Finally the tides are shifting. Game developers now feel confident enough to push against this madness publicly. This is HUGE for the industry and for us gamers. We are WINNING.
it is and always was about how to make more money... while the people fight each other over ideologies, they profit from both sides. this is caoitalism 101. cmon guys
Seeing is believing in my opinion. I would say it is now becoming the more popular thing to do in some spaces. Let’s be honest activism is always going to be thing in media as it’s just matter of who is making the product and how they do it. Some writers could just be sneakier in how the implement those themes. It’s hard to say until we see the new media that comes out in the future.
The man really said: "just make good games" and some idiots got mad at him. I'm starting to believe some of the people who participate in these conversations don't even play videogames
Definitely not, I had a long argument about concord with someone before finding out that they had no idea what concord was...when I mentioned a waste of 400 million, they got confused until I explained it to them. It was in the comment section of a video about concord....
Its the same argument of why should you add a trans person in a medieval fantasy setting, when the answer is consistency. If you can fully transform with magic, how would including that make cohesive sense? Why settle for a half hearted mutilation?
You never had to in the first place, crying about art content being progressive is just hilarious to me, looks back at the history of art, just as funny as all the woke and old man shouts at clouds crap, what's also hilarious is people thinking they've just stumbled across the subversive rubicon now as if people haven't been whining like little crybabies the entire time, don't like the message of art content, make your own art content... oh yes that's right as ever most of the people whining don't have a creative bone in their entire bodies.
My character in HD2 has a prosthetic leg, a prosthetic arm, and is often female depending on the rng when I respawn. How is that not diverse? Is it only considered diverse when the half robot chick is fighting Nazis like in Battlefield, or when the black chick is a Nazi, like in Battlefield?
The best part, is it's diverse in a natural way, like it should be, based on the world of the game. It's not the lame force diversity that the left loves. It's diversity because Super Earth doesn't care who you are, you can fight and be fodder for the cause either way, because you don't matter 🤣
@@simonlarge2052 Ive saved Earth from Hell…..We both have. This is much your victory as it is mine. Now we can return. Do what we were meant to do. Play games with beautiful character models. It doesnt take a genius to see that the world has problems.
Let’s be real, in that world all these identity issues went extinct because those who had these issues either died by the enemies or the reigning power 😅
The modern audience never existed out side of Twitter or now Bluesky, they never buy or support a product. We have never seen “a smash hit for modern audiences” and it not indie 5 or acolyte level bad
Basically, the people who are "modern audience", are people who only care about politicks. So, they would not care about games. And would not buy games.
Tbh they didn’t resist anything, they just didn’t care, with massive fumbles and money loss that western studios have taken from it, they saw that and just simply concluded that they wanted to make money not make a statement
I don't trust the CCO. He says about how DEI shouldn't be added needlessly and yet in his game there are bodytypes which don't add to anything and his community managers ban people left and right for the "wrong think" CCO clearly is trying to appeal to both sides here and isn't geniuine in the slightest.
Offended modern audience = bad Offended 7,4 billion people = good How can i find a way to go back in the normal world ? The reverse one is literally hell 🤮
As a girl who has been gaming forever, I absolutely like having games provide options like female leads, or male romance options when romance exists. However, I don't need the Witcher or Kingdom Come to have a female lead. Identity is not critical to the game, because you are playing a set character. In a game aimed at self inserts or true create your own experience styles, having more options is good, but I always expect most games to be aimed at men because they are a much larger number of male gamers. Furthermore, when people make games aimed at women, they tend to make more of the gameplay, story, etc be aimed at more traditionally feminine content which I personally don't prefer. I like games as they are, it's just cool to play a girl. But if the story has to change to be softer or more boring or dramatic because it's "for women" I don't want it. It's a bad trade.
As a girl gamer, I don't care about female leads, me personally. I do want female body options. I like making my character a woman that looks like me. So editing my character with a 40 DDD chest, is better than pretending to be flat chested. Then I just mute rude or lewd men that can't handle my curves.
If that was the case then let me break this down for you. It’s not gonna change anything in AAA sphere especially with battle passes and microtransactions and dlc. Some people look at the “boogeyman” but completely forgot we still have unnecessary large devs teams and still giant cooperations are still heavily invested in the the business unlike the ps1/xbox/game cube/ps2/360/ps3 era. Oh man we got rid of DEI but what about all the other bull under that’s been there for years? Some people tend to forget about that and mainly focus about the politics with it. Stick with indie games and stop looking devs twitter or community page,unless there’s something more disgusting like fallout frontiers mod in the game.
@@raevenent751 She's more like love and hate because, can't count the times that dumbass pilot dropped a 500kg on a top of a tree and killed me in the process.
@@MrThedruid22 ubisoft tried the same thing. Upper management tried to say they don't push woke narrative when they obviously do all throughout company. HD2 CEO words mean nothing but empty virtue signaling when he allows his employees to act in contradicting ways with impunity for punishing people and banning them for simply having the wrong opinion on things. HD2 also does make contemporary political statements like joking or being satirical about soldiers, military industrial complex and wars people are still recovering from but guarantee they won't do they same about anything l g b t.
@@Arthrexxno he has a point, the CEO is equally to blame. The CEO directs all decisions that result in the companies success or failure, so if the CCO isn’t doing his job, the CEO needs to step in and say “do your job right”.
Woke Earth invades one of the alien planets. In this game, you play as aliens defending their civilization. Even alien civilizations wouldn't understand what it is about.
Whats funny is the most prominent proponent of DEI could never ever ever ever give you a verifiable way in which DEI makes ANYTHING better. Because it doesn't. Because its racist.
If you call someone a DEI hire, they’ll probably be offended. How can anyone expect us to pretend that DEI is a good thing? The people pushing this crap are either malicious or stupid.
Its just to grab government benefits. That's why things like sweet baby exist. They just consult companies on maximizing government benefits. It has zero to do with social engineering, other than the intent of the government kickbacks, which were probably created just to make money anyway.
It was so funny when people were asking for a LGBT cape in thelldivers 2 ... a game where the fictional government sees its citizen only as expendable resources, and the women as soldier factories. Sure, it would absolutely fit the universe XD
Im gay and I would never wear a trash rainbow cape. Why would I wear a rainbow on my back in the middle of a war lol that shit would get me killed immediately.
DEI isn't just present in the games industry. I work in a UK call centre, where all recruitment and promotion is done to meet DEI standards. The result is industry veterans working under people with 0 experience. This always end up with the lower, but more qualified agent, showing their boss how to do the Job. Boss builds resentment to the agent, and voila. A toxic workplace environment.
You can look up "DEI" plus any company or govt agency amd chances are they'll have a webpage section talking about DEI. Nearly every fortune 500 company in the US does. Its far from a buzzword its openly adopted by the establishment power structure.
it is discrimination under UK law to decide promotions like that. We have other workplace laws that also contribute to that being a major issue. Where I work tried the same thing until this was pointed out and backtracked so fast it was surreal. It's an utterly stupid way to decide a promotion, merit and capability are all that matter in the work place, at least if you want to have a successful business that actually makes sense.
@@sinAnon6689 That only works for small companie, try to do that with a major corporation and you'll find yourself unemployed and unemployable and good luck winning a lawsuit, since you won't be able to afford the millions of dollars in legal fees for years before the case is resolved.
The biggest problem with DEI advocates is that they are not consumers. It's never with them 'I would buy your game if it adhered to DEI standards', but instead it is always 'if your game doesn't adhere to DEI standards we try to destroy your company'. There is no pleasing these people, so don't even bother. They are nothing but a vocal, small minority that pretend to be everybody's target audience.
The controversy is the "woke" staff at Arrowhead that have purposely attacked the community and caused drama in the past. Arrowhead also have a history of saying one thing then doing another. Pilestedt originally told players that "they were playing the game wrong" and actively didn't believe/understand why players were furious with the insanely poorly thought out decisions they were implementing in-game. This literally boils down to a "saying one thing, doing another" issue, people are tired of lip service. So while his statement is indeed a positive one, only actions tell. When player model skin tone became a thing on sleeveless armor...why was the only color brown? Why did players have to ask for more than just brown... Just to point out, other major developers are putting out statements similar to this too...almost like a memo's gone round saying "say something your players will like, then profit?"...
@@SpiceCh No, equity is quite literally stands for equal outcomes. DEI without equity is just another take on Affirmative Action, but affecting the whole of whatever it's infecting instead of specifically targeting hiring practices.
It's gonna take years, the likes of ubisoft hired lots of focus groups and hr/management/hiring positions are riddled with them and they will cover for each other.
Yeah, Bud Light was the tipping point, when people began to realize that they have the power to hold these mega-corps over the barrel for inserting senseless political trash into their business model.
As someone else said, if this guy made a burner account and posted the exact same things on the game's forums he'd likely be banned by the moderators. There's a huge clash between what this guy is saying and what the company actually does.
What DEI initiatives exist in HD2?? What are you talking about? I am not aware but open to education Ah you're right- I guess the discord. Advice - don't join discord servers. They're full of the worst of humanity
@@sleepyboi8060 I think he means that, if he'd asked this question on a throwaway, he'd just be banned with no proper response, regardless of AH's stance.
@@sleepyboi8060There was a while where they were trying to shoehorn LGBT shit, mostly. That’s when I hopped out of the game. That and DEFINITELY the other devs and mods messages.
The reason this is a touchy subject especially for helldivers 2 is because their discord server is moderated by literal activists who have banned thousands of players for mentioning anything negative about DEI while promoting and protecting inappropriate things like furry p***.
It's a shame that these room temp IQ moderators allowed furry Pron on a discord for a GAME that is PUBLIC. That's just the dumbest thing you could do in a Public server as a Moderation team. There is places for furry stuff and that place is not in the official helldivers server that's public. No sympathy from me and no Excuses can be mad.
@@JosephPeritothere was never furry porn. It was a furry character drawn in a full set of helldiver armor. It’s literally the same as if you put bugs bunny in helldiver armor. Threatening people with bans tho for putting emojis you didn’t like on the picture is really immature tho.
7:15 Yes, and no. It's that those statements are unpopular, yes, but it's also that they are extremely heavy-handed, because they are put in by people who lack the brain capacity, emotional maturity, and life experience to do it properly. If you don't believe me, (re)play Drag Age: the Failhard
Part of the issue is these people don't even understand what DEI is. I've had DEI supporters with their over developed emotions try to tell me DEI is workers' rights. They don't even know what's going on, but it makes them feel good, so they support it.
Games that use the term DEI seem to make the characters in it hella unnormal. I believe the old Dragon Age games had better *Dei* even though it really wasnt a thing. You had a special kid that was great with enchantments, you had some characters that weren't straight. It wasn't under the term Dei and those people were normal. Not weird. Hell Dragon Age was probably one of the best examples of different races and how people react because of that within the game. It was normal not fucking weird like Crap guard made it.
DEI is specifically a neomarxist agenda it is not related to traditional character diversity which has existed in games pretty much forever. Like every RPG has a diverse cast of characters just for variety's sake and the player has a lot of options for party composition. It wasn't political before though.
@@barahng"neomarxist" is a nonsense "catch-all" for what you really mean to say; culture and politics that you don't like. Neo-Marxism isn't a real thing, it exists only in your imagination.
*As long BlackRock, DEI which is call BRIDGE and stupid Canada making consulting groups This issue is not over we must continue to fight just recently Google is censoring AzurLuna with outfits keep your guard up this isn’t over*
Also, the "Body type 1, 2" thing in Helldivers 2 is implemented that way because the default setting for your voice lines is to random, the whole point is that every time you die and get reinforced, canonically, your character is proper dead, and now you're controlling the next hapless mook to get sent down to the surface. the body type 1, 2 thing is because several times in a mission, you will be switching between male and female voices as you die and respawn, so they just used it as "chunky or less chunky nondescript person in suit" option.
