Top Hat Studios issues statement saying they will not censor Sense - 不祥的预感: A Cyberpunk Ghost Story

[G4Knight]

24 minutes ago, Eraezr said:

Big L to everyone who said they made it up.

 

 

 

 

 

Major L

[Eraezr]

4 hours ago, G4Knight said:

You’d be surprised how many women are gifted out there. Let’s not pretend they don’t exist. I had to mention it once the oh-so-classic line “backs must really hurt” showed up. Even their eyes roll harder than these keyboard warriors.

 

Coincidentally, one of the characters is based on a 3D printing/aerial drone enthusiast personality, Naomi Wu. It looks like a collaboration. https://www.thegeekgetaway.com/2021/01/sense-cyberpunk-ghost-story-with-not-be.html

 

 

This is her Twitter https://twitter.com/RealSexyCyborg

 

Edited January 3, 2021 by Eraezr

[DordorTheSwift]

Well they earned my purchase.

Really hope the game does well and doesn't get the patented Sony censor hammering that's becoming all too common.

[Wavergray]

1 hour ago, Eraezr said:

 

The verb.

Oh like blackmail. Good to know.

Anyway threats and stuff aside, have they patched the game to play better? Checked the game out months okay and it was looking pretty bad.

Like good on them for sticking to their morals, but the game doesn't look worth more than $5 or as Humble Bundle fodder.

 

[Eraezr]

2 minutes ago, Wavergray said:

Oh like blackmail. Good to know.

Anyway threats and stuff aside, have they patched the game to play better? Checked the game out months okay and it was looking pretty bad.

Like good on them for sticking to their morals, but the game doesn't look worth more than $5 or as Humble Bundle fodder.

 

 

It's a rite of passage for a cyberpunk game to launch buggy.

[Shadiochao]

1 hour ago, G4Knight said:

Major L

 

Not really. Not a single one of those supposed death threats or calls for violence are public. The only public posts in any of those images are simple criticism or disapproval of the game, despite Top Hat making it seem like the evidence of threats was there all along if only we had looked. Nobody should just take someone's word when they can't find proof, and even now that's essentially all we have because Top Hat are the only ones who have access to it, if it's real.

 

It just seems a bit too convenient to me. Of all the games with large-breasted characters in them, it's this obscure one that had less than 100 Steam reviews that somehow became a massive target. How many Senran Kagura games are on Switch? What about the games that Sony and Microsoft won't even publish because they're too risque? What made this one special? Apparently something did, and now people whose only personality trait is being anti-SJW are going to throw money at them for not changing something they're not even under pressure or obligation to change. Every game attracts criticism but it doesn't mean the developer has to listen. A massive story overhaul patch for the TLOU2 hasn't been announced, after all.

 

Though the supposed DMS that actually call for violence tend to use slurs for some reason. Makes me wonder even more who's actually sending the threats and what their motive is. At the very least it doesn't seem to be SJWs.

 

Either way the only winners here are Top Hat, and would've been no matter how this turned out. The people who were against the game inadvertently gave it a huge and frankly undeserved popularity boost, and the people who were against the people who were against the game are now saddled with something that only got bad-to-average reviews.

Edited January 3, 2021 by Shadiochao

[Zid960]

Just a day on the net. I mean as this point if the game dev doesn't have a hate/death mob following them. Im shocked? lots people just have nothing better to do than be a$h0les. It shouldn't happen but. There isn't a way to fix it other then the cops. Which blow off most of this kind of stuff.

[Elvick_]

6 hours ago, Abby_TheLastofUs said:

I looked through that tweet that was linked here, and I saw maybe two or three replies that could be read as asking the game to be censored. Most of the negative comments directed at it are making fun of the game, not calling for it to be cancelled. There's over 700 replies, so there's the possibility I could have missed something, but more likely it seems this is a manufactured controversy on the publisher's part to increase sales of a game that's already bombed on Steam.

 

Scrolling through the Top Hat Studio's twitter account, they average less than 30 retweets per tweet, but their anti-censorship posturing tweet got over 4000 retweets and they gained over 2000 new followers in a day. It's maybe the most attention they've ever gotten. 

 

Meanwhile, the game has been out since August on Steam and has only 125 reviews and at one point it was pulled from sale due to poor player feedback. The most recent reviews are applauding the devs for "sticking it to the SJWs", with some stating they aren't even going to play the game. They just want to support the devs.

 

Like I said at the top, this whole controversy was cooked up by the publisher to get people to buy a game that bombed. People make fun of a game that no one was going to buy, publishers use the newfound attention to play the victim and get some sales out of it.

