The Godot Community Firestorm

Sadly, sometimes the world of political, social issues and even religion intersect with the world of game development. My goal with GameFromScratch is to be a place to discuss game development and just game development. With this recent Godot community firestorm, sadly that intersection of topics cannot be avoided.
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[@oo--7714]

The meltdown tells you everything you need to know, the godot devs aren't serious. Instead of just being quiet they said all if that. And they had a meltdown over 1 sentence which is insane, there is no way you can really rationalise crying over a one off comment made by a developer who pays money for your service. All of the defensiveness over that was weird. The devs couldn't even bother ignoring it. Very unprofessional.

[@TheChromePoet]

I've been meaning to talk to you about the Bible, when is a good time for you?

[@Drejzer]

I wish that this video was what brought my awareness of this topic... Unfortunately, it would appear that YT had different opinion...

[@yeost187]

Thanks for letting me know to unsub from you. You don't want drama then 2 seconds later "I despise asmongold"? Bye felicia. Edit Im not unsubbing because you don't like asmong. I'm unsubbing because you are sounding like another hypercritical woke loon, like the GodoT cm is..

[@kloa4219]

shouldn't have covered this, a lot of anti-SJW/anti-woke stuff is pushed by bad actors who have no interest in the mediums that they complain about and it is done for profit. Ignore the nontroversy so that the anti-woke people can move on and complain women in Star Wars again.

[@albertoblanco1256]

This is why I'm anti-social on social media. I'm not looking for community, just a tutorial on vectors.

[@erichzannbusoumuzan]

But vectors are homophobic! They can't be anything but straight! Poe's law demands that I write the following - "this is a joke".

[@GianniLeonhart]

Actually based

[@nineret]

WTF is happen literally.... just found this video the suddenly

[@FineWine-v4.0]

& these clown have the nerve to call devs @ss#oles

[@aleksitjvladica.]

Same.

[@DesignCourse]

No, they did NOT "mistakenly" block anyone. They blocked anyone who wasn't fully on board with their actions. If you merely made a suggestion to stay out of politics, BLOCKED. That's not an accident. That's an idiotic, activist community manager that should be fired.

[@Kio_Kurashi]

It wouldn't have even been about politics that people were being blocked. So more to your point that it wasn't a mistake XD The only "mistake" was that they chose to do it at all.

[@MountainLabsYT]

Agreed.

[@ew2430]

Hey Gary, I started my UI journey with you man! Appreciate your videos.

[@pasta8026]

Oh. No wonder I was blocked. I just responded "Is this necessary?"

[@BobDevV]

the level of unprofesionalism is astounding. They were replying to people like it was their private account, not a representation of an organization. It is ridiculous and you don't need to delve into "politics" to see what was going on. Also giving control of your org social media to bunch of reddit admin like individuals is ridiculous in itself/ They had similar thing going on on github, people banned from github for saying something to moderators. Ridiculous.

[@c-domination]

Wait, Godot Café wasn't official? There was an invitation to the server on the website.

[@ahettinger525]

When there was no official Godot server, they directed people to Godot Cafe (which was just "Godot" at the time). Godot Engine (the official discord) was created recently, and they now direct to that. This was announced on Godot Cafe as well. I have theories as to why this change occurred, but no inside knowledge (so I'll just keep them to myself).

[@pro.giciel9084]

@@ahettinger525 Yes a months ago Godot Café was the "official" server because it was were most of the comunity was. They annonced that they left the server to be 100% community moderated because they were not involved enough.

[@MFool64]

good think i left that server

[@MrKomalarn]

They are LYING" Yesterday, on official godot page under "Community" they listed Godot Cafe infite link under "Official communities". Cowards

[@AHeinermann]

​@@MrKomalarnit's not though. They moved off of it months ago and announced it in that Discord. Seems more likely that they didn't update the website. It's even covered in the video.

[@woodbyte]

Well, judging from that board statement, I'm pretty sure this will happen again and you will have to talk about it some more.

[@ManuCGDev]

Based, actually

[@randomjimbitz512]

100% factual

[@raul0ca]

Content

[@synthblade]

@@woodbyte hey, as long as the engine does its job, idc who says what.

[@ICEknightnine]

Yeah, "submit a form proving your innocence" is just taking the side of community management.

[@MateoTeos]

Well... they banned a lot of people left and right, and to unban your acc you need to include your e-mail, for some reason.

[@pescadorCardoso]

So they can witch hunt and dox you, naturally :)

[@felix_xb]

Because of the github bans probably. That or maybe they need the email to check if you were paying them before they banned you? :D

[@SomeNerd361]

I imagine there are platform-specific reasons for it.

[@ViktorsJournal]

From what I heared it's not only like that. Unban to at least some people happens without filling the form but the form is there to let people know it exists and to avoid a situation someone could be missed since the overall numbers are not 1 0 two users - although mistakenly banned are a minority compared to people who really just went off with death threats and such, which is still unfortunate that it got to this stage.

[@novh4ck]

@@felix_xb Nah, there were only three bans on GitHub and those guys will never be unbanned because they were creating insulting issues against the developers and trying to harass them directly in the repository. That's not the reason for the e-mail inclusion.

[@waguno]

a position as a community manager must have mentally prepared people capable of dealing with other people. This generated unnecessary hate for the godot engine.

[@captainseagold3559]

Most community managers I've personally known enjoy telling people what to do. If you've ever had an HOA, there's always that annoying person that tells you the shoots on your bushes are in inch too tall. These are the types of people that look for jobs to boss others around. It's really hard to find one that isn't a little crazy.

[@gardian06_85]

the Godot foundation guidelines specifically state that "baiting" is an unacceptable behavior, so by the CM making a post with targeted language "woke" they knew what they were doing, and it absolutely was "baiting" whether you agree with the standpoint or not. they should have the guidelines thrust upon them for the reverse stance as well.

[@lucasljs1545]

@@captainseagold3559 not even my bosses ever ordered me around, I guess people just look like cucks. My bosses always addressed me with respect while screaming at others LMAO

[@tomgrimard8075]

That' so true, you should be a community manager lol

[@ImFangzBro]

The way you phrased that sounds like a wifebeater, tbh. It has the exact same vibes as "Why did you make me hit you?"

[@kataro100]

I think Godot Main Twitter Accounts should be like Blender. Where it just focus on the Product; ie Updated, Development Progress and Maybe some community showcase. Keep it Professional. But also they did not address about the Godot GitHub block??

