In an interview with Niche Gamer, an interview most gamers are already familiar with – legendary game designer Denis Dyack, the mind behind titles like Metal Gear Solid: Twin Snakes and Too Human, spoke up about #GamerGate and against the false narratives being put forward by media and those with an agenda to push. According to Dyack, broadly painting the gaming industry as this misogynistic community is bad business for the industry and for attempting to bring in a more diverse audience to the industry in the future.

According to Dyack…

“In my opinion, out of the female developers who talk about GamerGate publicly, [Amy Hennig] is by far the most credible, she’s been in the industry a long time and she’s worked on a lot of big titles. She felt that as far as misogyny goes, and females having a hard time, (I’m paraphrasing here, of course) but she felt people were painting a false narrative of the industry, and it’s looking bad. I strongly agree with that. In my experience, the games industry is great place for women to work in and I believe that through years of experience and making games with many talented women.”

Dyack explains that he hasn’t seen the level of misogyny that some people are painting against the games industry, and that the industry is still evolving from just being a tech-centered vocation to a more creative vocation, thus it’s bringing in new faces all the time.

He goes on to say that…

“I completely reject some of the statements that are being said about it being hard for women to move forward. I remember thinking “Thank God someone finally said something”, so Amy inspired me to come out and speak on this topic. I hope other developers will also speak out. You don’t have to agree with everything in #GamerGate; I certainly don’t. Finally, I understand it does not mean as much
coming from me being a male but I hope it means something.”

Throughout the months there have been a number of developers who actually have come forward to say that the gaming industry isn’t a religion of women-hating white guys worshiping under the 4chan and 8chan cathedral of misogyny. Many of these interviews had to take place anonymously because developers fear greatly for their jobs. YouTube outlets like Bro Team Pill and major websites like The Escapist conducted interviews with some of these developers who have said many of the same things that Dyack has said.

In fact, Dyack states that many of the major developers in his circle that he’s talked to are most definitely what some people would consider “Pro-GamerGate”. In the interview with Niche Gamer, Dyack states…

“Most of the developers I know seem to be very pro-GamerGate. And what I mean by that is, again, they want journalistic ethics, they want their games reviewed fairly. They want to not go through having to jump through hoops. They just want people to look at, talk about, and enjoy their games. The anonymous interviews you posted from other developers are in line with groups I have spoken with.”

It’s true, Niche Gamer landed a couple of high-profile interviews with developers like Christian Allen from Serellan, as well as an Xbox developer who had to remain anonymous for the sake of his career.

Other developers found themselves on the receiving end of the swinging hammer of defamation from various gaming websites in the past and have openly spoken up about the issues in games journalism that not only hurt their careers but the careers of their peers as well, including but not limited to Mark Kern, Brad Wardell and even Denis Dyack.

Others like Michael Hartman from Frogdice Inc., have wanted to step forward but fear the retaliation from the media for doing so, writing on Twitter…

It sucks to have to keep my yap shut because there's too many people counting on me to avoid controversy that could hurt our games.

— Michael Hartman (@Muckbeast) May 27, 2015

It’s unfortunate that the media is allowed to defame their own audience, game developers and spread misinformation and lies to the general public and are allowed to get away with it. Thankfully, some institutions have been looking into the media’s impropriety, on the mainstream scale at least, including the CRTC, ACMA and soon the Dutch council for ethics in media journalism.

The entire interview is well worth a read and you can check out all of what Dyack had to say over on Niche Gamer.

(Denis Dyack image courtesy of Alejandro Argandona)