[Phredreeke]

Hot take: the reason left wingers aren’t posting about politics here is that left wing discourse is permitted if not encouraged at just about every gaming forum out there.

[Hendricks266]

Reaper_Man, on 10 November 2022 - 04:35 PM, said:

Hendricks -
I am fully aware that there is not only no will, but no interest, in - using your words - palatability. I said earlier that I am under no delusion that anything will change, ever, and I truly mean that.

But isn't that pretty much admitting that the "heart and soul" you're defending... is unpalatable?

This is what I was getting at with the chipotle mayo. Some people prefer to stick with what is bland, milquetoast, corporate... That's okay I guess. But don't yuck our yum.

Reaper_Man, on 10 November 2022 - 04:35 PM, said:

It's interesting you choose They Live as a reference point, considering that movie is pretty explicitly anti-Reaganism. I wonder what you'd see looking around here, all things considered. I know everyone assumes they are the hero of the story, but...

Two terms of Reagan and another of H.W. so thoroughly infected the political mainstream that today the D's appeal to the same fake, California/Hollywood, corporate "tradition"/"authority" as he did.

Clinton was decently loved as a "cool" liberal president but he did plenty of bad shit in the same vein, think parental advisory stickers and repealing Glass-Steagall.

Then we had W.

Reaper_Man, on 10 November 2022 - 04:35 PM, said:

On that note, I am tickled that you don't see the brand of conformity and groupthink present here. The camaraderie, as you put it. The fact that someone can post 1 meme counter to it (one that you have to admit is mild compared to plenty of other posts in this very thread) and people are so incensed that I'm immediately attacked and insulted. Now to be clear that didn't bother me, I say that because among the pages and pages and pages and pages - literal thousands of comments - of right-wing posts on this forum, 1 comment from 1 person challenges it, and everyone goes into a tailspin? Come on. That is so fragile it's hilarious.

Believe me, I've experienced toxicity in this place. I would say I've become stronger from the pressure Forge has applied in the past. Don't mind Radar, you may be interested in the mute functionality.

You're experiencing a common social phenomenon: when a nail sticks out, people will try to hammer it into conformity. Don't conform. Give 'em an ass-blasting.

I had a laugh at Dark Brandon's L btw.

Reaper_Man, on 10 November 2022 - 04:35 PM, said:

As for your final point, it presupposes that everyone comes here to discuss Duke Nukem the character and not EDuke the game engine.

That's kind of what I was getting at by "related topics". I also considered working in the phrase "games where you blow up living things into little bits" in contrast to unfiltered dialogue on the forums.

Reaper_Man, on 10 November 2022 - 04:35 PM, said:

There was like 15 games at Realms Deep using GZDoom, wouldn't you like to see more than 2 representing EDuke?

Yes.

jkas789, on 10 November 2022 - 07:07 PM, said:

To Danukem and Hendricks:

While I appreciate the effort you went to explain your thoughts, you both should really not be falling for this low quality bait.

msleeper has been part of the community for more than two decades. You bet I'm going to take what she says seriously.

[jkas789]

Quote

msleeper has been part of the community for more than two decades. You bet I'm going to take what she says seriously.

And that is your prerogative. I just think it's clear to everyone here that msleeper. Reaper-man, whatever was baiting for a reaction.

Anyways I have a very important question if you don't mind Hendricks. As a latino living in the USA do you know beef head tacos? Is that a thing over there or is that not a thing? I have been wondering for years but nobody has been able to answer me decisively if the taco restaurants over there keep to the good old recipes or not. My own taco experiences so far in California, Arizona New York and Washington have been less than stellar in terms of taco variety. There is no beef tongue tacos, or beef cheek tacos. The head and the tripe seem to be woefully wasted over in gringo land.

[Phredreeke]

Let me tell you a story. It’s about a little boy called John Cena, not to be confused by the wrestler/actor John Cena. John loved playing Halo with his friends and calling other people the N-word on Xbox Live.

Then when John grew up, he realised he didn’t want to be John anymore. John would identify as a girl and take the new name Joanne after her favourite author. However Joanne’s friends rejected her new identity. So Joanne found new friends, who accepted her new identity but it came as a cost, Joanne had to shun her old self, as the edgelord calling people the N-word on Xbox Live, and adopt the religion of social justice. Joanne accepted that, after all her new friends accepted her as she saw herself, and the people who she used to play Halo with would call her slurs and say they identified as an attack helicopter. Joanne would go on to make the same demands on others as her friends made to her and she would even disavow her own father for refusing to get rid of his very dangerous AR-15.

The moral of the story is the “right wing” could just have accepted Joanne for who she was and then she wouldn’t have turned into such a massive pain in the back for everyone else.