[@Zhulanov]

The thing is, this is that it was then I started to follow it. Now for some time it feels like someone is just using it as their personal account

[@letopizdetz]

All the small business I know are like that. Social media exists strictly to promote their products / services, never post 'opinions'. Only 'opinion' a business should have is 'I'd like you to buy this thing I'm offering'.

[@nathanscarlett4772]

​@letopizdetz this is how it should be. Regardless of what lobbyists say, corporations are not people.

[@theguyfromsaturn]

I agree.

[@kuroodo_]

Blocked

[@Produno]

Thankyou for a very honest and level headed review of the situation. Unfortunately i was banned from the godot cafe for echoing pretty much what you have said here.

[@tux_the_astronaut]

Oh i remember talking to you damn its a shame they banned you

[@Produno]

@@tux_the_astronaut Heh, I you too! Maybe its for the best, I should be concentrating more on my game. If they ban everyone with an open mind, its probably not somewhere i want to converse anyway.

[@shindig9000]

@@Produno 💯

[@pureheroin9902]

​@@Produnodoes 4.3 have everything you need? If it does, it might be worth thinking about keeping with that version.

[@QriousKoder]

most people were for the saying keep politics out of it, they went on a powertrip some people even saying all orgs must have a political stance and what not.

[@the_dude_josh]

You’re 100% right. I wish more people who have influence understood this

[@transformersloverjon]

People who have influence should not use their influence to make a positive difference? Isn't it telling that a tweet not even explicitly, but implicitly acknowledging the existence of queer people and/or minorities was enough to ignite a "firestorm?" Maybe it would be better if people on Twitter grew a thicker skin instead of flying off the handle when it's not their specific lifestyle being spotlighted. On Twitter. The worst social media platform.

[@makanansari144]

So Godot was doing amazing they didn't have any problems! Then I guess they got bored and created a problem for themselves! Congratulations!

[@Kobold666]

They suddenly got a lot of funding from a lot of places. All that money had to go somewhere, so they hired community managers and moderators, an army of social media ninjas, everyone and everything that has nothing to do with game engine development and actual code.

[@charlieking7600]

Godot had actual problems, like performance. Rendering is stil atrocious from performance point.

[@lucasljs1545]

@@charlieking7600 now it got Forked so real devs work on it. Redot Engine the new name.

[@viruschris3160]

@@charlieking7600For 2D or 3D?

[@charlieking7600]

@@viruschris3160 for 3D. Demos like Abandoned Spaceship run poorly on old videocards which can handle decade old AAA games like Doom 2016.

[@felsenstern]

Where those guys paid by Unity to bring back some customers?

[@QriousKoder]

i mean it's not that far fetched after what unity almost did lol

[@ZachHixsonTutorials]

While something like that could definitely be a chess move for them, could you imagine the backlash that would hit them if that got out? "Unity pays employees to attack LGBTQ+ and use homophobic slurs on competitors social media," would *not* be a good look.

[@mandisaw]

Unity doesn't care about Godot 😅And the PR risk of a move like that only has bad-bad, no upside.

[@gonhunter3994]

​@@ZachHixsonTutorials I think it would be more like "Unity gets a woke idiot inside the Godot team as CM to ruin them"

[@Axiassart]

That theory is underestimated the idiocy of those people

[@sololeveling944]

Banning people all way to git repo is too much , it damages godot reputation and contribution.

[@quinnleavitt4105]

The people banned on the repo were harassing other users

[@The_Xeos]

The bans on the repos were valid, it was a bunch of trolls harassing contributors to spread misinfo.

[@Callsign_Sturm]

@@The_Xeos Godot devs have been ban crazy for ages. Before I knew about their politics I noticed something was wrong with how they hype the community but don't tolerate criticism well. All they have to do to be respected is continue creating an uncompromisingly good engine. They're CM is indeed dumb. They could've said "Indie devs don't always have to reinvent the wheel" and that would've been a factual response.

[@frosty2912]

Maybe someone will fork it and start a new engine. As you said Godot just damaged it's brand.

[@lucasljs1545]

Already forked, Redot Engine. Godot is dead.

[@YouHaveTrouble]

The fault for this entire situation lies in whoever blocked that first person saying to focus on game engine and not politics. That was not harassment and it started entire shitstorm.

[@ricardor2478]

Exactly IF the CM had addressed and acknowledged the shortcomings of the engine that were being pointed this shitstorm wouldn't even have happened

[@NeightrixPrime]

I disagree. It is a mistake to hire anyone who holds beliefs that conflict with reality. The red flags are there.

[@px8]

you helped me setup my minecraft linux server like 1 year ago bro, thanks a lot! i recognized ur username lol

[@NowThatsAnime]

Bro he's not the first person to be blocked. I ws the first person to be blocked on both discord and github. I did post about it back in june. Reddit got taken down but fb post of mine still exists. If you want I can give link. That time no one noticed because I was a nobody. This move have been going on for at least 6 months.

[@skaruts]

I read a ton of replies and hidden replies, and I barely seen anything that could be considered harassment by any reasonable person.

[@krzysieksiewio8930]

I got banned on the Godot Cafe for having a polite conversation with some other users - and automatically on the official one as well. I'm using and contributing engine since v1.0. I've participated in the official meetings with other devs many times. That's super sad and heart braking. How can one brake so beauty project in so short period of time...?

[@hlop_vmp]

"i pay taxes why I'm getting jailed for braking rules"

[@Callsign_Sturm]

​​@@hlop_vmptheir rules are poorly implemented. I have RARELY seen legit trolling or overt behavior on these discords. They act like young adult girls who think every SMS they don't want is harassment, then they themselves say terrible things and harass people. They're very inward minded. They browbeat people for writing pull requests if there's anything less than positive to say about the engine. Before I even knew about their politics I noticed this on github and it was a huge turnoff. I basically thought to myself "Well, they made the mistake of going MIT, at least they can't touch my projects." Usually any time a discord has the permaflag on it I know two things; the primary mod who put it there is hyperactive on the discord because of his ego, and two, the rules are going to be very closed minded. All they have to do is create an uncompromisingly good engine and not waste their time like this and people will love them.

[@That_One_Guy-.]

@@hlop_vmpAh yes, automatically going for the bad faith interpretation, that’ll surely contribute to the conversation

[@lucasljs1545]

@@That_One_Guy-. that hlop is part of the Godot discord, they are raiding every video about this and flooding the comments with trolls and gaslight.

[@GakuCMDR]

I remember you. I ended up banned as well and felt discouraged because I feel like we all were having a polite discussion. Didn't know it was going to end like this.