125 reviews is a lot for a random indie game in a sea of them... do you use Steam often? Because it's not uncommon for them to have less than 10 reviews for years. Bet you've heard of Ratalaika, and they have barely any reviews of their games on Steam. Only one I see with over 100 is Devious Dungeon. Most are less than 50, InkSplosion or w/e has less than 10. Even games older than Devious Dungeon have less reviews.

 

I think a better example of it being for attention is just pointing to the writing in the game itself. There's some dialog about people who complain about games manga they will never buy and play read.Actually I'll just post the screenshots I saw. It's so on the nose and so fitting to the situation it's silly. Almost like people should do a bit of research into something before knee jerk reactions based entirely on assumptions. That way they can have an argument that's not shit, but who cares about that. Feelings~

 

 

Regardless, the entire purpose of throwing "that's sexist" and "learn to draw women" is to associate it with being bad. Being sexist is bad, everyone already knows this, the entire point of trying to label people sexist is to alter their behavior and control what they can and cannot do. You're either naive or being purposefully obtuse about that. You don't have to directly call for the removal or censorship of something for that to be your end goal. "I'm not saying it has to be removed or changed, just that if you do that you're a horrible person and endangering women!" You should see what some of those deleted replies were.

Edited January 3, 2021 by Elvick_

[Eraezr]

5 minutes ago, Zid960 said:

Just a day on the net. I mean as this point if the game dev doesn't have a hate/death mob following them. Im shocked lots people just have nothing better to do than be a$h0les. It shouldn't happen but. There isn't a way to fix it other then the cops. Which blow off most of this kind of stuff.

 

The denialism from Top Hats haters is kinda funny too.

Edited January 3, 2021 by Eraezr

[G4Knight]

52 minutes ago, Eraezr said:

 

Coincidentally, one of the characters is based on a 3D printing/aerial drone enthusiast personality, Naomi Wu. It looks like a collaboration. https://www.thegeekgetaway.com/2021/01/sense-cyberpunk-ghost-story-with-not-be.html

 

 

This is her Twitter https://twitter.com/RealSexyCyborg

 

It certainly is. She even signed off on it. Nice catch.

[Darling Baphomet]

Gotta say, not really a fan of the pro-censorship indications of this thread. People should have the right to make death threats if they want to. Frankly shocked at how much fascist anti-free speech bias there is here. Has cancel culture gone too far?

[Eraezr]

18 minutes ago, Darling Baphomet said:

Gotta say, not really a fan of the pro-censorship indications of this thread. People should have the right to make death threats if they want to. Frankly shocked at how much fascist anti-free speech bias there is here. Has cancel culture gone too far?

 

When people lack basic mastery over their own emotions and needs, they try to compensate by trying to control what other people choose for themselves. It's a kind of destructive shadow that lacks self-awareness and emotional maturity.

 

Another variant of this is when people are angry or bitter about their powerlessness in their lives. You see this in retail stores or any customer service joint. Some customers poorly treat cashiers. These people are prone to adopt an attitude when they see someone who’s in a position that cannot fight back – all in the name of ‘customer service’. By exerting this brutish control over another, they find it easier to cope with their shadow’s feelings of powerlessness and frustrations for whatever may be happening in their own lives.

Edited January 3, 2021 by Eraezr

[Darling Baphomet]

4 minutes ago, Eraezr said:

When people lack basic mastery over their own emotions and needs, they try to compensate by trying to control what other people choose for themselves. It's a kind of destructive shadow that lacks self-awareness and emotional maturity.

 

Exactly. Complaining about other people making death threats is a clear sign of emotional immaturity. I mean, if you can't handle a death threat here or there on Twitter... maybe you should delete your account? Or just go outside, take a walk, clear your head. Being a sensitive snowflake and playing the victim because of words on the internet just proves you lack both maturity and critical thinking ability.

[Eraezr]

1 minute ago, Darling Baphomet said:

 

Exactly. Complaining about other people making death threats is a clear sign of emotional immaturity. I mean, if you can't handle a death threat here or there on Twitter... maybe you should delete your account? Or just go outside, take a walk, clear your head. Being a sensitive snowflake and playing the victim because of words on the internet just proves you lack both maturity and critical thinking ability.

 

Could not agree more. When people want others to delete their account, they're quite emotionally immature and overtly sensitive.

Edited January 3, 2021 by Eraezr

[Darling Baphomet]

3 minutes ago, Eraezr said:

Could not agree more. When people want others to delete their account, they're quite emotionally immature and overtly sensitive.

 

Damn, after that rep I was hoping I could go a few more posts before you realized I was mocking you. Oh well.

[Eraezr]

9 minutes ago, Darling Baphomet said:

 

Damn, after that rep I was hoping I could go a few more posts before you realized I was mocking you. Oh well.

 

I mean, you just kinda reinforced my point at that 2nd post So it was appreciable.