I was going to comment the opposite actually, the whole point of having body types instead of male/female is to appease "the modern audience" what you said makes absolutely no sense as dying doesnt change the reality of male/female gender in the human race.
yeah but naming the body types 'male' and 'female' wouldn't change that at all. so the usage of 'body type' is clearly more than just that, it's supposed to appeal to the "gender doesn't exist" types.
@@ChinnuWoW Marketing. Somewhen, somewhere, some 'genius' pitched the idea that they could increase sales by appealing to popular trends. When they started mismanaging games (basically inevitable for large companies to eventually drift off into this) and failed meeting sales goals, they relied on 'this surefire trick the other companies don't want you to know'. And when that failed, instead of admitting that they were wrong, they doubled down on simply not having pressed the magic solve-all button hard enough. It's fundamentally incompetent management, enabled by a general economic culture where managers are never really held accountable for fucking up a product, but at worst sent off with a golden parachute to enlist at the next company with a glowing review of their previous one. Because, in the end, the people supposed to hold them responsible are also management, and don't want to break the unspoken agreement to ensure each other's wealth unconditionally.
"Gamers won" is not really the full story, since this is significantly larger than the videogame industry. What has actually happened is that investment firms have started to roll back their ESG push. This was reported on in August with respect to Blackrock, who only approved 4% of shareholder ESG proposals between June 2023 - June 2024, down from 47% in 2021. It's just important to note that this shift is not just with respect to videogames, but is occurring or will be evident across many different industries in the next couple years.
12:24 the problem is identity. Your story sticks a black guy in feudal Japan, you gotta explain how he got there. But they can't. The explanation ends up cringe or low effort or brings up uncomfortable truths when the objective is escapism. So instead of fixing that, they try to push it on the gamers.
@@imkraezy why do you try to antagonize people whenever they go against your argument? This is my last comment, do actual research instead of blindly following this. By the way, Japanese people have spoken all over the internet about this matter so you might as well go and tell them they’re all racist
@@imkraezyWhere did this guy ever say he didn’t like the character being black? That wasn’t ever said. He stated that historically he was not a samurai
I’m Irish and Mexican with a half German mother and half black brother, we both grew up in one of the biggest border cities in our country - I HAVE HAD ENOUGH D.E.I. TO LAST MY ENTIRE LIFE. I DO NOT NEED TO SEE IT IN THE VIDEO GAMES I PLAY TO ESCAPE THIS SHIT-ASS REALITY.
I got banned on their discord for simply complaining about not being able to play the game during their server capacity issues at launch. Pretty childish behaviour coming from these people.
Everyone who read "Brave new world" knows that changing of the commonly used language is key to make people compliant to the cause. So, this _forced_ change of language is highly alarming and should be seen and treated as such.
You are aware though, that all of those things already exist? Brave New World was a Mirror to our current world. There are barely differences ... just different setting. Same humanity.
As an spanish speaker, a lot of our "modern audience spanish speakers" say that english Is More modern cuz It evolved to modern audience and ITS a lenguage More receptive to changes..... AND like you said before, i thinks ITS true and thats the reason Twitter and these social media pages are so f up, but they used that flexibility againts people, they are reprogramming people
Like him or hate him, but fighting "compelled speech" is exactly what Jordan Peterson originally became famous for. They tried to tear him down in Canada for years, but now he's having interviews with the man most likely to be next PM. Although, I wouldn't be surprised if the current government, MSM, and their useful idiots somehow managed to sabotage that. Trudeau has abused his powers before, after all.
I'm increasingly of the opinion that all the DEI stuff, as well as many of the other tangentially related ideologies, that demands people agree with them will be looked back on as one massive case of "The Emperor's New Clothes". The 'con-men' got the ear of various CEOs and influential people, the 'emperors' dressed their companies and institutions in the 'fancy threads' of DEI, they have gone on their 'procession through the streets' to show off through their incessant marketing campaigns. The 'townsfolk' uneasily went along with it worrying about accidentally offending someone and the 'childs outburst' about the ridiculousness of it all is now reverberating through the crowd. The only differences from the folktale seems to be that most of the 'emperors' are starting to try to distance and hide themselves away from it all, and the 'con-men' behind it don't get to hide in the shadows.
What do you mean it’s still not allowed to be talked about why they are making this propaganda and why it’s more important to them than profits. We can’t even discuss the actual ideology and people that caused this
They all tried to build a legacy around it - not understanding that a literal Great Work requires communion with the Holy Spirit. They do no know how to create beauty - only transform and misshape ugly things - and they tried to possess everyone to uphold and maintain their image and “message” but the whole thing became an inauthentic and inorganic binary machine response. When they speak we hear the legion , they may be many, but they know nothing.
@@letsbegeeks9456The farther away from the truth they go, the less capable they are of creating compelling stories and characters. These folks have lost the ability to distinguish between basic good and evil, their minds being darkened. If you don’t know the difference between good and evil, your heroes are just villains.
9:01 racism is taught , not inherent to the human condition. If a child isn't taught about racism, they dislike people based on how they treat them not the color of their skin.
Yes and no. People have degrees of in-group, out-group preferences in their mind. But a lot of that is learned. If it wasn’t skin color, people would be delineating on other things. That tribalism seems to be in our DNA to some extent.
It essentially is self taught by experience … if certain people are constantly committing the same act a stereotype is borne and then reinforced over and over and then it gets worse when that certain group glorifies the stereotype themselves as if it’s a good thing Knowing it’s what makes people not like them
All labels are neutral. It's what the label points to that gives it negative or positive connotations over time. The terms "sjw" or "woke" were coined by people to label THEMSELVES. The negative connotations came to them over time due to those people's actions. If you don't want the label you are associated with to be negative, stop behaving in a way that contributes to the negative connotations of that label. This is something the woke will never understand or acknowledge. Instead of changing behavior, they will seek to rebrand into new labels to escape the connotations. It will never happen because it's their behavior that makes the label negative, not the label itself.
Bingo. You get it. Activism as a whole isn’t inherently a bad thing. IMHO, it serves as a way for society’s issues to be brought to the fore. The issue comes when activism and “the message” begins to eclipse the products intended purpose.
The inverse is also true. Terms like "Chad", "weeaboo" etc were originally used in a more negative way, but they started getting used ironically and now their connotations are more neutral or even positive
Perfectly explains what happened to 343 Studios. They chose a name, did everything wrong with it and people said 343 as an insult until they CHANGED IT. Now their called Halo Studios, but I have a feeling the same thing is gonna happen soon...
Not only that, but they start with one label and run with it until everyone is sick of it, then claim that it "doesn't really exist" before fading over into another label and repeating the whole gaslighting process. This has happened 3 or 4 times over my lifetime and it's fucking exhausting. We went from "Political correctness" to "Oh political correctness is just a rightwing bogeyman and no one on the left actually cares about it" to "Social justice" > "Oh actually social justice is just something conservatives made up so they'd have something to be perpetually angry at, we were never into social justice" > "Woke" > "Oh actually woke doesn't exist it's just something made up by grifters and podcasters and toxic males and incels and nazis" DEI...
I consider myself to be left wing, but I 100% agree with pilestedt here, if a political message doesn't add to a game/creation, then it really shouldn't be there, no matter what it's trying to say. I'm not saying you shouldn't be able to add a message to a game, but if you do, you should at least take the effort to wove it in organically.
All art is inescapably political, but you don't have to critically analyze everything you consume, and you don't have to put an overt political message into your game to check a box. It's okay to simply make/play a game where you just shoot bugs - not that deep.
agreed. starship troopers is very political, but that is in the core of the film, its all about that particular political view. its not just bolted on to make a statement completely unrelated to the film, it IS the film. theres many political statements starship troopers doesnt make because they are nothing to do with the film. everything should be in service to the art, if the politics are part of the art they are essential to it, if they are just tacked on to make an unrelated real world statement then they pull the audience out of the art.
@@necaacenHell yeah, brother! 100% agree, I've been working on a novel for 4 years and it pulls heavily from our worlds military conflicts but essentially takes place 500 years after a modern nuclear apocalypse that sets the few remaining survivors, back into the stone age. I can agree and see how organic story telling revolving politics is as you said "essential" unless it has nothing to do with the story itself.
I think that the reason that the Bud Light thing was such a spectacular fail was because the marketing genius in charge of the campaign was interviewed. She said that the reason for the campaign was that they wanted to reach a DIFFERENT consumer and spoke of their current customers with contempt. Jaguar has since said "hold my Bud Light" and stuck their own thumb straight up the ass of their current loyal customer base. They may be surprised to discover that their new young target customer can hardly afford rent. Those that CAN afford such a car reside largely in the Middle East, Eastern bloc nations and the far east. None of which are fans of the image that the campaign portrays.
Capitalism in high corporate in a nutshell. How do we increase our customer base? How about we try marketing our product to people entirely disinterested to it, even though anyone with a double digit IQ, should be able to realize that these people will never buy it. DEI is just an antempt to increase a already satuarated market. People who shouted these values will just as fast get replaced as the ones before them, when the business suffers. Its the desperate last try of investors who over invested 2020 with the very temporary boom in gaming.
From my understanding, Jaguar's sales have been going down for years, so their "loyal customers" weren't buying. With that situation in mind, I understand that they felt they needed to make some big changes. But hoo boy did they make some bad choices in that. What they SHOULD have done is come out with some exciting new EVs that their customer base, and customer adjacent (those who knew and respected the brand but maybe haven't yet bought) would be interested and excited to buy. They did not do this.
@@ColinFox This comment section would say I'm woke as fuck but even I think there must have been a gas leak in the Jaguar office when they approved that rebrand or something. It's like if Harley-Davidson started marketing to pregnant women... An infant could have told them that was a terrible idea. God, capitalism really has failed in every way imaginable...
It's not like the game has opposing viewpoints either. While there's no pride capes, there's also no white power caps or modem political capes. The only political stance you can have is full allegiance to Super Earth, a fictional, intergalactic superpower that unifies humanity and transcends any DEI barriers. That sounds like exactly what these people want, no? At the surface level, yes, but they really just want to exist in a bubble with no opposition whatsoever. If you want your viewpoints easily accessible in a game, you must be prepared to allow opposing ones as well. Otherwise, you're supporting censorship, which historically is not the first time. Keeping it neutral is the only way it should be.
It's probably not so expensive to fund a few websites and a hand full of idiots. The modern audience might just be ever so slightly big enough to pay for the crap.
DEI only panders to a very small and excluded minority, wouldn't it be more profitable and productive to pander to the majority? Isn't that a big issue now that AAA studios are shutting down because of it? It's not rocket science.
When they started to a this stuff in games years back. I used to think that the idea was, "our normal audience wont care much, and this might draw some minorities tonour product". But these day's, this isn't about marketing. This is just ideology. Its insane.
There is 2 reasons why Studios are shutting down. 1. Forced DEI practices, where they first make a game just trying to hit as much checkmarks as they can to appeal to DEI without even thinking about how it affects the game. This means they usually spend more time thinking "how can we make this game inclusive" than with "how do we make this a good/fun game". 2. During COVID games sales skyrocketed, and most studios are stupid and overcorrected expecting that marked would suddenly grow and stay that way even after COVID so they overhired and grew too big. When evidently the sales did not stay the same all those studios that overhired were spending way more on sustaining all their employees, so making agames got way pricier and since sales went down after COVID they could not sustain themselves and started bleeding money. This is the reason we have been seeing huge layoffs in the gaming industry for the last 2 years, because the industry is correcting the false growth they had during COVID.
@47slogra So just how real is the DEI answer ESG checkmarks in gaming, necessary? Or is it one of those things like most things that was and is still said alot that we take it for granted or as a fact? But yeah I get the covid part , everyone locked up or at home.