[@acgumut]

Clarification for people who are not aware of some pinpoints: The mod who used a harsh language was not just a random moderator. He is one of the main contributors of the foundation and if you check his chat history you will see that he was responsible for most of the announcements on the channel since 2016. Even the channel's introduction message was written by him. There are also some rumors saying that the community manager who messed up was actually a friend of another like-minded developer in the foundation who got her hired.

[@diligencehumility6971]

why they hire these people ?

[@justanothercomment416]

@@diligencehumility6971 Mark'sismsm and the agenda.

[@ManuCGDev]

that discord is not affiliated with godot in any way or form it WAS the only one that existed at a time, but as the project grew they created a official one

[@NoGo-nl5ll]

@@ManuCGDev it 100% is. They had it linked on their website until VERY recently.

[@Protech-ps6cw]

He's like a King there I don't think he could get fired

[@matthewb192]

its always these community managers causing issues. They don't add anything into products and always cause drama.

[@nushia7192]

Huh? Imagine throwing a tantrum just because of a joke. Isn't that on both sides? PLEASE STOP BEING SO CLUELESS...

[@DaussPlays]

@@nushia7192 What are you talking about? A community manager throwing a tantrum and blocking/banning people, especially people who contribute to godot itself, is an actual problem. This isn't a 'both sides' thing at all.

[@shindig9000]

@@nushia7192 It's not that you don't have a good point here in your message, but your delivery is not helpful for getting others to see your point of view.

[@pranaykumar6648]

​@@nushia7192 Community manager, is using Godot, to spread her propaganda....

[@hlop_vmp]

@@DaussPlays What are YOU talking about? Contributing don't give you ticket to be jerk LMAO

[@yaminnather521]

Unity HQ is having a field day

[@viruschris3160]

How good is it for making 2D sprite games? And easy access for hobbyists?

[@bonehead8803]

​@@viruschris3160 Stop spamming please. It's annoying.

[@viruschris3160]

@@bonehead8803 oh sorry. When I was trying to post, it said no network connection and waited to see if I got connection back and hit reply. ^_^; I honestly didn’t think it was delay the post instead of cancelling it.

[@makian_real]

​@@viruschris3160its pretty good for making 2d games

[@Nicholas-nu9jx]

​@@viruschris3160use unity over godot. It's more polished and supports more platforms

[@Clawthorne]

What bothers me is how empty and two-faced their response to this situation is. They're fully throwing xananax under the bus (as they should, what he said was beyond disgusting) but at the same time shielding their CM fully and blaming "wave of harassment" and "negative engagement" for the situation. Also notice how they're actually not apologizing to the people who were unfairly blocked, instead hand-waving it away with a "eh you can just use the contact form lol". They're not handling the situation. They're dismissing it. And that makes me wonder exactly what kind of relationship the CM has with the Godot team, or what dirt she has on them, for them to come to bat for her like this, despite her taking actions that were objectively wrong. Actions that would have had ANYONE else thrown off the team lickety-split. I mean, she's not even apologetic. Or trying to calm down the situation. She's currently on her personal account smugly tagging asmongold of all people, trying to antagonize him into making another video about the situation. This is the kind of person the Godot foundation is so adamantly defending? Just... what??

[@Cydeamon]

This is beyond insane

[@gonhunter3994]

Simple, she a friend of 1 of the Godot devs who SHARES her worldviews

[@gostan2718]

stop assuming the CM gender

[@NoGo-nl5ll]

@@gostan2718 GFYS

[@jacobblaustein7779]

How do we know who was unfairly blocked: pbs.twimg.com/media/GYlCKuZXYAAG8a3?format=jpg&name=medium

[@pranaykumar6648]

The community manager needs to be fired, very unprofessional.

[@forgottenland6962]

It's her job to avoid this kind of PR disaster, not fuel it. It's gross incompetence as a comms person first and foremost.

[@sobieckil07]

@@pranaykumar6648 True, but she won't. She was hired because she is friends with the team and she will stay because she is friends with the team. Shame, I really enjoyed the direction they were going into from the technical standpoint. Open source projects cannot allow themselves to alienate their user base any more than commercial ones if they want to survive and be relevant.

[@sdfxcvblank5756]

​@@sobieckil07I've really wish there was a genuine precedent for community managers being sued into Bolivian for this kind of thing by their own company.

[@azureaki]

​@@sdfxcvblank5756Sued into Bolivia, LMAO

[@Kr33gola]

volunteer how is going to fired him? meaby sued...

[@vman103]

The "Wokot" Tweet was made on the official Godot Twitter, so that's a problem. Also, they say "wave of harassment", but what does that entail? I checked just a handful of the hidden replies and, some were not necessarily constructive, but others were. And personally, I think the Tweet did not need to be posted. If you're running the social media account for a game engine, I think it's better to ONLY talk about the engine and related projects, merch, etc.

[@powerbeard5653]

They call any form of criticism and disagreement "harassment"

[@Mautar55]

I checked a lot of accounts. Most had no feed related to godot or development at all. Only a few involved people were in touch. Many political accounts asking for neutrality tho.

[@PapiNewGunie]

"If you're running the social media account for a game engine, I think it's better to ONLY talk about the engine and related projects..." I believe what you are describing here is people acting professionally. Sadly that is lacking from a lot of the Godot staff and leadership.

[@jensenraylight8011]

yeah, they're talking about irrelevant political stuff, idk what their intention, recruit more woke people? just like how people can smell sales and advertising from miles away, people can smell political agenda as well, and being outspoken about your politics is as bad as being a pushy salesman. no, nobody is being mean to anyone, they should keep their own private life to themself, and do their job properly

[@ForeverZer0]

I will never understand the purpose any product/service that is not directly related to any hot-button topic would ever remark anything about it in a public/official way. There is only downside to it, with no upside whatsoever. As a business, if you have no opinion on a matter, anyone and everyone will be content, but if you convey it publicly, you are only going to alienate some non-zero number of people away from your product. My assumption is that it this is a tactic used by ideologues within organizations to accomplish exactly this. I miss the old days when random companies didn't feel the need to wade into political or controversial issues for no reason whatsoever, and they simply focused on making superior products or services.

[@BigBraGad]

The Godot Engine is great at being a game engine. Who are random people to think that it should also be an activist platform? Why not just keep things simple instead of trying to be something other than what it is?

[@Rietto]

Twitter drives people insane, I swear.

[@mavencore3557]

Because it's ran from a non-profit, which has a board of directors. They are intentionally destroying their reputation. These people openly calling for violence of people who doesn't bow down to them.

[@skellious]

"keep things simple" does not equal allowing anti-LGBTQ people a safe space to hate on LGBTQ people.

