Markiplier, Welcome to the Game, & The Ethics of Developer Trolling

[@SpacemanScott]

For anyone interested in any other long form video essays from my dumbass, be sure to check out my video on the best worst Fallout New Vegas mod: Dust - kzbin.info/www/bejne/lZSYnmqld656l5Y

[@orangejello3263]

That video was grand, I definitely suggest it for any Fallout fans

[@HeavenLeahSky]

Hey how do you feel about Amazon smart devices?

[@Heydad956]

Bruh that's what made me subscribe I'm just getting through the backlog

[@HeavenLeahSky]

@@Heydad956 what? I don't see who you're replying to

[@laynecinder661]

That was a fucked up joke.

[@SouperWy]

A similar event occurred when Mark played The Blackout Club. The devs saw he was playing and decided to troll him. The difference is, they just make some text flash on screen that related to what he was saying along with Bob and Wade, to spook him. It had no effect on gameplay and provided a laugh for everyone involved.

[@elodiejohnstone5240]

Also in the 2016 toys for tots stream, the devs trolled a bit (can’t remember the game name though) and Tyler almost died laughing. Very obviously in good fun and definitely not for over an hour

[@Real_RUBB3R]

That kind of developer trolling is the good kind, same thing with Clustertruck and when they would troll people streaming their game (Do they even still do that?). Just lighthearted fun for everyone involved

[@SouperWy]

@@cheebaleeb I was aware of the enhanced horror button, don't worry. :P Couldn't they also play as the shape instead of just the normal "pvp" mode?

[@cheebaleeb]

@@SouperWy I don't think they could play as the shape, but they could make it so he was WAY more aggressive to you. Or if he wasn't out, he would come out and be fully aggro. All depended on who you got and if it was SAO, how mad you made them lmao.

[@thatemeraldguy4585]

@@elodiejohnstone5240 Good ol' Landfall Games lol

[@_Bread-_-]

personally i was very into the blackout club's enhanced horror, I'll never forget whispering to my friend in game (we got immersed) while sneaking around and then just randomly, in a new third voice i hear "Why are we whispering?" my heart sank.

[@aud7593]

that sounds horrifying and also amazing omg? the VAs (?) and devs must've had fun with the enhanced horror feature!

[@radioactivepower600nanaspersec]

@@aud7593 Is that feature still a thing? Or did they stop doing it a while ago?

[@aud7593]

@@radioactivepower600nanaspersec no idea, i don't play the game! I only watched this video :)

[@radioactivepower600nanaspersec]

@@aud7593 Oh, ok, thanks anyway :D

[@ragingranger4859]

​@@radioactivepower600nanaspersecIf I remember correctly, the Enhanced Immersion feature no longer works because they finished the story a couple of years ago.

[@Andre-uu5xv]

Cast: "Idk Adam kinda comes off as an asshole to me" Adam: *Immediately proves him right*

[@l.2620]

​​@@TommFoolery Get off of your alt Adam

[@OpossumPartyy]

​@@TommFooleryAdam had every ability to just ignore it though? Dickride harder ig?

[@RamenLlama]

Nah. All a ruse. We know you're still Adam.

[@wal2er862]

⁠@@TommFoolerywhy do you care so much about this dev? “a streamer called a dev an asshole and the dev ruined the streamers gameplay, well in my argument that’s the same as punching someone and them punching you back it’s just self defence!” you realise that makes 0 sense right? The streamer called him an asshole boohoo move on. The dev isn’t a 10 year old who takes everything personally. The dev just came off as a seething redditor the moment he got called out, and threw a tantrum over someone who liked his game. It’s childish and unsurprising coming from someone that people often view as weird and creepy. The streamer called him an asshole that would’ve been wrong if it wasn’t true, proven by the dev himself.

[@ZawaOnYoutube]

@@TommFoolery that handful of sentences was sure a lot of effort to read. Why do people so proudly flex unintelligence? There's nothing more stupid than seeing "I'm not reading all that" in response to less than half a page of a novel. It's funny when people show off that they haven't read a book in years 😂

[@necrofai6713]

Welcome to the Game 3 is just gonna be Adam outside taking pictures of your house and posting it on Instagram for all his followers to see

[@dylantoney6971]

then not getting banned by youtube and only getting a temporary monetization cut

[@3spoons366]

Sssniperwolf is scarier than the game

[@zelirious4504]

Please that would be hilarious

[@Shitposting_IHMN]

Polish youtuber vibed with it and we all had our fun, we wanted for this to happen in the new game, but it wont happen sadly

[@ghostly.creature]

if Sssniperwolf became a game dev 💀

[@NathanTruby]

I like how when Adam threatened to leak dms, the other guy just showed them anyways like a fucking Chad

[@Luzaku_kiss]

Likely because he knew that wouldn't work at all, since there wasn't anything harmful there.

[@limonlx7182]

I mean, when the story gets public either way, you would want to be the one telling it, and not let the other side take control over the narrative, because Adam could be playing victim, lie, fake DMs, change them and do whatever he wants with it. That reminds me of Hamilton and how he publicly admitted to having an affair, before the information could be spread and twisted by others.

[@EmilyKveldulv]

Its a power move lol

[@vanessa000fly]

​@@limonlx7182i love how you used one of the founding fathers as an example for a person playing a video game exposing twitter DMs. Truly history repeats itself. Also Hamilton the musical is great❤

[@The_scrongler1978]

@@vanessa000flyI eat a ton of il ham

[@Shad0w_Cha0s3m3ralds]

"I always saw Adam as kinda an asshole" "IM NOT AN ASSHOLE, I FUCK WITH YOUR GAME AND MAKE IT UNBEATABLE TO SHOW YOU HOW MUCH OF AN ASSHOLE IM NOT"

[@tartipouss]

Rad NITW pfp Gregg rulz, ok

[@PlatoonGoon]

The most hilarious bout of narcissism. "You're playing *_MY_* game for views!" _"I mean that's kind of what twitch is"_ isn't that how you *sell* your game btw?

[@wrigglenightbug8679]

@@PlatoonGoon This actually shows how he's not an asshole. He's so nice that he's getting upset over having free advertisement! He would rather work hard and advertise the game himself instead of having other people do it for him. (Disclaimer for lobotomy patients: This is a joke)

[@comicsans3421]

@@wrigglenightbug8679 damn thanks man as a lobotomy patient i almost fell for that one

[@adamtaurus7840]

GREGG RULZ OK

[@xethaz8088]

At 1:31:07 in Mark’s final part (6), the annoying hack puzzle literally solves itself and then immediately after another hack activates which ALSO SHOULD NOT BE POSSIBLE!

[@ChicagoRatHole]

Good eye

[@TecTitan]

@@ChicagoRatHole Well, you are talking to sasuke...

[@bullhelmet]

He started turning off and on the Wi-Fi and refreshing the browser. That makes hacks appear much more often. The hack that mark “solved” was probably a bug kzbin.info/www/bejne/kIrPhXqih5p6btE 7:50 states this

[@ShaggyDabbyDank]

It was a bug, as Bullhelmet stated. People who played WTTG2 a ton at the time knew not to turn off and on the wifi so much and refreshing the browser, because it would bug your game out.

[@KratonWolf]

That's proof enough to me. Mark's game was definitely messed with by Adam.

[@Stickat2]

The fact that Adam said he'd never do anything like this again because of "cancel culture" is so fucking funny to me. Hes literally saying ">:( I cant just be an asshole and get away with it so I'm just going to have to play the silence card this sucks"

[@RIISK04]

"Oh no, the consequences of my own actions!"

[@MrJesus4132]

@@JeloOW Thank you for alerting us to your presence......

[@samthorne3765]

​@@JeloOW That's a fun way to announce your arrival, I guess

[@JeloOW]

lol mfs didnt even read the main comment, which self reports as a snowflake gen alpha cant fucking read

[@Deja117]

@@JeloOW I agree, Adam is one of those. I mean, what kind of person takes your money for something then does everything to make it a bad experience? It would be like putting tapeworms in food and selling it to people you dislike. Saying it's the finest quality, farm fresh.

[@matthewporter7871]

I will say, if Mark’s game was messed with, that would be weird. To me, none of Mark’s comments seemed like actual attacks. It all just seemed like regular gamer rage to me, which to me seems to be the goal of the game. If the game developer got mad that Mark got mad at a game made to have so many moving parts and made to be scary and/or frustrating well that’s just stupid.

[@monroerobbins7551]

Exactly! Like, Mark was mostly raging, or proposing genuine critiques.

[@froggy5748]

I haven’t seen the streams in a solid couple of years now so I may be misremembering but you’re right, literally all I remember was mark getting mad at not being able to complete it or making small errors that fucked him over (which is valid to be mad at, especially during long ass streams) and the occasional constructive criticism, which he gives to almost every single game he plays. He sometimes gives lists of things he likes and doesn’t like about games when he’s done playing them and during playthroughs he’ll often make comments of “oh that feature is really good” or “oh I don’t really like that”. It’s literally just how people who play games tend to talk about them??? I genuinely still don’t understand why the dev got so mad at mark for treating his game like every other game.

[@justarandompepe8961]

@@froggy5748 the only thing mark said that was bad was "i hope you enjoy all the sales i brought you" or something like that. that really pissed him off and also upset people in the comments. i think that was at the very end of the stream though so it wouldn't have made him start messing with the game.

[@DindellaTheDefender]

​@@justarandompepe8961, even that's such a weird thing to get upset over. It's 100% true that a popular KZbinr playing or covering a game increases the games sales. Acknowledging that out if genuinety and/or humor is odd to me.

[@thechosenone5421]

@@DindellaTheDefender yeah, but acknowledging that has the arrogant implication that the person is doing a favor to the developer, and that the developer should be thankful for it

[@Taylor-bw4zg]

"You called me an asshole so I'm going to proceed to prove you right for the next 2 hours, that'll show you!" Good to know he handled criticism in very mature and humble manner!

[@Raebu]

he's just based

[@Ronald98]

@@Raebu Cringe

[@OperatorMax1993]

@@Raebu cringe

[@Enixgeek]

@@Raebu cringe

[@highlander6573]

​@@Raebu cringe

[@patrickloureiro351]

I love how the dev complained about cancel culture but then spent two hours personally cancelling a dude's stream because he said the dev seemed like an asshole.

[@haveagoodday7021]

Funny thing is that they weren't wrong to say he was an asshole, Alex just proved his point.

[@Pihsrosnec]

@@haveagoodday7021 saying that someone seems like a bit of an asshole isn't even particularly bad lol. immediately spending two hours to get revenge on someone for it is stupid. at that point it's beyond petty

[@haveagoodday7021]

@@Pihsrosnec True lol

[@bluecreator7779]

@@Pihsrosnec Yeah any other person would prob just brush off the comment since they don't personally know you or reach out to prove them wrong. But immediately turning hostile is a big yikes.

[@DeezN00tz99]

those who cry about cancel culture know nothing about it, its consequence culture and if it was real then half the people who were """""cancelled"""" wouldnt still be famous and able to continue being so.

[@graveyardoperations7407]

A few instances of trolling is funny. Two hours is fucking creepy.

[@Ishouldreallybeasleep]

Yeah, my thoughts exactly. If cast wasn’t that far into the run and he decided to mess with him for like 10 minutes for shits and giggles, I think that would be fine. But 2 hours?! Dude get a hobby.

[@timdadwagan]

Did Adam ever stop or was it cast who stopped playing completely

[@ZoofyZoof]

I don't think it's creepy, it's just assholeish.

[@DisAGamer680]

Like in cluster trucks when mark bob and wade were playing together, that was funny but idek if they messed with the game i think they just put text on screen, 2 hours MANUALLY is psychotic.

[@ShadowEclipse777]

​@DisAGamer680 plus the ClusterTruck's dev only ever did lighthearted trolling. Not basement welling reddit mod levels of online harassment

[@covereye5731]

You know. I'm all for separating art and artist. But that is hard when the artist is directly manipulating their art based on their hurt feelings.

[@jackinthebox8177]

Understand completely I want to love this game because it's fairly well made (if a few mechanics are annoying) But I feel so bad watching those play throughs now that I know what a dick Adam is.

