Bombin' the A.M. With Scoops and the Wolf: 10/13/2014

@sydlanel: Ok, I just read your entire original long post. Tell me your issues with journalistic integrity. I saw Zoe Quinn, the escapist piece and awards. So let me know your issues with journalistic integrity.

@kingclip:

OK!

Well it is quite clear that if a journalistic output will result in the benefit of a product, then the output should be clear to disclose any amicable relationships between both parties. I think that's a pretty generic standard, isn't it?

Likewise, If it is a review I'd argue that the reviewer and the developer shouldn't be friends, The output should try to make sure that the reviewer is as level headed as possible. Of course this is difficult in artistic mediums where a lot of the same people know the same groups of people, and its natural peoples with certain game tastes will gravitate towards certain games. But still, acknowledgement goes a long way.

And well more obviously I personally find that if any monetary compensation will be received by either party, it should be clear.

Now this may be impossible in practice, and it's not that I don't trust journalists to be professional, but I think for the sake of clarity it should be the aim. And this not only on the side of journalism, but also on the publishers side.

I find that it would be positive to document how much influence a publisher may have even in just getting exclusives and coverage. I suppose Journalists should just But yeah Maybe this is a bit ridiculous as this is not a communist regime where privates must disclose their expenses.

(For the record, I find that Gamasutra, which is one of the sites under "scrutiny", does label posts quite clearly when they are paid by third parties)

And finally, I think game journalism should not be prevented from covering "unpopular" issues. Not circling back to Zoey quinn, but if an issue like that (with The Fine Young Capialists). Why isn't anyone looking at it? I understand that we don't want to hammer on her any further.. but I have not read a single level headed report on the issue. Only he said she said, which also leads to more animosity from both sides. Sex scandals and Harassment should not be used to divert attention from corruption.

If there is in fact fraud, influence trafficking, unlawful defamation etc. It should be addressed, covered, and punishable by law, but this all seems like prep school bullying. Right now there is an overwhelming sense that if you´re friends with the right people, you are beyond reproach.

(and I'm not saying I want to punish anyone, Particularly because I think Zoe has had enough shit thrown her way, but if our industry is growing, we have to get serious with it).

I know this gets icky, and I know there has been too much said. But I'm not even talking about this particular event, but events like these that MAY happen or MAY HAVE happened and we have no idea. Media should not be hogtied or circumscribed to what the industry believes is approved.

Let me reiterate though, that I do not support any hashtags or any form of harassing, because I know the internet, and I know that this may be taken out of context.

And also let me be clear, I don't mean to criticize the Duders either. I know they are friends with developers all over the place. But I find that they generally are very open and clear about where they are coming from when they analyze a game or invite a developer...

...they have been...

Things get real at about 39 minutes in (good on you, Patrick and especially Alex).

Then things get surreal at about 56 minutes in (oh god. Whhyyyyyy).

This type of harassment (internet harassment) is not something typical of gamers. Neither is it typical of feminists.

There have been beautiful levelheaded responses from the gaming community and from outside the gaming community, that explain that there are some serious issues with the integrity of gaming journalism and that the extremist feminist movement is (finally) meeting the first industry that dares push back. I won't let some kind of sexist cult ruin our hobby, nor some people who do horrible things through the internet.

Deadly Premonition is one of my favorite games ever.

My biggest point here is that there is no anti-GG movement as much as there is just everyone else. No matter how you look at it, and how worthy SOME of the claims might seem to be, the movement was founded on a lurid blog post and the desire to harass, and should be condemned on every level. We should also be anti-GG, and talk about journalistic ethics (of which I don't think the gaming industry is especially problematic) completely separately, as GG itself has absolutely nothing to do with journalistic ethics, it's just something they use, to use their own words, as a shield.

I almost made a Twitter account just to tell Swery that D4 is half the reason I'm buying an Xbox. But Twitter is a horrible place.

And @alex, it doesn't solve the world's problems, but know that for every crappy internet person there are 1,000 that love and appreciate what you guys do. Ebert was my favorite movie writer, Sam Smith of the Bulls is my favorite sports writer, and I'm not even joking that you're in that company on the video games side.