[@HendrikMans]

Blows my mind that a single tweet is considered turning into an "activist platform". You're all showing your whole asses right now.

[@mavencore3557]

@@HendrikMans A single tweet, huh? Look at these people's history. Even if people are basing this off a "Single Tweet", then what is the context of that tweet. Clearly pushes a preferred political identarian ideology. An ideology based in hate, bigotry, and violence. They also continue to reaffirm this, "weeding" out people who doesn't conform to it. It wasn't just one tweet, get over yourself.

[@wedge_one]

This is really bad. CMs should learn to stop using corporate social accounts as if they were their personal account. This attitude of BLOCKING devs really made me thing of jumping the ship.

[@keyser456]

It's not just CMs. This isn't specific to one job title or even the gaming industry. It's pervasive.

[@shindig9000]

The statement from the Godot Foundation Board is absolutely not satisfactory in my opinion. People being blocked by mistake isn't excusable and the it 'seems' to me that the code of conduct wasn't being taken into account. Secondly, there is an argument to be made that the community manager was not following the code of conduct along with a lot of other people that were not punished for similar behavior but on the other side that more so agrees with the views of the community manager. Lastly, I find it embarrassing that people's sexuality and personal beliefs automatically are thrown behind the label "woke" when there is plenty of people that are "in" one of the minority groups that do not like the ideology behind what is generally referred to as "woke". Everyone on all sides agree this term is over used and misused these days. For the sake of the community becoming healthier and to keep support for the system strong, I would like to see the Godot Foundation take more personal responsibility for this situation. Shoving the blame on the "negativity" is unbecoming and does not build trust or a welcoming community. This is the most balanced take on the situation and I hope it is read in good faith and is close enough to sticking to the news story even though I am putting some of my personal feelings into it. Thank you for reading. 💙

[@nushia7192]

Code conduct? Like what? shrimping(simping) for the ones who donate?

[@commentinglife6175]

Very well said. That's kind of my issue with this. The argument "they were harassing us" doesn't fly when you went out of your way to stake a position YOU KNEW would piss off a good segment of your customers. I don't care if you think your side is right; that's the problem! You violated the rules by harassing those people who just want to make a game! It wasn't a joke; the original tweet was harassment IN THE OPINION OF THOSE OFFENDED! And, as the one side of this debate keeps claiming, if someone is offended by something, it is wrong by definition. Well, here you go!

[@Callsign_Sturm]

Yeah this. Wokeism is going to approach red scare levels of bullshit. Plenty of gay people and furries make game engines and they make no mention of it because it isn't relevant to the project.

[@crywithmi2419]

why is it not excusable? being blocked on twitter isn't hurting anyone

[@diligencehumility6971]

Not that statement is a joke. And if you look at the board, you'll see why. They are all the same people, it's the same people who runs both Godot Cafe and Godot discord channels, the foundation, etc, it's a few very far-left lunatics running the show, while normal regular people actually do the heavy lifting and implementing features, while other normal people pay money to the project. Those lunatics just sits on top and act like dictators

[@TheSteveTheDragon]

Ive seen this behavior time and again. Very unprofessional and childish.

[@blackcitadel37]

with an especial focus to the childish part of it.

[@Algardraug]

I like how white dudes can say that it's "just politics" and "it's childish" since they aren't affected by anti-woke backlash

[@robertonome2448]

@@Algardraug congratulations. you somehow made this about race

[@TheSteveTheDragon]

@@Algardraug I'm not white or straight, my guy.

[@ELTABULLO]

​@@Algardraug lmao

[@kuroodo_]

Contrary to their official statement, this issue has been happening for months. It is no accident, and it definitely is not about harassment. They block anyone they disagree with. Here is a quote from the creator of the Godot engine, made June 2024 when the same thing was happening: "This is not a democracy, this is private property where the owner reserves the right to show the door to anyone they dislike, without having to explain anything." - Juan Linietsky

[@kuroodo_]

Just to add one more quote from Juan: "Well, you have to realize that online communities are private property, so you can discuss rules and politics as much as you want, but ultimately the owner decides who is to stay." - Juan Linietsky

[@ryanvenjoyer]

Probably same types that think property should be owned by the public, unless they're the ones who happen to own the property

[@luuuucas]

Based. He's right.

[@rameynoodles152]

@@kuroodo_ I mean, I don't disagree with that statement... I think it's missing some context. Who was he saying this to and why? This doesn't necessarily indicate that he would ban people for superficial personal reasons. He's just saying that the owner has the right to do so if they please, not necessarily that it's morally right to do it for no good reason.

[@romulo2714]

Juan is right, that's mega based.

[@edwardperkins1225]

It's a problem if you express a view that's anything less than perfectly aligned with their politics, and then you can't ask how to do something in the software in their forums because you're blocked. Even if it's open source and can be forked that's still a problem.

[@skellious]

Set up your own fork and community then? No one is stopping you, we just don't need community members invalidating the identities of other community members. Your Lgbtq status is not an outfit you put on and take off. It's part of you. Its inseparable from everything you do.

[@user-eg6nq7qt8c]

@@skellious "invalidating identities." lmao. ok.

[@edwardperkins1225]

@@skellious You're kind of proving you want perfect political allignment if you represent Godot somehow. By your own logic the community managers are "invalidating the existence" of people who post opinions they don't like. Many of those opinions represent who those people are, yet it's allowed to disagree with them, and ban them too. Do you think a Republic could work if every time someone disagreed it was supposedly unpersoning the other person?

[@chasecobb7988]

The objective problem is that this behavior damages the brand. How can anyone try to build a serious future on the Godot platform knowing that a super mild disagreements can have them excommunicated from vital resources? They should immediately backtrack and put measures in place to make sure it never happens again.

[@riptmangleshank4286]

...measures which include firing and banning their CM.

[@Aeroxima]

Hard to not see parallels to the Unity situation, just in a different flavor. But I don't use Godot anyway, and I guess at least it can be forked (in theory, it's not effortless), and as said those forks often don't go anywhere

[@llareia]

Yeah it's pretty hard to put your faith in a business that arbitrarily throws its business partners/clients/users under the bus. Kinda the whole reason I jumped from Unity to Godot in the first place. 🤔

[@sheeftz]

They did not appologize enough to those banned without a reason. They did not punish in any way those who banned them for no reason. They behave like "oh, it was just an accident, not a toxic behaviour from our braindead community manager." No, sorry, it wasn't an accident. Somebody put a person that characterize herself as "obnoxiously queer" as a community manager. By accident?

[@IPlayKindred]

@gr-os4gd talking about red flags when you have the american flag in pfp.

