Culture critic Anita Sarkeesian is desperately trying to get back into the gaming gig… again. The queen of consternation made tweets recently, indicating that she wants to dig her claws into one of the most highly anticipated games due out next year. She out-and-out requested CD Projekt Red to bring her on as a consultant for Cyberpunk 2077.
On June 16th, 2019 she tweeted out in reply to Ryan Boyd, who had his own thread criticizing CD Projekt Red’s explanation of body horror and the lack of sanctity for honoring one’s temple that essentially turns it into a profane display of degeneracy. Sarkeesian, nonplussed at the existential conversation regarding puritanism versus transhumanism, decided to hijack the topic to request a consultancy job at CD Projekt.
Hey @CDPROJEKTRED, I’m always available for consulting cause it sure sounds like you might need it before the whole of the internet drags you for what sounds like some potentially sexist representations… which we all know you’ve struggled with in the past 😬 https://t.co/MZmcUDhLR0
— Anita Sarkeesian (@anitasarkeesian) June 16, 2019
Sarkeesian then uses the opportunity to plug her own site, and promote her new consultancy outfit, which is designed to reshape the way people engage with interactive entertainment… or more realistically, convince people to disengage from a game that’s no longer made to be fun.
Video game designers! Let me help you avoid these kinds of mistakes. I want you to make the great games you’re envisioning while appealing to a broader audience (and that includes not offending entire market segments). https://t.co/juzcRj89wo
— Anita Sarkeesian (@anitasarkeesian) June 16, 2019
They want their game to be successful, not die
— Ruthven78 🕹 (@ruthven78) June 16, 2019
The fact that she would attempt to use E3 as leverage to peddle a pitch for a job at CD Projekt Red consulting on the upcoming Cyberpunk 2077, shows that she must be on hard times. Who knew that after spending seven years trying to ruin the gaming industry that it would make it far less profitable than when she began?
Her pleas for attention did not go unnoticed, though. The tweets also saw her getting called out by some gamers, especially those who are tired of games kowtowing to the ideologues while chasing after the phantom audience.
As some users pointed out in the thread, Sarkeesian tring to weasel her way into the warm embrace of other studios is a death knell for gaming.
She tried to same with TW3 and Kingdom come Deliverance
Both of them were game of the year without her— KeenGaze (@KeenGaze) June 16, 2019
PLEASE NOTICE ME
PLEASE
THE INTERNET STOPPED PAYING ATTENTION TO ME
I JUST WANT TO BE RELEVANT
WHY WONT YOU LISTEN— The Father (@Greekfuck) June 16, 2019
“Nice big title you have there CDPR with #Cyberpunk2077 . It would be a shame if I smear your game and your video game company as being racist and sexist bigots. I’ve got the video game media on my side so you better hire me.” pic.twitter.com/RGWOrb9wua
— Mad Lucied, Embodiments of Mokkori Core Values (@magi_slayer) June 16, 2019
But gamers calling out Sarkeesian for the perceived grift on CD Projekt Red was just one of many attempts by Sarkeesian to squeeze into the dress of relevancy during this year’s E3.
She was also recently indignant that Electronic Arts didn’t contribute money to her ever shrinking coffers, making a tweet on June 8th during the weekend of the EA Play event lamenting the company’s negligence of unimportant non-profit organizations.
Don’t get me wrong, these big companies need to speak up & fund initiatives that end online harassment but those of us who were canaries in the coalmine, who sacrificed to make sure people recognized this dire problem, we are not remembered when it’s politically safe to speak up
— Anita Sarkeesian (@anitasarkeesian) June 8, 2019
There’s like a mix of scorn and greed wrapped up in a seething sense of irrelevance packaged into those two tweets.
Nevertheless, the snickering over her ever-fading presence in the gaming industry was sadly thwarted slightly by her mish-mash of statistics regarding gender representation at E3, which was accompanied by a pie chart detailing how many female protagonists were presented at this year’s event.
She had another short tweet chain present on June 14th, 2019 with the data, which is a poor man’s sequel based on last year’s gender representation chart she rolled out for E3, which promptly got torn apart by any and everyone who was unwilling to buy into propaganda.
This year’s #E3 was the second worst year for female representations since we started collecting this data five years ago. Not a great sign for the state of the industry. https://t.co/zLE6Xvho1f pic.twitter.com/piaAZbztQD
— Anita Sarkeesian (@anitasarkeesian) June 14, 2019
We’ve seen a significant jump in games with multiple character options, and that’s great, but it should be in tandum with games that are starring solo female characters, not in place of. It’s important we have opportunities to play through stories about women and their lives.
— Anita Sarkeesian (@anitasarkeesian) June 14, 2019
This kind of gender identity politicking in gaming has turned the entire conversation regarding female protagonists in Western games into a toxic minefield of anger and disgruntlement. Plenty of games that tried to follow in the footsteps laid out by Sarkeesian have managed to do little more than devalue the brand or end up on the Get Woke; Go Broke – Master List.
Seeing Sarkeesian focus only on misrepresenting the games at E3 for an opportunity to shovel in more of the identitarian bullcrap does nothing but ignite the ire within the very souls of normal people.
The good part is that so far CD Projekt Red hasn’t reacted to her… yet. Hopefully it stays that way until the game launches on Xbox One, PS4, and PC next year on April 16th, 2020.
(Thanks for the news tips Mad Lucied and johntrine)