Change is great, for the people who want it.
The harassment of the writers is $%^& behavior, but comparing the WoW controversy to Star Wars seems a bit outlandish.Star Wars dug up an old character to portray them in a completely out of character light with zero attempt to explain how or WHY they became a complete 180 of their previous self.Warcraft has a blatantly evil character that has been that way since Warcraft 3 being evil and has reasoning put forth, even if some of it IS relegated to a book (which I'm not too fond of when it's dialogue that should have played out right infront of the player).There seems to be a pretty big gulf between the two to me. Neither deserves personal attacks, but I have zero sympathy for any criticism Rian gets for making the travesty he put out. There's a difference between upsetting people because unpleasant things are happening in your story and the bad guys are "winning" and upsetting people with just plain bad writing to subvery expectations.
In the past, the pre-patch stuff Blizz has released has often been pretty tepid--lukewarm oatmeal stuff. This time we get some really riveting cinematics and really wrenching plot turns--as in Game of Thrones-level wrenching. And of course some people are finding reasons to be upset, while others are finding reasons to love what Blizz has done. Either way, it's working as intended. You're supposed to be riveted and shocked and even outraged--this is the start of the conflict that will propel BFA, and you're supposed to be feeling something strong. None of us can predict exactly where it's going to end. (Come Monday we'll all be too busy leveling to worry so much anyway). There will be time enough to trash or praise the plot line when we can look back at it in its entirety and judge it fairly.
Interesting, toxic vs constructive is a lot like the reverse bullying issue we see in school. Bullying in schools is an issue for the teachers to deal with they also have to deal with students false claims a student being bullied to manipulate their own agenda.I believe it is a shame that people are on a witch hunt for people with a counter points of view vs pointing out toxic individuals.I me the story writing in BFA pre-release is bad as we have characters acting counter to the previously developed story arcs. Jaina suddenly has become a good person again as she was full of hate and rage. Sylvanas went from the defender of her people and her quest to do what is best for the horde to a chaotic evil villain out of the blue. We did have some explanation in the Before the Storm novel but none of that has been included in the in game story leaving me asking what are the writers doing. I do expect this to be reported as I did point out that the writing is inconsistent with Jaina and Sylvanas because it will offend someone but that is online world we live with.
And once again my comment is deleted before posting. Three paragraphs just gone. Fix your comments wowhead.TLDR: stop being jerks because you contribute nothing.
I agree with Chris in that you shouldn't throw death threats around, just because you disliked X or Y. Just don't buy it.Same goes with anything else, if you don't like how a thing has turned out, get a refund or simply walk away from it. Vote with your money, vote with your loyalty.As much as I *hate* how Sylvanas is being written, I'm not throwing toxic tweets at anyone. I tweeted #NotMyWarchief and how I think she's out of character. It wasn't an aggressive, toxic response to something I'm passionate about.Anyway, it's nice to hear Chris is doing well. I wish him and his family all the best. I hope Chris returns to work with Blizz in some semblance, because his artistic visions are often so incredibly interesting.Also, I agree with Chris when he says "it's hard to get your vision out", because we sadly live in a world were money talks. If the funders don't trust your vision, you won't get it fully expressed because you gotta please the money, sadly. And then you might be a sellout in the eyes of your fans, and possibly even yourself, but then maybe the funders will see "oh, he could do what we wanted, we can fund a second project and give him the reigns fully"In regards to Diablo 3, it's easier to attack the public face for a decision people dislike, especially when it comes to a game with a passionate fanbase. But, yeah, Chris. I love you. I miss you.
What Chris misses here is that its one thing for new creators to create new pieces of work for people to enjoy, and another for some random idiot to come in to an already established work and tweak it with no regards to that work's past. The latter is what gets people upset. It happened with Star Wars, its happening with WoW, it will happen with some other work in the future. I don't see people mindlessly attacking upcoming writers/directors etc. who have a vision and want to create something new. They wait for their work to be released then judge it based on their taste. But when someone steps into an established work that you've been a part of for years and years and actively shts all over it, yeah you have every right to call that person out. Yes some people take it too far with personal attacks and what not, but again, no one should be surprised at this outcome given how passionate certain people can be about the things they enjoy. So no Chris, the fandom is not toxic, its just really passionate about WoW and saddened that a now corporate blizzard is set out to destroy the game's legacy you and others built through terrible writing, terrible gameplay changes, terrible content gating etc.
The thing that concerns me is that people who have reasonable arguments get lumped into the group with all of the “toxic” people. Not saying that some people aren’t exhibiting bad behavior just that it is often used as a way to shield creators from criticism.It is interesting that the specific example here is fan reaction to “The Last Jedi.” It was not a great movie on many levels but it was visually impressive and had some good bits in it. I went to see it opening night and was at first entertained by it but the more I thought about it the less satisfying it was. This was before I went out to see what other people thought about it. It was hard to have a reasonable discussion about the film because as soon as you said anything critical some one would jump all over you calling you names and accusing you of being whatever -ist was the flavor of the moment for shutting down discussion. Then a few days later Disney weighed in and basically accused everyone who voiced a negative response to the movie of being horrible people.When creators call a community toxic, whether it is true or not, all they are doing is attempting to shut down discussion. This is a tactic that is used by people who don’t want to hear bad things.
MMOs are in a weird spot as far as criticism is concerned. You're living in a constantly changing world governed by the narrative and creative teams, so it's hard to separate the creators from the creation. That said, there is a difference between valid concerns/critique and personal attacks.
Its a two-way road. Blizzard, and especially team Ion, is terrible at handling criticism and basically lets it become toxic. With the ever shrinking amount of communication from blues that gap will always be filled with negativity. Their current systems do not work, the more you face the critics the more you stem toxicity by having dialogue and trying to reach a endpoint together.Team Ion's current philosophy is to throw out barely tested changes then ignore any dialogue until it gets too big to simply ignore and only then do they whine about toxicity. Its a monster they played a heavy part in creating themselves.
While there is a lot of toxicity & frustration in our somewhat faceless society, and much of it lashes out when presented with obvious targets, I find it annoying that the limited number of extreme reactions get focused on to the exclusion of all others.Yes, it's the media cycle.. and humans do love dramatic gossip... but it's used as an (often subconscious) excuse to avoid the rational portion of the critique. Every criticism is waved away with "oh you just aren't understanding it."For every wildly inappropriate extreme reaction, there tend to be a larger number who felt a more restrained & rational version of that same reaction.This expac's storytelling is looking poor & uninspiring to me. It feels like a mediocre mix of designed-by-committee combined with "it sounded great when I first suggested it to the team" ideas trying to pass themselves off as bold storytelling. It's the plot design equivalent of WoD Garrisons - a mismanaged attempt to be bold.I could write a formal essay outlining flaws, but it would be pointless because no one cares about one more faceless opinion on the internet. The dev team is committed to their course now anyway.And for the record I didn't think much of the Saurfang video either. It was a straightforward play for the heart-strings that worked mainly due to its simplicity... plus, any plot that's marginally coherent looks good at this point.
"How dare you to critzice our divine story writing that is the best that exists of all time! You are so toxic!"