[Lord_Bane999]

4 hours ago, Darling Baphomet said:

Gotta say, not really a fan of the pro-censorship indications of this thread. People should have the right to make death threats if they want to. Frankly shocked at how much fascist anti-free speech bias there is here. Has cancel culture gone too far?

It's not that anyone is explicitly pro censorship. It's just that it's annoying to see a Developer or Publisher makes comments that they were getting threatened of censorship when nothing of the sort happened. It's also worse to see mention of death threats when nothing was even remotely close.

 

These are random people mostly voicing their opinions on the internet. Do some go extreme yeah they do but they are entitled to their opinions still wether wrong or right.

 

It's not like the ESRB, PEGI, Valve, etc basically went to this company and said "Hey guys we don't like he content of your game and you need to censor it to have it published." It's stupid some people are runbignnn with this treating it the same as what just happened with Gal Gun and other games that actually get censored.

[Eraezr]

Unfortunate that those threats insinuated about sending a bomb to their address. 

[German_Atheist]

Are you honestly arguing whether there were death threats or not? We all know there were. Most devs receive such threats on a regular basis. Even devs that make racing games. I'm friends with two devs at Playground Games and they told me about people being pissed over a certain car not being fast enough. Others get angry over Edinburgh Castle (in Forza Horizon 4) not being "pompous" enough. They receive death threats all the fucking time - and all they do is making racing games! Think about it!

 

Spoiler

 

 

Edited January 3, 2021 by R4M_ATHEIST

[TakemetoNarnia4]

loool so fake. they are doing this for clout

[Abby_TheLastofUs]

21 minutes ago, Eraezr said:

Unfortunate that those threats insinuated about sending a bomb to their address. 

 

Very considerate of Top Hat Studios to protect the identities of the people e-mailing them threats.

[Japanime_Gamer]

I wouldn't at all be surprised if most every game made these days undergoes similar attacks from people with nothing better to do.

 

The fact we are hearing about this particular one is clearly a publicity stunt and is essentially free advertising.

Edited January 3, 2021 by Japanime_Gamer

[Walt the Dog]

1 hour ago, Abby_TheLastofUs said:

 

Very considerate of Top Hat Studios to protect the identities of the people e-mailing them threats.

Considering that leaking these people's identities would almost certainly send a hellfire of anti-SJWs at said people, all of these targets likely being a good deal smaller than Top Hat, it makes sense to protect their identities so as to not start a mass incident or, should it start anyway, at least be able to shove away blame for it.

Edited January 3, 2021 by Walt the Dog

[Abby_TheLastofUs]

40 minutes ago, Walt the Dog said:

Considering that leaking these people's identities would almost certainly send a hellfire of anti-SJWs at said people, all of these targets likely being a good deal smaller than Top Hat, it makes sense to protect their identities so as to not start a mass incident or, should it start anyway, at least be able to shove away blame for it.

 

That'd make sense, if Top Hat Studios hadn't also said that the comments compiled could easily be found. 

 

They say they didn't want to point out examples to avoid causing more fights, but now they have to do it because people are calling them liars. They say the comments are easy to find (10 seconds is their estimate) but still redact all the names.

 

Out of the tweets selected as examples, only a few could be considered calling for censorship. The extreme stuff comes from direct messages and e-mails, which can't be searched for. And for some inexplicable reasons, many of the direct messages are transphobic.

 

So now, if people retaliate against the commenters, it will be against the people that weren't threatening Top Hat Studios. For some reason, Top Hat Studios is willing to risk harassment directed at people that insulted them and the game they're publishing, except for the people that went at them the hardest. 

 

Seeing some of the tweets they used as examples of harassment and calls for censorship, I'm sticking with my initial assessment of the situation. After people said the studio was lying, they wanted to post something to continue propping up their story, but since none of the messages that were actually posted were threatening, they cooked up the direct messages and e-mails.

 

Death threats are common on the internet, but they involve games and movies that people care about. The Spider-Man devs got death threats because of people that were attached to the old Peter Parker, the No Man's Sky devs got threats because people got hyped for their game and were then let down, etc. This is a game barely anyone even knew existed, people expressed mockery and disgusts and then moved on. It's not that I don't think any of those people would ever send death threats, I just don't seem them caring enough to actually do it in this instance.

 

 

Edited January 3, 2021 by Abby_TheLastofUs

[Eraezr]

Now this game will sell well for an indie of this stature. I'd rather support something like this than AAA studios who hospitalise their staff from crunch and threaten to withhold the pay cheques of its animators. That is not only scummy but illegal. Which makes such studios a dark mirror of the death threats which come their way if they're almost killing their own developers or compromising their wellbeing.

Edited January 3, 2021 by Eraezr