[@Callsign_Sturm]

@@IPlayKindred I'm more afraid of cartoon / furry / Warhammer people than I am of people with flags if a country that was founded on individual freedom.

[@IPlayKindred]

@@Callsign_Sturm do you not realize how ironic that is? you talk about individual freedom while throwing shade towards groups that use that exact virtue? especially when non of what you mentioned is harmful. god you guys are clowns.

[@poleve5409]

@@Callsign_Sturm you have no reason to be afraid of either man there's no need to pick a side over something so childish.

[@Callsign_Sturm]

@poleve5409 The stereotypes they perpetuate makes it hard for me not to create biases that keep me safe. Often cartoon people pfps go insane at some point or do weird things like delete all their add-ons or ban people.

[@thegreendude2086]

I believe this is one of those moments were "the messenger ruins the message". These moderators did not do what Godot stands for, an open community. Too bad, the fault lies with the moderators. In my opinion does it not change Godots value as a game engine.

[@nushia7192]

They tried to, but you know? both sides have very annoying idiots.

[@Callsign_Sturm]

​@nushia7192 Pretty sure Juan himself (lead dev) has stated he'd ban people for misusing the pronoun feature on the forums... something that's been a lighthearted joke since the 90s. Man, if these people want to be accepted they should start by providing an uncompromisingly good service and not letting their beliefs get in the way...

[@ryanvenjoyer]

Where there's smoke, there's often fire. Don't expect this to be the last of Godot's problems, especially after their banned donors pull away from the project.

[@matet7772]

@@nushia7192 that's why u should hire professional which is committed to push company forward, not any side of agenda.

[@nathanl6598]

This is the second time this has happened. In fact, I think it happens constantly.

[@gravious]

Deftly navigated Mike, i agree with your stance here and admire your resolve. I do however also agree that Godot as a software service that is meant to be open to all, should not be co-opted by overzealous individuals. Let those who want to state a message use the engine and make a game that fits their narrative.

[@llareia]

Maybe I just don't understand open-source, but it seems to me like blocking people based on something unrelated to the project itself is pretty antithetical to the principles open-source is founded upon.

[@MorbidEel]

@@llareia IT is also unclear what people mean by "block". The code is accessible anonymously on github. That means any sort of block would be useless. The only case I can see for a block is people being idiots on the issue tracker.

[@thomaswhite7527]

It's always the community managers...the most hostile force for any community.

[@letopizdetz]

It's just lord of the flies. 'mods' and 'admins' went crazy with power since the start of chat rooms and small forums.

[@Wineblood]

Activist community managers always strike me as people who want access to a community but don't have the required skills for it, so they go for the "social media as a job" position.

[@sobieckil07]

​@@Wineblood Bingo

[@jonel3596]

I Personally don't accept that statement. What a bullshit lackluster response

[@pacman_pol_pl_polska]

Israel tier response.

[@Slaynelonewolf]

Just a simple "Don't worry the team is working on that issue, I'm just farming for some egagement from this community to showcase their work." No drama , no need piss people off , banning them from the github or losing suporters. So dumb.

[@eliteengineer7340]

I got banned permanently on the discord server for posting a meme about the cm manager loosing sponsors in the channel meant for off topic

[@blackcitadel37]

it seems godot went the way of the rainbow.

[@rameynoodles152]

In the official server or Godot Cafe?

[@randomjimbitz512]

Really weird timing... Unity changes their pay structure... Godot starts a dumpster fire??? LOL

[@IWillYeah]

UE getting rid of free megascans and FAB changeover.

[@burgeryoufoundbehindthegrill]

UE did fund Godot if I recall correctly. Don't forget, corporate espionage is a thing. Companies do insert plants and try to sabotage the competition. There are no coincidences when it comes to crooks

[@sdfxcvblank5756]

It really does feel like that community manager is a corporate plant and this is genuine espionage at least I hope....

[@DJHEADPHONENINJA]

Imagine playing the victim card instead of firing whoever is behind the Godot twitter account?? Yikes

[@playakoz]

Amen, they also lied about blocking people as well. I t was not a mistake at all.

[@learningforever957]

Yeah. They even blocked new responses to their last tweet. The victims are those who got a free ban by the face. And they made a form to fill if you think you were banned without a reason xDDDD Extremely pathetic. I love Godot, but that comunity manager is so dumb.

[@SirRichard94]

fire for what? blocking people? damn

[@playakoz]

Are you suggesting that blocking paid developers for suggesting politics stay out of video games is the right thing to do? Do you think a game engine should any hand in this mess?

[@catto-from-heaven]

@@SirRichard94 Causing a PR disaster is exactly the opposite of a CM job

[@humbleraider6343]

So basically godot's developer and the community management said, "We are free to say everything we want and you all need to shut up!" Okay. Bye godot.

[@andermetalbrasil]

I don't care about the political or religious views of Godot members and contribitors. I don't care if they are "woke" and support ideology A or B, but I think they should support those things in their personal accounts and lives, not through the Godot official account. I love Godot, and I think it's sad to see the Godot community, which should be all about the engine end game development, being divided because the community manager thought it was a good ideia to share her ideology through the official Godot account. I think Juan and other members of Godot Foundation should make it clear to their colaborators that those kind of topics, not related to the engine or game development, should not be discussed publicly.

[@SomeoneOnlyWeKnow.]

As an lgbtq person I don't really have the luxury to just not care, I like to know if the people making something I support are against the existence of people like me so I'm glad when they're public about it whether they do or not.

[@_Lumiere_]

​@SomeoneOnlyWeKnow. Even the people who are against the over-abundance of "woke" things in media are just fine with your existence. People can disagree on a lot of things without literally desiring the extermination of one another. Let's not pretend that this "woke" ideology is measured, fair or inclusive. Just look at the language xananax used. And look at what simply saying "focus on the game engine" resulted in.

[@unk000]

​@@SomeoneOnlyWeKnow. WTF are you on bro... paranoid much? 🤔 Just live your life and don't be a weirdo around other people (aka making your sexuality/political views your whole personality). It's not hard to understand, and keeps social cohesion intact. The VAST majority of people aren't against gays bruh... 🤦‍♂️ But..!! when you guys are 24/7 yapping about this and trying to hijack things/communities to make it all about yourselves... THIS is what creates hatred against your kind. It's counter-productive! You want acceptance, not animosity, correct? Set a better example by stopping segregating yourselves from other people in the community. You are a developer just like others. Period. Everything else is superfluous. That's all that matters in this particular context.

[@SomeoneOnlyWeKnow.]