[Reaper_Man]

Phredreeke, on 11 November 2022 - 12:08 PM, said:

Hot take: the reason left wingers aren’t posting about politics here is that left wing discourse is permitted if not encouraged at just about every gaming forum out there.

This take is so cold that it's the same temperature in both Fahrenheit and Celsius. I can read this take almost verbatim on 100 different websites from 100 different people every day of the week. This is the quintessential "I'm a capital-G Gamer™ because SJWs and gamergate and pronouns in bio, nyea!" hot take. It's also a perfect encapsulation of the right-wing victim complex mentality, because when you say "left-wing discourse" what you mean is "not explicitly right-wing discourse". Your idea of what a "left-winger" looks like is so skewed by 4chan and "free speech absolutism" that you see liberal boogeymen everywhere, and I suspect you don't even realize it. This is what I said to Dan; negative-B is not necessarily the same as positive-A.

A few of my hobbies seem to have an inordinate number of conservatives in them, conservative men in particular, and they love to "joke about politics". None of the jokes are very good, but they try nonetheless. The funny thing is that, the absolute microsecond that you make fun of their politics, they go into a ballistic meltdown. They cannot handle any sort of push-back, any sort of criticism, and take "just jokes" their direction as the deepest personal insult. The woodworkers in particular are the worst about this. You'd think guys who work with their hands would have thicker skin.

I've had that interaction dozens and dozens of times over the years, and gamer forums with "right-wing discourse" remind me almost identically to those experiences. I'll at least give Duke4 credit, usually the other online groups conveniently remember they have a "no politics" rule that only gets enforced when there's politics posts that goes against the groupthink.

Hendricks266, on 11 November 2022 - 12:10 PM, said:

post

I assure you that I'm not in any way offended or upset by any comments or toxicity or ass-blasting. You have to know I wouldn't be stirring the pot if I was. Besides, I've heard worse things from people I actually like and respect.

This is really tangential, but I think Carpenter would pretty explicitly disagree with your assessment. His exact words were "a criticism of unrestrained capitalism". Reaganomics and the "greed is good" policies of the yuppies and the 80s Republican party that frankly hasn't gone away. It's not "the liberal Hollywood elite are now the ruling class and so they're now who the aliens are". You don't have to take my word for it, Carpenter has been somewhat outspoken about the it after the movie and its iconography being co-opted by the alt-right in recent years. Dare I say that if it came out today, it would be denigrated as being "woke".

I'm not yucking your yum, I'm just pointing out that "avoiding palatability at all costs" results in an inherently unpalatable end product. It's more like if you open a steakhouse where they're all served well done with ketchup, just because that's the way you like them. And then when every customer tells you that's a terrible way to have steak, you respond "heh well you're free to associate somewhere else if you don't like it". Like... Yeah, we know that. That isn't the part of the interaction that made no sense. It's trying to sell steaks that almost nobody likes.

You don't have to tell me about the gentrification or the corporate-ization of creativity in the social media era. I think it's gross that I have to maintain a professional social media presence, and routinely use terms like "brand" and phrases like "content creation" that have no real meaning. I mourn the death of the webforum era and the written tutorial. Every time someone points me to a video tutorial about a math formula or a programming problem, I die inside. But the thing is, just because you don't like the game doesn't mean you get bonus points for not playing. As an individual, sure. My personal social medias are in no way professional. But we aren't talking about an individual. We're talking about... the brand, EDuke. The brand, Duke4.

I'm not just talking about the forums either. Dan, this is more re: your comment. You can't say "oh well the forum is different, because most people use the Discord now", especially when there's a big button at the top that links to it. It's the same circus. At least once a week I hear about some gossip of what happened in the Duke4 Discord or get sent some screenshot of people just being genuine pieces of shit to each other. I get told how the off topic channel is the most active on the server, and it's filled with the same right-wing vitriol you find here. I don't even ask for this stuff, because none of it surprises me. I've made an active and intentional decision not to be part of the Duke4 Discord because of this, even though part of me feels like I probably should be (although I have no idea how much or how little dev/CON questions or discussion happens). But I made this decision because A.) I don't want to be associated with that kind of just utter garbage, but even if that wasn't the case then B.) it just fucking sucks to be around as an average user. Again - well adjusted people don't act like that. And they don't want to be around it, either. You're not 4chan. You're not SomethingAwful.

An easy cynical response to this is something about "family friendly" or "selling out", but we're not talking about setting up a Disney World attraction. You can't honestly tell me that "the culture" of Duke4 is objectively more hostile and less welcoming than its counterparts, and that that's a non-zero part of the reason for the community stagnation. And that that's more valuable to you than growth.