But alas, it's easy to get bogged down in negativity due to its frequency in recent months. And yes, it fucking sucks that you try to stick up for others but the trolls just keep on coming. My friend got harassed for retweeting a Sarkisian thing and she's not even in the industry. This thing knows no bounds.

Yup. Video games.

@sydlanel: Man, you talked about fallacies, earlier... This looks like a lot of tautologies to me. "In a perfect world, things would be this way, but I realize that's not realistic, so probably not. Also, this particular thing shouldn't happen... unless of course certain conditions are met and then it should." Tautologies AND fallacies do nothing but make a circle out of the argument. Just saying.

How would a GB staff member being open about their friendship with a dev change the perspective? No one's going to admit they gave a game a higher score due to unrelated reasons and you can't prove it whether they're honest or not, anyway. If your initial statement is "reviewers shouldn't be friends with devs", then don't backpedal at the end of the post with "except if they say they are". When has that ever stopped someone from being disingenuous? (For the record, I'm not accusing GB of ANYTHING, but I'm having trouble sorting your logic)

Other than that, I actually agree with your friend there. This is about harassment. Besides the fact that no one should be surprised corruption is present in a major, multinational business (really think about it. Is it that surprising?), it's also being used as an easy smokescreen.

For ease of conversation, lets just section this off into "good" and "bad" people. And yes, I hear your cries of protest that humans are not caricatures. So, lets be sure who we're talking about: anyone who's ever issued a freakin' death/rape/assault/stalking threat is designated "bad", because I feel that's non-negotiable. That's what children do. Seriously messed up, sociopathic children. For those people, calm discussion is out the window. They don't get to say, "yeah I did that, but ethics..." anymore. That is no longer a viable excuse.

Now that we've done that - in this mystical world where every "bad" person has been sectioned off from discussion - we begin talking about ethics. Even those people who agreed with the aggressor(s) but didn't directly threaten anyone; they're included to, because the possibility of groupthink and all that. Once that's done, I completely agree with everything you've said. Well, I can't speak for the small nuances or aforementioned tautologies I didn't catch or sort out in my quick read over of all your posts, but the broadstrokes, yes. Corruption should be punished accordingly and so on.

I just thought it was important to clarify that I think there's a point of no return from where discussion about the arguably less important problem (compared to threats of one's safety) of journalism ethics is no longer viable. And that point is openly threatening one's safety.

And look! I managed to refrain from mentioning Gamergate or feminists or even specific people. I also considered that every time I mentioned ethics, adding "/feminism" to include both major arguments, but I thought you might get mad about creating "sides" and stuff; still, I tried my best to be all-inclusive. Except for "bad people" because I'm taking a hardline stance against death/rape threateners. Not exactly controversial, I don't think.

Oh my god that erotic fanfiction question or er....statement that patrick read from his tumblr made me die laughing.

@kingclip: Relax about Gamasutra, I was making a point of how it actually did a good job declaring what was sponsored and what was not. And I wrote italic quoted scrutiny, because it simply has been linked within the "conspiracy" denying it doesn't change the fact it was named, nor does it make it immediately guilty.

I understand your points, and I understand the system works a bit that way no matter in what industry, and I'm sure places like the Music industry are far more covetous. But not all of it is reviews, particularly in the gaming industry, sometimes just coverage and mentions are as effective, due to the extremely long production times. But it all seems to work sometimes too friendly.

I agree though, the youtuber-publisher relaton seems more problematic.

Just as an example, in the Pax prime GiantBomb presentation, there was a long "ad" for disney infinity. Sure, those guys are friends and it was funny and all, but I felt a bit awkward with that. Was it a friendly thing? because some of it felt extremely corporate? I'm not outraged about it, but I did find it odd. However, I do think what you say is true, the disclosure probably wouldn't make it any better.

I remember at the time a lot of people were puzzled by it too.

In any case, what I find odd by the lack of more earnest and clear journalism of the points of conflict, is that in the end most information I've read from either side tends to be sensationalist. So, if the discussed conflict with the young capitalists got resolved, why hasn't that been disclosed clearly? that would be less ammo for GG.

You say, a movement started by a jilted lover, but I'd like to know if what that jilted lover said had any truth in it. It seems to be that because he did this in a fit of rage, it loses any validity. I have investigated myself which of his points have been disproved, because it didn't ring true to me, but it has been extremely hard to find.

