BioWare writer quits after death threats to family

Elikal · August 2013

Check this out:

http://metro.co.uk/2013/08/16/bioware-writer-quits-after-death-threats-to-family-3925970/

"The senior writer on Dragon Age II has decided to leave developer BioWare after ‘graphic threats’ were made to kill her children.

‘I was shown a sample of the forum posts by EA security,’ says Hepler ‘And it included graphic threats to kill my children on their way out of school to show them that they should have been aborted at birth rather than have to have me as a mother.’"

I think WE ALL should be alert to agressive posts. Saying such things IS NO JOKE! How people can be so mean and evil to threaten people over a GAME is beyond me. Such people must be sick in their mind!

People doing such threats should be brought before a court as if it were a real threatning!

TheLizardbones · August 2013

Huh. On a related note, here's a post about an article on rabid fans threatening developers and driving them out of the industry.

http://www.mmorpg.com/discussion2.cfm/post/5909490#5909490

nariusseldon · August 2013

Gosh .. some people take their gaming way too seriously. Really ... death threat just because you don't like a game?

Kaerigan · August 2013

Reddit user Karthaugh had this to say:

This is sensationalized garbage copying quotes from polygon:

"Jennifer Hepler left BioWare this week to begin work on a book about narrative design and do some freelance work. Her most recent job title was senior writer on Dragon Age: Inquisition. But it was Dragon Age 2 that led to the death threats, the threats against her family and children and the harassment.

When asked if the harassment led to her depature, Hepler told Polygon "No, leaving Bioware was for family reasons. I am going to be working on a text book on narrative design among other game-related freelance projects."

After Dragon Age 2 came out in 2011, Hepler told Polygon, many of the people involved in the game's development received angry emails, abusive forum posts and petitions calling for them to be fired. About that time, someone dug up an old interview Hepler participated in six years earlier. In the interview Hepler mentioned that her least favorite part of working in the game industry was playing through games and combat. Some of the interview was put in the official forums as evidence that Hepler was to blame for changes in the game's combat. The forum post was removed and Hepler went on maternity leave. But then the following February someone created a forum post resurfacing the interview and called Hepler the "cancer" that was destroying BioWare.

"I had opened a Twitter account a few weeks before that, and this poster or others quickly found me there and began sending threatening messages," she said. "I shut my account down without reading them, so I'm not certain what they said, but other people have told me they were quite vile."

The forum post and Hepler's initial response on Twitter, ignited a firestorm of hatred and harassment that included emailed death threats and threats against her children.

"I did my best to avoid actually reading any of it, so I'm not quite certain how bad it got," Hepler said. "I was shown a sample of the forum posts by EA security and it included graphic threats to kill my children on their way out of school to show them that they should have been aborted at birth rather than have to have me as a mother."

Hepler also received harassing phone calls and threats on the BioWare Social Network.

The impact though, she said, was mostly positive.

"The outpouring of support I received — large amounts from female and gay fans — was incredibly heartening," she said. "I got hundreds of messages from people who had been deeply moved by characters and scenes that I wrote and who had made positive changes in their real lives because of it. Without the negativity, I'm not sure that I would ever have heard from all of these people confirming that there is a need for characters that tackle touchy social issues, for characters who are untraditional or even unlikeable. It has definitely strengthened my desire to continue to make games that strive for inclusivity and that use fiction and fantasy to explore difficult, uncomfortable real-world issues."

Link to full article:

http://www.polygon.com/2013/8/15/4622252/plague-of-game-dev-harassment-erodes-industry-spurs-support-groups

Metro is a piece of shit that regularly steals and recycles content from proper news sources, please link people to the original article.

We all know the gaming community has a lot of problems and this deserves a lot of attention, but the polygon article (well researched and written) deserves the credit not Metro.

rawfox · August 2013

Hunt em down.

Get the responsible person.

That is absolutely no fun.

Kaijin2k3 · August 2013

Yeah, a lot of people think they can just say whatever they want. And if someone gets offended, "well they just need to grow a thicker skin!!!"

Bleh.

Now to be completely fair, death threats is something I heard a lot in person as well, especially high school. They were just flung around like candy every time people got angry.

People are just violent critters.

BTW, thanks Kaerigan for posting the proper article.

norusdog · October 2013

yah this kind of thing shouldn't be acceptable and they should start prosecuting people for such things. What you do and say online should have the same consequences as if you did it in person. When it comes to threats and such. There have actually been people killed over game crap. So making such a threat SHOULD be taken seriously and the person doing so prosecuted.

