It's one of those things when the reactions are far more entertaining/troubling than the actual kickoff incident
Well
here is the original tweet from 17 hours ago by Jaffe that Wildgoose ran with in his opinion piece (I agree that Wildgoose is totally free to have an opinion but it seems like Jaffe took offence to what Wildgood twisted out of his words with selective quoting).
Jaffe said:
It would be nice if we could correctly acknowledge that the term 'girlfriend mode' is sexist, offensive to a lot of folks, and long past ready to be put out to the 'shit we will be embarrassed to admit we ever said' pasture while also having the stones to admit there is a still valid reason the term was coined in the first place.
We should be able to embrace and push forward a change in the way we talk about games in the interest of inclusion,fairness, kindness, and respectability for ALL gamers (and all people) while still being able to openly acknowledge that the vast, vast, vast majority of adult women want NOTHING to do with a game like Borderlands 2 (or a game like God of War or Twisted Metal or Gears of War). Anymore than the vast, vast, vast majority of men have any interest in watching a show like Project Runway or reading a book like The Notebook or Twilight.
Political Correctness has been 90% fantastic for our society because before you know it, it stops being 'politically correct' and -rightly so- simply becomes folks being treated with respect. But the remaining 10% has really done a hack job to our culture, neutering the fuck out our ability to acknowledge things as the way they truly are.
Bolded the context that Wildgoose ignored which led to Jaffe getting a LOT of misinformed people attacking him on Twitter thinking that he meant that women don't like games like Borderlands. Anyone that has bothered to read his blog or tweets would recognise that Wildgoose picked poorly when finding things to back up his opinion.
This was one part of Wildgoose's
opinion piece that I was a bit confused with
Wildgoose said:
I don’t think anyone would argue that the “Best Friends Forever” skill tree is a bad idea. It is, after all, a concept design for inclusion, an effort to make a complex or intimidating game more accessible to more players. But the language Hemingway employed, regardless of whether the game officially features a “girlfriend mode,” is all about exclusion. It is stating that you are a novice player because you are a girl.
I would agree with that if he called it the "Female Mode", not the "Girlfriend Mode", which sounded much more like after describing the BFF skill tree to his girlfriend noted something as such. Considering this the company that WENT OUT OF THEIR WAY TO HELP PROGRAM A MARRIAGE PROPOSAL FROM A DUDE TO HIS
"diehard Borderlands fan" girlfriend, I think they know that women also play their games and are capable of holding their own (which, again, is why it is called BFF, not Woman Mode).
The whole event just reeks of the kind of outer media articles that generally ignore all context in the industry and any previous history relating to everything referred to. It felt like a fluff piece on CNN on a slow news day. Which really shocked me because Wildgoose is usually awesome to read and listen to.
But in the end I don't feel outraged or annoyed or angry, it is just his opinion. Nothing more, nothing less and
most importantly he feels comfortable expressing it. Which will only lead to better things as the more comfortable people are with expressing their opinion fully and truthfully, the more likely we are to get a clearer picture of where this medium is headed.
Everything is cleared up now, Jaffe has responded to the piece and educated those who were misinformed. Wildgoose has got something off his chest. And in the future we will find developers having more PR standing next to them making sure they read from a script rather than try and be too casual and bring their private lives into the business of selling games.
P.S. I DO think that someone can be intentionally sexist. I didn't really understand that comment.
P. P. S. Twisted Metal Black was awesome! God of War was pretty cool. Would be nice to see Jaffe end up in a producer role at a bigger developer, being an indie guy doesn't seem to bring the best out of him