[@thesolidestsnake]

I really love the WTTG games and Scrutinized (rides with strangers will come out definitely soon) but seeing all of this is about of a damper on my love for it's world and unique look at internet horror. Especially since Adam loves to insert himself into his games (not only in the trolling way, legit the games I mentioned all include him or someone who acts and looks like him)

[@alx1431]

What scares me is that nobody seems to care that he backdoored his game. Everyone is focused on the bad things he did with it but what he did makes his game essentially spyware.

[@HappyLarry.]

@@thesolidestsnake I wouldn't really be able to seperate it at all really, like if you buy his next game, you're actively supporting that asshole

[@massgunner4152]

That's kinda the issue isn't it? Being able to separate them only works as long as the artist doesn't mix too much of himself on the art.

[@gamesux420]

"this guy is kind of an asshole" *accused guy INSTANTLY goes out of his way to prove openly that hes an asshole* what a champ

[@whothehellarewe]

What a guy, making otherwise vague conclusions easy to come to and confirming it for us. Truly a hero.

[@Shitposting_IHMN]

Polish youtuber vibed with it and we all had our fun, we wanted for this to happen in the new game, but it wont happen sadly

[@brylinx1451]

​@Aj_Rejt Eleven. I was on the stream at that time and it was glorious

[@Shitposting_IHMN]

@@brylinx1451 sucks that most people are b*tches and fake, and will look for any drama possible

[@honeylemonadearts8852]

Adam really said "I can't believe you called me an asshole I'm now going to be an asshole that'll show you!" Way to go dude

[@Masochistickoala]

idk man the comment from Cast was kinda backhanded. Adam could've been having a bad day then that just peaked it. We all have those days.

[@ravencollins5638]

@@Masochistickoala where we ruin someone's day for two hours because they said they don't have a read on us? That's mental instability

[@whothehellarewe]

Adam: * getting free publicity from streamers, even if some criticism here and there. Adam: * gets mad at a bit of criticism and ruins peoples fun. Streamer: “Well, I guess I’ll stop playing your game.” Adam: * Shocked pikachu face. “CANCEL CULTURE AT IT AGAIN!”

[@MattyyyBoiii]

I read that in Giani's Senator Armstrong voice 😂

[@thegreathashil4553]

​@@MattyyyBoiii CANCEL CULTURE STRIKES AGAIN

[@JeloOW]

the streamer gets mad that he "cant" play a game lol

[@Ale-km3ux]

@@JeloOWI mean he paid for it and it was modified so he specifically couldn’t play it

[@JeloOW]

@@Ale-km3ux he doesnt own the game

[@roscob7089]

The fact that Adam's response to being called an asshole was to... well, be an asshole, is kinda hilarious in an ironic way

[@WhisperWithTheEyes]

And the fact that the streamer said that he really didn't know Adam and respected his games, but had a bad impression really makes it seem like an overreaction lol

[@FTZPLTC]

It would've been hilarious, if he'd left it at that.

[@somechupacabrawithinternet8866]

"i'm going to prove that people are horrible by being horrible"

[@gamerule18]

"cancel culture strikes again"

[@rakano3733]

I mean talk shit get hit lmao

[@nikkyonthemoon7719]

One thing that pissed me off with the developers is that they got so pissy about marks harmless teasing jokes and ignores his genuine criticism on the game

[@DanofAllTradesYoutube]

I was going to say the comments Mark was saying was obviously teasing. Especially since he's kind of KNOWN for that type of tongue and cheek.

[@tylerisntasheep6854]

yeah how are you going to make a rage game and then get mad when people rage

[@funguy398]

Imagine if dev just fixed the game after Mark's comments and helped him win, that would be a different story

[@404_coffee9]

Yeah me to.

[@evilemperordude]

From what I’ve seen, Mark is actually pretty forgiving of games other people would rip apart.

[@lulubaaa]

spending 2 hours straight to manually troll the game is literally insane. like what.

[@yoink4180]

The reason just makes it crazier. “I’m going to spend hours manually trolling this guy bc he said I gave off asshole vibes. I’m not an asshole!! >:(“

[@theimperialzone]

Fr. Like maybe the guy shouldn't have called him an asshole, but 2 HOURS? You sat there, manually trolling a guy for 2 hours straight, just because he called you a name? And then threatened to leak DMs that had nothing malicious within them? The shit with the offline backdoor that you don't have the choice to opt in or out of is shady as fuck too. And then when people got mad, it seemed like he was trying to say people were overreacting and that it's 'just a prank'? Everything that Adam did just showed that he WAS an asshole.

[@lulubaaa]

@@yoink4180 no really like he’s just proving he’s an asshole lmaoo

[@vault6242]

I mean if anything it makes more sense than just watching a stream for 2 hours straight, because you can atleast affect the stuff you're watching

[@suncat530]

@@vault6242 it sounds like "crowd control stream", but the 'crowd' consists of 1 person (the dev), and the streamer didn't consent to it.

[@xtrem5428]

"Farming my game for content" buddy, it's free advertising. Most game devs WANT people to stream their games.

[@completlynormalhypernova666]

Hello Neighbor developers were DESPERATE to have lets players play their game. It's great advertising for any game

[@swagar]

Depends on the game, to be fair. There are absolutely games I watch streams and let's plays of because I don't want to buy them.

[@Aureilia]

What... did he want people to do?? Not play his game and just assume it's good??? 😭

[@randompromises1038]

​@@Aureilia he didn't seem to have an issue with the streamers playing his game so long as they didn't openly insult him. THEN suddenly it was a problem like "Oh if the game is so bad why are you still playing it? Just for VIEWS hm????"

[@irecordwithaphone1856]

​@@swagarYeah but for every person who isn't going to buy it, there are other people who hear about the game from a stream that will buy it

[@LakeGameCreepr]

Developer trolling should never go beyond harmless messages and eastereggs. Intentionally ruining people's playthroughs is juvenile

[@TheChaosCorvid]

Something I've done in old horror projects is having a unique dev controlled enemy to pop in with. When I added it, it was in the patch notes, and friends who enjoyed the game would ask me to join. It was so well received I turned it into a New Game + feature for people who completed the main quest to be able to join their friends as an enemy. Should also be noted that this was a co-op game and online only.

[@choryllis6646]

This. And he didn't just ruin a couple playthroughs; Adam did it for 2 hours. Dude literally had nothing better to do than to sit there for 2 hours and spawn in enemies just to ruin every single attempted playthrough. And then on top of it he blocked the player on twitter and banned him from the game discord.

[@firstnext5482]

I feel like "ruining a playthrough" is something you can, like, ONCE per person and you gotta time it correctly. It could be funny if like five minutes into a run you get bumrushed for no reason by every single threat possible and then the developer messages "oops wrong button my bad "... but if you do the same thing when the player is 2 hours deep and five minutes from winning? Asshole move right there. Doing it repeatedly with the intent to stop a player from winning... what are you doin', man? That's sad. That's not just an asshole move, that's a sad asshole move.

[@Forcoy]

Depends on what the game is

[@localmenace3043]

@@firstnext5482It’s a “sad asshole with no life” move.

[@necronyx7176]

Cast didn't even really call Adam an asshole, he just said Adam *seemed* like one. And Adam proved him right.

[@Joe90h]

"I've heard some stories and he's been really weird to me." Adam: "And I'm here to 100% corroborate this."

[@queenautumnween2796]

That's what I was thinking. Like he started by talking about how weird it is that he has these gross images in his game and questioned where you find these images, nothing bad. It's becomes kinda rude saying, "I've heard people say mixed things about him. Some say he's kind of a psychopath. Others say he's nice." And "to me, he gives off the impression he's an asshole" is a little bit of a dick move, but not anything bad tbh. The way Adam responds by basically ruining his stream and basically harassing him for 2 hours straight makes Adam a huge asshole...

[@DisDatK9]

I think thats an important distinction people should catch onto more. Like, in all avenues of my life I make absolutely sure I never really call someone a name, but rather call them out and hope they change the behavior (for example, I'll say someone is *being* a huge dick, or they are *acting* like an asshole.) As in, they can stop being a dick or an asshole, Its their choice to act like it but it doesnt define them as a human. But when people hear that and decide to run with that as some excuse to bully and harass, I'll make sure I just tell them "You are a huge asshole."

[@cynthiahembree3957]

I will agree Adam shouldn't have done this but I think it's disingenuous to say Cast didn't call him an asshole. If you don't know something from personal experience just keep your mouth shut. Especially if you are a streamer. He basically put a developer on blast in public. Not saying what Adam did was okay but Cast shouldn't have said anything at all. Two wrongs don't make a right but also don't judge a book by it's cover. TLDR they were both in the wrong but Adam was more in the wrong.

[@Joe90h]

I don't really know either guy in the exchange, but there was something in the specific words the streamer was using that implied that there was a story he wasn't comfortable in sharing, but he felt it important to divulge the lesson that was learned from it. It seemed like the streamer was trying to, in a round about way, say "The guy gives me bad vibes and we shouldn't poke at him like a lolcow" because that's likely what kind of audience those streams picked up and the streamer was trying to warn them off. And when the dev immediately threatened to leak DMs as a go to it becomes really easy to figure out what sort of stories he had that he felt uncomfortable to share. Two wrongs don't make a right, sure. But I think when taken as a whole it recontextualises exactly how he spoke about the dev.

[@GABBAB]

Shout out to cast for keeping calm throughout the stream and trying to persevere in the game. Yes what he said may not have been the kindest but also he himself wasn't saying Adam was creepy, he was just answering a question. Plus even if he was, that's his opinion- Adam abused the shit out of his stream because he was petty.

[@Pepstep_07]

adam proved him right with his actions in a way

[@Aaron-qe9ms]

@@Pepstep_07 I wouldn't say "in a way". He full on proved he was what Cast was calling him. Adam was like: "How dare he call me that without any proof! Let's give him some."

[@CastCS_]

The whole time I was thinking he was just having fun. Was shocked at the maliciousness that suddenly came out.

[@404_coffee9]

Yeah he was rather calm about it.

[@KingOfDarknessAndEvil]

​@@CastCS_ Yeah if instead of what he said he instead had said "lol just having a bit of fun at your expense, gg" it would've been fine, but he decided to get so hostile with it

[@mrSatern100]

Can't help but feel both fascinated and kinda terrified at the fact that the game that's all about people hacking you to try and stop you from winning... had a almost secret update where the dev was able to essentially hack your game to try and stop you from winning

[@Woody2Times]

😂😂 what’s crazy is I always wanted to be a dev that could control AI in a FPS of course

[@timdadwagan]

And the antagonists name is Adam as well hmm🤔

[@cowlgurl]

i think my favorite "developers trolling" moment was when jerma985 was playing the stanley parable 2 ultra deluxe, and the devs were photoshopping a picture of a spider onto screenshots of jerma's stream and then posting it on a website that you can access through a qr code in the game the reason why i believe it worked so well imo is because of three factors. 1) it didnt actually take place in the game 2) jerma essentially consented and welcomed the "troll" by turning it into his own content and playing along and 3) it wasnt mean spirited. the ethics of dev trolling are the same as the ethics for pranks. a prank works when, at the end of the day, all participants acknowledge the joke and arent seriously hurt by it, but a prank becomes cruel when it harms and distresses one side of the party for the enjoyment of the other.

[@jontaryn4816]

The cluster truck pranks are also hilarious! I think one of the biggest differences is in stakes. Like if each level is like 5 minutes at most it’s pretty harmless

[@Walkingfenix]

Cluster truck trolling was so fucking good

[@maki1177]

Stanley parable devs are some of the best group of ppl

[@theblobconsumes4859]

Best comment that made a good point much faster than the video.

[@TheDiazDarkness]

As commented, Cluster Truck dev trolling was funny.

[@hedgelord0]

Consent is important. Regardless of the benefits of devs messing with your games, consumers should still know that it's a possibility, at the very least

[@chainswordcs]

​@@RedHatGuyYTnot the point. take for example super mario maker levels. there are kaizo levels (really hard, impossible for all but the most hardcore players) and there are troll levels (can be pretty dickish). in both cases, the player knows more or less what they're getting into ahead of time. some people really like kaizo, some people really like troll levels, but it would be a bit irritating for a level that appears normal to unexpectedly turn into a kaizo and/or troll level halfway through.