You know what would get rid of all that? an official public statement.

If the conspiracy is so outrageously silly (and I actually believe it is pretty silly) why hasn't there been more direct and effective disproving efforts that don't focus solely on the horrifying harassment.

The lack of it makes the GG accusations seem more founded than I would like to think they are.

More than anything I've only seen your original reaction "why are you questioning this things when these people are monsters?" I would say, some of the growls the monsters are making sound suspiciously like words.

Anyhow, I hate coming out as a GG defender, the truth is that I'm just a general Skeptic. and there are too many things to doubt right now.

but I suppose that is veering off the topic you were interested in.

@sydlanel: Anything the jilted lover had to say that has anything to do with journalism (a single digit percentage to be sure) has been proven wrong, and resoundingly so. Anything the jilted lover had to say about his or his ex's sex life is not germane to the conversation in any way.

Kudos to @alex in this episode. He spoke from the heart and he spoke well. Great to hear you speak out about this shitstorm on the site.

Also, kudos to @patrickklepek for reading that first "question". I almost died laughing.

@poobumbutt: Well first, tautologies are not necessarily fallacious, if the axiom is true, then all the reasoning is true.

Second I clearly said that although unlikely in the system, we should strive for it. That is not a tautology, as I'm never declaring an axiomatic truth that supports on the reasoning itself.

It's like saying, although no-one is perfect, we should strive to better ourselves. which (albeit fairly lame and obvious) isn't really an absolute, only a declaration of what I think could be valid discussion points.

I specifically said I wasn't aiming my criticism at giant bomb particularly because when they are covering a game, they are generally extremely clear as to who, how and why. I did later mention a particular situation in The Pax panel, with the disney infinity dudes, that was strange, because it felt like a bit of a commercial.

However in other news outputs it has been an issue, and I don't really see why there should be such secrecy, since in general honesty works fine for these guys. Particularly because if there is nothing to hide, secrecy simply looks off.

In any case, yeah I agree, harassment = bad. Although I doubt stopping GG would do anything to prevent harassment, I'm quite sure these people who harass will continue to find ways to do so, of course this doesn't excuse them... but I don't really know if anyone can police the internet... and they are not the ones listening here.

Alex almost made me cry :(

I'm glad Alex stopped Patrick from reading those tweets. Don't give those guys the time of day.

Five star game on Giantbomb baby! Good thing that GB is all above this nonsense

I am a GGer and I am proud!

Second on both points with Patrick and Ryan. Also the thought of fan fiction makes me chuckle....lots.

This episode was a little boring. I appreciate most of the stuff the Chicago and New York "offices" of giant bomb, but something tells me they're going to part ways any day now. Think about how little content crossover is. Patrick even said, oh I'm going to be playing this game, they might be quick looking it... he didn't even know. They might as well be the 8-4 podcast...

while i hate people getting harassed for voicing their opinions, i highly disagree with @patrickklepek saying that we should support these people by buying their games. If a game is bad its bad(not saying the people mentioned games are or not), i wouldn't go out and eat at a bad restaurant because i knew a member in the owners family died or were hurt, it should be no different here.

Sooo...where do I find the @PatrickKlepek/@Alex fanfic?

@nomin: I will be really glad when people stop thinking that sexual=sexism.

Alex and Patrick, don't let the asshats get you down duders. Sorry to hear this is still going on. Patrick, I followed you here from G4 and I remember several times when Adam Sessler had to defend Abbie and all of the other women who would appear on the show and on the podcast from similar vitriol so I imagine you guys are exhausted by all of this. I would like to say that without this show that you guys do I never would have known of Alexa Ray Corriea or Samantha Kalman. Both of them are intelligent and entertaining and I will pay more attention to anything they do as a result. I realise not everyone will be willing to put themselves in the public eye after all the recent shit but please do continue the positive things you do to make people welcome. I know that ignoring trolls never makes them go away, but addressing them directly does incourage them. All that can be done is to continue to be the awesome duders that you are and to provide support and exposure to those that trully deserve it. This site does have great moderators and Rorie too to make sure people are treated with the same level of respect that the rest of us take for granted. Sorry for the long post, I just don't like to see you guys so demoralised. Love the show and everything you add to this site.

