LONG BLOG
Gaymer Con, Reactions, and Extremes
Over the past few months, I've sat back and just watched Destructoid. It's a sad state of affairs that I seem unwilling to participate in the culture of the site anymore but it has become an unsavory culture for me. This culminated, of course, in the reaction to Gaymer Con.
Before I make a reaction on the reaction to the announcement, a quick aside on the con itself. I can see why several people think it's a great idea and more power to them. I personally disagree with the sentiment. Obviously I have something against LGBT community or I'm a hate monger, right? Actually, wrong. One of the biggest problems facing this country right now is the fact that we gave up on the idea of a melting pot. When people are allowed to seperate themselves from the whole of society, whether for good or bad, it creates a little splinter group. This group splinters from that, which splinters from that, etc and so forth. The notion is brilliant, but this group all by itself no longer has any reason to try and assimilate with the culture and likewise, the culture no longer has a reason to accept this little faction.
As an idea, I find it counter intuitive for acceptance. But then again, I've always been a geek and ruined the better part of my childhood trying to either fit into a little group, or trying to adapt myself to the accepted norm. I understand the notion, I've just never seen self-segregation work.
Having gotten that out of the way, the reaction to the announcement didn't really surprise me in the slightest. Jim Sterling claims to have been surprised and annoyed by the reaction and it boggles me as to why. In fact, gamers are among one of the largest extreme reaction groups that I've seen and each each, it pushes me further and further away. Gamers only have two modes nowadays. This is awesome or This is the worst thing ever.
Examples? Why certainly! When GTHD was announced, it seemed, at least to people like me, like a great idea. So get this, you get a free track and a few free cars, right? Then, if, and only if, you want some additional cars or tracks, they're sold to you ala carte. So if you're like me and only really enjoy racing the Dodge Viper RT/10s, that'll be $1. And you get to use this immediately unlike Forza DLC where you buy the car pack, then you have to unlock them. In the average GT game, it takes between 6-12 hours to get to access the Dodge Vipers. That's not only expensive on the game, for me, but that's expensive on the time as well. Think about it. At least 6 hours invested before I can drive the cars I really want to drive. Once again, $1 solves my problem. But of course gamers reacted poorly, bitched up a huge firestorm, and made the entire project get canned. Why? Well, because GT4 had hundreds of cars including 15 types of Ford Taurus, 30+ Lancers, and 40+ Corvettes. And everyone knows, when driving the Nuerburing course, you TOTALLY want to do that shit in a Scion xA that maxes out at 85 MPH. Kotaku, king of the reactionary fuckwits, ran an article that "priced" GTHD according to GT4's content. This number was ridiculously high, of course, and it garnered even further support. Sony was beaten, project was cancelled, and all because something new was being introduced that broke the norm.
This is but one example where and extreme reaction essentially denied us the ability to progress. Now imagine you are EA, the evilist company in the entire world according to Jim Sterling, and you announce you'll allow Kickstarted indie games free storespace on Origins for 6 months after launch, you would think that this is good news. After all, it's selling the game at 100% profit. Nah, this too was corrosive, evil, and insidious. Let's say you want to read a review of Omodius Excellente to see if it's good. Well, the review on this site practically calls you a pedophile for even being interested. Or how Saints Row 3's review score was actually reduced on this website because of the concept of DLC being held back from the project. Once again, an extreme.
Even removing yourself from gaming and listening to the Podcast, holy fuck! I'm done. Because it IS an extreme reaction by itself. Like how Jim claims "the friend zone" is an expression of entitlement to a woman's vagina (I have NEVER heard this interpretation until Jim) or how, according to the entire cast last episode, men are nothing but brooding, violent rape machines waiting to descend on helpless victims.
This website, Destructoid, has been steadily increasing it's support and display of ridiculously extreme reactions to the point that I can't even look at story comments anymore. Rather than trying to curtail it or control it, it's been growing and growing. Finally, we now have the website we see nowadays and it's supposed to surprise us when, good or bad, something garners an extreme reaction. Well, I'm not surprised annd more importantly, I'm fucking done. You cannot constantly fly off the handle, yell like a self-entitled 8 year old confused by the concept of discussion or compromise, make constant paranoia induced claims, and do about as much research as the average GameFAQs Top 10 list and not expect your audience to do the same. When the voice of the site returns to what I used to love about destructoid, MAYBE you can have nice things again. But YOU trained your audience to do this so it's hardly a surprise to me when it occurs.
sheppy 
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Before I make a reaction on the reaction to the announcement, a quick aside on the con itself. I can see why several people think it's a great idea and more power to them. I personally disagree with the sentiment. Obviously I have something against LGBT community or I'm a hate monger, right? Actually, wrong. One of the biggest problems facing this country right now is the fact that we gave up on the idea of a melting pot. When people are allowed to seperate themselves from the whole of society, whether for good or bad, it creates a little splinter group. This group splinters from that, which splinters from that, etc and so forth. The notion is brilliant, but this group all by itself no longer has any reason to try and assimilate with the culture and likewise, the culture no longer has a reason to accept this little faction.