[@chainswordcs]

​@@RedHatGuyYTbut i know i'm just shouting into the void here. if you're willing to ignore the entire point over one single word (which is being used correctly, mind you) i don't know why you're even here to begin with. if you're not willing to think critically about anything, why are you watching a youtube video essay about a game you probably havent played

[@uncroppedsoop]

@@RedHatGuyYT you probably heard that word used a lot in the context of sexual stuff but all it actually means is permission

[@RedHatGuyYT]

@@chainswordcs man. you went on and on about a throwaway comment i made? get a freaking life and touch some grass my guy. it's not that deep

[@alx1431]

It is not a videogame. If it is contacting web services without your knowledge it is malware. Spyware to be specific.

[@kyrak5340]

All Adam did was actively prove people's point that he is an asshole. If you cannot take criticism about your game, art, or character and be able to counter-claim in a fashion that isn't "Okay now I'll actually make your game unplayable and unenjoyable." then YES you are as bad as people think you are.

[@basicallyghostie7362]

Ah yes, Adam is the Strisan effect

[@Strawberry_Cubes]

He litterally made a tweet about this guy being the dick and going “HE JUST WANTS TO CLICKBAIT FOR MARKIPLIER” 💀

[@coldeed]

Criticism about himself not his game. I honestly think that's awesome, and if you expect people to be a bigger person don't talk shit and expect others not to respond lol.

[@notrealnamenotatall2476]

@@coldeed But all he did is prove their point.

[@mewtuwa]

@@coldeed And now everyone thinks he's an ass, lol.

[@verrueckteriwan]

To make this clear, the behavior of Adam is in fact illegal, many countries have a paragraph on what is called "computer manipulation", and he is doing so by installing a "backdoor" on your pc in the form of a video game. If you want something like this in your game, you have to inform people and get their approval. If you are not doing that, people can report the game (or developer) for collecting "personal information" (which are for example a timestamp and an IP-address, which makes you identifiable), this can get you banned on steam and can lead to a fine up to 10 million € or 2% of annual sales achieved worldwide (whichever is HIGHER) in Europe alone. (source: Article 83 GDPR).

[@etherknightmare1181]

This should be up higher in the comments, imo.

[@verrueckteriwan]

@@etherknightmare1181 thank you, but sadly my comment was about a year too late to be relevant :D

[@etherknightmare1181]

@@verrueckteriwan Is it not true, anymore? If it's true, it's still relevant. It might not be useful in this specific topic, now, but it could be useful to someone, later.

[@verrueckteriwan]

@@etherknightmare1181 of course it is still true (thats why I linked the source, so anyone interested can read for himself), but the relevance of a video is the highest in the first week after it got posted, which mean most people have seen the video and will not see my comment anymore, because the chances are low that they will watch the video again ^^'

[@etherknightmare1181]

@@verrueckteriwan You're not wrong, but it's still relevant. Others will learn this and can point it out to others, should the occurrence arise.

[@SunsetEnvy]

Adam is a good example of what to NOT do as a game developer.

[@alx1431]

He is a example of what not to do as a developer in general. Contacting web services without letting you know what exactly is going on should be illegal.

[@ZorotheGallade]

I'm pretty sure putting a fucking backdoor in a program you distribute IS illegal. What if Adam decided that his HILARIOUS PRANKS could go one step further and put code in his game that lets him remotely access your files? Or change your computer settings? Or dox your position in live stream?

[@fedcab4360]

@@ZorotheGallade i read the speedrunning guide and i think its total bullshit, "No what he is doing is not illegal" "The chances of him giving you a DOS are basically 0" Why not entirely 0? like that's like me saying "yeah i have this child i kidnapped and i COULD kill him but the chances of me doing it are basicallyyy 0" Just dont kidnap the child in the first place

[@ZorotheGallade]

@@fedcab4360 Exactly. He's one step removed from the game becoming ransomware, but we're supposed to be "safe" because we trust him not to take that final step.

[@alx1431]

​@@ZorotheGallade Finally some people that understand the severity. There is nothing stopping him from running other, way more dangerous code on your machine. There is an unspoken trust between developers and users to not run bad code on the users machine, but he already broke that trust. He doesn't just get the trust back whenever he wants to. I'd be really interested in getting his game, in the state where he had that backdoor, decompiled and analyzed for other possible malicious things he may have done.

[@bane9951]

I think that Adam making himself the ultimate mastermind at the end of the game says a lot about him

[@TheOnlyPedroGameplays]

He is within his rights as the creator of such a game. You can right a book and make your self insert the main villain of the story if you want to, it’s just writing, no matter the morality

[@ScorpionClaws789]

​@@TheOnlyPedroGameplaysOk, and? They're saying it makes him look conceited and childish, they're not saying it's illegal.

[@TheOnlyPedroGameplays]

@@ScorpionClaws789 oh I mean rights in a different sense, excuse me. What I mean is that Adam, even despite being such a lame and childish character, is completely within his right to free expression to make himself the villain mastermind of his games, even if it’s really dumb. It’s different than the case in the video where he dumbly reacted to some guy calling him an asshole by sabotaging him. In that case, though, yeah, he’s really infantile

[@vanillune]

@@TheOnlyPedroGameplays they never said he wasn’t allowed, just that it made him look dumb lol

[@TheOnlyPedroGameplays]

@@vanillune I’m still not saying they can’t judge anything, I’m just explaining that he’s completely justified to do the edgy mastermind things, the only thing they’re not cool to do is judge him off of doing it in the first place, but you’re cool to judge the way he does it and acts. In any case, though, I said what I said, and I don’t want to continue to defend the point all night

[@coreylemon]

"Was this justified? I don't care." Welcome to the Game 2 is not a free game. These people payed money for a product, which the developer intentionally made unusable after receiving that payment. It might be a stretch, but that sounds like something that could be argued to be illegal to me.

[@sarafontanini7051]

its certainly a shitty, ashsole move

[@Saibellus]

certainly unless there was some kind of upfront disclosure that the seller could and would break the product for you, i would say it is illegal

[@TrueLadyEvilChan]

Super super messed up

[@AprilSunshine]

This

[@rachalwithana7099]

if the tampering to make the game unwinnable had been permanent, it certainly could be considered illegal since the dev consciously decided to make this product unusable for a targeted person - but since it was only temporary trolling that at best spoiled hours of gameplay and just pissed people off, i don't think there's a lot that can be done about that legally

[@DulcetCatharsis]

The main thing about Welcome To The Game 2 for me is that the "developer back door" that allowed the trolling sounds like it could be a major security issue. Maybe other games have similar backdoors and it isn't the security risk it sounds like, but that sounds like the type of thing where you would be able to gain more information than just their log in times and stuff

[@danielshore1457]

It's especially concerning from the fact that this is an offline single player game

[@zombiechibixd]

It's worse actually. Because if you know how the browser work (you're the developer of a game that has in game browser), you could really make some RAT and actually hack the player's computer. Anything browser related, is terrible, especially if you don't keep it up to date.

[@DeepVoicedDude]

He deserves every single one of those negative reviews. Reputation is everything to Indie devs and this dude took his own reputation out back and shot it lol

[@gatordragon6140]

Wait what rep? As far as i knew adam was pretty much a better version of digital homicide or yandev, that isnt really something you can take out back and shoot given how microscopic it is lol

[@whothehellarewe]

@@gatordragon6140 Holy fuck, shots fired.

[@arn3107]

​@@gatordragon6140well people liked his games ig

[@Shitposting_IHMN]

Polish youtuber vibed with it and we all had our fun, we wanted for this to happen in the new game, but it wont happen sadly

[@AxiEisa]

Guess what happens if he DOESN'T troll the players? Everyone will praise his character growth

[@Stereo6400]

if you’re a longtime fan of mark you can 100% tell that “raging” thing was ABSOLUTELY a joke. he has a VERY obvious joke voice and you can definitely hear it in the clip

[@Bookgurl656]

Mark was just stating very good points.

[@liviwaslost]

I’m not a massive mark fan and even I think it’s very obvious.

[@antirevomag834]

Haven't been a fan of mark since like fnaf 3 was a thing... Anyone who's seen him trying to get through fnaf2's hardest night can tell he's not raging that much in this case. Guy was literally censoring that video he was f-bombing so much and that was in the EDITED version.

[@rainingtacos3135]

He was definitely annoyed but he wasn’t as raging as he showed

[@mayravixx25]

For sure, I think the only times I've ever seen him genuinely angry were during his surgeon simulator video with wade a long time ago, and when he was playing "getting over it" where he literally threw a chair in rage. Most of the other times I'm guessing it's just slight annoyance rather than full on anger

[@reagansido5823]

"I'm just entertaining people" when he made the game unwinnable out of anger is a real "it's just a prank bro" excuse.

[@OneGamer2EnvyThemAll]

[Russian accent] It's only game, why you have to be mad?

[@FranciumBoron]

​@@OneGamer2EnvyThemAllRemember - no Russian.

[@mrpenguin8731]

I mean, it was quite entertaining

[@mrpenguin8731]

@@OneGamer2EnvyThemAllI like that joke

[@ThatGuyCaffeine]

@@mrpenguin8731 For you maybe, not for cast. He just said "he seems like an asshole" and Adam went to go on a vendetta against him and just ruin his game. He couldnt handle a simple comment about him. Then he went on twitter to go and say "OHHHH CANCEL CULTUREEEE" when in reality it was completely justified to complain about him.

[@LiminallyYours]

Another issue is the reverse of this: if dev trolling can make the game harder, it can also make the game easier, invalidating any speedrun where there was even a chance of it happening. It's a human-controlled variable which makes a toggle absolutely necessary for any use of the game that needs perfect metrics (speedrunning, testing...)

[@Agent234sp]

Damn, bro had a backdoor into people's games and he used it to make things worse for them. Adam could've redirected websites and written messages on the screen. He could've done harmless fun player interactions, but instead decided to ruin their fun.

[@yarinoi8662]

@@genericname2747 Yes! this would have been so much better!!

[@OdaSwifteye]

@@genericname2747 Oddly enough the Stanley Parable did that. When Jerma and a few others were streaming the game the developer updated their website to show screenshot of them playing the game live. Jerma doubled down on the gag by having a screenshot of him sleeping with a spider on his face.

[@sere971]

@@OdaSwifteye wait they did that live? I saw it happen to a streamer and wasn't really 100% sure what it was all about, but figured it was just a screen capture thing somehow, but that wouldn't make any sense thinking back on it-- that's super cool that they did that and timed it properly

[@poingupoingu]

@@sere971 yeah it was an actual person. Jerma's playthrough shows what's going on really well because the person had to tell Jerma to get back to playing the actual game.

[@AgarthanExecutioner]

@@OdaSwifteye One of the many reasons I love jerma. Man is hilarious and rolls with anything you throw at him

[@AsterInDis]

I think the consent of opt-in is important in the case of dev trolling. Honestly I could see a dev doing something way worse with their trolling if they're not held accountable, so I'm glad that Reflect Studios got backlash and reverted the troll update.

[@solitudeguard8122]

Gmod glue pack moment?

[@Solinaru]

I keep thinking about how haunted house attractions in RL usually have different levels of interactions with the guests depending on when you arrive and what you've signed up for. the baseline experience is going to be spooky but the actors need your consent in order to go a little extra to their limits. As such, I'm ok with some horror tropes in games that are automatically assumed like when a game will shut itself off as part of a jump scare. That's about the line though before you need the player to consent to more elaborate tricks. (ie, dev hijack or connecting to an outside database)

[@RammerHammer]

It's also a VERY slippery slope. We've seen games like DDLC and OneShot (among a ton of others but this are the first ones that came to mind) be able to edit and add and delete files on your computer, who's to say a developer with malicious intent won't make a game that can backdoor its way into your PC's personal files. It's really not that hard to do

[@joyflameball]

@@RammerHammer ? Idk anything about Oneshot, but I know that DDLC only changed files in its own game folder. Bringing it up here feels kinda... weird? There's a big difference between "dev makes a game that can change your computer's personal files" and "dev makes a game that edits its own files for a more immersive experience." Plus, games that can change your personal files exist, and they're called viruses and malware, and they get removed and blacklisted pretty quick from my knowledge. Idk, this "slippery slope" argument feels weird.