The majority can be bad. Asmond talks about it in the video, lol. Putting LGBT messages in a game in Saudi Arabia would be awesome. I think if you're in a group with ANY parallels to Saudi Arabia, you need to get out.
And you're gonna watch how the pendulum is manually pushed back again. They're not gonna let up on this. They're just running damage control. People really need to dig their heels in and stay vigilant about this stuff going forward.
it was while ago so forgive some inaccuracy but I believe it was a community manager or mod not officially associated with arrowhead that later apologized or was demoted whatever the problem was it's not anymore is the important thing really
Still do. But it might be Sony who control the communist mangers. Not Arrowhead. But Arrowhead should have pushed back. That they did not, is why they lost half the players.
I’ll never understand why a game dev would ever ever ever cater to the minority rather than the majority of folks who actually buy and play their games.
For fear of backlash. It's always been known that if you do anything considering gender, race, sexual preferences and whatever else, it generally never ends well for that person if it's seen as bad. Doesn't matter if that audience that's being targeted is a minority since anyone who supports them would also typically raise up their pitchforks with them which increases the numbers by a lot. That's why they thought it would be the same for this situation this time around, even if the stuff that's been happening wasn't the same type of situation, and more of a "it's my way or no way" from the entitled minority which is just a small group of the main group to which even they hate them because they make them look bad. 🤣
In addition to what others have said, alot of the DEI pushes have happened because of investment from companies like Blackrock who basically mandate it to be eligible for funding.
Probably we were rich. They were creating the useless departments & hiring thousands of people. And for their ESG (Social/Environmental/Governmental) initiatives, they were/are getting investments & grants & loans & subsidies & tax credits & low tariffs... So it was probably very hard to estimate the actual losses & the reason for it. (That's why Socialism doesn't work). Twitter fired like 80% of the work force (6,000 employees), & nothing has changed. And the workforce/human resources are the largest expense for any company. Just the salaries: 6,000 * $100,000 = $600,000,000 + all the benefits (they probably saved close to a billion dollars a year). And Now the Trump administration is planning to take the subsidies away.
About time people start to fight back in the industry. People should just keep not buying shitty, propaganda riddled games and these companies will fade into obscurity on their own. Don't give up.
I got a great idea for a game, it’s called “DEI or Die!” And in this game you are an uncover cop who is dressed as a trans person to uncover a major Liberal Conspiracy, ultimately finding out it was all a ploy to sell more woman’s clothing because guys are pickier buyers for apparel. Fill the games dialog with fucked up things that you can say that have to be argued to generate controversy in certain situations, and as you go further down the rabbit hole, you find out about political figures who are happily funding the chaos and taking dividends from the fashion industry. This game could offend everyone equally and they would have no room to bitch about it. Real gamers would love how fucked up it is in mockery yo the whole situation, it could easily be game of the year.
4:13 Massive difference between having a fictional political party and it's fictional values depicted in entertainment and entertainment trying to make a political statement about our current world, trying to convert people into an ideology or overall lecture about real political ideologies. Edit: 7:28 ...aaand of course Kotaku journalist doesn't seem to understand the difference either.... * facepalm * HellDivers 2 is presenting a fictional world and not once telling you how you should actually think in ours.
i don't see anything wrong with making political statements in game. it's the same with movies and music, art it's a form of expression. most of the best movies are a reflection of something that is happening in society. and a lot of games talk about real problems using fictional plots
@@95onimushaAll the political messages are the same. Its the same message that "artists" learned in liberal arts classes. They don't have an original thought in their heads. These ideas are not their own.
I think the turning point was the minute everyone found out about Sweet Baby Inc in videogames specifically. We knew things were changing and that the companies were not listening to their main core audience, and we were gaslighted into believing we were the problem. When in reality it was all an agenda being forced upton gamers that we never asked for. Thats when we all collectivly said you know what any company and studio that has sweet baby inc in it we will not play those games and so we did. And as a result studios began to shut down until companies started giving gamers what we always asked for and wanted.
They won't. The CCO is fake and tries to play both sides of the conflict. He tries to appear as understanding of what gamers want while at the same time bending his knee to the woke mob. He unironically has less respect from me than actual wokies because at least actual woke people are honest and true to their beliefs. At least i can respect them for doing what they believe is right. The CCO of Helldivers isn't even able to pick a side and stick to it.
reminder that spitz, the guy who owned the helldivers 1 fan discord everyone had been using for 9 years, got promoted to moderator in the official helldivers 2 discord and then deleted the 9 year old community. i like discord but im gonna be so happy when this shit dies and we go back to forums.
I only just started on helldivers. I got it when it blew up last spring, but couldnt play it because Ive been busy with work and college. Genuinely, I have been grinding the crap out if it for weeks now, and yet, it doesnt feel like a grind because I am having such a blast the entire time. It's been like 60 hours in game and I dont feel like stopping or playing anything else... Which is weird because I normally lament what boring grindfest I feel like playing at a given time. ... It has not been lost on me during those 60 hours that the reason Helldivers 2, for the clunky mess that it sometimes is, is so amazing to me, precisely BECAUSE it doesnt have DEI BS written all over it. The satire can be so biting and easy to debate about in game with friends BECAUSE they didnt give one iota about the IRL politics of the satire. Things that would normally be considered toxic in other games, like team damage and teamkilling, in your typical slow as p@ss grind fest with no compelling story, PVP, a feature that often gets removed from games because of the toxicity... Actually becomes a source of hilarity in this game, you almost done care if a friend f@cks up a dive because they often do it in the funniest of ways. The PVE environment encourages military style commraderie (something I miss from the actual military), while catering to make you feel like a bad@$$ when you extract with 2 seconds to spare after an hour of gripping vietnam PTSD simulator. This game is as good as it is, precisely BECAUSE it doesnt give a f@ck one way or another about your politics, and puts the player experience and enjoyment first, rather than the backstory of some bullsh@t token NPC nobody cares about. Basically Helldivers has reminded me what gaming used to be, like some long forgotten core memory... And... It saddens me that it is now a rare outlier in a sea of trash, AAA games and DEI morons should be ashamed for ruining an entire artform.
I'm wondering is this changing of our language part of the WEF plan to have 'a new living language across the world' as per the Georgia Guidestones? George Orwell warned about the effect that changing the language would have and we appear to be well on the road to that dystopia.
It may be a not great time for video game media but at least understand that we are living in the best time in human history right now, even if it doesn’t feel like it. Just the fact that you are literate, are not enslaved, will likely live over 50 and have running water is proof of it. Despite media coverage of crimes the overall crime rate is down a lot. Don’t act like we are living through something like the Great Depression. I understand times are tough, but we are no where near Orwellian. You want to see Orwellian, look over at North Korea.
It's simple: If a game doesn't let me make my own character it has to let me play a character who I want to be, or a character who I want to help. So if you make a female character whose whole personality is being insufferably smug I don't want to be her, and I don't want to help her, so I don't want to play the game.
23:00 I disagree - First sign of a spring was Hogwarts game. They tried so hard to cancel the game and it became the biggest thing of the year. Then the right side noticed that they in fact have the power in numbers, not the most vocal ones online on the left
The people paying for gamepass refusing to quit it can't speak with they wallets, Xbox execs got those people wrapped around they fingers, to them one game doesn't matter regardless of how many poor games drop as failures
Besides very few exceptions, that require some aspect of DEI for the story, DEI really doesn't matter. DEI doesn't make a game good. DEI also doesn't make a game bad. Everyone complaining pro or anti DEI in games should touch some grass.
I hadn't been aware of the DEI movement for quite some time, but as I've observed different talks and heard out their opinions I've been able to critically think over the situation and believe I have come to a conclusion; people don't like seeing things in the world that break their perception of that world. it's an issue on both sides.
the funny thing about this is in the literal opening cinematic it shows a mix raced couple. Also the player character is in armor so you never see them and the other npc's on your ship are different races too.
Which leads into the idea that these people don’t actually play the game. If they do, it’s the bare minimum of playtime and all of its spent looking for a problem that isn’t there. On the flip side of things, it could also be applied to the people who refuse to touch the game because the body type A and B mechanic. It’s a lot of grown ass adults trying to find company in their misery.
You have to understand that they do not care about any of those things, they would be angry if it wasn't there, but it being there isn't going to stop them from pushing for more, its the same ideology of intersectional feminism, women have been able to vote and work, have rights that men don't have (like voting without being subject to a draft) but you will still continually see them asking for more while also trying to shut down anything that disagrees with them, like male only DV shelters etc, those get attacked, harassed and destroyed. It's the same concept here.
The Naughty Dog trailer was exactly what I expected. The exact type of character I had no doubt they would create. However, the 'girl boss' archetype is thoroughly exhausted at this point. I think that's another reason people collectively rolled their eyes at it. I'm tired of it too and I'm not a white man, you don't have to be to object to a lazy concept used over and over by too many game companies.
It’s simple, if you make a great game that doesn’t push your own political agenda and respects the player base gamers will be more than happy to support it, shouldn’t be that hard to understand
Theres definitely a space for political messaging in games. Some of the best games have serious, overt political messages. The problem is when theyre integrated in ham-fisted, on-the-nose ways like we've been seeing recently. Its also because some political points, like those in Veilguard, are poorly fleshed out and presented with no room for discussion/thought, making it a preaching lesson rather than having the player come to the realisation on their own terms through the story development. (Basically, as you said, *respect* the fanbase and the in-world lore)
@@FungeHucker yeah I do think there’s a difference between having subtle messaging/themes and overtly pushing agendas in entertainment, the problem is that it feels forced now bc the new people making these games/movies don’t have the talent to write nuanced pieces of art like the people who worked at these studios a decade ago
@@vloggie300 100%. The kind of stuff we are seeing now reminds of the kind of short-sighted, underdeveloped writing from a high school English class. In-your-face messaging riddled with clichés and leaves you feeling judged instead of curious - I don't even mind if it's a political message I disagree with if it gives me space to reflect on my own views.
Sure Asmon, there’s probably an extremely minuscule percentage of people who are wascist but the vast majory just doesn’t want to lectured to, and want to enjoy a fun to play video game. I never had a problem with “not being represented” in video games and I played as women, orcs, etc.
Honestly, if the stakeholders think this is the way to portray social politics awareness towards the population, they are really off the mark. People like to play games because they enjoy the thrill of the experiences these games give towards the player. A player that doesn't need to be reminded over and over again over political aspects of the real world while enjoying fiction. Gamers these days are plenty aware already by their own experiences over how politics are going by sheer exposure of the internet, they don't need that shit to invade the one thing they find interesting and engaging in their down time. They instead seek the thrill of good gameplay and engaging story telling games to play and make memories of playing it to remember in nostalgia in the future.
Funny (not funny) thing is, he would be banned from the official helldivers discord if he said this there. they need to clean house. Put your money where your mouth is.
lol he's not on either side here. This is a very political answer. With all of the other shit that the community manager has said, there's no indication that the company, as a whole, is going to deliver a "DEI free" product in the future or anything.
Idk why some of these developers defend DEI so much? Like my g you are loosing money, isn’t that they re objective? To make money? People just don’t t want a forced message invented by mentally ill people in they games
They are not loosing money, they are not making sales. But they get millions and millions from blackrock to do that shit, so thats why it keeps happening and thats why they defend it. They make money without selling anything...
It's funny they think the player character is evil and the good side is the... bugs? Robot aliens? What even. These commies really should stop to think, "maybe we're the baddies".
I remember early in Helldiver people were trying to make the bots into victims, when those who play the game can clearly see bots death camps with dead humans in cages.
Honestly, doesn't matter... I put maybe 40 hours into helldivers 2 and I'm never buying another one of their games after they make. I'd probably not bother with a game their devs worked on. They tried to bait and switch in woke, and they got their money. That's all they get from me. Plenty of retro games and indie devs.