@@_Lumiere_ You say they're just fine with lgbt people's existence and yet they keep voting against that but ok

[@mrmunkee]

​@@SomeoneOnlyWeKnow. You do have the luxury to just not care, you are making up problems for yourself.

[@iLikeCoffee777]

The Twitter blocking isn't so much a problem as the GitHub blocking is. That's where the real problem is. Twitter has been a firestorm of BS and outrage for years now. I appreciate your commitment to keeping this channel focused on game development with as little side commentary as possible.

[@Dukep6]

Them blocking people on Github just bs! Why do they have an MIT license!

[@SmplySilver]

the MIT license means they can fork all they want. they just can't harass people on the git issues, violating their code of conduct, and expect to keep participating directly.

[@The_Xeos]

No it's not bullshit, the people blocked on Github were harassing contributors. The blocks were perfectly legitimate.

[@Callsign_Sturm]

​​@@SmplySilverthe CMs harass people on that github lol They're fragile.

[@mim_yt6177]

@@The_Xeos All that excuse about harassment was said by Rémi (another extremist that many people point to as the root of all the problems), but that harassment has not been proven, nor has Rémi provided any evidence that it occurred. Even he said that only 2 people have been blocked in GIT, a number that does not match the people who have complained about the blocks.

[@lucasljs1545]

The also control pulls and pushs on the main branch. That's why Godot has some problems that people are trying to fix for months and it never gets fixed, because the people who control the main branch doesn't want to.

[@avp2501]

This is the risk of using social media. Personally you're better off without it.

[@mandisaw]

This. Twitter especially is just a cesspool, and has only gotten worse. Main issue though is you need trained professionals to handle PR & CM, and even then mistakes can be made. In a volunteer org, you rely on whoever steps up, which isn't always ideal.

[@commentinglife6175]

@@mandisaw I'll be honest: not sure even having "trained" people would do any good anymore. We've seen community managers that are fully paid and supported by a company create controversy where it doesn't need to happen. As much as I say this is typically an awful idea, a community manager position really should be a committee of people requiring at least a couple sign-offs before a message can be posted because at least then, the usual "watering down" of positions would likely be a good thing. (And, if the entire committee agrees with something and posts a message, it is much, much harder for the company/organization to claim it doesn't represent their values.) In reality, I don't see much value in a community manager. The good ones (and I use that term to mean someone who doesn't hurt the business by causing drama) generally fall into one of two camps: either they act as a regurgitation of official press releases (things that have normally gone through executive and legal review) or they perform a glorified customer support ticket role, pointing to FAQs or directing folks to the area that would best resolve their issue (e.g., website issues to this group, gameplay/multiplayer issues over here, etc.). Sure, the person running the Wendy's Twitter account is successful at snark but A) you aren't Wendy's with that specific Twitter reputation and B) your customers probably really don't want that!

[@HarryPujols]

This is the risk of using X. KZbin has tons of rage baiters too, but thankfully the algorithm has kept me away from that trash.

[@benhunter8551]

You can always ignore social media, but social media won't always ignore you.

[@avp2501]

@@benhunter8551 it's easy for me since I've never had an account on any platform.

[@mikecodev]

I got a telegram bot that sends me Godot related youtube videos and in the last hours it went crazy. I thought something special happened AND IT WAS JUST DRAMA. FFS STAHP! hahaha

[@ELTABULLO]

Touch grass

[@Prismwind]

I'm all for a non-toxic community. I'm all for things like gender equality and trans rights. But this wasn't equality, this wasn't helping anyone's rights. This was blatant hate and hostility against anyone who just wanted a game engine and not to have to talk about that subject, it is basically them acting exactly like what they accuse others of. Reverse discrimination is still discrimination. Also, their apology still acts like they were the victim and like this was all just a misunderstanding... you don't get some of the bans they handed out and language they used from just a misunderstanding. Anyone who wasn't cheering this on for ANY reason at all was banned, as if not cheering them on was the same thing as being their enemy no matter what the reason, even if it was just "Can we please just be a game engine and stop going on about politics?" They basically lied about their intentions with these bans. I'm still using Godot for various reasons for my game, but this does seriously make me not want to participate in their community or server for the most part. I'm trans myself and I still find this reaction of theirs cringe.

[@rameynoodles152]

People like you are going to have to fight the battle against these nutcases. They can't hide behind "discrimination" when people like you confront them on their bullshit. Good luck my friend.

[@Eepistoo]

No matter who you are, if you are on wrong side of the fence, well.. banned i guess? In other words, gender politics they push here do no care the gender part if you are not also align with the politics part (left). This is why discrimination happens even inside that community. I personally do not understand, why they eat their own, and what even is that community in the end and why it has to be on everyones face.

[@AnnCatsanndra]

I'm in a similar boat. I have a lot more sympathy for the moderators/community managers in situations like that, and I've learned from my own experience that I absolutely do not have the fortitude for community management (because I tend to be far too lax and let the annoying users start chasing off the good ones before I can start handing out punishments). So I genuinely believe the excessive blocking may have been due to being emotionally overwhelmed and struggling to separate bad-faith messages from harassment and pointless noise. Buuuuuut, my sympathy aside, this situation was entirely avoidable on the social media handler's part. I'm totally with you on "I don't want to participate in their community or server for the most part". Admittedly, I _never_ intended to join those communities or servers, except to the extent that I intended to submit push requests to the engine's source itself. As an end user of the engine, I don't really want to join more groups for idle-chat than I need to. I want the engine to thrive and do good work. That doesn't require me being friends with anyone involved with it.

[@NihongoWakannai]

These type of people will just say you're lying about being trans and if you prove it they will say you have "internalized bigotry" or whatever. They've so thoroughly deluded themselves into thinking they're the "good guys" that they can't possibly conceieve of the people they're "protecting" disagreeing with them.

[@gamesalot]

I really dislike the google doc to request an unblock instead of just veting the bans themselves. They deff should apologize more to people banhammered with no good reason.

[@vrabo3026]

Yeah there's something really off about that. Basically saying "YOU take the time to do some work to rectify OUR mistake." like what? You shouldn't be required to do anything.

[@lucasljs1545]

And they are asking for personal info for unblocks LMAO

[@amex02]

If the community manager makes an uproar in the community, they should be fired

[@llareia]

I guess she thought "manager" meant "boss". 😅

[@achrafgarai6621]

Thank you for bringing this up. I also experienced being blocked by the Godot page simply for liking a comment that touched on the same issue. While I still believe Godot is a fantastic engine, their approach to PR has made me reconsider and lean towards sticking with Unity.

