Culture Guild Wars 2 writers fired following heated Twitter exchange with streamer - Gamergate, the gift that keeps on giving.

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.

And the usual assclowns are out in full force:

https://www.pcgamer.com/amp/guild-w...lowing-heated-twitter-exchange-with-streamer/

 

[Buddha]

It really blows my mind that these people have such an idiotic idea of public and private. If you want to use your professional position to increase your own social media presence, you're risking that professional position. This is why the rest of us don't use our real names or bring up our real jobs when we're shit posting.

The other thing is that she is just so simply angry, and while guys do get a pass for behaving that way (oh look how he's taking command) I really don't know how much it hand to do with her gender rather than like other people have said, publicly pissing all over a couple of content creators.

edit: In the end just use an anonymous account if you want to flip out.

 

[tumblrkek]

She and her whiteknight had it coming.
What's up with Guild Wars 2 and these people, by the way?

 

[Ledian]

Going back through articles like this one from PCG (comments already close which is just coincidental eh?) it seems their efforts are for naught.
The narrative came and is being pushed out too slow- EVERYONE knows she was the asshat in this case and it was completely justified to fire her and her little pet knight dressed in white. It's made circles all around Twitter, 4chan, forums of all kinds, and here obviously. People are actually getting pretty angry that everyone (i.e dangerhairs and the media) is defending her and lying so blatantly- even twisting the facts to make her the victim despite being the one to pull the trigger for the situation like an exceptional fucking idiot.
I'm curious to see if this keeps going, will there be a push-back? Will this be a spark that ignites the powderkeg?

Probably fucking not but it'd be amazing if it was.

“By the time that guy came along, I was so tired of having random people explain my job to me in company spaces where I had to just smile and nod that it was like, ‘No. Not here. Not in my space,’”

YOU COULD'VE JUST IGNORED HIM DUMBASS.

 

[Buddha]

“By the time that guy came along, I was so tired of having random people explain my job to me in company spaces where I had to just smile and nod that it was like, ‘No. Not here. Not in my space,’”

edit: fuck movie clips, cut off 'you broke your little ships'

 

[thejackal]

This woman created a lot of :autism::autism::autism::autism::autism::autism::autism::autism::autism::autism:.

Fireable offense, no doubt.

 

[Sweetened Condensed]

She says in her Kotaku interview that her firing sends the message "Make sure you smile while they hit you." Saying you "slightly disagree" with someone is hitting them? Bitch please, you sucker punched the guy.

 

[SiccDicc]

She and her whiteknight had it coming.
What's up with Guild Wars 2 and these people, by the way?

ArenaNet and NCSoft are filled to the brim with these types. When you're surrounded by like-minded individuals you tend to become emboldened in your behavior -- even outside of the tribe -- and that was her mistake. She basically spat in the face of the entire community when she insulted the community partner, and make no mistake, that's the only reason she was fired. They put up with her attitude towards the little guys because they agreed with her politics.

 

[TheMonkeyMan]

I've been seeing Deroir get quite a bit of support from women on Twitter, so it's not like everyone's out for blood.

 

[AnOminous]

Going back through articles like this one from PCG (comments already close which is just coincidental eh?) it seems their efforts are for naught.
The narrative came and is being pushed out too slow- EVERYONE knows she was the asshat in this case and it was completely justified to fire her and her little pet knight dressed in white. It's made circles all around Twitter, 4chan, forums of all kinds, and here obviously. People are actually getting pretty angry that everyone (i.e dangerhairs and the media) is defending her and lying so blatantly- even twisting the facts to make her the victim despite being the one to pull the trigger for the situation like an exceptional fucking idiot.
I'm curious to see if this keeps going, will there be a push-back? Will this be a spark that ignites the powderkeg?

Probably fucking not but it'd be amazing if it was.


YOU COULD'VE JUST IGNORED HIM DUMBASS.

Well think about it this way. You can't be mansplained to about your job if you don't have a job.

thoughtfulblackguy.jpg

Price felt like Deroir overstepped his bounds. “Today in being a female game dev: ‘Allow me—a person who does not work with you—explain to you how you do your job,’” she tweeted, adding that she’d been working in narrative for a decade and didn’t need the concept of branching dialogue explained to her.

This is stupid sounding as fuck. "Today in being a cook. . .some fucking customer told me how he wanted me to make his food despite not being a cook! Fuck that guy! Hey, why am I being fired?"