[@RammerHammer]

@@joyflameball Anything's possible, that's all I'm saying. I don't expect anything of the sort to realistically occur, but you can't write it off entirely

[@mercury5003]

"adam seems like an asshole" >adam immediately proves his point

[@BerserkerDwarf]

>greentext on youtube >being this new

[@loli_cvnt5622]

>both of u >shut up

[@bloodyhell8201]

@@BerserkerDwarf tick tock. Time's catching up.

[@artificialdevil-sm]

"Consent is not the absence of a no, but the presence of a yes." Based on this, I absolutely think dev trolling features should be opt-in only. (Though it's fine if it's something like "game detects when you're streaming it / if you reloaded after something bad / etc. and is already coded to fuck around a little when you do that with no live input from developer. At that point, it's literally just part of the game experience.)

[@theeskrungly]

Also if I am correct, the developer threw a mini tantrum on twitter because he was salty that phasmophobia was more popular than his games.

[@Zectifin]

thats because phasmophobia is good and his games are garbage.

[@digitalizedmind6784]

meanwhile the phasmophobia devs stream themselves playing their game and actively try to kill each other despite it being a co-op game

[@Naokarma]

"Oh no, this game is doing well, everybody shit on it for no reason!" -like half of game devs, for some reason

[@AshlynOne]

Also because Phasmophobia devs are awesome and super cool to their player base. Even include a lot of fan suggestions and listen to feedback.

[@demonicp4763]

@@Zectifin Adam's games are great. They capture atmosphere really well and really create that sense of unease in the player. The idea of deep web searching had never been done as well as Adam did it in WTTG1/2. as a person though, Adam is very petty and definitely gives off that he doesn't like when his way is the right way. dgmw, Phasmophobia is good, but i felt more enjoyment watching WTTG, as with a lot of people. So no, his games aren't 'garbage' but its just that Adam is a huge dickbag

[@that_random_artist6580]

What’s hugely dumb is that Mark is never EVER genuine with his “insults” at any creator, ever. ESPECIALLY game devs. Like 99.99% of him being mad at games is half said as a joke to entertain his audience and half said out of harmless frustration. I don’t even REMEMBER how much he cussed out CupHead, FNAF, any horror game that startled or frustrated him, and he literally threw a chair when he played Getting Over It. But he’s never cruel. He doesn’t bash them as people, and clearly he enjoyed playing it enough to play 17 hours of it on stream. So it’s not like he actually hates the game or the devs. Idk, it just seems like some narcissistic man baby bs to go after a perfectly kind man who’s advertising your game to MILLIONS.

[@that_random_artist6580]

@@nanoviolence7681 true. I just like to believe that everyone is good until I’m proven otherwise, and with all the genuine GOOD he does, I have a hard time believing he’d genuinely insult a game dev.

[@twilight3272]

@Nano Violence How he truly feels isn’t really the point though, because at the end of the day he never publicly insulted the creators personally. Therefore, over-retaliating is just in poor taste.

[@nanoviolence7681]

@@twilight3272 at the end of the day it's just people that I couldnt care much for. If you told me they both died I would say "damn,that sucks" then go into another video. Interest in this sort of thing is fleeting less you make this your whole life. No one knows how they feel about this truly. Hell, they could be on it together. And you wouldn't know

[@pilotmender043]

This could have been out of more pure frustration but didn't Mark make tweets about how terrible Getting Over It is and how nobody should ever play the game?

[@lordpeterturbo5216]

@@pilotmender043 if you explain the joke then you killed the joke

[@jamiemunger2931]

Honestly, the fact that someone coded in a way to have access to the files over the internet into a single player game is such a red flag. At no point does that game require an actual connection to be functional, so it seemed like he KNEW that he was gonna have to use that feature.

[@exp5261]

Access to the files?

[@jamiemunger2931]

@@exp5261 unless the game is stream exclusive, which it's not in this case, the dev would be messing with the game files that are downloaded on your computer.

[@hanakoisbestgirl4752]

Ever heard of clustertruck? The devs can mess with the game while your playing it and it's great. They can put text on screen and give power ups and make the game harder and just troll the streamer and everyone seems to love it when they do it

[@MissOnana]

@@hanakoisbestgirl4752 The difference here is that they are able to do that through a feature the streamer opted in for. They gave their consent to allow that to happen. No one consented to what happened with WTTG2.

[@strangevol5264]

@@hanakoisbestgirl4752The dude in the video mentions it!!

[@thecrematedkitten8810]

I think consent and awareness are essential. You mentioned schizophrenia at the start in jest but you touch on an important concept. For people who are prone to psychosis and distorted pereception, experiences like developer trolling can cause a real break in reality for a person which can put their psychological stability, even their life at risk depending on their situation. I agree that it's fun and trivial in most situations but a manipulation of power should never threaten a person's safety like that, the cost far outweighs the benefit.

[@joyflameball]

I'm so fucking happy someone is mentioning this oh my god. It's not just bad for general gamer experience, anyone with disorders that mess with their perception of reality would be horribly effected, holy shit

[@frankiemillcarek6976]

1000x this! It's the same reason I think ARGs should have a big fucking warning website or wiki explaining it is an ARG pop up as the first search result. I understand that it takes a sliver of fun away from some people but if you can't suspend your disbelief to play then the game isn't really that good or interesting. If you are making a piece of media (movie, video game, ARG, etc.) you should want people to *choose* to engage with it. Forcing someone to engage with something in the public sphere without regard to their physical and mental wellbeing isn't art, good media, or fun. It's assholery. Trolling has always been assholery and this is no exception.

[@Totally_Glitched]

@@frankiemillcarek6976 110% agreed. I know I've personally had to take a step back from the vast majority of ARGs and unfiction type stuff, because it screws with my head and perception of things in a very nasty way. So I really appreciate when warnings are given upfront. Funnily enough, it was a tumblr post about adding unreality warnings that helped me realize how bad my own paranoid delusions were. I genuinely thought it was something everyone experienced, and that it was considered 'part of the fun' when it came to ARGs and unreality fiction (similar to how people enjoy being scared when they watch horror movies). Then I learned that no, these things aren't supposed to fuck you up *that* much. ^^;

[@JoeySkirmish]

lol

[@DeezN00tz99]

I have bad paranoia this would fuck me up pretty bad,

[@acetrigger1337]

My opinion is: if Adam created the game with the entire concept having him as the "Main Villain", with actual prompts and proper warnings about the experience in which the game was all about, this would be a revolutionary game. but making an option like this be a surprise is just very abusive, manipulative and quite a stupid thing to do... legally.

[@LiamNajor]

I...actually want to make this a game, this is a GENIUS idea

[@arn3107]

​@@LiamNajorhonestly yeah

[@arn3107]

​@@LiamNajorhopefully Adam won't try to claim plagiarism or something

[@ipga13]

reminds me of game.exe. kind of a strech but oh well

[@TheSpolly2]

The game The Blackout Club had a pretty similar concept, in that the game's gods were played by the devs, roleplaying in character.@@LiamNajor

[@AndrewRT13]

"Forget about Big Brother's watching. Big Brother's playing." Did not expect such a hard line from a video essay about dev trolling.

[@jackrabbit.]

Was looking for this comment: it's really scary. It's ruining Adam's chances of ever, EVER being trusted to make a profit off a game again. Nobody wants their game to be tampered with like this, and it's horrifying how easily he's been able to do it.

[@catbatrat1760]

Same. Like, that legit sounds like a horrifying writing prompt.

[@aldar98]

meanwhile gtaV online modders:

[@arftrooper2057]

I’m not a lawyer, but given the precedent set by apple successfully being sued for tampering with their products’ battery life with updates, there is an argument to be made that making a game unplayable without the consumer’s knowledge on purchase is illegal

[@fecal_position6412]

The provable damages would be less then the filing fee for any potential lawsuit, I'm all for seeing it happen though.

[@alteregobruh]

The thing is... It is playable. It isn't winnable while being messed with, but it still was 100% playable.

[@brightroot5719]

@@alteregobruh You can make that same argument for Apple though. The phone is still useable with a tampered battery life, maybe your battery will die much sooner but still 100% useable. But that argument is also bullshit, same applies to saying that for what adam can do to your game.

[@alteregobruh]

@@brightroot5719 See, but like… That’s directly harming the phone and making it like that, forever. What he’s doing is messing what your gameplay for a few hours. Once he decides he’s done with you, it goes back to working as intended. Apple messing with the battery life messed with it forever. The battery is just fucked now. Adam messing with the game is not permanent, not guaranteed, and, oh… His game doesn’t cost hundreds of dollars. So, uh… Yeah. There is a difference. What he’s doing is scummy, definitely, but he’s not directly harming the game forever. When he’s done with you (which would probably be soon, especially if you aren’t streaming) it works as it did before. And it’s possible to install earlier versions, before the one that introduced the feature that allowed him to do that.

[@SpecialInterestShow]

​@@alteregobruhdid Cast's game go back to normal after? It sounds like it didn't

[@Soupurman]

12:34 "Was it justified? I don't care." BEST answer there honestly

[@null6209]

Why is nobody talking about it just being a BLATANT SCEURITY RISK to have a developer have an immeadiate, direct, p2p connection to your game, without your consent????? Like, in the off chance you run the game in Admin mode, he's got you, he has access to your pc, done and dusted

[@thatmariohead1741]

That was my first thought to! Even if Adam only uses the backdoor to make the game artificially harder - any dev with a similar backdoor could use the game as malware to gain access to a computer. Or heck, a dev could program it in in good faith, but then be compromised by a hacker who uses the backdoors as a database of potential victims. It'd be ridiculous if this security risk wasn't at least opt-in.

[@MrCrininer]

@@thatmariohead1741 It's not really a backdoor per se, though. The game connects to a server and receives requests that can affect the gameplay. Which is basically the same way any multiplayer game works. That's why it's not illegal, and why Valve didn't do anything about it.

[@swagar]

​@@thatmariohead1741Is it really any more of a risk than installing a game already is? You're trusting a binary executable a random game dev put out. You're already letting arbitrary code run on your machine. A malicious dev wouldn't need an active, ongoing connection to a backdoor to do something nasty.

[@etherknightmare1181]

@@MrCrininer Active control over the game without authorization is illegal, though. He has access to how your pc behaves, even if just slightly. Unauthorized access to computer systems is a thing in many countries.

[@Heathenfidel]

@@MrCrininer A backdoor that can only mess with the program that it's in is still a backdoor. The fact that it's secret and the fact that it allows the dev to manually control things in the game to make it unwinnable for specific players are enough to make it a backdoor. It might not be illegal, but it's still a backdoor.

[@igaak.9709]

About proof for Adam tampering with the game: two very popular Polish streamers got trolled in a simmilar way, with Adam admitting to it.

[@DaburuTori]

yup one was Eleven

[@taylorfreyholtz9153]

I think the main issue, the reason it bugged me so much is because it wasn’t in good fun with Castora. He wasn’t laughing or smiling by the end of it, which as my parents taught me is the signifier of a *Bad Joke*. And while I would’ve said it’s fine to let developers just do whatever a little earlier the idea of this happening sets a dangerous precedent. You don’t need it to happen multiple times to protect people from what’s going on. What happens if some kid is playing a game and a developer starts messing with them? If a developer uses that position to message them? What if the developer does something that actually upsets the player? Shouldn’t the player be allowed to opt out if it’s affecting them negatively? I think even if it’s just for parents, they should get a chance to make sure their kid isn’t talking to any strangers online or make sure they’re safe. You can’t exactly read back a log of what devs say to children either that has such a potential for danger, and you could say kids aren’t going to play games that are age restricted but…come on. Castora made a shit ton of his livelihood off of that game for a while, and genuinely enjoyed it even if he said some rude things about the developer. Adam pretty much broke that respect and love for his games at that point. In the end games are something we do for fun, to make us happy, to have a good challenge. And openly allowing Devs could break that.