In my tiny defense of Mordor's ending (also thought it was a bad ending), I hate QTE's, but I also hate when the final boss of a game is just the same kind of fighting as the rest of the game. For this game specifically, the player would have just hacked at the boss, dodged, countered, etc. for a longer health bar. That to me also adds nothing to an ending sequence. I want games to do something else also, but at least it wasn't dragged out.

You rock, dude.

i need to read this scoops x the wolf slashfic for uh reasons that arent jerkin' it i swear

@patrickklepek Even in a noisy city, you would have heard that phone drop out of your pocket. You sure your dog didn't eat it?

@sydlanel: Okay, yes I understand. I probably should've said "sorry if this insults" because I really wasn't trying to attack your opinion, but really didn't understand your reasoning. My bad.

And yes, like I said: "a mystical world"; it would be hard to police the internet without resorting to some... Questionable tactics. I was just speaking in theory for clarification.

Cheers.

@poobumbutt: Ah it's all good, I am very discussive online, but I always try to keep it cool.
I like to think I'm discussing with people that are willing to have a conversation. And we have had some pretty good conversations in here, so I'm happy.
Cheers for clarifying tho :D

I wanna smoke Patricks hair, It may taste like an orange

@patrickklepek Hmmm... Sorry to hear about the loss of your new device (I had my iPhone 3G stolen right out of my hands a few years ago back at my old job in downtown Dallas so I know what not having a smart device can be like)... but maybe your iPhone running away is a sign your next phone should be a Note 4... you know, the one that will work with the Gear VR headset. ;D

He wasn't a jilted lover. He was someone emotionally abused by someone who has issues of her own that no one wants to bring up for fear of hurting a friend.

While I share the sentiment Alex & Patrick expressed about these types of attacks on female figures in gaming, I can't bring myself to feel the type of shame Alex was talking about. Sharing a hobby with people doesn't make me feel karmically liable for the shitty things they do. It'd be a different story if you support their cause, but if you don't, it's just a bunch of assholes. They are rampant in every walk of life.

In surprising turn of events, GG'ers have unmasked a brazilian videogame journalist to be behind this and not a GG'er but a mere Anita Sarkeesian hater. Huh.

Great show guys. I always look forward to your reasoned and thoughtful dialogue. Cheers!

You know what the dialogue around Brianna Wu's abuse is in the most Gamergate-centric segments of the internet?

It's not "Oh let's support this person by using our powers of information gathering to uncover the perpetrator and deliver justice and maybe make the internet a bit of a safer place"

It's "This woman is blaming Gamgergate for this because it just so happened that her personal information was posted on our boards. The fact that some guy reading those boards used that information to threaten her doesn't mean it has anything to do with Gamergate. Let's find out everything about him so we can prove he's never used the hastag and is therefore totally unrelated."

They care more about their goddamn deserved image problem than the well-being of the innocent person that the environment they have created has hurt. She was targeted because she made fun of Gamergate. Her information was posted on Gamergate boards. Someone thought that was the best place to do that. Someone reading those boards acted on that information. This is absolutely connected and no amount of "But we're against harassment!" or "That doesn't represent Gamergate" will change that.

The movement has had no observable positive effect on this industry. The Escapist slightly revised and reiterated their ethics policy. That is the sum total of non-negative effects the past two months have had. Everything else has been disgusting and harmful and has pushed the industry back. NONE. Not one, of their supposed pieces of evidence for journalistic corruption has ever amounted to anything but circumstantial evidence, coincidence, or a fundamental ignorance about the operation of professional games writing.

I ask this to Gamergate supporters who truly believe it's just a movement about Journalistic ethics. I really do believe there are a lot of you. I think you've been misled and are unintentionally participating in a hateful, reactionary movement, but I won't deny your existence. Give me one positive result of Gamergate. One ousting of legitimate corruption. One goddamn thing to put on the other side of the scale from all the horrible bullshit that is absolutely not coincidentally happening at exactly the same time as Gamergate.

One shred of evidence it's ever been anything worthwhile and I'll reconsider my stance that Gamergate is a movement entirely of bigotry and/or ignorance.

Until someone can do that, I'll continue being pretty disappointed that Giant Bomb continues to be more or less silent as a collective site on this issue.