[@question_mark]

bro I've *litterally* seen this coming from the day she got hired 💀 in the last poll I basically wrote "please don't get political" in the additional comments It is just so disgusting that godot gets this kind of problems litterally for things that just do not have anything to do with the engine itself

[@theohallenius8882]

I'm surprised that individual was able to get hired anywhere in the first place. Now whenever I think of Godot I don't think of the Godot logo or Juan, I think of "they/them" with nose ring and green hair so toxic almost like a nuclear waste, but it's just regular waste

[@pankoBreadCroisant]

the problem is people attach the label "political" to anything they disagree with. acknowledging that diverse people exist is not political

[@NihongoWakannai]

​@@pankoBreadCroisantno one started drama when they showed support in pride month. No one cares about them "acknowledging diverse people" stop making straw men. What people dislike is them intentionally antagonizing anyone who doesn't follow their dogma.

[@ForeverZer0]

@@pankoBreadCroisant Are you implying the issue is about someone denying the existence of "diverse" people? There is literally no possible way to not be aware of these "diverse" people, they will smash down your door just to scream it to you when no one asked or cared. This is a game engine, let's focus on technical meritocracy, it has nothing to do with how people feel about themselves inside or what kind of things they do in the bedroom.

[@question_mark]

@@pankoBreadCroisant By "pls no politics" I really meant keeping the whole godot PR aspect oriented towards the engine itself. Like when you have so many people contributing to the same project, you necessarly end up with different minds when it comes to polarizing subjects and this diversity should not be a problem. Here we really got a catastrophic situation, like that community manager objectively deserves to lose that position. We had a big number of contributors getting blocked simply beacause they expressed their preference for political neutrality in godot's PR. And they were totally legitimate in doing so, the mods in the other hand are just disgusting here, it is flat out abuse of their position as mods in a debate that should not have been initiated by them in the first place.

[@TheRealAfroRick]

It was a TERRIBLE move from the Godot Foundation and they should have established a policy that the only thing they are permitted to cover on the foundations official channel is official news about the game engine - period. The foundation should apologize for the nonsense, establish clearly what the original channel is for and remove the ban hammer from anyone involved in this mess.

[@facundodellarosa734]

they'll do that once they fire that stupid community manager they hired that is making that mess

[@AirmanCS]

Is so easy... an official account is supposed to be, boring informative announcements about the engine, nothing more nothing less, no support to anyone game or style, just events, updates and progress

[@shadowlordalpha]

The comment they provided as context is a bot comment as well or at least it appears to be one

[@jlewwis1995]

Bruh I'm literally one of the wokest of the woke and yet when I saw this "#wokot" stuff it made me cringe bigtime, could they have not worked that tweet in literally ANY other way? This is almost a unity pr team level optical disaster 🙃 They could have said "we support diverse games being made with godot" or "the godot community is a safe space for all different types of developers" or something like that, buuuuut they chose "#WOKOT" INSTEAD...? Really? That's the best they could do? Maybe allowing them to get away with making w4games was a bad idea, this reads like massively out of touch corporate pr team slop lol

[@stupidburp]

Agreed. It was a gross way to try this. When those in the community being referenced are cringing, they messed up badly and should have owned that mistake. Dodging their own clumsiness and aggression is not going to help make things right again.

[@Callsign_Sturm]

Instead of using digital muting and banning features to turn themselves into an inward high horse holding echo chamber they could've just doubled down on creating an uncompromisingly good engine and avoided the stereotypes... Instead they could've written a small post stating indie devs shouldn't have to reinvent the wheel EVERY time and that would've been enough. When antics get so bad it makes libertarians start to disassociate/avoid you, you know you've done something wrong lol

[@mandisaw]

The very things that ppl look to in FOSS projects - that "of the people" spirit (small-d democracy) and casual, do-more-with-less approach - means you don't get trained professionals handling PR & community mgmt. Not saying that the pros don't screw up sometimes, but this is such a PR 101 "What not to do" case :(

[@felix_xb]

@@mandisaw the person in question responsible is not even a developer as far as I'm aware but someone who was HIRED as "professional CM"

[@mandisaw]

@@felix_xb PR is an entire trained field, just like being a software developer. But like any field, there are folks who are good at it, and folks who aren't. And everyone can have an 0/10 day. I don't follow Godot (or Twitter drama!) so who knows where this particular CM falls on the rankings of best-to-worst. It does seem likely that there wasn't enough policy, training, or oversight though, so that part is on the org, not the individual.

[@colin_actually]

Pretty tepid response from the foundation but whatever. A collision of this sort is inevitable if you put a bunch of rainbow flags in charge of your socials. But banning and hiding posts and all that is just weak sauce. Let your message speak for itself without having to abuse your power to coddle it. Like as if there's a shortage of supporters on twitter or even within Godot for this sort of thing. Unnecessarily heavy-handed!

[@bruceyawen6160]

I think its important to not jump the gun... I personally will just pretend nothing happened and wait what the next days/weeks bring

[@jonas8588]

100% Agree

[@drewo.127]

My thoughts exactly!

[@realkauficroft]

Not to be disrespectful but it sounds a bit like "I'm just gonna wait and see what the bullies do next, we have to give them a chance, maybe they will not ban as much and maybe they will stop using their political fundamentalism as weapons against the community."

[@bruceyawen6160]

@@realkauficroft its still better to wait and make an informed descision

[@drewo.127]

@@bruceyawen6160 👍👍👍

[@guywithrabitwow6764]

No one takes responsibility. No one tries to solve the issue; they just say the case is closed. Community managers don’t dare to manage-they claim they did nothing wrong, blaming outsiders for causing the issue. It’s so amateurish. The main problem is that, from now on, even the slightest move could trigger another problem. The same thing will happen again, with no one taking responsibility, again.

[@GabrieleNunnari]

The most absurd part is that they have not fired all the moderators involved. It was clearly a crazy action that damaged hugely their engine and future development. There is nothing they can do to recover from the damage done to their credibility. Everyone can see that the action was a crazy act from unstable people. They where not "overwhelmed", they just when rogue and begin insulting everyone. Is a person like that a person that should manage or moderate a community? NEVER. These are the clear red flags that tell you that those people should be removed from their position. The amount of economical damage produced by this action, will resonate for a very long time and destroy the growth of what seems to be one of the only valid alternatives to unreal engine. Banning developers from the git hub is VEEEERY BAD. People are working and investing in you, WHY IN THE WOLRD those people had ANY power on github? Do you know that people invest time and money in game development? Godot is a tool used to develop products that require years in the making, with money and everything on the line, and an idiot "overwhelmed" could take it down because you do not agree with them? Are you crazy? What if someone want to do a game that is deemed to not been inclusive enough? What if some developer wants to make a game that in the view of the moderators should not exist? They can take your investment and work down? Are you crazy? This is even worst than what has happened to unity. The only real reason why someone could do something that stupid is to damage godot from the inside to favorite the regrowth of unity. With all the respect, I do not know what would be the worst option. Still, really guys, rethink you hire strategy and get rid of this kind of people, they NEVER bring anything good, those are not people you can have a talk with, they are exactly the same as the anti-woke, people incapable of a conversation that is "overwhelmed" when you do not agree with them.

