And the usual assclowns are out in full force:PC Gamer said:Guild Wars 2 developer ArenaNet recently parted ways with writers Jessica Price and Peter Fries, who were involved in a contentious Twitter discussion with Guild Wars 2 Twitch streamer and YouTuber Deroir, who is also partnered with ArenaNet through its content creator program.
On Tuesday, July 3, Price wrote a lengthy Twitter thread about writing for MMOs, particularly Guild Wars 2, and why player characters are uniquely difficult to write compared to protagonists in singleplayer games. To put it simply, she discussed how to give characters personality in a way that also leaves room for players to create their own character. In a reply to Price's thread, Deroir argued that branching dialogue options could give players more ways to define their character's personality, overcome the MMO-specific constraints Price discussed, and improve the roleplaying potential of Guild Wars 2.
Yesterday Price highlighted Deroir's reply in a series of tweets suggesting he was uninformed and that his reply was condescending.
Among those tweets, the one that's drawn the most ire, particularly on the Guild Wars 2 subreddit, is Price's remark about "rando asshats" talking down to experienced writers and developers.
Responding to the mounting criticism of these tweets, Peter Fries defended Price's position in a now-deleted tweet which is archived here, saying "she never asked for [Deroir's] feedback".
For his part, Deroir said that he "meant no disrespect" and simply wanted to create "dialogue and discussion" with Price. He also apologized for any offense his argument may have caused.
In a post to the Guild Wars 2 forums, in a thread explicitly about Price and Fries' tweets, ArenaNet president Mike O'Brien characterized the statements as "attacks on the community," saying "two of our employees failed to uphold our standards of communicating with players" and that those employees are "no longer with the company." O'Brien also said "the statements they made do not reflect the views of ArenaNet at all."
It's no grand secret that game developers, especially women, are regularly targeted by fans who want to lash out, condescend or place blame, to say nothing of the insults, threats and other toxicity routinely hurled their way. That being said, this incident was not on the level of the harassment maelstroms we've seen in the past. A developer explained their writing philosophy, a partnered content creator offered feedback, and that developer responded somewhat rudely. Ordinarily that would be the end of it, perhaps followed by a round of apologies or someone stepping away from their role temporarily, but in this case ArenaNet felt the need to immediately fire the employees involved.
https://www.pcgamer.com/amp/guild-w...lowing-heated-twitter-exchange-with-streamer/