I guess what I'm trying to say is: I don't know how you can square up wanting to grow the EDuke brand, with wanting to maintain a culture of radical free speech absolutism where toxicity is treated as an immutable trait that everyone just has to accept. If you want to reach a broader audience - which I 100% believe you're sincere when you say yes - then you have to appeal to that broader audience. If you want to sell steaks, you have to realize most people don't share your very niche palate.




Unrelated, but I've had other friends on this board tell me how people will act one way "in public", and then have DM conversations with a completely different personality or persona. I thought this was weird and wasn't entirely sure what they meant and thought this was probably an exaggeration. Then I had someone in this thread send me a DM essentially explaining how they put on a show by trolling the forum but don't believe any of the stuff they say. Like they have to put in airs and be a right-wing troll to fit in. I'll let this person reveal themselves if they want, but... That's fucking psychotic. Everything about that is insane. I don't know what to say, that's why I didn't reply. Just stop? Stop pretending to be someone you're not for social clout among people whose entire identity is "being an asshole, because that's my right"? And if everyone suddenly attacks you for it, then congrats, now you understand the problem? Clearly Phredreeke thinks that maturing is cringe, but if you aren't also an emotional adolescent, then I'm sure you'll see the benefits in improving yourself.

[Phredreeke]

Reaper_Man, on 11 November 2022 - 03:30 PM, said:

Your idea of what a "left-winger" looks like is so skewed by 4chan and "free speech absolutism" that you see liberal boogeymen everywhere, and I suspect you don't even realize it. This is what I said to Dan; negative-B is not necessarily the same as positive-A.

I am a fucking left-winger. I’d side with Bernie Sanders on 90% of issues. But no one is getting banned anywhere for saying “healthcare is a human right”. What would have happened had I gone on Doomworld and said “hey, I think it was stupid of Kyle Rittenhouse to go out during the riots but those shootings were clearly in self-defense”. I’d be deleted quicker than Hillary deleted Seth Rich.

Reaper_Man, on 11 November 2022 - 03:30 PM, said:

Clearly Phredreeke thinks that maturing is cringe, but if you aren't also an emotional adolescent, then I'm sure you'll see the benefits in improving yourself.

I find that the people who obsess about maturity tend to be very immature individuals.

[Aristotle Gumball]

Reaper_Man, on 11 November 2022 - 03:30 PM, said:

Then I had someone in this thread send me a DM essentially explaining how they put on a show by trolling the forum but don't believe any of the stuff they say. Like they have to put in airs and be a right-wing troll to fit in. I'll let this person reveal themselves if they want, but... That's fucking psychotic. Everything about that is insane. I don't know what to say, that's why I didn't reply. Just stop? Stop pretending to be someone you're not for social clout among people whose entire identity is "being an asshole, because that's my right"? And if everyone suddenly attacks you for it, then congrats, now you understand the problem? Clearly Phredreeke thinks that maturing is cringe, but if you aren't also an emotional adolescent, then I'm sure you'll see the benefits in improving yourself.

I didn't say I was doing it for clout & I genuinely don't give a shit about that. I told you it was mostly for fun. I've run around in circles with just about anyone worth talking to on here. They know I can't hold my tongue. Instead you should've focused on the part about mental illness (in a way you have, but I'm far from the only psycho on Duke4). That said, you did make me realize by how you were interpreting me as "another right wing troll" that I probably let myself be corrupted, at least in some part of my consciousness, although I basically act the same as I've always acted IRL.

It's just hard reading back that thread I linked you because I was actually being 100% genuine there. I kinda pushed it out of my mind. Then reading it again (because your arguments reminded me), it's like it snapped me back to reality and now I wonder why the fuck I keep coming back here.

The honest truth is probably it's because I get to say almost anything I want without consequence. But is that something I want or need in my life to become a better person? No.

We'll see if I stay away for good now, but I wish someone would just ban this account or something because it would probably help.

Honestly, I've never been on a website or any community, or like, any physical space with other people in it that I could just shit on someone with impunity. No self respecting admin should allow a random person that barely contributed to their forum to use their RL photo for the creation of humiliating memes, for example. Yet it's happened. Maybe it was a minor nuisance at best, I don't know. You should think about other members, though. I've like, genuinely HARMED people here (like the Aussie kid who threatened to kill himself) and had to apologize to them later. If I ran my own site, I'd definitely have banned a guy like myself.

Maybe I've provided some amusement or insight at times, but mental illness shouldn't be an excuse to keep someone around. Sometimes getting rid of them is actually doing them a kindness.

Do yourselves a kindness too. I derail threads and keep a lot of these crazy conversations going.

Btw, when Radar was removed, so was the thread for his mod. I can't remember what mod it was now (haven't checked if it's been restored), but I thought it was fucking ridiculous that he gets banned and I don't, when I've probably caused more numerous and egregious infractions (and have been around for much less time, since Hendricks seems to care about veterans). Radar actually likes it here, is personally friendly and gives second chances, etc. He's way more of a team player.

