pic.twitter.com/wVyvydZqrz

— Ken Klippenstein (@kenklippenstein) June 28, 2024

1. "Star Wars was about Antifa in SPACE!"

2.

3. "boring cishets" "easy with the slurs there, buddy"

4. D&D went woke?

5. "there is no gate, it's within your mind" "I completely agree" "I completely disagree"

6. "I tried to warn you, anime is next!" " "

7. "media literacy "

Trust them !chuds

• Games journ*lists often beat difficult games, but face criticism and abuse for their reviews.\

• The myth that games journ*lists hate video games is false; they are passionate about the medium.\

• To find trustworthy game critics, look for those with similar tastes and opinions to yourself.

I get it, games journ*lists are terrible at video games. Remember that one guy playing Cuphead? Let's ignore the fact that games journ*lists regularly beat entire games in a far shorter timespan than regular people who don't have deadlines to meet. Turn a blind eye to the fact that they don't have a single guide to help them beat a difficult boss or access an area with some abstruse entry method like drinking poison that kills you at any other time. Forget about the fact they beat them before the patches arrive to make the game easier.

They also hate video games, and chose to cover this beat because they want to destroy the entire industry. It doesn't matter that wages are low across the sector and crunch is rife, especially when reviewing hundred-hour games with bafflingly tight turnarounds. We hate video games, and can't wait to tear them down.

The myth that games journ*lists not only suck at video games, but also actively hate the medium, is one that I've never understood. However, the issue with game reviews is much easier to parse.

Gaming in 2024 is team-based. You're Team Xbox or Team PlayStation. Team Fortnite or Team CoD. Team Stellar Blade or Team Censorship. Team Developer or Team Journ*list. That's how many g*mers see it, at least.

There's a major problem with games marketing that fuels this feudal misery. Hype trailers for games years away from release whip fans into a fervour, and the excitement heightens to a level where any criticism of the game is seen as a personal sleight. Calling Stellar Blade's protagonist Eve boring meant that you're a part of the pro-censorship wokerati who can't stand a beautiful woman leading a game.

There's another issue here, to do with reading comprehension and media literacy, but I won't go into that today.

Team Elden Ring got mad last week, when a couple of reviews said that it was too difficult. Accusations flew across the Twittersphere, the critics behind said reviews were told in no uncertain terms to 'git gud', and suffered far worse abuse, as misogynistic as it was vitriolic. Cuphead has been brought up, again.

Fast forward a week, and players are levelling the very same accusations at the FromSoftware DLC. Countless mods have added easy modes to the game -- one called Journ*list Mode, despite the fact journos beat the game without needing it. Players feel bosses are unfair, they believe the systems are too abstruse, and yet they refuse to engage with some of the game's core mechanics due to believing they're a cheat's way out. I wonder if any of them have apologised to the reviewers who pointed out these very issues?

It's not just an Elden Ring problem. When Kallie Plagge reviewed Cyberpunk 2077 for GameSpot, she was hounded by thousands of players for pointing out the game's negatives. She didn't like the edgy aesthetics that played no meaningful part in the gameplay, so she was labelled a prude. She pointed out offensive depictions of minorities, so she was called an SJW. She called out the technical issues obvious even on PC, so she suffered a barrage of hatred.

Plagge was at the receiving end of a whirlwind of abuse from g*mers excited for CD Projekt Red's new title, eight years in the making. Their excitement, as well as the marketing campaign, blinded them from seeing fair criticism as exactly that -- fair. I don't know her, but I imagine Plagge was excited to play the game, too. Games journ*lists and critics like games! And yet, her 7/10 review sparked days of collective outrage.

However, when the game released, fans saw the truth for themselves. Just days after Plagge's review was published, a post appeared on the Cyberpunk subreddit titled, "Everyone talked shit about her, but I'm starting to agree with Kelly Plagge [sic]". On the whole, the review was more positive than the sentiment on the subreddit. The fan reaction was so intense that a new subreddit, /r/LowSodiumCyberpunk, was set up by the minority of fans wanting to escape the swathes turning on the game for the exact reasons Plagge pointed out.

What gives? At what point do you start trusting game critics and those who review your games? As much as you think we're different to you, that we have different agendas and want to tear down the things you love, we're not. We love video games. We wouldn't do this job otherwise. But we have to be honest about our opinions.

So find someone with similar opinions to you. While Eurog*mer's reviewer found the DLC so difficult it spoiled their experience, our reviewer relished FromSoftware's seemingly insurmountable challenge. I myself play and review a lot of RPGs and text-heavy games because I'm a book nerd at heart. If you, too, like those sorts of games and welcome valid criticism of the genre, keep tabs on my OpenCritic page.

This is how to navigate the media landscape. Find someone your tastes align with, or whose criticism you enjoy reading. Find your Roger Ebert. Don't just look at the biggest reviews on the biggest sites, because you lack important context about the person behind the webpage. You can expect their review to be balanced and fair, but it will also be entirely subjective -- reviews are opinions, after all -- so you need to dig a little deeper to understand whether this is a perspective that is similar to yours. If your favourite reviewer writes for an independent zine, go for it, that might be more valuable to you than an IGN or TheG*mer write-up.

But no games journ*list is out to get you. The vast majority try to be fair in their criticism and unbiased when it comes to inconsequential arguments like console preferences. Nobody's going to give Astro Bot a two because they love Xbox. Nobody is trying to destroy game developers' lives. We're honest, we're opinionated, we're human. Just like you.