 

[Fleshy Sanik]

Anyone who's ever been on Paizo's Pathfinder forums has probably heard of this cunt.

She had a reputation for going into threads where players were politely asking writers questions and the writers were responding to even tough questions with clarifications and good natured humor. They were chill threads.

Until she'd barge in and start being openly hostile. While other writers would respond to, say, a plot hole with "Huh. Never noticed that! Could be a good adventure hook for the party to investigate!", she'd respond with "It's something you obviously just don't understand..."

She was also ALWAYS spouting SJW drivel on the forums, talking about privilege, "Problematic" things in RPGs, how every RPG pushes a political agenda, and blaming "Toxic" gamers for everything.

Eventually she got so infamous and obnoxious that Paizo booted her.

Lol, when Paizo of all fucking companies fire you for being hostile towards the customers you know that you have a problem

 

[RG 448]

I've been seeing Deroir get quite a bit of support from women on Twitter, so it's not like everyone's out for blood.

They’re all just slaves to the patriarchy, their feelings don’t count.

 

[Gordon Cole]

She says in her Kotaku interview that her firing sends the message "Make sure you smile while they hit you." Saying you "slightly disagree" with someone is hitting them? Bitch please, you sucker punched the guy.

When was "Talk shit get hit" conflated with abuse in these jagoff's eyes? I'm noticing it a lot more whenever they're criticized for saying stupid shit.

 

[Burning Fanatic]

Whenever a thread pops up about Jessica Price, I hope somebody here will be decent enough to link me to it.
Imma watch that thread immediately.

EDIT:

While not a huge fan of YY, I like him for at least coming off as more "Reddit-friendly." He doesn't seem to have an anti-sjw slant where he's got to be full-on sensational (like ReviewTech, MundaneMatt, Quartering, etc), nor the opposite viewpoint like Sterling. He basically gives off a sense of how "normal people" would look at a shit situation like this.

Cause when you watch the video, you see the exact twitter exchanges that went on. Of course, like @BuckBumble posted, Kotaku and other sites make it out like the initial tweets responding to Price were very self-entitled, despite that clearly being the opposite case.

 

[ThePurpleProse]

Whenever a thread pops up about Jessica Price, I hope somebody here will be decent enough to link me to it.
Imma watch that thread immediately.

EDIT:

While not a huge fan of YY, I like him for at least coming off as more "Reddit-friendly." He doesn't seem to have an anti-sjw slant where he's got to be full-on sensational (like ReviewTech, MundaneMatt, Quartering, etc), nor the opposite viewpoint like Sterling. He basically gives off a sense of how "normal people" would look at a shit situation like this.

Cause when you watch the video, you see the exact twitter exchanges that went on. Of course, like @BuckBumble posted, Kotaku and other sites make it out like the initial tweets responding to Price were very self-entitled, despite that clearly being the opposite case.

I see a lot of people here missing the point on WHO was fired, that cunt was a full SJW piece of shit.
Here's a video that shine some light on this subhuman waste of oxygen and yes, it's the Quartering.

PS: That game is gay as a butterfly, so it is a surprise they didn't bend over.

 

[Munchingonfish]

Why'd you leave your prior employer?

I massively sperged out against a very important customer after he respectfully aired his opinion in a public conversation I hosted.

 

[Elwood P. Dowd]

edit: In the end just use an anonymous account if you want to flip out.

But then how can you get all the attention you crave as brave powerful wamen in a smol cowboy hat?

 

[MeatRokket08]

She'd make prime lolcow material, I tell ya.

 

[Feline Darkmage]

They're both autistic. This is a literally who.

Jess is such a nobody the only reason I'm familiar with her has nothing to do with her actual jobs and everything to do with even bigger jobless failures like Secret Garden Gnome orbiting her twitter shitty threads all the time.

And now she'll be some kind of martyr assaulted by the bad internet boogeyman, just like she's always wanted.

 

[Sweet and Savoury]

She'd make prime lolcow material, I tell ya.

Meh she's not really a low-cow in the typical sense.

She's just a very bitter, angry woman who feels hatred towards men for what ever imaginary reason and dumps out her vile when ever the chance arises.

On twitter that's like a dime a dozen, you can't swing a stunted cat without smacking into at least 5 bitter feminists with a axe to grind in a single try.

Being a shrieking harpy on Social Media isn't exactly a niche role...

 

[QI 541]

Poor Peter Fries, looks like being a white knight doesn't pay off.