I still play HD2 every now and then. I’ll get a random text from a buddy saying, “Ready to spread managed democracy?” And we spread democracy throughout the galaxy.
I get really tired of that whole 'politics are in everything' argument. I mean sure, Starship Troopers is absolutely a political commentary in some regards. But it's about the benefits and responsibilities of citizenship and what people are willing to sacrifice to gain it. Turns out, very little to do with gender theory garbage or racial payback. Just because something involves politics doesn't mean it makes sense to shoe horn in the particular political issues you're obsessed with.
The issue with the starship troopers movie is that the director read only a few pages of the book, thought it was “fascist garage” and made the movie his way.
Its happening because these devs see this crap isnt selling and they can now proudly proclaim not to have this garbage in their games without fear of cancellation, at least in a financial sense. Thank God.
The worst thing is that people just hear 'inclusion, diversity, equity'. Those words all sound nice individually, but they only work when everyone is considered and that is not what's happening in every case. There is no equality in this world and it will never be 'fair', just live in reality.
We don't want fringe californian politics in our games it's really just that simple. It's not that politics in games bad, it's that the politics they're trying to push are simply terrible, destabilising nonsense.
This is a good, nuanced take. Poltics is a complicated subjec that is often handled poorly when someone doesn’t write or understand nuance well. I don’t use nuance well, but I do understand that it exists. the people I’m around barely understand it. And that’s sad because I really want someone to debate and talk about Poltics with that contrasts my opinion. It could help develop and refine my understanding of society. Instead I get a world where people have discarded understanding in favor of staying in their echo chambers, afraid of the outside world and its complexity so they figuratively return to the womb, where nothing can hurt them.
Fairly misleading messaging. Pilestedt wasn't saying "Don't add DEI to games". He basically said "Don't add _anything_ to games, if it does not add to the experience (DEI or otherwise). Just make good games"
Most the time though forcing diversity into games often detracts from the game as more focus is put into hiring people to make your company look inoffensive and game inoffensive.
The turning point was Gamergate. Lots of people who were on the forefront of it will scoff and say that Gamergate accomplished nothing but ultimately it was the first time people noticed that DEI was being used as a smokescreen for terrible people to ruin products and companies and then published that information in a way that got wider public attention. That was the point at which the HSS Gaming started its long, slow, grinding about-face. There's good reason that Journos still wake up with cold sweats from nightmares about Gamergate. It's when they lost.
23:00 i think the turning point was the southpark episode about the subject. Even know it's more for movies in general, the idea still radiates through all media at the time
Weird. Wasn't Helldivers II community manager being a furry freak? Banning people over his weird fetish on their discord? Or they finally got rid of him?
Alleged*, nothing has ever been proven definitively on the subject matter. Of course, it didn't stop media and grifters from running with it. Like most things, the context has been removed for attention, attacks and profit.
@@joshbull623 What do you even mean? Have you been on Helldivers 2 discord server during PSN drama? I did. Dude is a freak, and thats an understatement.
I couldn't disagree more with one thing... "DEI isn't nearly as bad as affirmative action" DEI is far more destructive than affirmative action ever was
Yeah. Aydin Paladin does a lot of good work deconstruction just how bad DEI policies are, including things like literally teaching internalized racism to kids on an institutional level through CRT. DEI includes affirmative action, but it is so so so much worse than just that.
It’s too late. They have infiltrated the workplaces and will only hire their own. I am outnumbered in my own team and you can definitely judge a book’s work ethic by its cover.
Their community managers are prob irl friends of them, they haven't but they have been "shut up" and don't post stupid shit anymore. One of them did get the axe though if I remember correctly, the guy that was aggro at Sony or something back then.
@@unloyal4847 you do not mix friendship and business. if they are too stupid to understand such basic principles then they deserve all the hate for it.
@@unloyal4847 so this is just corpo speech to calm things down,because friends are mirror of yourself .Like will you have a friend who always talk about furry porn and woke things, if you are not interested too?
The thing that I have found the funniest is the people (often Redditors) who get so upset about us not wanting to play their game. Then calling us typical insults about it as if WE are the ones that are being irrational! The hypocrisy 😂
It’s literally lean and bulky body types big guy I don’t see why you’re so pressed about this There’s nothing even implying that it’s supposed to be man and woman even if they named it differently
I think this year will still have a lot which were in development before the backlash really took off. I reckon mid 2026 is where we see a huge change . Like fable ans avowed is gonna be full of it
@@borismaric130 I’d say that’s more for rpgs but I agree we will still see a good chunk for the next years . I just think in a year and half is when we start seeing less .
Finally the tides are shifting. Game developers now feel confident enough to push against this madness publicly. This is HUGE for the industry and for us gamers. We are WINNING.
THEY ARE HIDING IT
DONT BELIVE IT
THEY WILL TALK TALK TALK
BUT THEIR ACTIONS WILL STILL BE DEI
PLEASE DONT FALL FOR IT
NOTHING IS CHANGING
PLEASE
WE ARE NOT WINNING
WE ARE MAKING A MISTAKE
it is and always was about how to make more money... while the people fight each other over ideologies, they profit from both sides. this is caoitalism 101. cmon guys
Seeing is believing in my opinion. I would say it is now becoming the more popular thing to do in some spaces. Let’s be honest activism is always going to be thing in media as it’s just matter of who is making the product and how they do it. Some writers could just be sneakier in how the implement those themes. It’s hard to say until we see the new media that comes out in the future.
@andremachado6663 well nobody’s profiting on the DEI side…
The man really said: "just make good games" and some idiots got mad at him. I'm starting to believe some of the people who participate in these conversations don't even play videogames
The DEI defenders are not saying "DEI makes games better", they're saying the opposite, and developers should ruin their games with DEI anyway.
Never did
i can bet kate bush's husband has never bought a game in their life
Definitely not, I had a long argument about concord with someone before finding out that they had no idea what concord was...when I mentioned a waste of 400 million, they got confused until I explained it to them. It was in the comment section of a video about concord....
No. Its the simple fact that "they" only know to gaslight, deny, and once proven false, gaslight more. Half the west are just delusional on purpose
In Japan we call this “虵足”
It means adding nonsense will ruin the art.
Like adding legs(足) to a snake(虵).
wouldnt a snake with legs make the silhouette of a dragon?
@@thanquolrattenherz9665Than make a dragon lol...not a snake
@@thanquolrattenherz9665 objectively false you need to add alot more then just legs to turn a snake to a dragon little dawg
Scientists in the US are trying to remove legs from lizards with gene "therapy"
The replies are perfect example of adding unnecessary bullshit to the conversation XD
''How is it inclusive?''
''Superearth is united in xenophobia''
What a hilarious answer
The jokes write themselves
mankind first !
no dei aliens allowed.
Dont worry ask your community managers it just works
Its the same argument of why should you add a trans person in a medieval fantasy setting, when the answer is consistency. If you can fully transform with magic, how would including that make cohesive sense? Why settle for a half hearted mutilation?
DEI: It's all about sending a message.
Ok, I got your message, now I don't have to buy your games.
@@AndreKing4 which means more $ and time for him along with less much less stress
What is the point of your comment @@AndreKing4
@@AndreKing4 Yeah, ever since I was married, I no longer have a girlfriend.
@@redpanda416 you could always get a new gf while still being married
You never had to in the first place, crying about art content being progressive is just hilarious to me, looks back at the history of art, just as funny as all the woke and old man shouts at clouds crap, what's also hilarious is people thinking they've just stumbled across the subversive rubicon now as if people haven't been whining like little crybabies the entire time, don't like the message of art content, make your own art content... oh yes that's right as ever most of the people whining don't have a creative bone in their entire bodies.
My character in HD2 has a prosthetic leg, a prosthetic arm, and is often female depending on the rng when I respawn. How is that not diverse? Is it only considered diverse when the half robot chick is fighting Nazis like in Battlefield, or when the black chick is a Nazi, like in Battlefield?
Touch grass in diverse biomes.
they want the pink color more on male character and lesbians gays every where
The best part, is it's diverse in a natural way, like it should be, based on the world of the game. It's not the lame force diversity that the left loves. It's diversity because Super Earth doesn't care who you are, you can fight and be fodder for the cause either way, because you don't matter 🤣
Helldivers are expendable grunts, there is nothing sexual, no faces, and humans are too busy fighting aliens to care about racism.
He's not fat, black and gay enough, that's what they actually mean
Humanity overcoming racism by directing all of that against aliens who want to destroy Super Earth is a beautiful thing.
It’s almost like Ozymandias was right
@@simonlarge2052 Ive saved Earth from Hell…..We both have. This is much your victory as it is mine. Now we can return. Do what we were meant to do. Play games with beautiful character models. It doesnt take a genius to see that the world has problems.
I’m racist
nah
Let’s be real, in that world all these identity issues went extinct because those who had these issues either died by the enemies or the reigning power 😅
The modern audience never existed out side of Twitter or now Bluesky, they never buy or support a product. We have never seen “a smash hit for modern audiences” and it not indie 5 or acolyte level bad
they do exist and they support the products, the problem is that there's no company that can make a living from 8 clients world wide
They don't play because they suck at games especially competitive, are any of these "activists" on any esport team? Um no 😂
I've known some alphabet warriors that bought those games. Thing is, their demographic ain't enough to sustain that kind of business.
Basically, the people who are "modern audience", are people who only care about politicks.
So, they would not care about games. And would not buy games.
they have no money leftover for games after paying for their psychiatrists and anti-depressives
Foreign devs resisting the DEI dogma is what American devs need to follow instead of grifting for Blackstone investments
Tbh they didn’t resist anything, they just didn’t care, with massive fumbles and money loss that western studios have taken from it, they saw that and just simply concluded that they wanted to make money not make a statement
Blackstone? Damn rebranding
Eboniferous Igneous
It’s never going to happen
Good to see gaming companies want to sell games again.
Imagine that
They saw how much money Ubisoft lost and don’t want that
I don't trust the CCO. He says about how DEI shouldn't be added needlessly and yet in his game there are bodytypes which don't add to anything and his community managers ban people left and right for the "wrong think" CCO clearly is trying to appeal to both sides here and isn't geniuine in the slightest.
They don't, if they would they would open the availability to purchase the game in various blocked countries.
Tell that to Ubisoft and Naughty Dawg. I will never get my money again
Offended modern audience = bad
Offended 7,4 billion people = good
How can i find a way to go back in the normal world ? The reverse one is literally hell 🤮
Lots of helicopter rides
Its not easy to find ones way out of the twilight zone
@Kyojironaxx Your profile picture works perfectly with this
Wait a few weeks, and then watch the fireworks. Inauguration day is coming.
do you really think there are about 1.5 - 2 billion of the modern audiance?
As a girl who has been gaming forever, I absolutely like having games provide options like female leads, or male romance options when romance exists. However, I don't need the Witcher or Kingdom Come to have a female lead. Identity is not critical to the game, because you are playing a set character. In a game aimed at self inserts or true create your own experience styles, having more options is good, but I always expect most games to be aimed at men because they are a much larger number of male gamers.
Furthermore, when people make games aimed at women, they tend to make more of the gameplay, story, etc be aimed at more traditionally feminine content which I personally don't prefer. I like games as they are, it's just cool to play a girl. But if the story has to change to be softer or more boring or dramatic because it's "for women" I don't want it. It's a bad trade.
As a girl gamer, I don't care about female leads, me personally. I do want female body options. I like making my character a woman that looks like me. So editing my character with a 40 DDD chest, is better than pretending to be flat chested. Then I just mute rude or lewd men that can't handle my curves.
Great comment 👍
Cyber punk did a great job with that imo. V is unisex and works perfectly for the game.
