As most of you probably already know by now, the GDC 2017 event ended less than one week ago (GDC 17 went on between the 27th of February and the 3rd of March). Well, since I’ve been reading quite a lot of tweets, posts and comments from Gamers and game developers who went to GDC 17. Long story short, I just thought that I could share my thoughts on the more “bizarre” aspects of GDC 2017 (I did not attend the event in person, but I have talked to people who paid GDC 17 a visit). You see, GDC 17 contained quite a few social activism, feminist and SJW sections, such as the “Making Games Under Fascism” section (which obviously is an anti-Trump statement).

That’s just the half of it though. As I’ve been told that GDC invited Dina Abou Karam to speak for five minutes during GDC 2017, and right now I bet that quite a few of you are asking yourself “Who the hell is Dina Abou Karam?“. Well,  if you have no idea (whatsoever) who Dina is. Then I would recommend you to check out Internet Aristocrat´s old “Mighty No 9” video. As it informs you about everything that you need to know about Dina’s connection to the SJW drama/scandal involving MN9’s development process, and once you match all of that in context to her invitation to GDC 2017. Then you simply can’t help to wonder why she got invited in the first place…

Nevertheless, the SJW madness train doesn’t stop there. As there were plenty of other crazy SJW GDC 2017 slides to be found as well:

Even so, I still have to say that the anti-white slides took the prize as THE most stupid thing that I’ve seen from GDC 17 so far (as seen in the pictures down below). I mean, it’s not like a lot of today’s games offers you the option to create the character (s) that you want to play as…Sure, I get the whole “diversity” in Gaming part, and I have no problem with that (just check out my “Black female video game characters that I love” list :3 ). However, I felt like this was a “bit” too much for my taste.

As for game developers and gDC 17. I actually asked an indie game developer (who wants to remain anonymous for now) about his/her thoughts on GDC 2017 earlier today, and this is the response that I got per e-mail:

“GDC was a huge anti trump rally. Years ago id trusted those gaming entities, like GDC and IGDA, I don’t nowadays”.

Even so. I should, however, point out that I have no idea what the previous GDC and IGDA events were like. Well, at least anything beyond GDC 2015 (I still remember Tim Schafer´s sockpuppet “incident”). So I will have to look more into the old IGDA and GDC events before I could say anything about the matter. As for GDC 2017 though, from my point of view (based on what I read, heard and seen) GDC 2017 made me feel like game development isn’t even about games anymore. I’m not saying that 100% of GDC 17 was like that, because that’s not true. However, the SJW and social activism GDC 17 slides (and whatnot) that I saw don’t (in my opinion) belong at any game event. As it’s nothing less than pure political and social activism propaganda.

As a whole though, GDC 2017 seems to have been a rather good Gaming and game developer event:

“Stop picking the absolute worst of the talks, everyone! The convention is overall really good!” – ZorbaTHut, via KotakuInAction (Reddit)

So “hopefully” we will get even less SJW/social activism and political nonsense during GDC 18 next year. Because (in my opinion) Gaming and game developer events should be about games and game development, and not nonsense like that…And as an extra bonus on the matter of “anti-Gamer” and so-called “gamers journalism” (this is not indirect related to GDC 2017, but this is the same kind of nonsense that went down at GDC 17). I simply I couldn’t help to wonder what Motherboard and The Verge thought when they wrote the following articles:

You know. This is a perfect example of everything that’s wrong with games journalism today (it’s basically the 2017 edition of the “Games are dead” narrative). So if you combine the GDC 17 SJW nonsense with most of the crap that exists in today’s “games journalism”. Then it’s no wonder why more and more Gamers are starting to look for other alternatives. I mean, who could blame them? Because I wouldn’t want to support these people with my money either. As they use my hobby as a platform for political activism and stupid anti-Gamer posts (sites like Motherboard and The Verge love to make Gaming and Gamers look stupid).

And with that said, what’s your take on this matter? And if you did attend to this year’s edition of GDC, then please feel free to share your thoughts with us in the comment section down below!

Credit:
Just Lyle

Source:
KotakuInAction
Internet Aristocrat
Heat Street
GDC 2017
Motherboard
Mighty No.9
Jed Whitaker
fsbossfight
Ian Miles Cheong
Robert Yang
The Verge
Medium

GDC 2017 pictures:
http://archive.is/4Ip5t
http://archive.is/lgwsW
http://archive.is/t21qt
http://archive.is/SkXKM
http://archive.is/jthTQ
http://archive.is/K8poo
http://archive.is/6Jd0K
http://archive.is/dsTfw
http://archive.is/WLXwz

***Disclaimer***
This is a personal opinion of the writer, and it doesn’t necessarily represent the other writers (nor The Gaming Ground´s) opinions.

Robin “V-Act” Ek
The Gaming Ground
Twitter: @TheGamingGround

More by Robin Ek:

• “Project Warlock II: Reworked Chapter 1” has just kicked-off its open playtest for PC
• The hardcore arcade racing game “DEATHSPRINT 66” is coming to PC via Steam in 2024
• The immersive fishing & Boating sim “Ships At Sea” is coming to PC via Steam EA on May 9th, 2024
• “Final Fantasy VII Rebirth” is now available for the PS5 worldwide
• The charming golf adventure game “Golfinite” is now available for the Nintendo Switch

Tags: Game developers, Game developers conference, Gamers, Gaming, GDC 17, GDC 2017