As an idea, I find it counter intuitive for acceptance. But then again, I've always been a geek and ruined the better part of my childhood trying to either fit into a little group, or trying to adapt myself to the accepted norm. I understand the notion, I've just never seen self-segregation work.
Having gotten that out of the way, the reaction to the announcement didn't really surprise me in the slightest. Jim Sterling claims to have been surprised and annoyed by the reaction and it boggles me as to why. In fact, gamers are among one of the largest extreme reaction groups that I've seen and each each, it pushes me further and further away. Gamers only have two modes nowadays. This is awesome or This is the worst thing ever.
Examples? Why certainly! When GTHD was announced, it seemed, at least to people like me, like a great idea. So get this, you get a free track and a few free cars, right? Then, if, and only if, you want some additional cars or tracks, they're sold to you ala carte. So if you're like me and only really enjoy racing the Dodge Viper RT/10s, that'll be $1. And you get to use this immediately unlike Forza DLC where you buy the car pack, then you have to unlock them. In the average GT game, it takes between 6-12 hours to get to access the Dodge Vipers. That's not only expensive on the game, for me, but that's expensive on the time as well. Think about it. At least 6 hours invested before I can drive the cars I really want to drive. Once again, $1 solves my problem. But of course gamers reacted poorly, bitched up a huge firestorm, and made the entire project get canned. Why? Well, because GT4 had hundreds of cars including 15 types of Ford Taurus, 30+ Lancers, and 40+ Corvettes. And everyone knows, when driving the Nuerburing course, you TOTALLY want to do that shit in a Scion xA that maxes out at 85 MPH. Kotaku, king of the reactionary fuckwits, ran an article that "priced" GTHD according to GT4's content. This number was ridiculously high, of course, and it garnered even further support. Sony was beaten, project was cancelled, and all because something new was being introduced that broke the norm.
This is but one example where and extreme reaction essentially denied us the ability to progress. Now imagine you are EA, the evilist company in the entire world according to Jim Sterling, and you announce you'll allow Kickstarted indie games free storespace on Origins for 6 months after launch, you would think that this is good news. After all, it's selling the game at 100% profit. Nah, this too was corrosive, evil, and insidious. Let's say you want to read a review of Omodius Excellente to see if it's good. Well, the review on this site practically calls you a pedophile for even being interested. Or how Saints Row 3's review score was actually reduced on this website because of the concept of DLC being held back from the project. Once again, an extreme.
Even removing yourself from gaming and listening to the Podcast, holy fuck! I'm done. Because it IS an extreme reaction by itself. Like how Jim claims "the friend zone" is an expression of entitlement to a woman's vagina (I have NEVER heard this interpretation until Jim) or how, according to the entire cast last episode, men are nothing but brooding, violent rape machines waiting to descend on helpless victims.
This website, Destructoid, has been steadily increasing it's support and display of ridiculously extreme reactions to the point that I can't even look at story comments anymore. Rather than trying to curtail it or control it, it's been growing and growing. Finally, we now have the website we see nowadays and it's supposed to surprise us when, good or bad, something garners an extreme reaction. Well, I'm not surprised annd more importantly, I'm fucking done. You cannot constantly fly off the handle, yell like a self-entitled 8 year old confused by the concept of discussion or compromise, make constant paranoia induced claims, and do about as much research as the average GameFAQs Top 10 list and not expect your audience to do the same. When the voice of the site returns to what I used to love about destructoid, MAYBE you can have nice things again. But YOU trained your audience to do this so it's hardly a surprise to me when it occurs.
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About sheppyone of us since 7:01 AM on 09.16.2008
I suppose since one of my stories has been promoted, I'm on the spot to get off my lazy ass and describe myself. I'm a 3D modeler working on Flight Simulators by day, a doodlin nerd by night. I try to remain without system biases but let's face it, no one can do that. I do want to apologize for some of my terrible grammar. I'm hoping to correct this issue as time goes on. I want to get better.
As to which games games I'm into, which ones am I not into is a more apt question. I'm a collector with a fairly massive collection. And, maybe as time rolls on, I'll fill more of this out.
As to which games games I'm into, which ones am I not into is a more apt question. I'm a collector with a fairly massive collection. And, maybe as time rolls on, I'll fill more of this out.