By contrast I literally never change unless absolutely forced by outside factors. Gotta say it's been important to realize it as it makes me question who I really am. Like who are you really when you get away with most things, owing to a perhaps above average linguistic ability? I don't want that to be the way society operates, but I admit I'm a hypocrite because I do this. I totally exploit social resources when they're allotted to me. I don't feel shame at all. If I hurt someone I feel bad, but because broader social controls don't work on me, I end up hurting people anyway.

Only online, mind you! Tons of vulnerable people out there, though, and that's who is being driven away. People that would actually be decent conversationalists and contributors to the forum without being aggressive assholes. God knows, maybe even a girl would show up. But yea that's all I've gotta say.

[Balls of Steel Forever]

I am active in a discord for mental illness, and am active only there, the kink community and here.
I would say that this is one of the most welcoming communities I've ever been in.
( I am also a radical left winger)
even more welcoming than the mental illness discord.

And that is a boon and a curse.
I do like it here quite a bit, and I hope it doesn't change much.

[Balls of Steel Forever]

oops.

[Danukem]

Reaper_Man, on 11 November 2022 - 03:30 PM, said:

I'm not just talking about the forums either. Dan, this is more re: your comment. You can't say "oh well the forum is different, because most people use the Discord now", especially when there's a big button at the top that links to it. It's the same circus. At least once a week I hear about some gossip of what happened in the Duke4 Discord or get sent some screenshot of people just being genuine pieces of shit to each other. I get told how the off topic channel is the most active on the server, and it's filled with the same right-wing vitriol you find here.

I look at the off topic posts for the funny memes from time to time, and it sure doesn't seem to be filled with right-wing vitriol. Occasionally there is a right-leaning comment or meme. Perhaps I'm just looking at the wrong times and missing it? Or perhaps that person who is sending you a screenshot once per week is carefully watching every post that rolls by and screenshotting any meme or comment that makes fun of progressives? The two main people who moderate there are certainly not right-wingers. I think mblackwell is the most active of the moderators there, and he is a very respectable and stalwart man of the left -- he posts his own political comments from time to time. It's not plausible that he would allow right-wing hate speech or for the channel to be completely dominated by the right as you suggest.

Reaper_Man, on 11 November 2022 - 03:30 PM, said:

I guess what I'm trying to say is: I don't know how you can square up wanting to grow the EDuke brand, with wanting to maintain a culture of radical free speech absolutism where toxicity is treated as an immutable trait that everyone just has to accept. If you want to reach a broader audience - which I 100% believe you're sincere when you say yes - then you have to appeal to that broader audience. If you want to sell steaks, you have to realize most people don't share your very niche palate.

Since you are speaking to me personally -- The way I need to broaden the audience for my EDuke32 projects is to actually do the work of promoting them more broadly and try to engage with the larger gaming community. If I had the time and energy, I would have a Twitch channel where I played Eduke32 games including my own, as well as posting good content on my YT channel, not to mention getting DT on steam. Things like that. As it is, I have a regular full time job and a family, so I'm lucky if I can get a few hours a week to check on bug reports and write some new code. I'm sure you know how it is, having just released a big, high quality project yourself. I'm fairly pleased that despite doing basically nothing to promote my projects, I still get a steady stream of new players. But I would like to do more.

I strongly disagree with your proposition that I "maintain a culture of radical free speech absolutism where toxicity is treated as an immutable trait that everyone just has to accept". That's a straw man.

If I ever said that I was a free speech absolutist then I was wrong. Any responsible person who has had to grapple with free speech issues learns sooner or later that it has to be more complicated than that. But yes I would call myself a free speech advocate.

Creators can and should have a moral compass. Even if I believed (which I don't) that running a much more censorious discord for my projects would lead to more players, I wouldn't do it. I hope you draw the conclusion that we have nothing more to discuss on that front.

[Danukem]

Aristotle Gumball, on 11 November 2022 - 04:27 PM, said:

Honestly, I've never been on a website or any community, or like, any physical space with other people in it that I could just shit on someone with impunity. No self respecting admin should allow a random person that barely contributed to their forum to use their RL photo for the creation of humiliating memes, for example. Yet it's happened. Maybe it was a minor nuisance at best, I don't know. You should think about other members, though. I've like, genuinely HARMED people here (like the Aussie kid who threatened to kill himself) and had to apologize to them later. If I ran my own site, I'd definitely have banned a guy like myself.

IIRC, you and "the Aussie kid" were both flaming each other in DMs (I only know this because you both complained to me about each other), and at least one of you was editing your DMs after the fact to make the other look worse. I mean yeah, fuck both of you I guess, in retrospect. I own up to that being a mistake -- if anything like that happens again, heads are going to roll.