[@404_coffee9]

It is a bad joke, a pathetic one at that.

[@dale117]

@@danjoredd there's already a major concern with games that use anti-cheat software if you weren't already aware. All anti-cheat software has kernel level access, which basically means it has full unfettered access even beyond administrator accounts in Windows, simply for the purpose preventing cheating in online multiplayer. Every AAA title you own that has multiplayer functionality, pretty much, gives malicious hackers a backdoor into your computer with higher system privilege than you could ever give to yourself. I'd say that's way worse than any 'dev troll' that can be mitigated by just making a standard user account that won't have write access for playing such games, personally.

[@bluhamilton2485]

I remember watching all of Mark's streams live because WTTG2 was actually something I was super excited for because it's actually a really unique game design that I rather enjoyed. But man Mark was right, like he's not a bad gamer, in fact he's actually pretty darn good so that fact that in 17 hours of gameplay he couldn't beat the damn thing once? There's just too much stuff to focus on and way too much RNG

[@psonehagrid]

He was making huge mistakes that caused his death. He could've beat the entire game he got so close but he kept making the same really bad mistakes that caused his deaths over and over again. and then he blamed the game and adam even tho none of his deaths were caused by bugs or tampering.

[@jtnachos16]

@@psonehagrid Problem: If those deaths are not being picked up as a result of the player's actions, by the player, after 17+ hours, then it is NOT the gamer's fault. That's the dev failing hard at explaining the requirements of the mechanics. That's a dev-side fail, not a user fail. Also, no. Just no. You cannot claim 'none of the deaths were caused by bugs or tampering' when the tampering doesn't have to be obvious and the only person who COULD verify one way or the other is a compromised source who cannot be trusted to speak in good faith.

[@psonehagrid]

@@jtnachos16 yeah i agree the game shouldve explained things better but just lookin up a guide will be fine and I know for a fact none of the deaths were caused by tampering because he did something wrong that caused all the deaths. Every single one every single time ive watched all the streams maaany times

[@jtnachos16]

@@psonehagrid See, you can make that claim all you want, but I don't believe it in the slightest. The simple fact that your counterargument is 'lol look up a guide' says all that needs to be said about the quality level of the game's design . Your fanboyish spam doesn't change that. EDIT: Also, I remember at least one loss of progress that resulted from the hacking minigame shorting the cooldown it is SUPPOSED to have and popping up immediately after he finished the previous one.

[@mythicalthings1796]

​@@psonehagrid If your only defense for a game is "look up a guide" then the games shit plain and simple. If your game did such a shit job explaining the gameplay loop that guides are required? Then it's shit.

[@thtoneboot]

Came from tiktok as well....this is very well made from the vocal quality to the edits its all amazing. I honestly expected this to be a well known KZbinr. You sir should definitely skyrocket

[@lui7136]

Ikr I'm surprised he has 1k subs with how good quality his video is

[@404_coffee9]

Hopefully he does I am leaving comments to please the algorithm try and help.

[@no-legjohnny3691]

Yeah, this video has boomed to several times the popularity of his most recent video, an SCP-097 narration video from 3 years ago with only a couple thousand views at most. Kinda hard to believe it's even involved here

[@Hana1LuLu]

@@lui7136 He now has 8.6k at the time of my comment! (for online history records) He's taking off and its well-deserved, this is a well-crafted video.

[@FTZPLTC]

The irony here is that Adam likes his games to be hard and challenging and somewhat frustrating, because then beating them is rewarding. But by introducing the possibility that he might be in your game making it unwinnable... he just made it so people are more likely to give up than keep playing.

[@Valen7141]

Adam: gets called creepy. Also Adam immediately: proves he's creepy by basically hacking the streamer's game without consent

[@frostedlambs]

Thats not creepy?

[@Konachaos]

​@@frostedlambsAre you making a confirmation or a question

[@frostedlambs]

i love jesus@@Konachaos

[@Konachaos]

i love you @@frostedlambs

[@frostedlambs]

thanks@@Konachaos

[@KelseyDrummer]

This reminds me of when Callmekevin killed a bunch of sims in a pool in the winter in Sims4 and EA patched it so you couldn't.

[@CharaDreemurX]

OK what version of the Sims four are you playing that putting a bunch of Sims in a pool in the winter won’t kill them? In fact being outside in any cold weather especially in swimwear is a good fashion way to have them die.

[@dallaerine4127]

​@charadreamuur7229 What the comment says isn't entirely accurate, but EA did patch the game after a CallMeKevin video. They made it so Sims can't freeze to death or die of heatstroke during events. Kevin was throwing outdoor pool parties in winter and killing 12+ Sims per party 😂 EA saw that even though Kevin was killing them on purpose, this could be an actual issue with gameplay for regular players if there was a sudden heatwave or snowstorm during an event with a set dress code.

[@KelseyDrummer]

@@dallaerine4127 If it was inaccurate it was probably because I was drunk when I wrote it. My bad! Lol

[@CharaDreemurX]

@@dallaerine4127 thank you for your response! Didn’t see it till now lol. But yeah that checks out!

[@ProcrastinationQueen]

@@dallaerine4127yeah, that happened to a Sims KZbinr called James Turner. He held an event during a heatwave, and every single guest died of a heatstroke! It wasn’t intentional on his part, and he mostly just found it funny in the end and a good video/progression was created due to that event, but if you’re playing a more serious storyline where that type of stuff can ruin your story, then it’s definitely a good idea to fix it 😅

[@space_1073]

Adam getting upset that he was called an asshole, and then immediately proceeding to be an asshole for 2 hours is wild

[@LoafofSourdough]

Imagine you’re playing a no hit run in a soulsborne game on YT or twitch, and Miyazaki himself adds a fucking dragon with 1 million health out of nowhere. That’s essentially what Adam has done with “The Troll Update”. It’s impractical on all levels that he has done this, not just to one, but to multiple streamers and content creators. There was only one person who gained anything from his actions, and even that it arguable. Adam got his revenge, but ruined his reputation in the process, losing more than he gained and pissing on the joy of those who actually enjoyed his game. I hope those few fleeting moments of godhood were worth the ending of his professional career.

[@tehpandehwub5177]

since when did his career end? As far as I know, every youtuber came back to play scrutinized and he's still working on newer releases.

[@Woody2Times]

Dawg it’s not like these horror games have days, weeks and months of saved data. They win and everything resets that’s the difference this isn’t Skyrim or those super hard RPGs like Dark Souls or whatever

[@MudZeePlayGamer]

Markiplier has always raged like that at harder games but it's obvious he still enjoys the journey. He still plays the game and continues and has fun

[@moonlitxangel5771]

That's also very clearly not a true Markiplier rage. You can tell when he gets truly angry and it's not very often that it happens. And I'm not saying he wasn't frustrated or upset by the game, but it's clear that he was playing up his frustration in those clips for views. However, I don't think that's really relevant given that from what it seems from what was shown in the video Adam would've likely taken that and lashed out anyway, especially since he deleted the tweets mentioning Mark's streams.

[@captainfirebolt5673]

@@moonlitxangel5771if you watch his final rant on the game when he gives up, you can sense very strong disappointment and maybe some anger, but the ones he showed were just frustration

[@pensandshakers]

He didn't even throw a chair or break a controller.@@moonlitxangel5771

[@Russia1815]

One of my favorite instances of Devs tampering with the game is Shipwrecked 64. The developer will occasionally hop into games and help people find hidden areas as a character named Stumbler. You can even talk to him in character too. It's pretty awesome.

[@raspymorten]

What a great fucking way to instantly validate what the Cast dude was saying. Extremely fucking weird behavior from this dude. Real shame too, cause I like his games. Anyway, really cool to see a small channel like this pop back out of nowhere, try something new, and have it blow up. Hope you keep up this kind of content, always up for more video essays on random topics.

[@CastCS_]

Great video man! Did a great job covering what happened with me, but I would like to add a couple additional notes. To start, I was actually really excited to have the dev mess with me, initially. Not that I was ever asked/gave my express consent for it, but personally I spent well over 100 hours mastering the game on stream, so I had no issues going along with it. I mentioned at one point “I won’t be able to play on this account anymore”, because of my assumption it was on an auto-script. Well, that stream I also did log onto a completely separate steam account, bought the game again, and guess what? Yep, instant “trolling”. As far as the Twitter DM’s go, the way Adam spoke in my chat insinuated there was something I wouldn’t want anyone to see. Of course, there wasn’t. My DM’s were respectful, breif, and polite in nature. Following the stream, I made a twitlonger talking about the events, only to receive harassment from Adam’s fan both on my socials & my stream. Some even faked being nice just to be snaking for his Discord. As far as info on the Trolling update, it WAS publicly announced. I streamed it for a week consecutively after it’s release. However, my fiasco with him & my twitlonger (which caught some traction) caused so much public heat for Adam that he publicly announced he would be retracting the “Trolling” update . So… a nice win there, I guess. I was an extremely small viewer streamer when this happened (still am 😅), so it really supports the idea that it could have been anyone. Supported by the fact that other’s reached out to me over the years with their own bad experiences with Adam. Fortunately, It’s all water under the bridge for me now, though. I am a Horror game streamer and have been for years, so finding new games is never an issue.😁 I also work full time as a KZbinr on a (separate) account. So all is good. I personally forgave him as I believe people can change, whether he actually has or not. Love the video Scott, will definitely be staying tuned for more. 🔥 Also huge W for saying my username right the first time, and thanks to those following me on Twitch. 😎

[@joepalmer9955]

It really sucks that a lot of people would rather stick to guns blazing and cause drama over something that doesn't matter to either side anymore, really. I think the report was good overall, and I don't think that time makes anyone immune to criticism, but it does show how poor some people are in character when it comes to hate and vilifying someone.

[@grognakthedestroyer468]

hey man, props to you for handling everything so calmly and civilly! it's shitty that adam got so vindictive, i could tell you really didn't want anything to do with genuine hostility. your discomfort was palpable. but good on you for staying cool throughout a few hours of a man arbitrarily taking out his frustration on you. i'll probably drop by to check out some of your streams, keep it up! 👍

[@Taznixx]

if anything good came from this, its that I've now discovered your livestream

[@Nylspider]

The main man himself commented, hell yeah

[@RealTyrakIGuess]

Props for keeping cool under pressure. Instant karma is incredibly funny IMO, so like, a single killed run and a lighthearted note in chat would've been entertaining, humbling, and MAYBE even justified. Probably good exposure for both of you, too, if it was done like that. ...But twO hOURS? Plus all the messages in chat and social media? Plus the harassment from this dude's fans? Good God. :...: All that said, you're right in that people change! Plus the update was rolled back, which is... probably a good thing here. And I guess everyone involved learned a lesson or whatever, so hey, that's cool. At the end of the day you've earned a follow from me just for taking this situation in stride, lmao. See you on Twitch. o7

[@DeadAtrocity]

Dude blamed that a group of people online that got offended, even though the whole situation came from him harassing someone for over 2 hours because he called him a mean name. And a pretty tame one at that.

[@Gamer25891]

Ironical oblivious stupidity is over the roof lol

[@nothinkin69]

It wasn't even him calling him a mean name. It was just "idk he seems like an asshole, but I've never interacted with him properly to know". Man literally just stated his opinion and then said he didn't even have the complete picture of him so to take his opinion with a grain of salt.

[@Sherolox]

He could've just messed with Castoreh for 5 minutes, but no, he had to take it much too far.

[@luckyc4t110]

Remember: If someone calls you an asshole, you should definitely fuck with them, threaten them, and block them, because that will prove them wrong.

[@Insym]

Thank you for making this video. I used to speedrun this game and this brought back a lot of memories. Great video, great research, big props!

[@skvader4187]

You're that guy who also speedran rides with strangers I think

[@untipocualquieraconunnombr1609]

What is your opinion on these accusations?

[@therasilvi]

I was thinking about your playthroughs as I was watching this. Does this alter your opinion of the game or game dev?