@@LezArtist5 idgaf about your soggy tatas. You didn't need to write that. You should write to developpers instead 😂😂
I was 69th like
I feel we've lost 8 years of good games because of dei and games as a service ...
You haven't been paying attention to the indie scene then
There's been some good ones. AAA titles are the ones suffering
If that was the case then let me break this down for you. It’s not gonna change anything in AAA sphere especially with battle passes and microtransactions and dlc. Some people look at the “boogeyman” but completely forgot we still have unnecessary large devs teams and still giant cooperations are still heavily invested in the the business unlike the ps1/xbox/game cube/ps2/360/ps3 era. Oh man we got rid of DEI but what about all the other bull under that’s been there for years? Some people tend to forget about that and mainly focus about the politics with it. Stick with indie games and stop looking devs twitter or community page,unless there’s something more disgusting like fallout frontiers mod in the game.
This is the lost decade
Lost good movies and good music too. Basically ruined all forms of art for Gen Z
But Helldivers has DEI: Democracy Eagle Incoming
⬆➡⬇⬇⬇
Eagle 1 my beloved
@@raevenent751 She's more like love and hate because, can't count the times that dumbass pilot dropped a 500kg on a top of a tree and killed me in the process.
@@greynand8466 no their soft targets the cluster would be more effective.
I've no idea what dei means so I'm gonna adopt this version cuz I like it.
the CEO own statements would get him banned in the helldiver community. They are extremely woke on the official socials
Probably why he's a ceo and they are moderators. The moderation community is a cesspool.
Agree
@@MrThedruid22 ubisoft tried the same thing. Upper management tried to say they don't push woke narrative when they obviously do all throughout company.
HD2 CEO words mean nothing but empty virtue signaling when he allows his employees to act in contradicting ways with impunity for punishing people and banning them for simply having the wrong opinion on things.
HD2 also does make contemporary political statements like joking or being satirical about soldiers, military industrial complex and wars people are still recovering from but guarantee they won't do they same about anything l g b t.
@@aNINETIEZkid Get your head checked. CEO and CCO are two different things.
@@Arthrexxno he has a point, the CEO is equally to blame. The CEO directs all decisions that result in the companies success or failure, so if the CCO isn’t doing his job, the CEO needs to step in and say “do your job right”.
Making the woke movement as a alien species
Warhammer 40K already did that, they're called the Legions of Excess.
More like invasive species
Woke Earth invades one of the alien planets. In this game, you play as aliens defending their civilization. Even alien civilizations wouldn't understand what it is about.
@@respox2191 kinda ironically 40k is getting turned woke too, no such thing as female Custodians!
I'd say Identity Politics over Woke.
Lots of good games have been Woke such as FFVII regarding Private powers destroying the world
Whats funny is the most prominent proponent of DEI could never ever ever ever give you a verifiable way in which DEI makes ANYTHING better. Because it doesn't. Because its racist.
In the United States, it's also illegal. It's been illegal the whole time.
If you call someone a DEI hire, they’ll probably be offended. How can anyone expect us to pretend that DEI is a good thing? The people pushing this crap are either malicious or stupid.
@@PrionicProteins Tell that to black colleges and Boeing
Its just to grab government benefits.
That's why things like sweet baby exist. They just consult companies on maximizing government benefits.
It has zero to do with social engineering, other than the intent of the government kickbacks, which were probably created just to make money anyway.
@@evil1st some people are trying to do that. Few colleges have been successfully sued over their DEI BS.
It was so funny when people were asking for a LGBT cape in thelldivers 2 ... a game where the fictional government sees its citizen only as expendable resources, and the women as soldier factories. Sure, it would absolutely fit the universe XD
Im gay and I would never wear a trash rainbow cape. Why would I wear a rainbow on my back in the middle of a war lol that shit would get me killed immediately.
@@bacidbrain9884 exactly bright lights bring stray shots
I swear rainbow capes would give me a REAL bad case of "accidental misfires"
Same reason why they wouldn't add country flags. There's no country's on Super Earth, only Managed Democracy.
A LGBT cape on a game with friendly fire... What could go wrong ? 😂
DEI isn't just present in the games industry. I work in a UK call centre, where all recruitment and promotion is done to meet DEI standards. The result is industry veterans working under people with 0 experience. This always end up with the lower, but more qualified agent, showing their boss how to do the Job. Boss builds resentment to the agent, and voila. A toxic workplace environment.
You can look up "DEI" plus any company or govt agency amd chances are they'll have a webpage section talking about DEI. Nearly every fortune 500 company in the US does.
Its far from a buzzword its openly adopted by the establishment power structure.
it is discrimination under UK law to decide promotions like that.
We have other workplace laws that also contribute to that being a major issue.
Where I work tried the same thing until this was pointed out and backtracked so fast it was surreal.
It's an utterly stupid way to decide a promotion, merit and capability are all that matter in the work place, at least if you want to have a successful business that actually makes sense.
@@sinAnon6689I worked where you work. But most of the time People will be to afraid to say something.
@@mrturbo84thats the purpose of a solicitor sending letters
@@sinAnon6689 That only works for small companie, try to do that with a major corporation and you'll find yourself unemployed and unemployable and good luck winning a lawsuit, since you won't be able to afford the millions of dollars in legal fees for years before the case is resolved.
The biggest problem with DEI advocates is that they are not consumers. It's never with them 'I would buy your game if it adhered to DEI standards', but instead it is always 'if your game doesn't adhere to DEI standards we try to destroy your company'. There is no pleasing these people, so don't even bother. They are nothing but a vocal, small minority that pretend to be everybody's target audience.
This comment deserve's a place in internet's hall of fame. What a perfect way with words to describe this mess.
"if your game doesn't adhere to DEI standards we try to destroy your company"
Kind of what this channel has done for a while now....
They are consumers
The controversy is the "woke" staff at Arrowhead that have purposely attacked the community and caused drama in the past.
Arrowhead also have a history of saying one thing then doing another.
Pilestedt originally told players that "they were playing the game wrong" and actively didn't believe/understand why players were furious with the insanely poorly thought out decisions they were implementing in-game.
This literally boils down to a "saying one thing, doing another" issue, people are tired of lip service.
So while his statement is indeed a positive one, only actions tell.
When player model skin tone became a thing on sleeveless armor...why was the only color brown? Why did players have to ask for more than just brown...
Just to point out, other major developers are putting out statements similar to this too...almost like a memo's gone round saying "say something your players will like, then profit?"...
What I hate the most about DEI is that it doesn't threat everyone equally when it's supposed to
this is a hilariously fitting typo (SBI and what not). good laugh
It's the exact opposite of equality. It's a big hypocrisy
They whitewash the DEI threat at meter.
Equity is literally inequality so it will never treat people equally.
@@SpiceCh No, equity is quite literally stands for equal outcomes. DEI without equity is just another take on Affirmative Action, but affecting the whole of whatever it's infecting instead of specifically targeting hiring practices.
These insane people need to be removed from management positions of ANY kind across ALL industries not just gaming
100%
Good luck, these people got their way to the top by being the most vocal victims. Taking them out of their roles will be worse than pulling teeth
It's gonna take years, the likes of ubisoft hired lots of focus groups and hr/management/hiring positions are riddled with them and they will cover for each other.
True.
Woah that's gonna be seen as very antisemitic cuz thats actually what the nazis did
Yeah, Bud Light was the tipping point, when people began to realize that they have the power to hold these mega-corps over the barrel for inserting senseless political trash into their business model.
As someone else said, if this guy made a burner account and posted the exact same things on the game's forums he'd likely be banned by the moderators. There's a huge clash between what this guy is saying and what the company actually does.
The guy who said that is ENDYMIONtv
What DEI initiatives exist in HD2?? What are you talking about? I am not aware but open to education
Ah you're right- I guess the discord. Advice - don't join discord servers. They're full of the worst of humanity
@@sleepyboi8060 I think he means that, if he'd asked this question on a throwaway, he'd just be banned with no proper response, regardless of AH's stance.
@@sleepyboi8060There was a while where they were trying to shoehorn LGBT shit, mostly.
That’s when I hopped out of the game. That and DEFINITELY the other devs and mods messages.
Yep. I posted something like that and comment got deleted.
The reason this is a touchy subject especially for helldivers 2 is because their discord server is moderated by literal activists who have banned thousands of players for mentioning anything negative about DEI while promoting and protecting inappropriate things like furry p***.
DEI should be banned thank God
Gross.
It's a shame that these room temp IQ moderators allowed furry Pron on a discord for a GAME that is PUBLIC. That's just the dumbest thing you could do in a Public server as a Moderation team. There is places for furry stuff and that place is not in the official helldivers server that's public. No sympathy from me and no Excuses can be mad.
@@JosephPeritothere was never furry porn. It was a furry character drawn in a full set of helldiver armor. It’s literally the same as if you put bugs bunny in helldiver armor. Threatening people with bans tho for putting emojis you didn’t like on the picture is really immature tho.
That is why I don’t join the discords 😁
7:15 Yes, and no. It's that those statements are unpopular, yes, but it's also that they are extremely heavy-handed, because they are put in by people who lack the brain capacity, emotional maturity, and life experience to do it properly. If you don't believe me, (re)play Drag Age: the Failhard
Part of the issue is these people don't even understand what DEI is. I've had DEI supporters with their over developed emotions try to tell me DEI is workers' rights. They don't even know what's going on, but it makes them feel good, so they support it.
Games that use the term DEI seem to make the characters in it hella unnormal. I believe the old Dragon Age games had better *Dei* even though it really wasnt a thing. You had a special kid that was great with enchantments, you had some characters that weren't straight. It wasn't under the term Dei and those people were normal. Not weird. Hell Dragon Age was probably one of the best examples of different races and how people react because of that within the game. It was normal not fucking weird like Crap guard made it.
DEI is specifically a neomarxist agenda it is not related to traditional character diversity which has existed in games pretty much forever. Like every RPG has a diverse cast of characters just for variety's sake and the player has a lot of options for party composition. It wasn't political before though.
@@barahng back then we've had diversity, now we have artificial division.
@@barahng"neomarxist" is a nonsense "catch-all" for what you really mean to say; culture and politics that you don't like. Neo-Marxism isn't a real thing, it exists only in your imagination.
*As long BlackRock, DEI which is call BRIDGE and stupid Canada making consulting groups This issue is not over we must continue to fight just recently Google is censoring AzurLuna with outfits keep your guard up this isn’t over*
Also, the "Body type 1, 2" thing in Helldivers 2 is implemented that way because the default setting for your voice lines is to random, the whole point is that every time you die and get reinforced, canonically, your character is proper dead, and now you're controlling the next hapless mook to get sent down to the surface.
the body type 1, 2 thing is because several times in a mission, you will be switching between male and female voices as you die and respawn, so they just used it as "chunky or less chunky nondescript person in suit" option.
You actually can set your voice to be male or female forever,but by default it is random yes
I love the random voice option. It really makes you feel like you are a new soldier each time you drop pod in.
I was going to comment the opposite actually, the whole point of having body types instead of male/female is to appease "the modern audience" what you said makes absolutely no sense as dying doesnt change the reality of male/female gender in the human race.
That's the way I've always thought of it. I think the random voice setting is actually really cool in this game.
yeah but naming the body types 'male' and 'female' wouldn't change that at all. so the usage of 'body type' is clearly more than just that, it's supposed to appeal to the "gender doesn't exist" types.
Actual game developers have never wanted this. Its the corporate HR departments forcing it.
What do they gain from this? Who is this for?
@@ChinnuWoW Marketing. Somewhen, somewhere, some 'genius' pitched the idea that they could increase sales by appealing to popular trends. When they started mismanaging games (basically inevitable for large companies to eventually drift off into this) and failed meeting sales goals, they relied on 'this surefire trick the other companies don't want you to know'. And when that failed, instead of admitting that they were wrong, they doubled down on simply not having pressed the magic solve-all button hard enough.
