Why is legitimate criticism of the game we love and care about met with such hostility on this platform?
Making games is hard, making big games is even harder. Reading up on actually constructive feedback on these forums, they usually fall into one of these:
- Something positive was done to reinforce long-term health of this game, implementing things that are respectful towards the people playing the game, and are well thought out and genuinely wonderful.
- Something that, in retrospect, feels like a misguided attempt at doing a good thing, which resulted in something bad happening instead.
- Something that straight up should not have happened, and somehow was never questioned even in concept stage.
- "The saddest thing about the past 3 years of destiny’s content model is having to watch my friends put it down one by one :/" -@MacticsG1
- Basic issues, frustrations and bugs that negatively impact the experience of actually playing the game.
- Aggressive monetisation that dictates game design on a fundamental level.
While there are people unironically screaming about their life being over, most people are expressing their concerns in good faith. There are legitimate problems with this game, the direction it's headed, the longevity of things we pay for, and overall decisionmaking. Anyone who plays Destiny will face some of these problems. Every single post I see about these issues are filled with replies along the lines of:
- "oMG JuST STOP complaining / playing the game then / go play cod"
- "so what you're saying is you're a bad player lol"
- "word of the day is entitlement"
- [insert incoherent rambling that is clearly a result of a sunken cost-fallacy]
- "bungie is allowed to do whatever it wants"
- "it doesn't affect me so clearly you are objectively wrong and a horrible human being. in this thread i will... 1/666"
A lot of these responses also include scouring all of the players' pvp / pve stats and playtime, using them as some kind of a weapon for personal insults. That is incredibly toxic, and shifts attention from the actual problems. It is okay to critisise things we love! In fact, it is good, healthy, and should be encouraged. Unconditional love of a product gets disturbingly unhealthy real quick. People point out problems in something they are passionate about because they want the game to be in a better state!
If the people who wish to see Destiny last as a timeless classic, and flourish among both new lights and veterans alike, get pushed out of the game with this hostility, all that is going to be left is an echochamber of hate and blind acceptance of things that are not good for the game, the community, and the perception of the game. We are better than this, let's not resort to senseless tribalism. We're all on these forums because we care about Destiny - let's be kind, and not silence each other for daring to say something vaguely disapproving of the game or Bungie.
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Because players can’t handle a simple truth.