Developer abuse (BioWare and other studios)

From that discussion...


Ask a Game Dev @askagamedev
It's what we hire community managers for. They tank the abuse and filter it for us.

David Gaider @davidgaider
For an official forum, sure, but for Twitter? For Facebook? Any place where a developer might have an existence outside of official channels, regardless of whether they use it for that? Community managers can't help there.

Ask a Game Dev @askagamedev
That's a very salient point. There's really no visible solution where we can be in a public space and NOT potentially treated as a representative of whatever company/project by the public at large.

Though that can change in the future. Imagine a social media platform where responses to your posts are automatically run through a "bile" filter or something - set the machine learning algorithms on recognizing people being assholes and auto-filtering those

All it really takes is a good engineering team and sufficient data, which any social media giant like facebook, twitter, etc. has in spades. Heck, they could even offload the acceptability criteria to each user so we could tailor what we feel is acceptable and isn't



I agree that bringing more robust filtering tools to the big social media platforms & forums is a large part of the answer.

There's concern that the amount of vitrol on Twitter, etc. is growing, but I think that's hand in hand with the growth of the industry as a whole. I have a feeling it's probably the same percentage, but the number of gamers just continues to grow year after year.

I really enjoyed the article, but as sad and depressing as it presents the issue, not all that surprising. One does not have to look far to see significant issue with discourse in society in general, not just in the gaming industry. There is something very wrong when people feel they have the right to attack others, particularly given how easy it is from the safety of a keyboard and monitor or phone.

No doubt there will be people that do not like a specific product for one reason or another, but I think the author makes valid points that show how counter-productive and even intuitive it is to attack the developer. That said, it almost seam that being a "hater" has become in itself a form of entertainment, rather than an expression of legitimate grievance.

From my perspective, having been around for a little while, I have learned that you are either part of a solution, or you are the problem, so if I really want change, I come to the table with solutions with "sugar" in hand, as the "stick" is seldom a positive motivator. The final lesson here though, WHY WOULD ANYONE WANT TO BE ABUSED 24/7 FOR MAKING GAMES, WHEN YOU CAN WORK ALMOST ANYWHERE IN the IT FIELD AND MAKE JUST AS MUCH, IF NOT MORE!

RESPECT AND PROFESSIONALISM IS NOT THE SAME AS LIKE AND IT MAKES THE PROCESS MUCH MORE EFFECTIVE WHEN THEY ARE BOTH PRESENT! MY 2-CENTS

That's how gaming brats interact with internet. Wanna feel yourself a developer? Play some multiplayer game - you'll get to enjoy the exact same wording. Now being a developer is just puts you in their field of view outside the game, all of them.

Have they tried talking with friendly fans?
Person A: "Hey, twat! Where is my Barbie World update? > YoU pRoMiSeD iT tWo HoUrS aGo!"
Person B: "Hi, Username, could you tell us..."
A riddle - whom to answer to get friendly dialogue?

All people are different, assuming developers are people there is no universal answer.
If even seeing this crap drops your mood the only answer is to limit publicity. Otherwise answer feedback you want to answer, for every insult message there is usually "report and move on" button.

That's for a community to decide. People with similar etiquette standards tend to gather together.
As for angry kids and wide internet like facebook or twitter - you can't nor educate nor avoid them there. It's applicable to any public person, not just abused underappreciated developers.

Developers don't deserve the abuse they get. I was going to make a longer post. But usually when I give my full opinion I get lynched for it.

A lot of people say they give abuse because they care. I just think they are all asses. I don't like metal gear or the witcher or horizon. You see me giving the developers of those games shit? The internet seems to have a fetish for hating on Bioware anyway. Anthem is going to be a shitstorm of epic proportions bigger than Destiny 2 bigger than Andromeda maybe even bigger than Battlefront II. This is why most of the time I prefer games no one has heard of. No one is telling me I'm an idiot for enjoying myself.

Okay maybe I was generalizing a bit. But I still think too many people allow themselves to get caught up in the internet hive mind a lot of the time. Endless anger seems to be the default mode people go to when discussing games. Its pretty old if you ask me. 

I didn't like the vault openings much in Andromeda. And some of the dialogue was corny but I still liked it. I just know in my soul of souls at some point there will be another Mass Effect game. I will eat my own shoes if there is not another one in the next decade. 

You know all of the blabbering that *killed* Devil May Cry? The fifth canonical entry is being made as we speak.....according to rumors.....so take that internet.....sort of....

You are like the best person or something. Guess I have to eat these now if the internet has its way. 

I have never understood that about people who play games on the internet. Everyone is so angry all the time. I don't know where they get the energy for it. 

Also you are considered less intelligent if you like universally reviled games. I would get so much poo if I were completely honest.

Of course abuse of this nature is revolting, and should be stopped whenever it is found. There is never a situation where death threats and the like are acceptable social discourse.