It's fundamentally incompetent management, enabled by a general economic culture where managers are never really held accountable for fucking up a product, but at worst sent off with a golden parachute to enlist at the next company with a glowing review of their previous one. Because, in the end, the people supposed to hold them responsible are also management, and don't want to break the unspoken agreement to ensure each other's wealth unconditionally.
Who are they referring to by saying "Modern Audience" anyway? It's like games nowadays only exist for "those types" of peole.
Basically it's like a unicorn,It may as well be inexistent.
The audience theyre trying to create by brainwashing children
Their imaginary univorn friend, because people like this clearly have no idea how regular human consumers work
Modern audience=far left activist who won't purchase product
They mean money laundering via goverment grants or ngo
5:10 love this. Just someone doesn’t include you in game, it doesn’t mean they have something against you. It was never about you.
"Gamers won" is not really the full story, since this is significantly larger than the videogame industry. What has actually happened is that investment firms have started to roll back their ESG push. This was reported on in August with respect to Blackrock, who only approved 4% of shareholder ESG proposals between June 2023 - June 2024, down from 47% in 2021.
It's just important to note that this shift is not just with respect to videogames, but is occurring or will be evident across many different industries in the next couple years.
12:24 the problem is identity. Your story sticks a black guy in feudal Japan, you gotta explain how he got there. But they can't. The explanation ends up cringe or low effort or brings up uncomfortable truths when the objective is escapism. So instead of fixing that, they try to push it on the gamers.
But it’s been explained, because that black man being in feudal Japan is real
@@imkraezy and it’s also explained that same man that exists irl was never a samurai, but the clown for the boss there
@ but I just don’t get why you don’t like that he’s black😭😭
@@imkraezy why do you try to antagonize people whenever they go against your argument? This is my last comment, do actual research instead of blindly following this. By the way, Japanese people have spoken all over the internet about this matter so you might as well go and tell them they’re all racist
@@imkraezyWhere did this guy ever say he didn’t like the character being black? That wasn’t ever said. He stated that historically he was not a samurai
I’m Irish and Mexican with a half German mother and half black brother, we both grew up in one of the biggest border cities in our country - I HAVE HAD ENOUGH D.E.I. TO LAST MY ENTIRE LIFE. I DO NOT NEED TO SEE IT IN THE VIDEO GAMES I PLAY TO ESCAPE THIS SHIT-ASS REALITY.
Ok rainbow man calm down
you are Irish, Mexican and German? so you are like:
"this has to be done 100% perfectly,... tomorrow."?
@@Osterochse but not before I chase this hangover
What a mess
I can't get all the ingredients in the bowl
I got banned on their discord for simply complaining about not being able to play the game during their server capacity issues at launch.
Pretty childish behaviour coming from these people.
I stopped playing the game because of the toxic discord mods, they hate free speech
Everyone who read "Brave new world" knows that changing of the commonly used language is key to make people compliant to the cause.
So, this _forced_ change of language is highly alarming and should be seen and treated as such.
You are aware though, that all of those things already exist?
Brave New World was a Mirror to our current world.
There are barely differences ... just different setting.
Same humanity.
@@keennickolas8575 no.
As an spanish speaker, a lot of our "modern audience spanish speakers" say that english Is More modern cuz It evolved to modern audience and ITS a lenguage More receptive to changes..... AND like you said before, i thinks ITS true and thats the reason Twitter and these social media pages are so f up, but they used that flexibility againts people, they are reprogramming people
Like him or hate him, but fighting "compelled speech" is exactly what Jordan Peterson originally became famous for. They tried to tear him down in Canada for years, but now he's having interviews with the man most likely to be next PM. Although, I wouldn't be surprised if the current government, MSM, and their useful idiots somehow managed to sabotage that. Trudeau has abused his powers before, after all.
I'm increasingly of the opinion that all the DEI stuff, as well as many of the other tangentially related ideologies, that demands people agree with them will be looked back on as one massive case of "The Emperor's New Clothes". The 'con-men' got the ear of various CEOs and influential people, the 'emperors' dressed their companies and institutions in the 'fancy threads' of DEI, they have gone on their 'procession through the streets' to show off through their incessant marketing campaigns. The 'townsfolk' uneasily went along with it worrying about accidentally offending someone and the 'childs outburst' about the ridiculousness of it all is now reverberating through the crowd.
The only differences from the folktale seems to be that most of the 'emperors' are starting to try to distance and hide themselves away from it all, and the 'con-men' behind it don't get to hide in the shadows.
🎯
Beautifully put.
What do you mean it’s still not allowed to be talked about why they are making this propaganda and why it’s more important to them than profits. We can’t even discuss the actual ideology and people that caused this
They all tried to build a legacy around it - not understanding that a literal Great Work requires communion with the Holy Spirit. They do no know how to create beauty - only transform and misshape ugly things - and they tried to possess everyone to uphold and maintain their image and “message” but the whole thing became an inauthentic and inorganic binary machine response. When they speak we hear the legion , they may be many, but they know nothing.
@@letsbegeeks9456The farther away from the truth they go, the less capable they are of creating compelling stories and characters. These folks have lost the ability to distinguish between basic good and evil, their minds being darkened. If you don’t know the difference between good and evil, your heroes are just villains.
9:01 racism is taught , not inherent to the human condition. If a child isn't taught about racism, they dislike people based on how they treat them not the color of their skin.
Racism today is basically pattern recognition
racism is gay
@@ILoveAmerica1123 "Recognize my unique qualities and culture that make me special. Also, if you recognize any of this, I'm going to report it to HR."
Yes and no. People have degrees of in-group, out-group preferences in their mind. But a lot of that is learned. If it wasn’t skin color, people would be delineating on other things. That tribalism seems to be in our DNA to some extent.
It essentially is self taught by experience … if certain people are constantly committing the same act a stereotype is borne and then reinforced over and over and then it gets worse when that certain group glorifies the stereotype themselves as if it’s a good thing
Knowing it’s what makes people not like them
Of course DEI would have helped! It would have decreased the server load and therefore reduced operational costs, because nobody would be playing it
^ Hire this steady server supporter now !
Lmaooo
All labels are neutral. It's what the label points to that gives it negative or positive connotations over time. The terms "sjw" or "woke" were coined by people to label THEMSELVES. The negative connotations came to them over time due to those people's actions. If you don't want the label you are associated with to be negative, stop behaving in a way that contributes to the negative connotations of that label. This is something the woke will never understand or acknowledge. Instead of changing behavior, they will seek to rebrand into new labels to escape the connotations. It will never happen because it's their behavior that makes the label negative, not the label itself.
Bingo. You get it. Activism as a whole isn’t inherently a bad thing. IMHO, it serves as a way for society’s issues to be brought to the fore.
The issue comes when activism and “the message” begins to eclipse the products intended purpose.
very well put
The inverse is also true. Terms like "Chad", "weeaboo" etc were originally used in a more negative way, but they started getting used ironically and now their connotations are more neutral or even positive
Perfectly explains what happened to 343 Studios. They chose a name, did everything wrong with it and people said 343 as an insult until they CHANGED IT. Now their called Halo Studios, but I have a feeling the same thing is gonna happen soon...
Not only that, but they start with one label and run with it until everyone is sick of it, then claim that it "doesn't really exist" before fading over into another label and repeating the whole gaslighting process. This has happened 3 or 4 times over my lifetime and it's fucking exhausting. We went from "Political correctness" to "Oh political correctness is just a rightwing bogeyman and no one on the left actually cares about it" to "Social justice" > "Oh actually social justice is just something conservatives made up so they'd have something to be perpetually angry at, we were never into social justice" > "Woke" > "Oh actually woke doesn't exist it's just something made up by grifters and podcasters and toxic males and incels and nazis" DEI...
I consider myself to be left wing, but I 100% agree with pilestedt here, if a political message doesn't add to a game/creation, then it really shouldn't be there, no matter what it's trying to say. I'm not saying you shouldn't be able to add a message to a game, but if you do, you should at least take the effort to wove it in organically.
All art is inescapably political, but you don't have to critically analyze everything you consume, and you don't have to put an overt political message into your game to check a box. It's okay to simply make/play a game where you just shoot bugs - not that deep.
agreed. starship troopers is very political, but that is in the core of the film, its all about that particular political view. its not just bolted on to make a statement completely unrelated to the film, it IS the film. theres many political statements starship troopers doesnt make because they are nothing to do with the film.
everything should be in service to the art, if the politics are part of the art they are essential to it, if they are just tacked on to make an unrelated real world statement then they pull the audience out of the art.
@@necaacen couldn't habe said it better myself, bravo
@@necaacenHell yeah, brother! 100% agree, I've been working on a novel for 4 years and it pulls heavily from our worlds military conflicts but essentially takes place 500 years after a modern nuclear apocalypse that sets the few remaining survivors, back into the stone age. I can agree and see how organic story telling revolving politics is as you said "essential" unless it has nothing to do with the story itself.
I think that the reason that the Bud Light thing was such a spectacular fail was because the marketing genius in charge of the campaign was interviewed. She said that the reason for the campaign was that they wanted to reach a DIFFERENT consumer and spoke of their current customers with contempt.
Jaguar has since said "hold my Bud Light" and stuck their own thumb straight up the ass of their current loyal customer base. They may be surprised to discover that their new young target customer can hardly afford rent. Those that CAN afford such a car reside largely in the Middle East, Eastern bloc nations and the far east. None of which are fans of the image that the campaign portrays.
Capitalism in high corporate in a nutshell. How do we increase our customer base? How about we try marketing our product to people entirely disinterested to it, even though anyone with a double digit IQ, should be able to realize that these people will never buy it.
DEI is just an antempt to increase a already satuarated market. People who shouted these values will just as fast get replaced as the ones before them, when the business suffers.
Its the desperate last try of investors who over invested 2020 with the very temporary boom in gaming.
From my understanding, Jaguar's sales have been going down for years, so their "loyal customers" weren't buying. With that situation in mind, I understand that they felt they needed to make some big changes. But hoo boy did they make some bad choices in that. What they SHOULD have done is come out with some exciting new EVs that their customer base, and customer adjacent (those who knew and respected the brand but maybe haven't yet bought) would be interested and excited to buy. They did not do this.
@@ColinFox This comment section would say I'm woke as fuck but even I think there must have been a gas leak in the Jaguar office when they approved that rebrand or something. It's like if Harley-Davidson started marketing to pregnant women... An infant could have told them that was a terrible idea. God, capitalism really has failed in every way imaginable...
@@ColinFox How nice of them to dampen the sadness about the loss of a historic car manufacturer by turning it into a clownshow short before the end.
"saying something is DEI is a dog whistle"
That sounds like treason ... Sending in an eagle
*Readies Senator with Democratic intent.*
…You know what, we gotta team up with the robots for this one. Hey, clankers! This guy’s got an EMP!
*angry automaton noises*
Nah, an Eagle is too weak and short for this group. Tesla coil for the win!
↑→↓↓↓
4:55 Blue Checkmark's takin' bout "Standing on business" my brother in Christ you cant even STAND!
It's not like the game has opposing viewpoints either. While there's no pride capes, there's also no white power caps or modem political capes. The only political stance you can have is full allegiance to Super Earth, a fictional, intergalactic superpower that unifies humanity and transcends any DEI barriers.
That sounds like exactly what these people want, no? At the surface level, yes, but they really just want to exist in a bubble with no opposition whatsoever. If you want your viewpoints easily accessible in a game, you must be prepared to allow opposing ones as well. Otherwise, you're supporting censorship, which historically is not the first time. Keeping it neutral is the only way it should be.
The thing is, they don't wanna a game to not have any message. They want a game that have *their* message
Who the hell is funding games journalism at this point?
going by their hiring/firing practices, no one anymore.
