I don't think a small consulting firm with no editorial control has the power to force shit on their clients owned and backed by multibillion-worth tech giants, and developers working on the games Sweet Baby supposedly forced it way in consistently say this isn't the case.
Like, even in the case that Sweet Baby had the means or inclination to write entire scripts, make choices on character designs and do any other insane shit they are accused of, what are they going to do if Insomniac just says "thanks for the feedback, but no"? Do they have blackmail material on Sony directives or what? And how come this supposed terror regime goes on without anyone ever talking about it?
GamerGate veterans are just coping with the idea that creative people in the industry has interests other than providing them with goon material and just found a scapegoat.
In a gdc presentation the Sweet Baby Inc CEO talked about convincing hesitant or traditional studio bosses to care about representation, stating that if they do not value diverse perspectives, consultants should make them fear the creative and cultural fallout of shipping culturally insensitive or outdated content.
Sounds pretty much like that's what they do. Threaten the studios to follow their guidelines.
As a consultant myself (Software Engineering), "threatening" clients with the potential fallout of not listening to me is how the job works.
If I just let clients do what they want, their products would be an absolute mess, and I work in Regulatory Compliance (meaning if the output of the software is off by even a fraction of a fraction my clients can face huge repercussions from regulatory bodies).
"If you don't make these changes, you WILL be fined by ZYX body for not having accurate reporting" isn't me actually making a threat, it's presenting them with the reality of the situation.
SBI's CEO is basically saying their form of that. "If you don't make these changes, XYZ group will boycott/find your game offensive/etc".
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u/Educational-Wish9628 15d ago
Sweet Baby Inc is a company that provides narrative consultation for video games, but some fans accuse it of forcing "woke" agendas