[@mugiwaerouma]

Whoa, did not expect to see you here for some reason

[@luckylucas7957]

Woah it’s the guy

[@fincollins350]

I think opt-in is the only ethical way. Personally I have some derealization and paranoia stuff. Sometimes I feel like Someone is fucking with me. Typically for games, I can just look at game rules etc and reassure myself that things are Just Code and there is not some malicious omnipotent Entity out to get me. Having an actual person fuck with me without me knowing, or when I'm in a negative headspace, could be Extremely dangerous for me (could trigger an episode of derealization and paranoia which could spiral into actual psychosis). Even just having a message that pops up informing me that dev trolling is a possibility and continuing to play is consenting to potentially having your game messed with is enough. Like I cannot stress enough, if someone is Genuinely fucking with me, I need to be aware of that for my own safety. But other players should also be able to consent, regardless of if it's for safety reasons or simply because they dont want to be bothered.

[@Xahnel]

Except how can you be sure that anyone the dev fucks with opted in? If the dev includes the capability to fuck with players live, then a single options menu button won't stop that.

[@Hungnir]

Behind you

[@Rosietea]

​​​@@Hungnircan you see me boffing your mother from that angle? 😊 🎉

[@joyflameball]

​@@Hungnir Wtf is wrong with you dude

[@felisazure1820]

I also struggle with paranoia so I agree with this. Knowing it's a possibility makes all the difference, and I really admire games that offer an opt in or out feature.

[@HoodieHorizon]

I'm majoring in game development and like if someone had a reaction to this game like Markiplier I'd be like "ok, what can I fix about this" while also laughing along. It would hurt but like, every creative profession hurts to get any criticism

[@BlueMiaou]

Same, I want to get into game development after I graduate high school and I'd honestly be happier in the long run if people were telling me how to improve my game. Not everyone has to take into account criticism, everyone gets to choose what they do with their art, but nobody gets to be petty about constructive criticism

[@sshaughnessy6543]

Mark definitely plays it up for laughs, but generally he has mostly good things to say about games, or if he didn’t like one, he’d still talk about what he thinks is good over what’s bad. He’s one of the few I find who gives constructive criticism (but I won’t act like i watch all things let’s play on youtube)

[@exoplaneeet9499]

but also like. as a computer science major. if the game/program in question's purpose was to elicit the emotion of frustration, and the people playing it ended up frustrated? like. id pat myself on the back. thats a success! its the same concept of a sad piece of art making someone cry or a comedy making someone laugh. you did the thing right?

[@neoqwerty]

FYI, in this case: implement a "pity pass". Track how many times the user failed at specific points, and for each however-many-attempts they die at on a specific stage, quietly rig the RNG to succeed for the next attempt, or increment the success chance until a success resets the RNG to "un-rigged" for that particular point. The player can still fail because of their own decision, but the RNG should give them a freebee if it screwed them over multiple times on the same element. That way even if RNGesus doesn't like them, they will progress onward.

[@neoqwerty]

@@exoplaneeet9499 There's a fine balance for RNG hell ragegames, though: if you make the RNG too unfair, players will give up before they can progress forward, because they don't feel like it's their skill that's holding them back. Also, player burnout. Most rage games make your failures dependent on your SKILLS, not on RNG deaths, because you want your players to want to play again, not feel disgust and anger at YOU THE DEV for wasting their time and money and to never want to touch anything you ever make again because they hated that game THAT BAD. The player feeling like it's their own fault and they can do better next time is kind of an essential part of the ragegame hook (along with "I'm not letting a stupid computer win!!!" spite-playing).

[@marions.3657]

Mark is untouchable in a sense, he is too big of public personality that unlike with cast, expressing explicite hostility toward him would only results in adam loosing the uphill battle.

[@marions.3657]

@@ahmadalimi9784 I dont agree because the parasocial relationship youtuber from his time have to their views is alot stronger then the one those celebs have.

[@marions.3657]

@@ahmadalimi9784 you mean the 20-30 who grew up with squeezie, cyprien, hugo tout seul, antoine daniel, le joueur du grenier who also all knew about pewdipie and jacksepticeye and even go inspired by them to star their own little gaming channel? I doubt it cause just because you dont know any french youtuber didnt mean that it wasnt popular in france.

[@existantperson8624]

Honestly the thing id be worried about is remote code execution if he can control your game through a website he can most likely do other stuff outside the game while your playing, not only that but it could be a legal issue to piggyback off someones computer without consent.

[@disruptivevoib]

Plenty of devs have ways to mess with games at times! That being said its not impossible he had a backdoor window kind of thing. Idk if we'll ever know?

[@disruptivevoib]

Why I say plenty, ive seen devs mess with player's games! Less uh, cruely of course! Like that one truck game where you bounce from truck to truck. I've seen others too, but that's the most common

[@FaerieBlue]

@@disruptivevoib the devs trolling the truck game is just funny and wholesome; Adam is just a dick LMAO

[@mariaestevez3690]

Cluster truck devs have done it

[@oliverwray9510]

@@disruptivevoib i think the main point of that persons comment is consent of the player. adam doesnt need it and can do whatever he wants, the clustertruck devs need your consent to have access though

[@AprilSunshine]

I actually love when Mark goes on rampages about hating games and devs. He's not being serious. It's just part of the fun for us, the viewer.

[@woozymammal]

Yes, until he gets so frustrated that he stops. Then he forgets how much he dislikes the games and then revisits them 😭 Gotta love him

[@Cdog-]

I remember a few years ago, I watched one of reflectstudio’s streams in twitch. They were just raiding people and screwing with people’s games. It was at that moment that I lost all respect for the developer because he was willing to stoop as low as to mess with people’s gameplay experience. Just a major A hole move

[@gaigeriel]

Yeah its very jarring to see a developer actually making his reputation worse by doing that type of stuff.

[@youtube-kit9450]

The worst part is that you absolutely can mess with someone's game... just talk about it beforehand. Imagine that, you talk to a streamer "hey, stream my game, I'll log in and mess a bit with your game to make it more fun and challenging and maybe even be in chat with some special marker to talk to chat". Fucking easy publicity, fun and engagement with the viewerbase. But no, dude's just a terrible douchebag and instead torpedoed his reputation completely by being horrible.

[@joyfulleader5075]

There was also one time where I was on one of his livestreams and one viewer asked him something like "Why do you look so tired?" Or something, I forgot what the exact question was and Adam got annoyed by that so he quit what he was doing on-stream to go to the viewer's channel and make fun of their content to the point where they deleted their vids out of embarrassment before eventually being banned from the stream.

[@lauriepoune]

@@joyfulleader5075 He's a a$$ , we know that now , but I can't believe you here like that can't be real ?! Is there proof ? If it's true than why no one talk about it cause that's awful if he did that ...

[@RED-my9hl]

​@@lauriepoune cuz it's only one instant of many

[@PopeMical]

For Clustertruck I always thought of it as a great method to add some more light hearted fun to the already chaotic game when twitch integration is on. It also doesn't feel like a massive privacy concern like other methods of interacting with a player's game. Also for a game like Welcome to the Game to have a backdoor the developer can use to mess with people... it sounds way more terrifying than some light hearted fun. Because the game already gets you paranoid about the threats figuring out where you live while playing and you are then going to tell me that the developer knows exactly which game client is mine and can remotely do stuff to it?!

[@matthewrobinson2442]

It should be noted for people new to Reflect Studios' content; (spoilers for WTTG2 specifically) Adam is given a role as the leader of Noir. Not just him playing a character, the character is just him. So definitely some power trip shit going on.

[@steebelieves2632]

Lmao wtf

[@FriedFrenchFries]

Or it could just be him having fun with creating a game. This doesn't logically prove that he put himself in the game as a power trip. I don't think Adam is a grandiose narcissist or anything. I think he's just too sensitive at being attacked for things like this.

[@SmokeyEdits]

@@FriedFrenchFries Just checked the wiki, it's literally him. Again spoilers, but there's an ending where Adam invites you to his apartment or some shit and attacks you and reveals himself as the leader of Noir.

[@matthewrobinson2442]

If it was just the plot thing or just the script injections I would be inclined to agree, but both at once implies this is an active power fantasy for him and that the reason he's sensitive about it boils down to having that fantasy questioned and disrupted.

[@TheWonkster]

@@FriedFrenchFries have you listened to him talk for more than 10 minutes? He's definitely out there.

[@notrealnamenotatall2476]

My thoughts are this: me buying your game doesn't give you the right to make me a toy for your entertainment. Customers are doing YOU a favor buying your product. If that product isn't what it was supposed to be, then it's not 'funny', it's not 'quirky', it's a failed transaction.

[@loudnoises8197]

Nobody should be doing anybody a favor. Buying a game isnt doing somebody a favor unless you buy it for the sole reason just to give them money

[@neoqwerty]

@@loudnoises8197 As a creator: we exist because our customers buy our products, without any obligations to do so. We're not vital services, or even commodities. We create time-intensive, costly luxuries. Creators exist to entertain customers, and if we're lucky, and did a good job, we get back praise as well as money that our customers could have spent elsewhere. But creators deciding that their customers are the entertainment? They're toxic as hell, stay away. That goes for ANY kind of creator BTW, even free ones where their customers pay only in views or downloads and engagement. If you see a fanfic writer who feels entitled to reviews, if you witness a D&D dungeon master who uses players to run their little fantasy story with a captive audience, that kind of thing? Keep walking, they're not worth it and they'll devolve into a pile of drama eventually.

[@loudnoises8197]

​@@neoqwerty Imo there is a difference between the two. Creators just create and live to create. Entertainers entertain. Creators can be entertainers but there is nothing implied that a creator should entertain or think about anything else besides his art. There are many writers, poets, painters, artists, etc. that just create for creation sake and dont do it for anybody else. There is a reason that many now famous artists are only famous post-mortem due the public finally seeing all the art that has been hidden during the artists lives (Kafka, van Gogh, etc.) I agree with you with that if a creator wants to get paid and/or foster an audience then they need to create something that captures the interest of an (paying) audience. But a creator should never be beholden to expectations and wants of other people unless the artists are fine with compromising/altering their art for them (also small point, im not saying that anti-social artistry is free from consequences and opinions, all of those are free to happen as a result of their actions)

[@backparker9264]

As a game dev student supposed to graduate next semester (because apparently, I can't even have a full year without almost having a limb amputated in some sort of accident and had to take summer classes just to stay on track) what Adam did is giving your stereotypical IT computer guy. The type that would most definitely say "go make me a sandwich" and laugh. It's also super weird how he obsessed over that streamer for 2 hours, the streamer thought he was being trolled or pranked but bro was actively angry and ruining the man's gaming experience. He seems sensitive and can't take criticism, probably thinks his game is the best because it's so hard and unbeatable. I'm surprised he actually has a fan base for being such a man-child.

[@Pepstep_07]

god you are so right

[@kathrynhamilton860]

Completely agree

[@ShexualEmoUnicorn]

100% agree

[@tytotech9498]

I hope you're ok, btw.

[@backparker9264]

@@tytotech9498 thanks. The leg was crushed and almost amputated but I’m good and the arm was also injured but I’m good again. Definitely determined to graduate college tho lol even with all these setbacks. Even my eye got messed up but I didn’t need surgery at least on my eye. Just arm and leg.

[@blobbyfishman5524]

imagine buying a dvd from someone and then finding out that at any time the movie on the dvd can be replaced with whatever the person feels like

[@distorted_heavy]

The NFT experience

[@flochforster6892]

I agree that Adam very likely never messed with Mark’s game. Mark has a massive presence on the internet. If Adam messed with his game intentionally just to make his life miserable Adam would’ve been crucified for it. Adam going after someone much smaller confirms this in my mind.

[@concept5631]

If KZbin, Markiplier's _employer,_ didn't have the balls to go through with punishing him for a bullshit reason, Adam likewise wouldn't. Ego be damned.

[@janetmontalvo6944]

@@concept5631well uh after the Coryxkenchin thing, Mark made a video about it siding with Cory. KZbin responded by kicking Mark out of there KZbin Celebration thing, something Mark had been preparing for awhile and already finished his part (which is now posted on his main channel). So yeah

[@concept5631]

@@janetmontalvo6944 I was referring to that time Mark got his first KZbin strike when he sided with Moist Critical.

