.

@dudeglove said:

@Doctorchimp said:

All I know is David Jaffe let Stephen Totilo know everything he thought about Kotaku, and that's good enough for me.

Okay I now dislike less (edit: sorry, typo) Jaffe after hearing that rant.

That was exactly my thought after listening to that. Well, minus the typo.