Regarding the RL photo, it was a mistake that you were merely warned and the posts were removed, rather than being banned. My guess is that the admin in question didn't ban you because they felt that it was merely a nuissance and didn't want to be the one to pull the trigger because it would appear biased. But if you need proof that we have learned from that, you can try something like that again now and I promise you will get banned right away. Same goes for anyone else.

But here's the thing -- sometimes mistakes have good consequences. Yes, it was a mistake to not ban you, but then you exiled yourself and when you eventually came back, you made some valuable contributions to some interesting discussions (you may say you don't care and it doesn't matter, but I disagree). So I do appreciate you even if you decide to leave again, and even if you should have been banned back then.

[Phredreeke]

This thread is OGAY

[Forge]

This thread is hilarious

[Aristotle Gumball]

Danukem, on 11 November 2022 - 09:55 PM, said:

But here's the thing -- sometimes mistakes have good consequences. Yes, it was a mistake to not ban you, but then you exiled yourself and when you eventually came back, you made some valuable contributions to some interesting discussions (you may say you don't care and it doesn't matter, but I disagree). So I do appreciate you even if you decide to leave again, and even if you should have been banned back then.

[ck3D]

In a way just being the messenger here but I would like to emphasize on how effectively bad the general vibe check is - it's not a myth and it's absolutely not so visible online since those chats mostly happen between mappers and modders internally (two communities that coexist and overlap but really are distinct), but I know for a fact many mappers have quit the website and/or scene due to how toxic Duke4 supposedly was, or looked, throughout the years. Now we know some people can mentally need scapegoat type of justifications but I also don't think they can just make this shit up either. I won't name anyone in particular but off the top of my head right now I can probably think of over a dozen people, and before any cutely vocal weak shit tries replying to this with some 'well that's on them for not being able to hang' type of middle-schooler levels of tired logic then I hope they can consciously check on themselves and what they really bring to the table of this community they claim at the end of the day; we're talking about waste of talent vs. waste of air.

Hendricks from your activity I genuinely think you're a rather intelligent person and so if I may be honest, I was baffled that you posted this:

Quote

You seem to suggest that because we do our own thing and don't blindly follow the mold, that we should debase what makes us unique and change into another cookie cutter discussion board in the name of palatability. All this would achieve is to gut the heart and soul of the place, and only then would it be truly dead.

Who is this 'we' you're talking about? This community doesn't need to be represented under some flag and suffices by just existing as the sum of its actors. Why try and distort that into something it's not, why try and handicraft the anti-image of a partially constructed caricature of Doomworld (when I can assure you most Duke mappers and modders are so Build obsessed they give close to zero shit about Doomworld). That's just getting in the way of everyone's real talent and true personality, especially when it comes to the point where people lack self-confidence so much they basically feel like they have to establish cliché personas. Anything more artificial than raw output is pollution if you ask me.

Now I'm not saying this place sucks at all as it can be welcoming and comfortable to so many profiles, everyone deserves to communicate and exchange and interact with others and as soon as etiquette is preserved then the overall anarchy also has its perks. Something I seriously wish would go would be such heavy use of the R-word or loose one of terms pertaining to autism (say, just really to express how a product is really good - or bad). I'm not saying I would like to see that moderated, I just wish there always were more general progress in the world at large regarding those topics, and that's hindered by the noise of imbeciles who regress by persisting against common sense for reasons that really only concern themselves. Usually, too, every reader but the poster themselves will be able to read the exact amount of bullshit in their persona and so the outcome is just raw cringe every time.

Ironically that's not too dissimilar to what keeps giving this website a bad name when there really is a pretty awesome variety of unique creative profiles on here who would deserve to shine in another way than playing e-Super Macho Man on a fucking Duke 3D port message board. A lot of the occasional pseudo-edgy gatekeeping I see (I know it's not as bad as the tip of the iceberg makes it look to some, but the general shape does protrude) is against a non-existent enemy and as such will creatively lead nowhere. What this community needs I think is this platform to remain at the very least positive enough to keep attracting creatives, otherwise the community might grow more fractured, disjointed and diluted (and then have fun gatekeeping that). Self-consuming organism type of logic.

At the end of the day all this is just noise too but hopefully constructive. Being honest one last time but what this place inspires to me mostly is misery, and that's fine. Misery is part of the world as some kind of default state and from that point on, everyone needs uplifting things to work their way up, regardless of how miserable those things themselves. Every step ahead and up is a positive and that's why people are drawn to entertainment and gaming so much. I think that's fine to admit and weakness in general isn't something to be ashamed of or pretend isn't there (everyone knows it is anyway). Misery exists to be recognized and that's how you win over it. It's also what I hope to solve at least in a humble part and for a brief moment in people/players every time I launch Mapster. That's also nothing exclusive to this platform at all, to be absolutely fair - there's a shitload of misery on the Internet in general (I'm always tempted to perceive it as some sort of receptacle or cesspool that can reflect the good but also the very worst in people). Regardless of the shirt color some like to claim on Doomworld or on here, whether one likes it or not, it's all part of the same human pattern. Personally I don't mind and can even enjoy reading whoever the fuck's mindless banter but a lot of that energy I also (ideally) wish were better directed and actually used creatively.

