MAMEWorld Forums - The Loony Bin - Re: #GamerGate - What do you guys think about this shitstorm?

> Or are retro games people not concerned?

I think largely we are people who are interested in the technology behind the games, and/or fans of games in general, not "retro" games specifically. The older games had less to work with, so often display more talent and clarity in their design and execution. But as to "concern:"

Games are art. An art, but as well art. Art in the construction, art in the design, art in the final product, and art even in the playing, to some extent.

The supreme purpose of art is to hold a mirror to the world. It reflects its subject, but also the time and place of its creation.

You do not change the world by "fixing" the things art depicts; you can only do, if anything, the inverse: to change what art reveals about the world, you must change the world.

Certainly, you can produce art that tries to change the world, but it best does that by exposing the thing you seek to change, not by hiding it, whitewashing it, pretending it doesn't exist. You need to proclaim as loudly as you can within your art that some ugliness exists, shove it in the face of those who would view it, and be sure to make clear that it is wrong.

The videos and blogs attacking games, gaming, and gamers are therefor wrong, useless, and perhaps counterproductive. And the one video I saw was even factually inaccurate, mixing the simple depiction of modern depravity in distasteful forms with scenes that target those actions as being wrong and evil.

Directing unwarranted violence toward a person is bad. So is directing unwarranted hatred toward a large --and growing-- segment of the population. More people are born into this world in which computerized recreation is normal every day, and you don't "grow out of" your enjoyment of such. Within whatever might be considered the developed world, in another generation only those who shun computers entirely outside of the workplace will not be "gamers." By all indications, the things she attacked will still exist, so will still be part of their experience.