[@Ender41948]

As pointed out by someone else in the comments, a couple of normally impossible events happened to Mark's playthroughs. Like in Part 6, where he received two hacks back to back without any reason, a happening the game usually prevents.

[@concept5631]

@@Ender41948 I don't know what it is with Mark but has to be in a King-like situation where he's just absurdly lucky.

[@flyingcicata9675]

I was not ready for a video from TikTok to be this engaging, thoughtful, thorough, and well-edited and well-mixed. Impressive is an understatement. Well done.

[@thejusmar]

The curse and blessing of shortform video is stuff like this can get lost in the mix of garbage

[@TechRules]

First of all, mad props for not taking the easy route here and just saying "Yeah Mark's game was probably tampered with." It's so easy to make claims like that without thinking too much about it only for the Telephone Game to start, spreading an urban myth around that takes away the true things that, more often than not, are a lot cooler than whatever nonsense the original information got morphed into. Since this game revolves around encrypted mechanics, it was probably against Adam's best interests to mess with somebody's game without hinting that he's doing so. It would just serve to disrupt attempts at figuring out the game and make it feel more like an unsolvable mess, a problem the game had already been accused of in the first place. Since you couldn't find any concrete disrepencies, I don't doubt your conclusion at all. If you'd like to hear the take of some rando who spends a lot of time datamining and poking through game code: To start off, I think it would be difficult to classify this particular trolling mechanic as a backdoor. In the purest sense, that term implies data is being accessed that the software shouldn't have in the first place. The act of targeting your IP address may seem problematic, but video games MUST interact with your IP in order to perform any sort of online functions, making it public information. If someone played a game with me in a P2P environment, chances are I had an opportunity to grab their IP without too much trouble. I don't think this could be considered a breach of security, for however much that matters in this conversation of ethics. As far as the implementation, it actually involves a pretty simple and common method. Adam does not, at any point, have full control over the user's game during these incidents. The game is simply passively listening for information to come in from whatever location he set up ahead of time. From this location, Adam can essentially send triggers to the user's game in order to make stuff happen. Despite that, these are still normal functions that exist in the game, just triggered in a very peculiar way. Functionally, this is no different than a news ticker on a main menu, or a Crowd Control feature from Twitch chat. Because of that, my opinion is similar to yours: This is primarily a conversation of implied consent between the developer and the player. In a sense, I think there's a sort of implicit agreement that single player games should be self-contained, static experiences, where any random aspects stay confined within the rules of the game. Online games get away with more of this, because it's seen as more of a "living" experience. Offline games, however, don't get this luxury, and any changes need to have a pretty good reason if they want to get by without backlash. What's interesting about that is the fact that horror games seem to run on completely different rules; since horror relies heavily on mystery and the element of surprise, players of horror games understand that many aspects of the game will be intentionally hidden and obscured. They are aware that the developer intends to shock and confuse them, and by simply playing the game, they wordlessly give the devs permission to get away with things that would be seen as glaring flaws in other genres. After all, it's meant to improve their experience. This is why I think tearing apart horror games is so much fun. So much critical information is kept from the player, often with the player having no way of ever figuring it out. As a result, I'm generally okay with horror experiences having features like this. "Experience" is the key word here, though, and the reason I think it really has to be seen on a case-by-case basis. Developers of horror games are given a TREMENDOUS amount of trust to give the player a good experience, with the expectation that they won't abuse it. It's not uncommon for horror games to directly modify or create files on the user's PC or even mess with the usage of them. Despite this, players are able to appreciate the experience because they have faith the game won't do any permanent damage and make it easy to get out of any situation it may put them in. What's seen here is an example of a shameless, complete betrayal of that trust on the developer's part. Small trolling features like playing music or making random things happen seems like a fun thing on paper, and I'm sure that's what Adam had in mind when he made this feature. Even if it was primarily for his entertainment, I don't doubt the intent was also to enhance the experience of people playing his game. Despite this, he ended up intentionally using these features in a malicious way by abusing the more disruptive functions (likely by spamming forced deaths) and forcing the game into an unplayable state, effectively ruining any positive experience the streamer could've had for the entirety of the trolling. I firmly believe that while it was within his power, doing this was NOT okay. In the end, I still think it was important that this update was rolled back, because the trolling itself also demonstrated a huge problem: It could be triggered remotely to ruin the game. Any sort of remote implementation like this (ESPECIALLY one you can't opt out of) introduces the risk of being hijacked by malicious users. If someone were to somehow hijack the system that sends out these commands, or find a vulnerability in the game to bypass authentication, they gain access to every feature the developer originally made for it. While this shouldn't outright stop a developer from making fun little things like this, it's important to reflect on the impact that a malicious user could have. Not only did Adam fail to do this, but he even demonstrated how easy it would be to completely ruin the game for others. Suddenly, users are saddled with solving a problem they never asked for, courtesy of the developer's carelessness. There are countless examples of this happening, but the most direct comparison can be found in Grand Theft Auto V: There was an incident where users somehow got access to developer functions. While the purpose of the functions were to moderate the online mode, they worked just fine in single player, giving them the ability to freely mess with players' offline experience. If you're interested in seeing the problems that occurred, you can find footage of speedrunner DarkViperAU having his runs forcibly ended by said modders ragdolling his character with no way to stop it from happening ingame. There is little excuse for allowing something like this to be possible, and it's good that Welcome to the Game 2 no longer suffers from that possibility. Great video, by the way! Thanks for bringing up such an interesting topic!

[@myhlosic]

This is such a lovely, in depth comment! I greatly enjoyed reading it.

[@woodmm2]

i aint reading all that but im happy for you or sorry that happened

[@stevespike8208]

I pressed read more and got uppercut with a fucking thesis

[@beidousimp1639]

TLDR?

[@BriarPatchNyra]

@@beidousimp1639 You can read what MIGHT be a full page worth of text.

[@thesoupdragon1]

and mark got 'hacked' when he was playing cluster trucks and the devs ware messing about with him in a fun way. if i can remember right they show a text on the screen saying what you fave color and mark said green and the devs was like blue got it and the whole map was blue. that is fun trolling no was harmed

[@ReesesBees]

Mark was never hacked or messed with by the devs of WTTG2. He was just unlocky and using a very buggy/glitchy build at the time.

[@tenebris.animus7104]

I actually tuned in and watched all of Mark's streams and thought this game was just impossible. I was really rooting for Mark and waited for every stream. Now I understand.

[@Ardorstorm]

Same

[@moonlitxangel5771]

If you watched the video, you'd know he didn't find any evidence of tampering during Mark's playthroughs and that the update that allowed Adam to tamper with peoples' games wasn't until two years AFTER Mark streamed the game. There was a single thing that was supposed to be an obscure, rare occurrence that happened twice in a row but that's it. Everything else, according to this guys' research, seemed just to be the game.

[@tenebris.animus7104]

@@moonlitxangel5771 okay i made this comment before watching so yeah.

[@gagetaylor192]

@@moonlitxangel5771 Except for the fact that there were things happening during Mark's playthrough that weren't supposed to be happening. So how do you trust a guy who's openly shown how much of an asshole he is? I remember watching him play this game and I just remember how much it seemed like the game was fucking with him. So despite when that update actually released, I still don't believe that Mark's game was 100% natural. Since we know that Adam has no issue tampering with people's games nobody can play this game now and have weird shit happen and trust that it's JUST the game. There's always gonna be that doubt.

[@moonlitxangel5771]

@@gagetaylor192 Evidence? Because this guy provided evidence that disproves what you're saying. Combed through all the videos and took notes on everything to be sure on whether it was game mechanics or tampering. I'm not defending Adam in any way, it just doesn't add up that his game was tampered with given that the tools giving him the ability to even do it weren't added to the game until later (fairly certain he said people checked earlier versions of the game as well) and stuff seems to line up mechanic wise with what Mark experienced.

[@CaSCHWANK]

some guy: "I dunno, i just get the wrong vibe from that guy, he kinda seems like an asshole" adam: *proves beyond a shadow of a doubt that he is, in fact, the world's pettiest asshole* cancel culture saves the day 😂

[@jeffboy4231]

Honestly, it doesn't matter, if it's good trolling or ruining someone's game. The thing it needs is CONSENT, if it's a feature you can decline then everything's fine, and as you have shown with the other examples, you can decline having that stuff. With wttg2, he can just force his way into the game.

[@Gamer25891]

Yeah and then another thing that got me mad is him just fucking up your game to the point of not being able to beat it. I get that Adam himself said that there's no script it's just him trolling but I don't buy it, who really knows, if there's a script like that, you basically ruined the product and it should be refunded. that's like buying a fucking vase, then making some remarks towards the buyer, and he slightly damages it or cracks it because he disliked your remarks. Wtf?

[@jeffboy4231]

@@Gamer25891 yeah, you have bought the game, it's now yours. of course some things you can't do. but other than that it's yours

[@kamataridashima]

100%. All the “grey area” in this situation can be resolved with simple consent.

[@earlsocksiii5174]

mark always, or usually always gives his true feelings about a game. he even spoke highly of fnaf security breach even as it was very visibly falling apart, he noted all the aspects he loved, all the good work put into it to have him actually be so pissed at a game, with no good things to say about it that he would on stream express exactly how much he hated it says a lot lol

[@unintelligentlifeform3821]

Yeah it takes a lot to truly piss Mark off. If you made him really mad, you fucked up

[@TheArbiter10]

As rare as it is to witness on the internet, there is, in fact, a mature way to handle criticism, regardless of whether you feel that criticism is valid or not. Adam could have easily turned the situation into an optics win for himself when that streamer guy called him an asshole in any number of ways... starting with, y'know, _not being an asshole_ . Besides, we all know that throwing a public temper tantrum when the internet says mean things about you is the _best_ way to get them to stop (cough cough yanderedev cough).

[@AFarmerCalledChicken]

I always joke that “I don’t take criticism, but I do accept cash or credit” I enjoy constructive criticism and feedback, but if I see someone being clearly rude or biased I tend to ignore them

[@gotgunpowder]

"Muh Yanderedev!" People didn't say "mean things" about him, they actively lied and spread misinformation about him being an awful person in an attempt to damage his reputation. His "temper tantrum" amounted to...responding to the lies and showing why they were false. Which of course immediately gets twisted into "ZOMG HE THREW A TEMPER TANTRUM!" Or they take the 1% of the time he acted out of line (which is something literally anyone would do after being harassed online *and in real life* for several years, like people were literally SWATing him and sending him CP/gore and leaking his personal info) and treating it as representative of how he really acts. People online will justify literally beating someone up for "saying mean things" but when a game developer defends themselves that's apparently too much.

[@alecrutz956]

@@gotgunpowder wait how much misinformation around him was there? I haven't been following the story for a few years so I lost track. all I know is that the game is taking a painfully sluggish time to be released

[@tonyhakston536]

@@gotgunpowder Regardless of his moral character, he has no credibility as a developer. He stated outright that EVERYTHING he did was intended to replace later. Aesthetic placeholders are all fine and dandy, progress is progress, but when your codebase is a placeholder? That’s equivalent to not having a codebase.

[@seabass5892]

@@gotgunpowder So, how's that working out for you?

[@benwaffleiron]

absolutely loved how cast called adam an asshole and then adam handled the insult by proving it right. mentioning "cancel culture" is also a big red flag

[@TheRedstonian]

Honestly it's practically a dogwhistle at this point lmao

[@RimFaxxe]

This is the man who on stream, told me, a 15 year old at the time, that I must respect him because he could be my dad💀

[@freshlymemed5680]

@@RimFaxxe Dude has a big ego for someone with self-esteem akin to wet toilet paper

[@naan000]

@@RimFaxxe that's so weird ew

[@Naokarma]

It's really strange how people are so quick to prove people right whenever they're called out on being X or Y.

[@mcclure3510]

I remember seeing the dev throwing a hissy fit on Twitter because he didn't think his brand new multiplayer game was getting enough attention... he looked like a real ass when he started tearing into people trying to calm him. Definitely can see him doing stuff like this - surprised someone making dark games like these hasn't grown up yet

[@Dr.Oofers]

What was his new game?

[@mcclure3510]

@@Dr.Oofers I don't recall the name, but I think it was the one where a bunch of cultists are trying to do a ritual while one's trying to sabotage it? Masks of Deception?