Ironic that Democrats got rid of Jamaal Bowman right when they needed his skills the most #CNNDebate pic.twitter.com/sCgalruW2W

— Logan Dobson (@LoganDobson) June 28, 2024

Yalls obsession with sbi is really sad. https://t.co/0HZl6YSid3

— Smitty (COMMISSIONS PAUSED) (@Smittt34) June 29, 2024

Most Based Comments

Basedness: 🔥🔘🔘🔘🔘

I'm not saying this is real or isn't. Don't know, can't know from photographic evidence. It is difficult to see detail given the age of the photo. I find it interesting that the 'debunkers' are able to state with absolute certainty that they see dominoes or plastic army men. Im an r-slur but they're defending their knee jerk biases without evidence. (-25)

Basedness: 🔥🔘🔘🔘🔘

Ron James, has released a new photograph of a UFO sitting on dominoes, he has released it together with his friend Greenewald, the creator of TheBlackVault.Flying Saucer photograph needs to be sourced & tracked.The hunt is on if you find any information regarding this image post below A hoax? Misunderstood or miscommunicated images?His latest Documentary, "Accidental Truth - UFO Revelations" narrated by Matthew Modine, was released on April 18th, 2023. It has won 24 awards and has stayed in the top documentaries on Apple for 18 weeks. He is also the Media Relations Director for MUFON, the Mutual UFO Network. In this role, he facilitates contracts, licensing agreements and content cooperation with TV shows such as "Ancient Aliens", "The Unexplained", "The Proof is ot there and more." He frequently appears on TV and web programming. (-14)

Basedness: 🔥🔘🔘🔘🔘

Hold up let me search my miniatures collection real fast. (4264)

Whoa….just had a thought…..what if….what if the miniatures were based on the saucer photo?? As a way to discredit it when it came out to public???This goes way deeper than I thought. (-13)

Angriest Comments

Angriness: 😡😡😡😡😡

If I were the military trying to discredit the existence of captured flying saucers, I'd definitely create replica fake images with miniature figures to ridicule anyone who tries to leak real information/photos. These fakes would look almost identical to the real thing. That way, if an actual witness comes forward (even with a real photo), they'd be discredited by all the fake images already out there that look almost the same. This is likely what happened with those fake alien dolls sold at Kmart. By making a toy that looks 95% real, any leaked photos get instantly dismissed. They probably also release balloons and other objects shaped like actual crafts. Then, all it takes is a link to a store selling the balloon/model ufo/doll alien/miniature figure for a quick debunk/dismissal.Flooding the internet with fakes ensures that when something genuine does appear, the online skeptics immediately discredit it because of how many times they have been burned with fakes in the past. The pr... (4)

Angriness: 😡😡😡😡😡

God darn, this looks so fricking fake. This is just some sad shit, looks like some disinformation shit to discredit the community by putting silly butt shit out there (1)

Angriness: 😡😡😡😡😡

Ron James is apparently considered a UFO "expert". He apparently has a collection of bogus UFO images that he had been planning to use in his upcoming movie. Unfortunately for him he accidentally publicized one of the compelling images and was forced to backtrack after real investigators pointed out the attempt to peddle BS to the gullible. This level of incompetence or outright grift is not surprising but he actually complained about the somewhat harsh criticism that came out of this affair. He will probably complain about the stigmatization of ufology while being completely oblivious about his sterling contributions. (10)

Biggest Lolcow: /u/Turence

Score: 🐮🔘🔘🔘🔘

Number of comments: 3

Average angriness: 🔘🔘🔘🔘🔘

Maximum angriness: 😡😡🔘🔘🔘

Minimum angriness: 🔘🔘🔘🔘🔘

NEW: Subscribe to /h/miners to see untapped drama veins, ripe for mining!

autodrama: automating away the jobs of dramautists. Ping HeyMoon if there are any problems or you have a suggestion

BTFO lmao 🤣

This is my response when people say we should give up on Biden.

Really

0-30 means your coach is a fricking r-slur

https://twitter.com/disrupthehuman/status/1806475873912053967

https://twitter.com/ninejackrose/status/1806565725831676169

https://9gag.com/gag/ae9p40j#comment

Burger cope. Burgers are the wealthiest peeps on the planet and yet building ingenuity is anathema to them

Behold don't post this to amerifats with surprise, they might spontaneously combust or erupt in epileptic seizure

Eurocucks of 9strag cant handle bantz

pic.twitter.com/ZEG2SDiSA8

— Gentile News Network™ (@Gentilenewsnet) June 30, 2024

@MoonMetropolis

https://twitter.com/Buzkowski/status/1805982638378832066

https://twitter.com/romn_genral/status/1806344437498298502

https://twitter.com/kurdX_/status/1806727400694354348

https://twitter.com/kurdX_/status/1806727400694354348

https://twitter.com/hatem83272975/status/1806466136281669943

https://twitter.com/reema_y_/status/1806654084423848155

You will not become Europeans

No one wants you, neither Europe nor Asia

Even the Euro Championship wants to expel you

You are not white or blond, your race is brown no matter how much you try to mix in Greece 🤣😂

Then get out of Turkey you arab refugee

We don't need your country, you idiot

The smelly one, come and take the Turks from Saudi Arabia, they work here as shawarma workers and barbers.🇸🇦🐪💚💚🤍

I can show you multiple smelly arabs begging on the streets of Istanbul. Now show me a Turkish beggar in Saudi arabia or the UAE 😅 Get out of Turkey

Do you deny that Turks work in Saudi Arabia and the Emirates?🤣I can get down to your level and show you some clips of Turks in Saudi Arabia and the Emirates, but I don't want to become like you, making fun of beggars + The smell is just from you and everyone knows that about you

Only rich Turks go to places like Dubai. While your arabs go to Turkey to work in cheap labor or to beg on the streets like this here 🤢

https://twitter.com/Sadged3/status/1806701955206549621

https://twitter.com/Ryal_sa/status/1806560322196525332

https://twitter.com/SAUDI_SW0RD/status/1806624724295786898

He can still win!