Blackrock maybe. It makes no sense. No one believes their reviews anymore.
*rubs hands together*
DEI arm chair division?
It's probably not so expensive to fund a few websites and a hand full of idiots. The modern audience might just be ever so slightly big enough to pay for the crap.
0:38 legit week 1 of game design 101
In simple terms, the party of inclusion is the least inclusive😂
You see similar stuff with ppl crying racism constantly
Those would be the same group of people.
DEI only panders to a very small and excluded minority, wouldn't it be more profitable and productive to pander to the majority? Isn't that a big issue now that AAA studios are shutting down because of it? It's not rocket science.
Game studios are run by activists. They only care about spreading their message and not about profit or anything like that.
When they started to a this stuff in games years back. I used to think that the idea was, "our normal audience wont care much, and this might draw some minorities tonour product". But these day's, this isn't about marketing. This is just ideology. Its insane.
There is 2 reasons why Studios are shutting down.
1. Forced DEI practices, where they first make a game just trying to hit as much checkmarks as they can to appeal to DEI without even thinking about how it affects the game. This means they usually spend more time thinking "how can we make this game inclusive" than with "how do we make this a good/fun game".
2. During COVID games sales skyrocketed, and most studios are stupid and overcorrected expecting that marked would suddenly grow and stay that way even after COVID so they overhired and grew too big.
When evidently the sales did not stay the same all those studios that overhired were spending way more on sustaining all their employees, so making agames got way pricier and since sales went down after COVID they could not sustain themselves and started bleeding money.
This is the reason we have been seeing huge layoffs in the gaming industry for the last 2 years, because the industry is correcting the false growth they had during COVID.
@47slogra
So just how real is the DEI answer ESG checkmarks in gaming, necessary?
Or is it one of those things like most things that was and is still said alot that we take it for granted or as a fact?
But yeah I get the covid part , everyone locked up or at home.
The majority can be bad.
Asmond talks about it in the video, lol.
Putting LGBT messages in a game in Saudi Arabia would be awesome.
I think if you're in a group with ANY parallels to Saudi Arabia, you need to get out.
We are all pink mist in the explosion
"Modern audience" = Larry Fink. And he's not going anywhere.
Very anti-semitic of you
Oh give me a break, it's not that simple
someone gotta "deny, defend, depose" the mf with this one 🤭
@@ladistar It is that simple. Always follow the money.
THE GOYIM KNOW, SHUT IT DOWN
The pendulum swing is occurring. Censorship and deplatforming is dying. People have had ENOUGH.
I had ENOUGH for sure.
And you're gonna watch how the pendulum is manually pushed back again. They're not gonna let up on this. They're just running damage control. People really need to dig their heels in and stay vigilant about this stuff going forward.
Why do they keep calling it "progressive"? Forcing ugly and unlikeable characters isn't progress at all, just cringe.
Didnt the same devs allow some super toxic/woke community manager free reign to be a POS to the customers?
Probably a shock, they're still there
it was while ago so forgive some inaccuracy but I believe it was a community manager or mod not officially associated with arrowhead that later apologized or was demoted
whatever the problem was it's not anymore is the important thing really
Still do. But it might be Sony who control the communist mangers.
Not Arrowhead. But Arrowhead should have pushed back. That they did not, is why they lost half the players.
A discord mod was mad at people emoting vomit and clowns on his furry porn. He went ban crazy and was eventually kicked off moderation.
@@ChaoticMartian tf did i just read lmao
I’ll never understand why a game dev would ever ever ever cater to the minority rather than the majority of folks who actually buy and play their games.
For fear of backlash. It's always been known that if you do anything considering gender, race, sexual preferences and whatever else, it generally never ends well for that person if it's seen as bad. Doesn't matter if that audience that's being targeted is a minority since anyone who supports them would also typically raise up their pitchforks with them which increases the numbers by a lot.
That's why they thought it would be the same for this situation this time around, even if the stuff that's been happening wasn't the same type of situation, and more of a "it's my way or no way" from the entitled minority which is just a small group of the main group to which even they hate them because they make them look bad. 🤣
@@AnriDarkmoorbacklash will inevitably happen, you just have to learn how to take it on the nose and keep moving forward.
In addition to what others have said, alot of the DEI pushes have happened because of investment from companies like Blackrock who basically mandate it to be eligible for funding.
They either do it for ESG funding, or they're true believers of "the work."
Probably we were rich.
They were creating the useless departments & hiring thousands of people.
And for their ESG (Social/Environmental/Governmental) initiatives, they were/are getting investments & grants & loans & subsidies & tax credits & low tariffs...
So it was probably very hard to estimate the actual losses & the reason for it.
(That's why Socialism doesn't work).
Twitter fired like 80% of the work force (6,000 employees), & nothing has changed.
And the workforce/human resources are the largest expense for any company.
Just the salaries:
6,000 * $100,000 = $600,000,000 + all the benefits (they probably saved close to a billion dollars a year).
And Now the Trump administration is planning to take the subsidies away.
About time people start to fight back in the industry. People should just keep not buying shitty, propaganda riddled games and these companies will fade into obscurity on their own. Don't give up.
I got a great idea for a game, it’s called “DEI or Die!” And in this game you are an uncover cop who is dressed as a trans person to uncover a major Liberal Conspiracy, ultimately finding out it was all a ploy to sell more woman’s clothing because guys are pickier buyers for apparel. Fill the games dialog with fucked up things that you can say that have to be argued to generate controversy in certain situations, and as you go further down the rabbit hole, you find out about political figures who are happily funding the chaos and taking dividends from the fashion industry. This game could offend everyone equally and they would have no room to bitch about it. Real gamers would love how fucked up it is in mockery yo the whole situation, it could easily be game of the year.
nice idea, made me chuckle.
Starring Shaquille O'Neal
This would make a great indie game. 😂
Maybe we could buy out Ubisoft stock and have them make game to add to insult.
Keep work shopping a script and get it to an indie dev.
4:13 Massive difference between having a fictional political party and it's fictional values depicted in entertainment and entertainment trying to make a political statement about our current world, trying to convert people into an ideology or overall lecture about real political ideologies.
Edit: 7:28 ...aaand of course Kotaku journalist doesn't seem to understand the difference either.... * facepalm *
HellDivers 2 is presenting a fictional world and not once telling you how you should actually think in ours.
i don't see anything wrong with making political statements in game. it's the same with movies and music, art it's a form of expression. most of the best movies are a reflection of something that is happening in society. and a lot of games talk about real problems using fictional plots
@@95onimushaAll the political messages are the same. Its the same message that "artists" learned in liberal arts classes. They don't have an original thought in their heads. These ideas are not their own.
I think the turning point was the minute everyone found out about Sweet Baby Inc in videogames specifically. We knew things were changing and that the companies were not listening to their main core audience, and we were gaslighted into believing we were the problem. When in reality it was all an agenda being forced upton gamers that we never asked for. Thats when we all collectivly said you know what any company and studio that has sweet baby inc in it we will not play those games and so we did. And as a result studios began to shut down until companies started giving gamers what we always asked for and wanted.
So when are they going to moderate their discord moderators?
They won't. The CCO is fake and tries to play both sides of the conflict. He tries to appear as understanding of what gamers want while at the same time bending his knee to the woke mob. He unironically has less respect from me than actual wokies because at least actual woke people are honest and true to their beliefs. At least i can respect them for doing what they believe is right. The CCO of Helldivers isn't even able to pick a side and stick to it.
Discord is so full of weirdos lol😅
Got banned for being a bigot about pronouns in there lmao.
reminder that spitz, the guy who owned the helldivers 1 fan discord everyone had been using for 9 years, got promoted to moderator in the official helldivers 2 discord and then deleted the 9 year old community.
i like discord but im gonna be so happy when this shit dies and we go back to forums.
@@Biesliek1mfw I break the “don’t be an ass” rule and get kicked for being an ass
Veilguard was the final nail in the coffin
I only just started on helldivers. I got it when it blew up last spring, but couldnt play it because Ive been busy with work and college. Genuinely, I have been grinding the crap out if it for weeks now, and yet, it doesnt feel like a grind because I am having such a blast the entire time. It's been like 60 hours in game and I dont feel like stopping or playing anything else... Which is weird because I normally lament what boring grindfest I feel like playing at a given time.
... It has not been lost on me during those 60 hours that the reason Helldivers 2, for the clunky mess that it sometimes is, is so amazing to me, precisely BECAUSE it doesnt have DEI BS written all over it. The satire can be so biting and easy to debate about in game with friends BECAUSE they didnt give one iota about the IRL politics of the satire. Things that would normally be considered toxic in other games, like team damage and teamkilling, in your typical slow as p@ss grind fest with no compelling story, PVP, a feature that often gets removed from games because of the toxicity... Actually becomes a source of hilarity in this game, you almost done care if a friend f@cks up a dive because they often do it in the funniest of ways. The PVE environment encourages military style commraderie (something I miss from the actual military), while catering to make you feel like a bad@$$ when you extract with 2 seconds to spare after an hour of gripping vietnam PTSD simulator.
This game is as good as it is, precisely BECAUSE it doesnt give a f@ck one way or another about your politics, and puts the player experience and enjoyment first, rather than the backstory of some bullsh@t token NPC nobody cares about.
Basically Helldivers has reminded me what gaming used to be, like some long forgotten core memory... And... It saddens me that it is now a rare outlier in a sea of trash, AAA games and DEI morons should be ashamed for ruining an entire artform.
I'm wondering is this changing of our language part of the WEF plan to have 'a new living language across the world' as per the Georgia Guidestones? George Orwell warned about the effect that changing the language would have and we appear to be well on the road to that dystopia.
The Georgia guide stones got blown up.
Language always changes, has for thousands of years
2019-2024 has been THE most Orweillien shit I've EVER experienced, we the ppl need to SPEAK UP and PROTEST!!!
Yes... because evil totaly stops when asked nicely...
@Jake-777-7 when did I say be nice? If nothing else, shut up and get out of my way when I DO.
@@Jake-777-7Real activism must have the words said backed up by actions. Or to make it into a metaphor.
“One hand open, one hand on your sword.”
It may be a not great time for video game media but at least understand that we are living in the best time in human history right now, even if it doesn’t feel like it. Just the fact that you are literate, are not enslaved, will likely live over 50 and have running water is proof of it. Despite media coverage of crimes the overall crime rate is down a lot. Don’t act like we are living through something like the Great Depression. I understand times are tough, but we are no where near Orwellian. You want to see Orwellian, look over at North Korea.
@@dabbingraccoons6416 no. Just no.
It's simple: If a game doesn't let me make my own character it has to let me play a character who I want to be, or a character who I want to help. So if you make a female character whose whole personality is being insufferably smug I don't want to be her, and I don't want to help her, so I don't want to play the game.
23:00 I disagree - First sign of a spring was Hogwarts game. They tried so hard to cancel the game and it became the biggest thing of the year. Then the right side noticed that they in fact have the power in numbers, not the most vocal ones online on the left
What made it even more stupid was the fact that this game ticked all DEI checkboxes and beyond.
We can just speak with our wallets.
The people paying for gamepass refusing to quit it can't speak with they wallets, Xbox execs got those people wrapped around they fingers, to them one game doesn't matter regardless of how many poor games drop as failures
@@weplayvrgames If people refuse to stop paying for it, they _are_ speaking with their wallets.
Besides very few exceptions, that require some aspect of DEI for the story, DEI really doesn't matter. DEI doesn't make a game good. DEI also doesn't make a game bad. Everyone complaining pro or anti DEI in games should touch some grass.
I hadn't been aware of the DEI movement for quite some time, but as I've observed different talks and heard out their opinions I've been able to critically think over the situation and believe I have come to a conclusion; people don't like seeing things in the world that break their perception of that world. it's an issue on both sides.