Got to think about the larger picture too. The Internet is an extension and a reflection of our world (regardless of how corrupted) and so it would make sense that the past few years online in general have been fucking depressing. The world has publicly been going to shit and thus there has been an effective overabundance of matter for everyone to become wild about.

[Forge]

ck3D, on 12 November 2022 - 05:07 AM, said:

before any cutely vocal weak shit tries replying to this with some 'well that's on them for not being able to hang' type of middle-schooler levels of tired logic then I hope they can consciously check on themselves and what they really bring to the table of this community they claim at the end of the day; we're talking about waste of talent vs. waste of air.

challenge accepted

ck3D, on 12 November 2022 - 05:07 AM, said:

I know for a fact many mappers have quit the website and/or scene due to how toxic Duke4 supposedly was, or looked, throughout the years.
I won't name anyone in particular but off the top of my head right now I can probably think of over a dozen people

frenchies are known for their retreat skills

[Aristotle Gumball]

ck3D, that was really well written. I hope anyone relevant here actually takes time to read and digest what you said.

[ck3D]

Forge, on 12 November 2022 - 08:59 AM, said:

challenge accepted

I know you're poking fun and all, but this is a good opportunity to remind you (if even needed) that you've been of great help to this community, Forge. Be it your steady, yet long-running stream of map reviews on various websites years ago, your general help on here, or direct substantial contribution via your own maps. It's actually really cool having you around these parts after all these years still.

Forge, on 12 November 2022 - 08:59 AM, said:

frenchies are known for their retreat skills

Before I sneak back behind the bushes and pretend no conflict ever happened, now I have to specify those were mappers from all around the world and of all kinds of backgrounds, whether geographically or socially. That's definitely taking your comment too seriously already but unfortunately I had to go there before someone turns this into an actual Americans vs. Europeans type of deal or some other phantasmal competition of teams and factions when at the end of the day everyone really wishes and yearns for the same things. Now I bet you didn't notice me gradually amplifying my voice throughout this whole post in order to mask how I've really been slowly but safely retreating back this whole time!

[Radar]

Just want to point out, in case it's been memory-holed already, that there actually was a significant effort to make this forum more palatable, and it was when the Outhouse was created, and also a more gradual increase in strictness as Ion Fury approached its commercial release, up until the ResetEra scandal after which I think the moderators just gave up. As a result of that scandal, non-members still can't see avatars, profiles, reputation, etc. unless they are signed in, as an effort to make the forum more palatable to non-members. The attempt to tame the culture of this forum totally failed, as historically the majority of members here were sh!tposters, and when moderation became more strict, a handful of them left (or were banned), and all that was left were just fewer sh!tposters, but still sh!tposters.

It's not even hard to moderate a forum where insults and threats are not permitted. Thousands of forums do this, in a just plain common sense fashion. But it's near impossible to implement on duke4.net as it is so against the culture, as repeat offenders never get the boot. Just calling out two posters that I absolutely love, Jimmy and Person of Color, who are/were probably the leading sh!tposters on this site, have never been permabanned, being seen as cherished members by even some moderation staff. It would be simple to implement common sense rules on this forum, but it would have to be applied equally across the board. Basically, the only rule on duke4.net is that you get banned when a moderator finds you enough of a nuisance, not based on any principles or objective standard.

Anyway, to comment on Reaper_Man's point again, the toxicity of duke4.net is hardly the reason there are not more Duke mods. If Duke was a more popular game, there would be other active Duke forums, and on those forums they would be hyper left-wing and make more mods, if you're inclined to believe political affiliation inspires creative content. But those competing forums don't exist because Duke is not popular. More content exists for Doom because Doom is more popular. It really is that simple.

[Forge]

ck3D, on 12 November 2022 - 09:55 AM, said:

those were mappers from all around the world and of all kinds of backgrounds, whether geographically or socially.

a lot of those people that created the 'problem' are long gone - along with the people they ran off. But reputations have a tendency of maintaining a long shelf life.

It had more to do with the 'problem' people being assholes, and not some tin-foil hat 'right-wing free-speech is the problem' delusion.

