An explosive scandal is taking place amidst the audience of video game journalism that surrounds an indie game developer named Zoe Quinn. The controversy that has risen around Quinn involves alleged affairs between her and several men in the video game journalism circuit (including a staff writer from video game site Kotaku.) As Quinn is the developer of the video game Depression Quest, a Steam Greenlight game, her relationship to journalists who would be tasked with covering her game.
Many of these alleged affairs are only known of from her now ex-boyfriend, Eron Gjoni, who posted a long winded, winding post brimming with claims of infidelity against Quinn. Many of these claims come from a WordPress blog started August 16, 2014 from Gjoni called “The Zoe Post.”
Since these allegations have been made public, Zoe Quinn and others have weathered a massive storm of controversy and social media uproar.
Details and evidence of the claims of affairs seem somewhat thin on the ground and it’s difficult to see through the fog of rage and accusations. In the midst of the social media storm Phil Fish—best known for developing indie game Fez—engaged in defending Quinn on Twitter.
According to Know Your Meme, August 17, in reaction to the attention then directed towards him (on Twitter and other social media outlets) Fish replied with such tweets as “you’re essentially rapists.” A tweet that Fish quickly deleted after posting it.
By August 18, the controversy had spawned a meme surrounding the accusations of Quinn’s infidelity and multiple sex partners via a video produced by the Internet Aristocrat called “Quinnspiracy Theory: The Five Guys Saga.” The reference to Five Guys Burgers and Fries is barely veiled symbolism tied directly to the five me that Quinn’s ex-boyfriend outed as having allegedly been in affairs with Quinn herself. This meme quickly came into use by 4chan’s /v/ (video games) board in order to hide discussions about Quinn from the mods.
The meme attached to the controversy is problematic for a number of reasons, including the open airing of the sex life of an indie game developer instead of shining a spotlight on the story that gamers seem to be outraged about: the nepotism and horse-trading that occurs behind the scenes. The result has been a degrading and problematic discussion that puts more time on sensationalizing the nature of Quinn’s affairs with little natural discussion of the relationship between gaming journalists and game developers and publishers.
Numerous outlets, especially video game communities, have reacted poorly to discussions and conversations surrounding Quinn and the fallout attached to the extent that Reddit mods of /r/gaming began deleting threads regarding anything Quinn related.
The gaming press itself has suffered under suppression when it comes to reporting on the whole controversy as well. With GamesNosh publishing (then withdrawing, Pastebin article) an article on August 19th—the article “Zoe Quinn Scandal” persists.
One Reddit thread surrounding the scandal has survived, one dedicated to the Internet Aristocrat’s “Quinnspiracy” video. As mentioned above 4chan’s /v/ has been deleting conversations related to the scandal as well—possibly for the same reason Reddit has been wary—due to that the nature of the conversation inevitably twists towards flamebait and famewars about the personalities involved and not the ostensible subject presenters claim to want to discuss.
The entire scandal has continued to thunder on social media, primarily Twitter, and on smaller blogs across the video game journalism scene—with big publishers such as Kotaku, Rock, Paper, Scissors, among others, sitting it out.
Problematically, during the brunt of the scandal a YouTuber by the name of MundaneMatt opined about the goings-on and his video on the subject was hit by a DMCA takedown notice allegedly placed by Quinn herself. She had the video taken down because it displayed a still image from her game (a still image that is part of press materials released to publicize the game) the video, “Hell hath no fury like a lover’s scorn (RE-UPLOAD)”, has since been restored without the image.
TotalBiscuit wrote a lengthy post about the entire scandal as well, trying to tread carefully away from Quinn’s alleged affairs, although he roundly criticized the obvious nepotistic phenomena within video game journalism TotalBuiscuit came out most harshly against the DMCA takedown. This is because he himself has been the target of false DMCA takedowns on YouTube and he is primarily a video commentator and publisher on YouTube.
This story is still developing and the scandal surrounding Zoe Quinn, video game journalism in general, and the state of the industry.
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