However, like many things in life, I feel there are two sides to a story. Let me explain. Years ago when Official forums where the primary method of communication between developers and fans, you would often see posts from customers of a critical, but respectful nature. Often times these posts would be deleted, or these fans would be given empty, deadpan corporate copy and paste responses. These fans desired earnest discussion about what they perceived as a problem. These people were more or less ignored most of the time, or developers would be defensive, citing creative freedoms and such. Either way, constructive conversation rarely would take place. These respectful consumers who had issues eventually realized these companies had no real desire to talk about these things, and they moved on away from Forums to do more productive things. This left forums with 2 kinds of people. The first group is what we now call the "Drone" or "Fanboy", people who don't desire in depth discussion in almost any capacity. The second group saw the sterile corporate none answers and decided to get way too angry about it. These people began to intermix with Trolls and other types of just naturally unpleasant types of people, combine that with lackluster moderation from these official forums and it spiraled out of control into the mess we see today.

I don't believe there is a way back to friendly discussion with developers, because personally, I don't think it was ever really there to start with, with some exceptions. Bioware stopped talking to us largely after Dragon Age 2, because they wanted to defend their obviously rushed product and the consumer side of things were confused and many other mixes of emotion, because the fans were not use to sub-par products from Bioware. Weather or not you personally like Dragon Age 2 is irrelevant. It is objectively a flawed game in many respects, and it was not something we as fans was used to from them and many members of said fan base overreacted in disgusting ways. As a result, despite the overwhelming majority of those fans being respectful about their displeasure with the product, and wanting to have discussion with them about it, it had become impossible. The devs eventually just withdrew entirely and we would forever more (with a few rare exceptions) get empty, corporate copy and paste responses.

The notion of "I abuse because I care" is of course ridiculous, however I think it is not far off from a valid mindset. "I am angry because I care", and that is a different mentality entirely. Mass Effect 3 made me angry, it made me angry because I cared, I cared about Mass Effect more than anything else in my life really. You could argue I cared too much, and it was my own fault for getting that attached, I loved that franchise beyond sense or reason. HOWEVER, ME3 did not make me nearly as angry, as Biowares official response to us did. Their soulless, utterly arrogant response towards the fan outrage. Yes, many of the fans took their outrage too far, much MUCH too far, but myself and many others, were trying to to just get answers, to talk about the issue. Then they basically told the entire fan base, that we are all just too stupid to understand how brilliant their rushed, half baked ending was. I know some people around here think that ending was good, I'm not going to get into disagreements with those people here because it's not related to this topic. My point is, THAT is what personally set me off, enraged me in ways I had never felt until then. To have my intelligence mocked and belittled is a sure-fire way to set me off quickly. However never once did I cross that line, into abuse or threats of violence. Never once despite my seething rage did I cross that line, because I was raised better than that.

My point is, yes obviously, people like this are digesting and there is never any reason for this type of discourse with developers, or anyone for that matter. But the way these companies have always more or less conducted themselves in cold, sterile manners has surely not helped in breeding this horrible toxic environment.

Disconnect with the consumer is indeed a large contributing factor, and it's effect cannot be overstated. These companies have always believed they know what a good game is, far better than we the consumer. We've heard it for years, even the Bioware devs have stated as much before. "You might think you want that feature, or that game, but you really don't trust me. I know better than you." This whole lootbox fiasco is just further proof of the disconnect, and goes a step further to showcase just how amoral these companies truly are. They do not care if they psychologically manipulate people, take advantage of people with real addictions, namely gambling for the sake of profit. They sell us a product for full price, only to withhold half of the product we paid for, to sell it to us later for even more.

In almost every other form of business, companies tell their employees that the customer is always right, even if they really aren't. The only exceptions to these rules, is Sports and Video Games. No in these ventures the customer is suddenly entitled brats who should just be grateful for whatever they deem to give us. This attitude that the larger companies like EA, Ubisoft, Activision-Blizzard all posses in one form or another, is not lost on people. Consumer trust is utterly gone, and these companies are doing absolutely nothing to remedy that, because in their minds, we are nothing but mindless sheep with ADD, and will just forget their transgressions in a weeks time and buy the next thing they shovel in our direction. They categorize us as animals, Whales, Dolphins etc, depending on how deep our pocketbooks are. They are even starting to render the term "Indie" irrelevant, with Take Two having founded an "Indie" publishing arm...the irony is thick indeed.

If it wasn't for companies like CD Project, Larian, AMPLITUDE and others, I would have given up on this passion that I love awhile ago. This past year or so I've been pretty angry at this industry as a whole, and I trust no one but a selected few. I admit my love of Elder Scrolls still has me believe Bethesda can get their heads out of their butts with their recent lackluster development releases. But either way, I think these recent "market trends" are playing no small part in the rising vitriol, even though this type of vitriol is disgusting, I understand and sympathize with the rage they feel.

It's terrifyingly easy for people to justify their destructive actions when the target is considered fair game by an anonymous angry mob.