It’s odd. For how much people
Claim they want dei etc. they don’t then support those products that have it
the funny thing about this is in the literal opening cinematic it shows a mix raced couple. Also the player character is in armor so you never see them and the other npc's on your ship are different races too.
Which leads into the idea that these people don’t actually play the game. If they do, it’s the bare minimum of playtime and all of its spent looking for a problem that isn’t there. On the flip side of things, it could also be applied to the people who refuse to touch the game because the body type A and B mechanic. It’s a lot of grown ass adults trying to find company in their misery.
You have to understand that they do not care about any of those things, they would be angry if it wasn't there, but it being there isn't going to stop them from pushing for more, its the same ideology of intersectional feminism, women have been able to vote and work, have rights that men don't have (like voting without being subject to a draft) but you will still continually see them asking for more while also trying to shut down anything that disagrees with them, like male only DV shelters etc, those get attacked, harassed and destroyed. It's the same concept here.
The Naughty Dog trailer was exactly what I expected. The exact type of character I had no doubt they would create. However, the 'girl boss' archetype is thoroughly exhausted at this point. I think that's another reason people collectively rolled their eyes at it. I'm tired of it too and I'm not a white man, you don't have to be to object to a lazy concept used over and over by too many game companies.
It’s simple, if you make a great game that doesn’t push your own political agenda and respects the player base gamers will be more than happy to support it, shouldn’t be that hard to understand
Theres definitely a space for political messaging in games. Some of the best games have serious, overt political messages.
The problem is when theyre integrated in ham-fisted, on-the-nose ways like we've been seeing recently. Its also because some political points, like those in Veilguard, are poorly fleshed out and presented with no room for discussion/thought, making it a preaching lesson rather than having the player come to the realisation on their own terms through the story development.
(Basically, as you said, *respect* the fanbase and the in-world lore)
Big facts 100%
@@FungeHucker yeah I do think there’s a difference between having subtle messaging/themes and overtly pushing agendas in entertainment, the problem is that it feels forced now bc the new people making these games/movies don’t have the talent to write nuanced pieces of art like the people who worked at these studios a decade ago
@@vloggie300 100%. The kind of stuff we are seeing now reminds of the kind of short-sighted, underdeveloped writing from a high school English class. In-your-face messaging riddled with clichés and leaves you feeling judged instead of curious - I don't even mind if it's a political message I disagree with if it gives me space to reflect on my own views.
@@vloggie300 100% . The old story writers were pros and something to aspire to vs. these clowns.
Sure Asmon, there’s probably an extremely minuscule percentage of people who are wascist but the vast majory just doesn’t want to lectured to, and want to enjoy a fun to play video game. I never had a problem with “not being represented” in video games and I played as women, orcs, etc.
Yea, as an Asian, I dont really care
Heck, most of the time I dont even notice some characters are Asian
Honestly, if the stakeholders think this is the way to portray social politics awareness towards the population, they are really off the mark. People like to play games because they enjoy the thrill of the experiences these games give towards the player. A player that doesn't need to be reminded over and over again over political aspects of the real world while enjoying fiction. Gamers these days are plenty aware already by their own experiences over how politics are going by sheer exposure of the internet, they don't need that shit to invade the one thing they find interesting and engaging in their down time. They instead seek the thrill of good gameplay and engaging story telling games to play and make memories of playing it to remember in nostalgia in the future.
Funny (not funny) thing is, he would be banned from the official helldivers discord if he said this there.
they need to clean house. Put your money where your mouth is.
I don’t even play the game, but I’ve heard about the discord servers “quirks.”
I quity playing the game becasue of the discord mods
lol he's not on either side here. This is a very political answer. With all of the other shit that the community manager has said, there's no indication that the company, as a whole, is going to deliver a "DEI free" product in the future or anything.
HD2 is DEI free tho
@@polskipolak9073 People unironically thinking Helldivers is DEI has to have mental problems of some kind
The game is DEI free but their community manager and discord mod are extremely political
We really need to bring back shaming people.
Idk why some of these developers defend DEI so much? Like my g you are loosing money, isn’t that they re objective? To make money? People just don’t t want a forced message invented by mentally ill people in they games
You can't argue or logic your way around political activists. To them the message being forced into public space is all that matters.
It was always about control, not money per se.
They are not loosing money, they are not making sales. But they get millions and millions from blackrock to do that shit, so thats why it keeps happening and thats why they defend it. They make money without selling anything...
@@y_s4021 it’s always about money until you reach the summit of power and then it’s always about control.
@@wejustsawmanfly Nailed it on the head. They are getting paid to do this, explains the budgets for these failures.
Helldivers 2 is 100% NOT for the "modern audience" We fight for super earth.
It's funny they think the player character is evil and the good side is the... bugs? Robot aliens? What even. These commies really should stop to think, "maybe we're the baddies".
Nah, We fight for Cyberstan!!
For super earth!!!!
@@Aizen_Sosuke999Its him Democracy Officer. I heard him shouting words I shall and will never pronounce. he’s a bot spy. My life for Super Earth!
I remember early in Helldiver people were trying to make the bots into victims, when those who play the game can clearly see bots death camps with dead humans in cages.
Honestly, doesn't matter... I put maybe 40 hours into helldivers 2 and I'm never buying another one of their games after they make. I'd probably not bother with a game their devs worked on. They tried to bait and switch in woke, and they got their money. That's all they get from me. Plenty of retro games and indie devs.
I still play HD2 every now and then. I’ll get a random text from a buddy saying, “Ready to spread managed democracy?” And we spread democracy throughout the galaxy.
If it ruins escapism, it shouldn't be included.
i like your take
This post. I don't want to be in the middle of a dungeon and hear about a characters personal choices... like wtf?
I get really tired of that whole 'politics are in everything' argument. I mean sure, Starship Troopers is absolutely a political commentary in some regards. But it's about the benefits and responsibilities of citizenship and what people are willing to sacrifice to gain it. Turns out, very little to do with gender theory garbage or racial payback. Just because something involves politics doesn't mean it makes sense to shoe horn in the particular political issues you're obsessed with.
The issue with the starship troopers movie is that the director read only a few pages of the book, thought it was “fascist garage” and made the movie his way.
Its happening because these devs see this crap isnt selling and they can now proudly proclaim not to have this garbage in their games without fear of cancellation, at least in a financial sense.
Thank God.
I'll believe it when they fully get rid of body type a/b 😂
Body type a/b sounds like blood type a/b; it's pretty sterile
I seriosuly dont understand why people care if its called a or b? Like why does it matter what it is called
Same, I don't trust any game with that
Boy if y’all don’t-
It’s really not a big deal. If the game is good I don’t care if there is dei. Just make a good piece of art
The worst thing is that people just hear 'inclusion, diversity, equity'. Those words all sound nice individually, but they only work when everyone is considered and that is not what's happening in every case. There is no equality in this world and it will never be 'fair', just live in reality.
We don't want fringe californian politics in our games it's really just that simple. It's not that politics in games bad, it's that the politics they're trying to push are simply terrible, destabilising nonsense.
This is a good, nuanced take. Poltics is a complicated subjec that is often handled poorly when someone doesn’t write or understand nuance well.
I don’t use nuance well, but I do understand that it exists. the people I’m around barely understand it. And that’s sad because I really want someone to debate and talk about Poltics with that contrasts my opinion. It could help develop and refine my understanding of society.
Instead I get a world where people have discarded understanding in favor of staying in their echo chambers, afraid of the outside world and its complexity so they figuratively return to the womb, where nothing can hurt them.
Fairly misleading messaging.
Pilestedt wasn't saying "Don't add DEI to games". He basically said "Don't add _anything_ to games, if it does not add to the experience (DEI or otherwise). Just make good games"
Most the time though forcing diversity into games often detracts from the game as more focus is put into hiring people to make your company look inoffensive and game inoffensive.
The turning point was Gamergate. Lots of people who were on the forefront of it will scoff and say that Gamergate accomplished nothing but ultimately it was the first time people noticed that DEI was being used as a smokescreen for terrible people to ruin products and companies and then published that information in a way that got wider public attention. That was the point at which the HSS Gaming started its long, slow, grinding about-face.
There's good reason that Journos still wake up with cold sweats from nightmares about Gamergate. It's when they lost.
It amazes me it took this long for it to sink in that gamers just don't give a shit and never have. Make good game that is all anyone cares about.
Journalists conjuring up stories into existence is like Warhammer 40K Ork logic - when they get into a big group and believe in something, it happens.
Haha never thought about it like that! Brilliant! I still love the Orks though!
now if only they typed it in red lol
@@TWLpontus that is no shade on Orks!
That's actually such an amazing analogy
23:00 i think the turning point was the southpark episode about the subject. Even know it's more for movies in general, the idea still radiates through all media at the time
Weird. Wasn't Helldivers II community manager being a furry freak? Banning people over his weird fetish on their discord? Or they finally got rid of him?
Alleged*, nothing has ever been proven definitively on the subject matter. Of course, it didn't stop media and grifters from running with it. Like most things, the context has been removed for attention, attacks and profit.
@@joshbull623 What do you even mean? Have you been on Helldivers 2 discord server during PSN drama? I did. Dude is a freak, and thats an understatement.
@@Evro_X gotta give it to Evro on this. their discord is a dystopian shit show.
my favorite part of the discord cringe was people posting that "i know a fascist when i see one" art that won a contest as a reply to the moderators
I couldn't disagree more with one thing... "DEI isn't nearly as bad as affirmative action"
DEI is far more destructive than affirmative action ever was
DEI is just the evolved form of Affirmative action
DEI is a specific implementation of affirmative action. They come from the same root, the civil rights movement.
Good point.
Yeah. Aydin Paladin does a lot of good work deconstruction just how bad DEI policies are, including things like literally teaching internalized racism to kids on an institutional level through CRT. DEI includes affirmative action, but it is so so so much worse than just that.
Now they need to remove DEI from the workplaces and put everyone that did this in jail.
It’s too late. They have infiltrated the workplaces and will only hire their own. I am outnumbered in my own team and you can definitely judge a book’s work ethic by its cover.
Did they do anything with their community managers?
I heard there is a a lot of issues
Their community managers are prob irl friends of them, they haven't but they have been "shut up" and don't post stupid shit anymore.
One of them did get the axe though if I remember correctly, the guy that was aggro at Sony or something back then.
@@unloyal4847ohhh no wonder i havent heard from them for a long time.
Last time was crazy and stupid.
@@unloyal4847 you do not mix friendship and business. if they are too stupid to understand such basic principles then they deserve all the hate for it.
@@katharinapeters6710They probably did get a notice thats why the thing stopped.
And I agree "friends" shouldnt do that to your business.
@@unloyal4847 so this is just corpo speech to calm things down,because friends are mirror of yourself .Like will you have a friend who always talk about furry porn and woke things, if you are not interested too?
The thing that I have found the funniest is the people (often Redditors) who get so upset about us not wanting to play their game. Then calling us typical insults about it as if WE are the ones that are being irrational! The hypocrisy 😂
No, he's still a sellout if the game has the 'body type' nonsense. That is something else that should not be tolerated.
It’s literally lean and bulky body types big guy I don’t see why you’re so pressed about this
There’s nothing even implying that it’s supposed to be man and woman even if they named it differently
Hopefully this year we start to see a lot less of the incessant pandering in games that we did last year
I think this year will still have a lot which were in development before the backlash really took off. I reckon mid 2026 is where we see a huge change . Like fable ans avowed is gonna be full of it
@@TECHNICALfalcon not just this year next 4-6 years that's development cycle
@@borismaric130 I’d say that’s more for rpgs but I agree we will still see a good chunk for the next years . I just think in a year and half is when we start seeing less .