How the Most Expensive Game Jam in history...

[AshburnerX]

...crashed and burned in a single day.

I find this entire article fascinating. It's like the perfect storm of everything wrong with TV, encapsulated into one man. I'm also kind of... inspired by how all the Devs and Youtube personalities stuck to their guns and refused to sink to the level of reality television. It's amazing how new media artists are completely different than old media producers.

 

[Jay]

Ridiculous and shameful. How did they even think this would be a good thing?

 

[AshburnerX]

Ridiculous and shameful. How did they even think this would be a good thing?

The thing is that it could have been fine. But because they fell too hard onto the old reality formula and didn't realize that the people who'd actually be interested in this wouldn't want there to be drama, the entire thing fell apart.

 

[bhamv3]

What's a game jam?

 

[Ravenpoe]

What's a game jam?

You get a bunch of developers together and have them crack out indie games in a short span of time.

 

[GasBandit]

I hate product goons.

 

[Bowielee]

I really hate to sound like a geek hipster, but I grow ever concerned by how mainstream our culture has become.

 

[Ravenpoe]

I really hate to sound like a geek hipster, but I grow ever concerned by how mainstream our culture has become.

I don't know what you mean...

Spoiler

 

[AshburnerX]

I really hate to sound like a geek hipster, but I grow ever concerned by how mainstream our culture has become.

Except that culture isn't what has become mainstream... what has become mainstream is an easier to digest version of it. It's not the same and it will never BE the same. But that's kind of what happens to all mediums...

 

[filmfanatic]

This has been an interesting story to read about and it is inspiring how these new media producers united in the face of Hollywood bullshit.

In the meantime, here's what the YouTube folks did when this thing fell apart.

 

[ThatNickGuy]

What's the TL; DR version of this? That's a wall of text and I'm just not very good with screen reading.

 

[GasBandit]

What's the TL; DR version of this? That's a wall of text and I'm just not very good with screen reading.

They tried to put on an event about making games that teams up indie devs with youtube celebrities. It was ultra high expense/production value.

The guy from Mountain Dew (who was a major sponsor, product placement galore) decided to make it a drama-based reality show instead, and tried to gin up drama by egging on sexism, while berating people about showing off Mt. Dew to the camera more/better.

Nobody played ball. They walked out. Mt. Dew guy got fired. But it was too late. The game jam was dead, and all the money wasted.

Everybody went to didney whirl instead.[DOUBLEPOST=1396467314,1396467244][/DOUBLEPOST]

 

[ThatNickGuy]

I love it. Fuck the corporate entities.

 

[Frank]

The writer of that article was then fired by Maker/Polaris. Then after there was an internet backlash, unfired. He'll be let go as soon as they think enough time has passed and no one cares.

 

[GasBandit]

It somehow does not surprise me that there's basically one production company behind all these big name youtube successes.

 

[Frank]

It's hard to want to watch anything that comes from the company that employs Pewdiepie.

 

[GasBandit]

It's hard to want to watch anything that comes from the company that employs Pewdiepie.

That there's one degree of separation (the production company) between the likes of Pewdiepie and Jontron hurts my brain.

 

[Necronic]

You know....reading one of the blogs on it, I don't know how I feel about this. Sure, the corporate shilling was high, but they were the sponsor, that's just how it goes, suck it up and move on. And the Matti guy, his questions were innapropriate, but the only questions I see that they got so angry at are:

To the teams with girls: "Do you think having a pretty girl on your team puts you at an advantage"
To the teams with no girls: "Do you think having a girl on your team puts you at a disadvantage"

The questions weren't appropriate, not doubt, but.....it's really not that big of a deal, and there were only 2 questions, really only 1 question. Walking off like that? I can understand it, but then the sponsors fire Matti to try and salvage the event, and what do the guys say?

"After we left the show, the producers, content managers, and countless others involved in the production of the series tried to work through a way to get us back to finish the jam. Though many of the immediate concerns were addressed (e.g. Matti was removed from the project) and they offered to completely restructure the event, the point remained – there was once a person there who destroyed everything. There was a person involved on this project who felt that it was appropriate to humiliate, embarrass, and harass. Our trust was broken and we were done." -Wallick

I mean....primadonna much? If there was some ongoing string of things like this maybe I could get the attitude, but (from another contestant who dropped out):

"Our whole interaction with anybody before the jam went down was nothing but respectful and excited" -Arnott

I think they made a real mistake by not going back. Like, a terrible mistake. Walking off gave them power, the producers fired Matti and would have let the show develop in a more natural way that was more appealing to the developers. They could have come back and said "see, this is our culture, we don't approve of how this was happening. Now we'll show you what we're really about", but they lost that chance. I know what they are against, but I never learned what they are for. If they had stayed I would have learned both. (if that makes sense.)

 

[Bubble181]

I did have the same feeling, partially. I mean, I can understand "not liking" the way things went, but part of it (that it wasn't going to be just a regular jam on some con or meet-up, with camera's in the background, but rather a tv show about game making) was pretty obvious, and some of the less pleasant aspects are pretty par for the course (heck, even Penny Arcade's Strip Search had some of that - and that was made by strip makers with strip makers about strip makers for strip makers!).
Some of the ways that guy behaved were far out there (and, if I interpret the text right, some of those would actualyl be illegal in Belgium under our anti-sexism laws...), and he was rightly fired/pushed off.
I can understand stopping for the day, whatever, demanding some renegotiations. Blowing the whole thing up because one guy was a jerk....eh. If anything, it might have been a good starting point to refocus the show - use him and his idiocy to talk about the stereotypes that plague gaming and the industry, how it impacts people, and how we can work to overcome it. Show that the girls are just as good as the boys, not better or worse. Show they can all work together respectfully. I'm fairly sure they could've worked that angle in - the producers would've been doing pretty much anything to recuperate the investment.

 

[Ravenpoe]

Well, from what I gathered from the article, the reality tv show competition of the 'game jam' wasn't communicated to the participants until after they'd already flown out and arrived. Combined with that Matti guy trying to create shit, not only in the inappropriate questions he was asking, but also trying to start a fight between JonTron and Zoe on multiple occasions, all added up to everyone feeling really, really uncomfortable.

Us reading about it might wonder why everyone couldn't just calm down, stop for the day, and move on, but this all played out over the course of what looks to be a very long day, and being in that sort of hostile environment can be very taxing. I don't fault any of them for calling it quits, especially when it started out under false pretenses and started on a bad foot with the lawyers trying to get them to sign away all rights to anything they make ever.

 

[AshburnerX]

They did what they needed to do to preserve their working environment (which also included not pissing off the kind of people with the audience to ruin them). It was the right move and the blame falls squarely on the shoulders on the producers.

 

[Bubble181]

I'm certainly not trying to suddenly defend Big Corporate Mysoginist Asshole Lawyer Rules, and I don't realyl fault them for walking away....But I do think that part of what they didn't like should've been clear from the start (they did know it was big enoguh production to fly people in from all over the country and it was big and sponsored) and that they missed an opportunity to be the bigger man and create a positive image.