Duke4 forum has been dying for quite some time, it has almost nothing to do with a 'toxic environment' so much as it has to do with the duke nukem brand dying. If anything that 'game' that was released over a decade ago did more to kill the community with it's cringe-inducing toxicity than anything anybody on this forum did or said to another forum member.
Technology and trends have also changed during that decade and the majority of the activity is on discord now - which I almost never go to. I post here because I'm comfortable with the people who still hang out here. At least most of them, aside from the troublemakers that stir up non-existent problems because they're bored and want to flex.

This thread (after the split) ran the gambit of social, religious, medical, and political issues with only a few instances of the temperature getting turned up, but nobody outright bullied anybody else or became 'toxic'. Not until somebody posted that they hoped a specific political party did well and that triggered somebody else.

If the admin here wanted to attract more people to the forum, they'd re-brand it to IonFury.net after they release their next commercial game & other than pushing all the older build games to subforums, nothing else would have to change.
Pretty sure the only reason they even keep this site around is for a back-up communication location & they have a website they can use to advertise their work.

[Aristotle Gumball]

Forge, on 12 November 2022 - 10:47 AM, said:

If the admin here wanted to attract more people to the forum, they'd re-brand it to IonFury.net after they release their next commercial game

Great idea IMO.

[Phredreeke]

I still haven’t gotten any answer as to why EDuke32 wasn’t as big as (G)ZDoom before any of the culture war stuff happened

[Forge]

Phredreeke, on 12 November 2022 - 11:39 AM, said:

I still haven’t gotten any answer as to why EDuke32 wasn’t as big as (G)ZDoom before any of the culture war stuff happened

a port for a older, more popular game that had about 6 more years of development and is way easier to work with?

https://magic-8ball.com/

reply hazy, try again

[Phredreeke]

Can I have an answer from someone who isn’t an alt-righter?

[Forge]

Phredreeke, on 12 November 2022 - 12:23 PM, said:

Can I have an answer from someone who isn’t an alt-righter?

lol
bad news.

allegedly everyone here is an alt-righter


even you

[DNSkill]

It’s beginning to look a lot like Christmas.

[Reaper_Man]

Danukem, on 11 November 2022 - 09:33 PM, said:

Since you are speaking to me personally

Actually sorry if I was unclear, I was responding directly to Hendricks, but you both brought up the Discord so my response specifically related to that was really directed to both of your comments. I don't know who runs what, "runs" I'm sure a very loose concept to begin with. My question - how does "the decision making body of developers and community managers" reconcile "wanting to grow the brand" while "maintaining The Culture"? - was directed to him, but I suppose goes for anyone in that capacity.

And since I don't think I was clear, I've specifically asked people not to keep me up to date with the going on of the Duke4 discord, because I really could not be less interested. You're right, I have a lot more important things to be doing with my time than gossiping about a server I've no real interest in being apart of. From what the lurkers reading this thread have said to me directly, it's basically because I'm in opposition and vocal, where most people just don't wanna deal with it and would rather pretend like there isn't a problem. See that's why no one complains...

Danukem, on 11 November 2022 - 09:33 PM, said:

[. . .] Perhaps I'm just looking at the wrong times and missing it? [. . .]

... Because at best the response they get is "what problem?", at worst they paint a target on their backs [more on this later].

I think a more likely answer is you're unaware of your own biases and how they affect your judgement. You essentially confirm this by later all but saying "moderation is censorship", itself the most ludicrous example of free speech absolutism. Of course we all know there are no real free speech absolutists, sooner or later they all find their line, again something you said yourself. For example, this week we discovered that Elon Musk, a verbatim self-described free speech absolutist, his line is people impersonating him on the internet. But he didn't stop being "a free speech absolutist" when he made this decision, he just metamorphosed into the final stage - a hypocrite. My point here being that of course you don't see trolling which aligns with your worldview as trolling because of your worldview. I'm sure you'll disagree, but the thing about believing in extreme concepts is you don't think they're that extreme. And the other thing about them is that we both know there's nothing I could say to change your mind - That's the conclusion you want me to draw, I'll be wasting my time. You're dug-in; you have righteous justification. You're protecting people's rights and freedoms on... an internet chatroom 🎉🎉 The world is saved, I feel so much safer knowing I can harass people using subversive language and line-toeing rules lawyering.

But don't worry, I'm not in the business of trying to change people's opinions, I just don't have the disposition for it. It's just a shame you're not capable of an objective look of your own absurd views, that coupled with your station, the effects that it has. Maybe the impending implosion of Twitter under Musk's "free speech advocacy" policies may give you a glimpse. But if I was a gambler, I'd have money on you cheering it on "because cancel culture and blue haired ess-jay-double-yous on the bird app are destroying freeze peach", or... something.



