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Game Developer Wu Leaves Home after Death Threats

posted by LaminatorX on Sunday October 12 2014, @02:07PM   Printer-friendly
from the whose-side-are-you-on? dept.

An anonymous coward writes:

Brianna Wu, head of the independent gaming studio Giant Spacekat, was the target of a series of tweets containing death threats on Friday; one published her home address (since redacted). The poster's Twitter account has been disabled.

Wu responded on Friday night with the tweet:

Brianna Wu @Spacekatgal

The police just came by. Husband and I are going somewhere safe.

Remember, #gamergate isn't about attacking women.

GamerGate supporters denounced the threats and "doxxing" against Wu and disavowed the poster. However, several suspected that the tweets were a false flag created by anti-GamerGate forces:

Sun Knight @SunKnightO

@Sen_Armstrong @Spacekatgal @chatterwhiteman It's clearly either a troll or false flag shame that people actually think its legit.

 
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  • (Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Sunday October 12 2014, @06:17PM

    by Anonymous Coward on Sunday October 12 2014, @06:17PM (#105159)

    Because it shines a light on a larger issue that should be addressed. Women in the gaming industry shouldn't have to sleep with game Journalists to promote their work.
    Why did you think I cared?? Asshole.

  • (Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Sunday October 12 2014, @06:25PM

    by Anonymous Coward on Sunday October 12 2014, @06:25PM (#105165)

    > Women in the gaming industry shouldn't have to sleep with game Journalists to promote their work.

    Who says they have to?

    • (Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Sunday October 12 2014, @09:34PM

      by Anonymous Coward on Sunday October 12 2014, @09:34PM (#105278)

      Um, we're trying to find out if that is what happened.
      Except every time we ask a question we get a shitstorm of OMG sexists assholes!!!! as a response.
      Which only makes us believe more in the likelihood of a coverup.
      The slander articles and their "coordinated" timing seem suspicious as well.

  • (Score: 2) by cafebabe on Monday October 13 2014, @06:05AM

    by cafebabe (894) on Monday October 13 2014, @06:05AM (#105442) Journal

    Women in the gaming industry shouldn't have to sleep with game Journalists to promote their work.

    No-one should have to sleep with journalists to obtain favorable reviews. However, five journalists (who may or may not enjoyed sexual relations with one woman) gave dis-proportionately good reviews for a "game" which consists of stateless HTML wrapped with a full-screen web browser.

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    • (Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Monday October 13 2014, @06:16AM

      by Anonymous Coward on Monday October 13 2014, @06:16AM (#105444)

      "Good reviews exist for a game I personally thought was shit!" is not proof of anything, except that the reviewers apparently like visual novels. Visual novels are pretty big in Japan, and have a niche market here in the US; so what? Where are these five reviews along with the proof that the game's creator fucked them within a week - or hell, a month - of the review? Without that, all you have is proof that your tinfoil hat is on too tight.

      • (Score: 3, Informative) by cafebabe on Monday October 13 2014, @07:20AM

        by cafebabe (894) on Monday October 13 2014, @07:20AM (#105450) Journal

        "Good reviews exist for a game I personally thought was shit!" is not proof of anything, except that the reviewers apparently like visual novels. Visual novels are pretty big in Japan, and have a niche market here in the US; so what?

        It would be an improvement if it was a visual novel.

        Where are these five reviews along with the proof that the game's creator fucked them within a week - or hell, a month - of the review?

        I've done game testing professionally and I've seen the effort that goes into games that flop. I've also seen how developers react when a reviewer doesn't understand a feature in a game. And I would hope that it is generally understood that game reviews are critical in some area even when a game pushes boundaries in many areas. However, if someone publishes a few webpages, they can expect most influential Steam reviews to contain the following:-

        This is a free text based experience that just has you clicking hyperlinks as you would a webpage. I can't really call it a game since I don't think the point is to entertain you. It was originally a website and this is just the web-kit version of the site put on Steam.

        Point blank: I think this game fails at what it set out to do. It doesn't make the user understand depression at all. In fact, it's just the story of some overpriviledged guy too stuck in his head. Nothing awful actually happens to the character. The player isn't made to sympathize with him in any way.

        First of all, I hold no grudge against any group, this is merely how I truely think of this program.

        Depression Quest is a program that focuses on what appears to be chronic depression and more specifically from a female mindset. Keeping in mind that this is dubbed "an interactive fiction game" with almost no gameplay, I would like to think of this program as more of a webpage story. The writing in this program is at a level of articulation and description that I would expect from a middle school student. Personally, I was disapointed in the level of writing most of all, with this program being a text-based program.

        As for the gameplay, it's completely told through text with decisions at the bottom, like Choose Your Own Adventure books. The writer was of average quality. It wasn't horrible, but it wasn't exactly Virginia Wolfe either. The choices frustrated me, however, by having you frequently unable to select more positive choices over more negative ones. I get that this was to simulate the 'it will never get better' feelings of depression, but there is a difference between feeling it will never improve and actively being unable to make a positive choice in your life, even ones like seeing a therapist. When I was depressed, they couldn't make me NOT see one.

        This is not a game. It is a digital "choose your own adventure" book, except none of the choices you make actually effect the ending.

        You may imply that I am a conspiracist but this is not a game which obtained distribution through intrinsic merit.

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