I appreciate Alex and Patrick's thoughts on the morning shows and in Q&As, and I follow all the guys on twitter so I know they're watching this. Alex especially has seemed passionate in a way I absolutely identify about this stuff. But Giant Bomb as a site has remained silent too long.

Incredibly sad thing to be proud of.

Thanks for another episode guys, love the show!

Well with any luck Sony can jump on the opportunity and pickup SWERY for his next game. Seems like most of the hardcore who would appreciate his games have definitely gone that way and Sony seem to really "get it" at the moment.

Man what the fuck Microsoft. This dumping of Kinect is just such a poor response to the bad will they already accrued in the past few years. The image of the company in regards to the "xbox team" couldn't be any more piss poor at the moment as far as i'm concerned. I feel like there was a fair bit of this movement of company attitude towards the tail end of the 360 which basically culminated in the hubris of the xbone launch, at some point all ears to the ground talent get's chased out of that sort of a culture.

@rzxvc: Dude but this is the thing - it's actually very easy to separate yourself from that broad stroke brush by simply not being one of those people. From your post it's obvious you aren't one of those trolls... although I disagree with some of your points, no big deal. But you're also waaay off topic.

That said, I think you veer very far from the issues at hand with your post. You go on about respecting both sides of an issue, lots of principles, etc... I think you're preaching to the choir here, man. What you're not addressing - and this is what people find so frustrating and makes GG impossible to take seriously - are the unique origins and aspects of Gamergate that pull it further and further away from the comparison you make about being a Christian and getting painted with the brush of the Westboro Baptist Church.

Firstly, I think that's actually inaccurate, lots of people (id say a majority at this point) can tell the difference between a member/suporter of the Westboro church and your average follower of Christianity. But I see what you are trying to say. But on the flip side, are you familiar with the roots of this movement? I mean, you don't address at all the harassment and seem to be doing this same "can't hear you lalala" thing when ANY link is attempted to GamerGate - a link that is quite founded, mind you. Why not talk with us about how bad this harassment is getting, instead of continuing to label yourself as being falsely accused? This is why everyone is just saying to get the fuck away from GamerGate, because it's toxic - simply go someplace else, you're not doing yourself any favors associating with the movement.

This "broad brush" is less broad than you think; It's not painting Christians with the Westboro brush, it's painting Westboro with the Westboro brush. Nobody is saying that GamerGate fuckwads make up the entire gaming fandom (okay a few are but they are obvious reactionary statements that will not be taken seriously in time), but people keep coming out of the woodwork saying they are being prosecuted.

May I ask - if your reason for associating with GamerGate is due to journalistic ethics - why you feel so attached to the label? Why do you feel GamerGate is your last bastion of hope for discussion of this issue? It's been around less than two months. Surely you see the way it has attracted trolls and that the group's ability to be recognized as having legit concerns has gone downhill in it's ability to make a clear argument - right from the start?

Just get away from them. It's not a defeat, it's living to fight another day.

(I'm not sure by your post if you associate with GG or not, so if you don't - consider that last part more of a rhetorical question)

I'm getting kind of dissalulsioned with Patrick, I remember back when Dong Nguyen was getting harresed for flappy bird, Patrick took the time to engage in a coversation with some guy who told Dong he should die over some fad game. Yet now with GG Patrick just seems to ascribe the motivation to all of them, Judge them by the most radical and vocal minority, and paint the vicitms as completly innocent (in Anintia's case atleast she has misrepreseted gameplay aspects to support her arugument and tried to scilence criticism). Really seems opposite of what he has preached and practiced in the past.

@itachiitachi: Agreed, and I just hope that somewhere behind the scenes he IS working on some more nuanced piece but sadly I doubt it. I used to be one to defend Patrick with all of those bitching about him but he's become so entrenched in his opinion now that worth reading has become pretty much worthless because it's been so one sided instead of (in cases like this) here's a good article from this side, here's one from the other side. He no longer seems like the objective journalist he used to be, who used to take criticism to heart and at least reply to much of it, which is a shame.

Hey ppl? you listening? Its video games, its a hobby. There are more important things in life like loved ones, your health etc. Just ignore hateful idiots and play games when you have the time. Trolls love when they get a response.... DAN!

Edit: also anyone referring to themselves as a "GGer" or directing comments to "GGers" please focus your attention on something more important for your own sake.