Phil Fish, the creator of the indie hit FEZ, announced over the weekend that due to numerous hate messages that he has received over the internet the highly anticipated sequel has been cancelled.

The official statement from Polytron’s website:

FEZ II is cancelled. i am done. i take the money and i run. this is as much as i can stomach. this is isn’t the result of any one thing, but the end of a long, bloody campaign. you win.

In just this past month I have seen several stories where these anonymous losers chuck vitriol at people who put themselves out there. From the Boxer who ended up tracking down his twitter troll in person (of course the coward had started apologizing over twitter once he realized he was at his doorstep) to VILE rape threats sent to Ms Creasy who was targeted after she publicly backed feminist blogger Caroline Criado-Perez, who was inundated with Twitter abuse (including rape threats herself) after she successfully campaigned to have novelist Jane Austen’s face on a treasury note.

Really? REALLY??? THIS is where we are now.

Some might argue that in the Phil Fish case…If he can’t take the heat, he shouldn’t produce half the heat by himself. And I get that there is a difference between criticizing one’s work one submits to the public sphere, and criticizing one as a person for being a person. However, it has gotten to the point where some of the stuff that is being typed is not only disgusting, it is almost criminal (see above).

Maybe we should institute a new rule here.

Don’t say anything online that you wouldn’t say to someones face.

I get why Fish has so much vitriol thrown his way. And yes, I do understand that he has caused a lot of it himself. But Marcus Beers (AngryGamer), despite what may be a good career in journalism so far, deserves to be called out on this so that he can be held more accountable in the future. He basically attacked a couple of guys on a very personal level because they didn’t comment on a story that has to do with an industry they have participated in but the story didn’t necessarily have anything to do with them specifically. Especially in Fish’s case, where his next game was NOT going to be on XBox systems and it looked like he was never going to develop for Microsoft again. Fish very much overreacted, probably shouldn’t have said anything at all, or should have asked Beers to have a personal interview if Fish didn’t like what was being insinuated about himself. But then again, Beers could have easily just said that he was disappointed that two of the top indie developers had refused comment on something big happening to the industry with which they are a part. Maybe being respectful about it gets him a story that many other journalist were wanting to get. Or he could just move on, he’s not entitled to getting anyone else’s opinion if they don’t want to get it. Going into personal insults is bottom of the barrel stuff that should be reserved to yahoo article comments.

People do have the right to choose who they give their money to, and if somehow you get a negative opinion of someone and you really care about the character of who you makes your entertainment, then fine, don’t buy what he/she sells.

Let me try and break this thing down.

1.) Try and recognize that the video game media has become TMZ and is yanking things out of context, sensationalizing, and helping to demonize many normal people. Not politicians, not actors, just people trying to make games. You should think really hard before you assume that you know someone’s character based on soundbites, footage of them in stressed situations, and how they react to vitriolic trolls on the internet.

2.) Leave it at not buying their game and be happy with that. Maybe reasonably discuss their mistakes, and how they could do things better. When you go beyond simply not supporting them and start spewing hate and meanness every time their name comes up, you are just a bullying little bitch. It’s not necessary for everyone to talk about how much they hate someone and critique how they look and how they act so much.

3.) Think about what you are doing and apply it to the other mediums that you enjoy. You can no longer listen to a musician that did something you don’t like. You can’t watch movies by Directors who said a mean thing. You can’t read books by authors who did a bad thing. Don’t apply your stringent principles to only this medium. That just hurts the medium by acting like it is somehow supposed to be different than the other entertainment mediums. Also, have fun with that. If you start treating entertainment creators at a whole with the strict code-of-conduct you expect from game developers you will find you no longer have much to enjoy.

Personally, I think AngryGamer should apologize. Loudly.

Fish should also apologize.

Then they should hug it out and move on with their lives – hopefully having learned that the way you act will influence how others act towards you.

-Dagobot


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