As for painting targets on backs, this is how it ties back around to the community being predominately right-wing culture war reactionaries:

Spoiler

Conservatism above all else dictates that the world exists as a hierarchy, and that everyone in that hierarchy know their place. Not only that, but that the hierarchy is natural and immutable. This is the fundamental basis of the opposition of anything they perceive as "forced inclusion" or "compelled speech" or "wokeness" or any other number of culture war buzzwords. The big fish eat the little fish, someone is the CEO and someone else cleans the toilets, some people get to be rich because they earned it and some people get to be poor because they didn't, and that's the way the world works, and anyone who suggests changing this system is therefore suggesting we change nature itself, and therefore is the be ridiculed and opposed. Nothing terrifies you more than undeservedly slipping down the hierarchy you see as a natural order.

The opposition really stems from a fear of themselves losing their place in the hierarchy. This is why conservatives will advocate for the powerful - say, opposing taxing the wealthy - while they themselves are not and will never be in that class. They may never be the big fish at the top, but they feel safe and secure in never being at the bottom and being eaten. They fear undeservedly becoming the ones cleaning the toilets, because someone has to do it but it shouldn't be them. This is why conservatism opposes "unfair advantage", but doesn't blink an eye on what they see as natural disadvantage. The person cleaning the toilets is doing that job because that's where they're supposed to be. Only bad things happen to people who deserve it, right?

To challenge the system, to suggest the system itself is flawed, is therefore to imply people in their "natural" level on the hierarchy are also flawed. Because to them there's no possible way any of this could be true, then means that you, the person leveling the complaint, are the problem. Not just a problem - a threat. A threat to the natural order itself.

[ck3D]

Phredreeke, on 12 November 2022 - 12:23 PM, said:

Can I have an answer from someone who isn’t an alt-righter?

May not be an answer but instead a honest question from someone who mostly lived inside the Build bubble for quite some time: what is the historical timeline of the progression of both Build and Doom engines? My personal understanding so far is people (obviously) have been mapping for both games, logically according to the respective popularity of each, ever since they first dropped, but I'm curious about the later technical advancements all the independent crews working on ports took it upon themselves to bring. I've dropped in and out of this community several times over the past two decades and so my timeline probably is full of holes, but I feel like for maybe a few years eDuke and Mapster32 were ahead of the curve, establishing and dictating a lot of trends GZDoom eventually picked up on. Which actually has generated some creative output I've seen before and could barely believe was not Build/Mapster at first sight (I'm not implying that's not cool, because it is - Mapster is cool and the whole phenomenon is interesting). As a whole GZDoom probably is the most convenient, bang-for-your-buck editor to use out of the two, but I feel like that's mostly if one wants to make rather pedestrian levels, no? A lot of the most conceptual designs by essence to this day are still Build-only if you're going to want sector-over-sector magic (which I'm aware is a niche taste in itself, but it's Build's) instead of different tricks and simulations. I get that you can pull off all kinds of abstract Doom shit (base Doom itself being very abstract) but the process and end product just won't be the exact same thing, it's just two styles. But honestly I'm not even sure why a war between the two scenes needs to exist. Or is it really what we're doing now, war of the games and ports? Why?

Also I hate to say it as much as I'm not targeting anyone in particular, but generally speaking I'm seeing a lot of concern for popularity and general buzzfeed from a crowd that 'supposedly' shuns Vice type of bullshit. Just do what's good.

[Phredreeke]

We draw the line, or at least should draw the line, on harassing other users.

No one here is being hurt over me speculating that COVID was made to order with the intent of scoring a democratic win in the 2020 presidential election.

Edit: ck3d yes I would be interested to learning about the historical evolution of respective engine as well

[Forge]

ck3D, on 12 November 2022 - 12:39 PM, said:

what is the historical timeline of the progression of both Build and Doom engines?

we can keep comparing and contrasting speculations, but it's pretty much fact that Doom was one of the top 5 selling (pc) video games in the 90s, and duke3d was somewhere around 15th. The user base and audience is demonstrably larger. Always has been.

The Doom franchise also kept releasing successful and decent expansions for the game and continued an interest in the franchise (for the time period in question everything up to and including Doom 3). Duke was trapped in development hell and became a running joke. Eduke32 gave a burst of life to the community, but that started to taper off. After a couple of years & still no Duke Nukem Forever, people grew tired of hovering around waiting on something that seemed like it was never going to get released. They left. When the turd finally dropped, even more people left.

Remember when dukeworld went offline and never came back? That was huge and we lost so many people from the community. Then 3dr shuttered their doors. A lot of people ended up here, but a huge chunk of people simply left. AMC forums and DNR forums kept going offline and we lost a few more people. Then Duke Nukem Forever Happened and stabbed an already comatose community.
Duke had been dying long before anybody starting making social justice noises and demanded reset-era levels of book burning.
It's not some mystery as to why one game and game editor is more popular than another. Identity politics and crocodile tears have nothing to do with it.