[@JenAmami]

​@@Dr.Oofers if this is the same time i'm thinking of, probably scrutinized? not sure if he's done this multiple times but i definitely remember him making multiple angry tweets about how people preferred watching scrutinized vs playing it themselves. people were pointing out this was likely because of the absurd difficulty of his games and like mcclure said he just wasn't having it. after that, he added an easy mode to scrutinized so it would sell better...except he made sure that easy mode's 'ending' (if you can call it that) was a petty jab at the player. it's a SUPER bright RGB flashing screen complete with children cheering and text that congratulates you for getting the 'shit ending' and telling you to play on the normal difficulty next time. keep in mind that scrutinized has fnaf style gameplay of 10 nights that get increasingly more difficult and a lot of stuff to constantly keep track of so it was definitely a...choice. when that still didn't work (i wonder why) he made more angry tweets, lol. such a shame. he slowly burnt away all good will he had and a lot of his more defensive supporters have gotten disillusioned after waiting for rides with strangers since 2016.

[@53x016]

@@JenAmami and on top of that, the normal gameplay has permadeath. so if you're unlucky to get killed randomly at the end of the night, you'll have to start all over again. overall his behaviour throughout his career has shown him to be a spiteful and petulant developer who scolds his playerbase for struggling with the already hard "normal" difficulty. i remember watching coryxkenshin play scrutinized on easy and having to watch someone else complete normal mode after getting the shit ending. BUT scrutinized isn't multiplayer, i believe they're referencing masks of deception, which has kinda similar gameplay to phasmophobia, where one of your teammates is a demon and you need to figure out who to exorcise them. spaceman scott very briefly mentions it at 28:36.

[@JenAmami]

​@@53x016 you're right, i totally missed the multiplayer part of the first comment somehow. that's definitely masks of deception then, i do vaguely remember him making a few tweets about it not doing well. i personally stopped following his stuff after his behavior over scrutinized. i felt like it was just...so bizarre to treat your audience poorly because they aren't playing your games the way you want them to be played. i found out about his 'trolling update' stuff around that same time and it cemented my feelings. in my time following him i saw so many tweets of his where he was petty to people for seemingly no reason too :/ it wasn't just me, either. around that time people were losing their patience with him and demanding refunds for backing his rides with strangers kickstarter. he kept assuring people 'it's coming i just need to make another game to drum up funds.' which makes sense on paper, but...if you don't treat your supporters well they're gonna stop waiting around. it's been almost 8 years!

[@EvonneSol]

As a former cyber security student? I don't see anything wrong with trolling, but I do see something wrong with a developer having a backdoor into your account to mess with something while you're actively running it. Think about this: what if he kicked off a script that downloaded a virus onto your computer via the game mid-game? By downloading a game you're giving an implicit in to your computer. You're trusting the file you're downloading to be vetted and virus-free. You're trusting the dev to not mess with you or hack your system. So I can see a lot of potential terrible situations arising from someone being able to get in through a backdoor DLC or update to a game. The implications of this kind of backdoor entry are really worrying. Imagine a 'dev' kicking off a script that then installs a trojan horse file to your PC that sits there for days, or weeks, or months, and then bricks said PC, or forces you to pay a fee to unlock it, all kinds of awful stuff could be done this way. There should be a clear line between having fun with your customers and outright ruining their experience or, worse, taking advantage of them. And this isn't a new problem with gaming, either. But as technology advances, this kind of hacking becomes more subtle and harder to detect. So, simply put, I think you should be able to opt out of anything that gives a developer the ability to directly affect your PC or mess with your games. Call me a fun hater, but I prefer knowing my devices are secure and all the sensitive information I have on them won't be accessed by a rogue developer and hacker.

[@ThornWolf1]

I definitely think that developer trolling should be A) something you opt into, and B) something that enhances the game. The example of The Blackout Club is perfect. I played it with a group of people who had all opted in, and while I don't remember if anyone was streaming, we did get live interactions. They were mostly vague and mainly picked on me because I was being very vocal compared to the rest of the group (I had somehow ended up as the strategy person and whoever was interacting with us was trying to throw me off), but it added to the game's immersion and even lore. The premise of the game is that there's these entities vying for control of this town and some are trying to recruit players to their own cause while others are trying to scare players off, so these interactions tie into that, depending n which 'entity' you get. Clustertruck seems like just some good-natured ribbing. The game itself is already a little silly to begin with, so having the devs messing around doesn't ruin the experience. In every clip I've seen, players are laughing and sometimes even egging the devs on, not getting frustrated and angry with what's happening. What Adam did to Welcome to the Game 2 was harassing players for his own entertainment by making the game nearly unplayable, not improving the experience somehow.

[@mewtuwa]

I mean, if you pay for an experience you should get the experience you paid for. Imagine if I paid for a tour and the guide just kept telling me the wrong information and leading me the wrong way.

[@Xendarion_]

He even did that to a polish KZbinr called Eleven (here’s the link to it but you might not understand polish kzbin.info/www/bejne/rn6Xf41vesiohZo ). He played the same song, trolled around and also summoned doll maker. Even played this doctor disrespect song. But in his live it seemed less vindictive from Adam. Just making a point that Adam is always watching all streams and it’s kinda scary.

[@concept5631]

That's one way to make sure the community never bothers trying to put up with you.

[@ghoultooth]

@@concept5631exactly. He really proved that he is an asshole and an egotist.

[@king.2597]

It could've been like a great way to use Meta narrative to scare the player even more, in a fun way, but he just did it like an asshole

[@Xendarion_]

@@king.2597 yeah man. If it was some shii like simple text on the screen like: "he's watching, you're in [insert game location]" now that would be good but yeah just like u said he just turned toxic

[@trianglemoebius]

@@Xendarion_ Another interesting use for this: imagine if every time a streamer mentions Noir, they show up. That'd really create a feeling of conspiracy and how they're not a group it's safe to mess with. Not to mention them having to then beat the game without ever mentioning the antagonists directly would be petty interesting.

[@cerabond7650]

Ok but " Forget about Big Brother's watching, Big Brother's playing." is a hard as hell line.

[@2013Pandorasbox]

I feel like trolling isn’t the issue here. The issue is the “backdoor.” Like that feels super illegal. I’m sure there has to be a privacy law issue here!

[@404_coffee9]

Yeah I personally love my anonymity.

[@exyzt9877]

the "backdoor" is anonymous. It requires some amateur sleuthing to get it to work. Basically, every session of the game has it's own randomized ID that is sent, alongside the game's current state, to a website owned by adam. Then he can input one of 10 commands to change the gamestate, such as triggering the hitmen and dollmakers automatically. He can't go into the game though, so to actually see what's happening, the person playing would have to be streaming it, publicly. Also, Adam would've had to go through every session until he found Castoreh's specific session. Probably had the stream and website side by side and just spammed the hitman command until he found the one. Now, because it's TECHNICALLY not collecting any data, it's not illegal, just shitty. but I would be concerned if that were in one of my games, at least without being relegated to a companion app of sorts. Because, well, it's a security risk. Because everything you do online can be traced to a public IP address, if a hacker wanted to go into the computer of some random person, just playing the game could basically do half the work FOR them, since they could intercept communications between the game and the server, and trace where it was sent from. Then they'd just need a private ip, and they're pretty much done.

[@Penguinmanereikel]

Well, i guess users *do* sign a EULA when downloading for most games. It's possible that Welcome to the Game 2 had a EULA permitting that. Plus, whether or not that data has identifying information is another story. Like, if it had anonymized data, he probably kept sending a command to each active copy until that command showed up in the streamer's game. Although, I do question the legality of _that_, once you've deanonymized a data entry.

[@-Name-here-]

It’s either 1) in the license agreement(as stated in the video, we don’t actually own any of the games we buy, just the permission to play them) or 2) it’s not actually gathering any personal info and it’s just a barebones command injector for Adam.

[@guymanguy]

all it would take is for 1 person that knows what theyre doing to find the backdoor and its REALLY bad

[@ismellstatic]

I’ve watched that Markiplier series more times than I’d like to admit and I agree, I never suspected foul play, but I wanted to watch this anyways and I’m glad I did. You have a really good point about the importance of us consenting to these experiences; some developers are seriously mean people and I’d really rather not leave my game open to their vindictive tampering. Hope this video really blows up!

[@LocalTorchwoodIntern]

Same here, the Welcome to the game streams are a few of my favorite comfort streams and I've seen them enough times to say that maybe there was some coincidence but I doubted foul play. Its completely disgusting how Adam reacted and genuinely the troll update shouldve been an extra hard mode when beating the game under a time limit or rule set.

[@imhotalk]

Such backdoors that could potentially allow some unknown person remotely open your browser, change computer files and possibly gain access to private information are really creepy and dangerous.

[@lilconch]

hey man, let me give an explanation. I'm not affiliated with Adam, i'm a cyber security major. welcome to the game 2 has what's called a post request sent to his server when the game launches. that's a http function. This means you are sending communications to the server. HTTP is called a "TCP" connection, that means your computer goes "hey, server, are you awake? my name is 192.168. 0.1" (thats a typical LAN IP) the server goes "oh sup 192.168. 0.1 yeah up up whats up? got a POST or GET request?" and your computer goes "yeup, sending stuff your way, lets talk!" THEN it sends the POST. to my understanding a POST message can contain anything. Now, it shouldn't be able to open a browser, your computer has to use a GET command to request that information. nor should it change your files. The only thing the post command does is tell your computer to send information across the internet to the server. what gets bad, is the fact that he could push real time updates. I dont know how. But i'm guessing it was steam's background update feature. But unless he has Root access which allows him to read write and execute at the most basic level of the computer and manipulate everything? I dont see it happening. Possible? yeah, anything's possible. But that code was quarantined to the game. something much scarier is the fact that there ARE games with what's called "root kits". they're tipple A companies claiming they need that access to stop cheating. As well as the fact that a TCP connection not only stores your IP but also your MAC Address. That is a unique code to each computer, like a fingerprint and is why VPNs are kind of shitty. they can hide an IP, but your mac address gives you away every time. This opens you up to D/DoS attacks and means that even if you use a vpn when playing welcome to the game? you STILL are not safe as your mac address will be known and he can still mess with your game.

[@thrackerzod6097]

Yeah, that's just plain malware at that point.

[@sentienteyeball2447]

literally i would fully remove the game and get my computer checked for anything that shouldnt be there it would be so terrifying

[@lilconch]

@@thrackerzod6097 Trojan horse baybe

[@lilconch]

@@sentienteyeball2447 windows defender is more then sufficient. But I have considered using steam as an attack vector before. I don't know what their policies and security is like on games and root kits so I've never tried it. Don't wanna get sued

[@FaruuFox]

The ClusterTruck developer's version of "dev trolling " is just wholesome, good fun. Letting people knowingly opt into it is the best way to do it.

[@yapalskippy1807]

The fact that he wrote himself as this main edgy antagonist is the funniest shit. Then cries about streamers calling his tedious game bullshit and fucks with streamers is just the best. I used to be iffy on Markiplier's response to this shit thinking he was in the wrong too but now it's 100% justified.

[@ohboi9990]

I’m sorry but the clip of mark facing the back wall all hunched over is hilarious

[@erisofterra8986]

So essentially that streamer was absolutely right when he said Adam was a psychopath and an asshole?

[@_TSC_46]

Yea basically lmaooo

[@Trigger__Happy]

Honestly just sounds like he’s way too overly defensive. If he’d humble himself and his ego a little bit then maybe he’d be a perfectly likable guy and none of this would’ve happened.

[@erisofterra8986]

@@Trigger__Happy Being insecure doesn't make you go out of your way to not only blacklist an individual from your game out of spite, but also back-end into it to try and TORTURE them. Thats psycho shit. Thats above and beyond the call of crazy.

[@Teknanam]

@@erisofterra8986 He made the game an unpleasant experience with his backdoor that wasn't specifically for this. Thats not torture. Thats being a petty asshole. The real red flag is that he did it for 2 hours.

[@kj6053]

@@erisofterra8986 It’s just a game. Accusing him of torture is way too far.