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Video Game Sophistry has interviewed Trent Oster about SoD

JuliusBorisovJuliusBorisov Member, Administrator, Moderator, Developer Posts: 22,752
in Baldur's Gate: Siege of Dragonspear
Video Game Sophistry (VGS) is a channel on Youtube that offers interviews with game developers. This week, they interviewed Trent Oster (starts at 23:28)

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=M6jgurm6cUU#t=23m28s

Comments

  • drakirdrakir Member Posts: 61
    Is it just me or did they (more than once) claim that Beamdog decided to remove a character due to criticism? (Which is, as far as I know, incorrect)
  • sparkleavsparkleav Member Posts: 871
    No it's not just you @drakir :)
  • KamigoroshiKamigoroshi Member Posts: 5,870
    Trent's mic is a bitter, bitter mic.
  • RathenauRathenau Member Posts: 80
    The interview itself was very nice, good insights and properly explained. Trent can read me a bedtime story any day. His voice is quite soothing.

    Now I don't know how and at what time the interview was conducted but before they even started, as @drakir pointed out; they mentioned that a transgender character was taken out of Siege of Dragonspear. Once at the very start and again right before the interview. After the interview it is repeated together with an inaccurate summary. That means these guys have done very little, to no research about the matter. Simply put: they only read the highlights and weren't interested in the story. They only want something that fits into their theme for the episode but more on that later. Interesting to note is that in the description it is stated that the character was changed. Different but again a falsehood, as we all know no changes have as of yet been made to said character. But why try to represent the facts when they get in the way of a good story, right?

    So, I'm a little disappointed Trent didn't catch that one and corrected the hosts. That and to continue the whole 'we got bad reviews only because we included a transgender person into the game' line of reasoning. Later on, there is the admission that there actually were valid criticism but no, let's lump it all back onto the one character. The massive bugs on release and quality of the story and dialogue aren't mentioned, those have nothing to do with said criticism. Or did they?

    Back to the show itself; as I understand it they argue that a group of people in the past rallied against the blackface acting and were in the right, but now these people right here talking about a different issue are clearly wrong. Because we say so, who needs arguments when you can just assert yourself? They avoid calling people paying customers, preferring to use terms as 'those who enjoy it', 'the public' and 'consumers'. (not consumers of said product mind you) Making it sound like the commodity in question is more akin to a public work or a statue than anything people need to spend money on themselves.

    At the very least it seems a very good name for the show, I trust they didn't mean it in the literal form where they are the ones purposefully pushing false arguments with the aim of deceiving but that is exactly what they've done.
  • drakirdrakir Member Posts: 61
    @sparkleav Thank you :)

    Now that I think about it, although some of it may be borderline nitpicking, the following things also caused a hovering question mark to physically appear over my head:
    • At one point they called it a remake, while at another point stating that it's not a remake.
    • They said it's 17 years in the making. (I believe that gives the impression that it's the Duke Nukem Forever of Baldur's Gate, rather than something that was started in recent years?)
    • They expressed regret and/or sadness that "the controversy", which is a very small component of the game, has taken focus from the actual game, while at the same time making this "small component" the main focus of the interview. (This is what we in the business call a "contradiction")
  • PurudayaPurudaya Member Posts: 816
    drakir said:

    @sparkleav Thank you :)

    Now that I think about it, although some of it may be borderline nitpicking, the following things also caused a hovering question mark to physically appear over my head:

    • At one point they called it a remake, while at another point stating that it's not a remake.
    • They said it's 17 years in the making. (I believe that gives the impression that it's the Duke Nukem Forever of Baldur's Gate, rather than something that was started in recent years?)
    • They expressed regret and/or sadness that "the controversy", which is a very small component of the game, has taken focus from the actual game, while at the same time making this "small component" the main focus of the interview. (This is what we in the business call a "contradiction")
    A small aspect of the game made news while taking away focus from the rest of the game. As a result, an interview was held that focused on that aspect. I wouldn't say that's a contradiction, just a pretty standard progression of coverage.

    @Rathenau Blackface was a means of exclusion, ridicule, and dehumanization of a marginalized group. The inclusion of a trans character in a video game serves none of those purposes. People who opposed blackface can be right and people who oppose trans inclusion can be wrong at the same time because they're completely different stances of principle.

    As far as the bad reviews go, I think Trent is primarily referring to the blatant review bombing campaign centered on the representation and inclusion of Mizhena. The average on Metacritic and GoG is ~3.0 while the average everywhere else is ~7.5. Beamdog has repeatedly acknowledged legitimate negative feedback and is implementing it as we speak, but the idea that the vitriolic backlash and 0 star reviews were primarily about gameplay mechanics and bugs has been roundly debunked. As for "paying customers"... that's not common verbage for developers generally. "Consumers" assumes an exchange of currency and in no way suggests that this was some kind of public work. With all due respect, I think the nitpicking is a little unfair (and I'm one of those who almost totally disagrees with Beamdog's decision to alter the content).
  • AyiekieAyiekie Member Posts: 975
    Plus, of course, most people leaving those reviews had never bought or played Siege of Dragonspear, and were thus not "paying customers" of any sort.
  • RathenauRathenau Member Posts: 80
    Making such claims is rather silly without any form of supporting evidence. Please explain your reasoning there my friend as stating your opinion alone can't possibly be your only way of reasoning.
  • BelleSorciereBelleSorciere Member Posts: 2,108
    The reasoning behind it has been explained many times. It's not hard to see that the number of reviews on Metacritic exceeds the number of user reviews for many AAA games, and most seem to focus in on a few particulars.

    Anyone who reads the GOG or Metacritic reviews can see what was going on.
  • FardragonFardragon Member Posts: 4,511
    Number of reviews >> number of games sold is pretty conclusive proof of fake reviews.

    However, when a review states things about a game that anyone who had played it would know where false, it is also a very major give-away.
  • BGLoverBGLover Member Posts: 550
    After historical events comes historical revisionism...

    People can say 'Baldurs-Gate-Gate' was only ever about the quality of writing, and the bugs, and had absolutely nothing to do with bigotry and bile and attempts to discredit and undermine a computer game for reasons that had almost nothing to do with said game.

    People can say that all those 0 out of 10 reviews that appeared immeadiately after Siege of Dragonspear was released, all declaring that SoD was the worst game ever made, were all honest and legitimate and not hyperbolic in the slightest.

    People can, in fact, construct whatever narrative they want to explain the events that occured immeadiately after the release of SoD.

    As for me.....

    I know what I saw and read.
  • drakirdrakir Member Posts: 61
    Purudaya said:

    A small aspect of the game made news while taking away focus from the rest of the game. As a result, an interview was held that focused on that aspect. I wouldn't say that's a contradiction, just a pretty standard progression of coverage.

    @Purudaya What you state above is completely logical in my opinion too - the "controversy" made big news and they covered it - makes sense. However, I don't remember the exact wording or such, but I think they stated that it's a shame that the "controversy" is getting more publicity than the game itself. To me, it seems strange to remark that it's a shame while at the same time contributing to said "shame". Although if you say this is not an unusual thing to do, that I may have misunderstood what they are saying, or that nitpicking about subjective details in video game-related interviews in the middle of the night is not the path to true enlightenment, I wouldn't be surprised if you're right ;)
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