I hated DA2 also..and I can go on for awhile about how BioWare is dead in regards to what they once were..they're now no more than an EA side studio capitalizing on the BioWare name...but to threaten someone with violence? people have some serious mental issues.

I mean it's one thing to say "so and so should be fired" over such a thing..but to threaten? c'mon now..reality...get a grip.

tommygunzII · October 2013

This is why technology will be the end of us, first world problems and whatnot. This is what happens when people no longer have to hunt for their food, idle hands = devil's workshop. I've had too much coffee, this is my last post for awhile

hardicon · October 2013

Just goes to show people are stupid in all walks of life. It is a video game people, if you don't like it don't play. People wonder why news media and other people view gamers as social deviants with violent murderous tendencies, that is why.

Kyleran · October 2013

Er, any of you folks paying attention to the almost daily stories of Facebook bullying, death threats which have resulted in many youths killing themselves over it?

Anonymity brings out the worst in people (see the story about the invisible man) and this behavior is evidenced everywhere.

Heck, over 12 years ago I was a clan leader in Lineage and had a disgruntled member make threats to hunt my 14 year old daughter (who played the game with me) down and harm her. My "crime?" I was showing favoritism to other clan members when I grouped with them instead of this person. Never mind the fact we were all level 30's, early 40's and he/she was like level 20.

I reported this above person of course, and they were perma banned by NC, but they ended up buying another account and a few months later, reached out to me in game and tried to apologize for their actions. Apology not accepted, I reported them again and they were banned. I left the game shortly after that.

Started my current policy to never share any personal info with anyone online such as my real name (which is extremely unique) and where I live. I also never lead guilds anymore, too much stress so I prefer to assist from the sidelines these days.

It sucks, but what are you going to do? Take proper precautions, never share more information than you have to with more people than necessary, and you can avoid a lot of trouble. Specific game designers might want to consider being more anonymous and leave their real names off the credits in order to cut down on the crazies messing with their personal lives.

neum · October 2013

Was that the writer with the yaoi fetish? I remember hearing about a female writer that pushed hard (lol) for gay stuff in Bioware games. No I am not bashing just asking.

telldonny · October 2013

Way to detract from the subject man.

goldtoof · October 2013

No she's the writer who said something along the lines of "bioware games should let you skip the boring combat bits and just play them as an interactive story"

Which she kinda has a point on, the combat mostly sucks in bioware games, the story is the strong point.

tom_gore · October 2013

Sick people always find an excuse to do their sick stuff. It can be about a game, an article or just walking on the street in a funny way.

I'm beginning to think Internet anonymity should be abolished altogether and everyone should present themselves with their real name. How to enforce it effectively is a problem, though.

Classicstar · October 2013

Originally posted by tom_gore
Sick people always find an excuse to do their sick stuff. It can be about a game, an article or just walking on the street in a funny way.I'm beginning to think Internet anonymity should be abolished altogether and everyone should present themselves with their real name. How to enforce it effectively is a problem, though.

If im secure from all these bloody freakes and psychos and it won't be used by all these evil companys and goverments to follow my tracks so my privacy is guarenteed yes im all for realnames.

But this is imposible so i say no to real ID.

All kinds of psycho's out there noway i risk some one on my doorstep or track me down.

Classicstar · October 2013

Sick people on internet example.

Few months ago i was entering cherno a city in DayZ and some guy see me try kill me he shout first "yoo fag im gonne destroy you you must be a he use N.. word, then start im gonne rape your mother and s...)well you get my drift thats how sick people are.

Ive in all years i played pc games online sind's '99 never act or said even closely to this kind of trash . Its sad that people are like this realy sad:(

This guy who did death threats should be locked up for many years there not worth anything and no excuse behaving like this.

skeaser · October 2013

rojoArcueid · October 2013

So the NSA can spy on people but they cant track the source of these death threats?

sibs4455 · October 2013

Originally posted by rojo6934
So the NSA can spy on people but they cant track the source of these death threats?

There was no death threats, even the lady in question say's so. She left the company for totally different reasons.

Talonsin · October 2013

What kind of person threatens someones kids over a video game?

Drakephire · October 2013

Yeah. Sadly not new. I remember back when SWG was being developed. This was around Alpha stage. Some jackasses at a PvP website started a discussion about hunting down and killing Raph Koster because they didn't like the direction he was planning for PvP. They had even posted an address.

It was sick shit. These guys are the lowest of internet trash. Sadly they also thrive in knowing that.

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BioWare writer quits after death threats to family

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BioWare writer quits after death threats to family

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Fools find no pleasure in understanding but delight in airing their own opinions. Pvbs 18:2, NIV