[@lucasljs1545]

Already forked, I would not waste time with Godot. Redot is the new main now.

[@MatrixDude85]

The point isnt if you agree or not. Its the fact that everyone knows this kind of stuff will and has destroyed businesses big and small. If your favorite family owned restaurant posted something controversial would there be backlash. Yes Ive seen it at place I worked as a cook. Regardless if you agree or not its bad buieness and they know this but its not there money. Clean house Godot or you will go under. Longtime fan of you and Asmold. To each there own lol. Many are missing the point and it has nothing to do with gender or sexuality and that is why people are like wtf. There is someone that should be removed asap for feeding the fire on Godot's main Twitter account as it breaks there own TAS. If it doesnt apply to them it wont end well for team. Anyway well said on this and very professional of you.

[@berkefekeskin9172]

its making me really sad that with such a mistake things got so bad that people just started to change engines or forked godot and just said "better engine with focused on game dev instead politics" it just feels so wrong. i really want godot to become the next blender so people can get a industry standard open source game engine. after brackeys return i got so excited about godot's community but with this one moderation mistake cost their whole reputation and momentum. its just sad. 😢

[@ImperativeGames]

You can ignore politics for a while but it won't ignore you. Especially if it is also about ideoligion (religion+ideology) that ruling class chose to indoctrinate people with.

[@LupusGr3y]

@@ImperativeGames Considering it was very much US politics, then yes, I can very much ignore it. It doesn't affect me in the slightest.

[@alexjames995]

Its simple, an open source community is open to everyone even those who politically oppose you. FOSS needs to understand this and prevent cultural warriors from joining their organizations.

[@ImperativeGames]

@@LupusGr3y For a while. But only until open source engines start requiring you to be a follower of some religion and conduct religious rituals if you want to continue using them.

[@dr-doctor-1992]

It's not the first time this has happened with Godot community but yea don't wanna keep making these mistakes now that Godot is more in the public eye

[@user-qq4wb4rz7q]

Saying something like "There's Asmongold who I personnaly despise" after saying you wanna leave out the drama lmao

[@kinshorin]

Yeah I don't really get it. Disliking him, I can get, but "despise?" I also don't even see why he was brought up at all.

[@anonymoususer1681]

Yeah that was very uncalled for.

[@TheDiner50]

Task successfully failed. GameFromScratch. Task successfully failed. Godot Engine. Task successfully failed. Unity Engine. Do not get me wrong. That AsmaGold is awful and messed up. But you know what? I take a AsmaGold, over a GameFromScratch that divided by zero. Completely, unjustified, name-drop. Task successfully failed. Do not restart/force shutdown your computer. We are saving your stuff. :5 days later. Do not hit the power button. Saving your stuff.

[@KrazeeCain]

I know a lot of people like the CM that started this riot like to drag his name through the mud for not toeing the line perfectly but I respect him for that, he fights against this kind of toxic unreasonable behaviour.

[@4R8YnTH3CH33F]

Asmonmold is very detestable, tbf

[@TranquilMarmot]

Twitter has turned into a toxic cesspool of ragebait and harassment. Seems risky to post anything there, honestly. We as gamedevs should really abandon Twitter.

[@TranquilMarmot]

No matter how neutral you are, if you go to Twitter you're GOING to get politics shoved down your throat. And it usually isn't the "we should be nice to each other" kind of politics....

[@Shawnecy]

Some of us never even joined it!

[@bethrains3105]

Absolutely. Shame on your for having a Twitter account. Shaaaaaaame!

[@nushia7192]

And they wanted game devs to limited on developing only for their side of the gamer side of the gaming industry.

[@TranquilMarmot]

@@Shawnecy I joined Twitter almost 17 years ago! It was a really nice place for a while. Didn't really start going downhill until recently.

[@dzonemanarmy]

The damage is done, the trust is gone

[@jernaugurgeh451]

Oh get you, drama queen.

[@Luan-RT]

Only for people who use Twitter, or whatever it's called these days. I had no idea about this drama until I watched this video (I don't use Twitter).

[@ICEknightnine]

@@Luan-RT no, the trust was gone long before this when they linked xan's server as their official server. I will only conversate with them on a technical level now and they won't get any of my funding so long as they continue to push and validate extremism. I'm not ignorant of how this will lead to an inevitable crash and burn, and I'd rather not throw my money into a volcano knowing that I'll have to move to a new engine.

[@TurtleTracks-g1r]

This is a pathetic statement from someone who probably isn't even a game dev lol

[@goodxp]

as someone else mentioned that discord server was pretty much the official one until recently. the way the official announcement presenting the situation making it worse. clearly there was a raging person who went overboard with the use of their power. and community appropriately reacted to it. and if you want to dig deep, i think this is linked to another gamedev drama that was getting attention on X. a solo dev was actively harrassed and persecuted by this activist group for weeks prior, for his game 'soulash' . I am guessing many people, including CM of godot had elevated emotions from that.

[@humman007]

Leaving aside of twitter, CM and whole affair, main problem is internal conflict within community that creates and develops the engine, if this continues its future may be in jeopardy and maybe at some stage it will fall apart, although there is hope by the fact that it is an open source project and someone else may pull another version of it further In any case it may stop mass migration from Unity/UE to Godot

[@junechevalier]

There’s an ex Godot employee who actually predicted something like this would happen, he said he didn’t expect it to be this soon lol

[@Ichthyodactyl]

Any chance you could direct me to the video/post where this was said? If not, no worries.

[@c-domination]

Remember last year I got pushback in the Godot subreddit for saying that the engine should stay neutral and all that flag waving just attracted weirdos from both sides of the culture war. And now I feel vindicated.

[@jernaugurgeh451]

'Neutral' in such an instance is effectively siding with bigots, oppressors and hatemongers who don't want marginalised people to be part of their thing or visible in society... which can incldue women in game dev. Nothing wrong with an organisation being accessible and inclusve and celebrating diversity. Everything wrong with "anti-woke" keyboard warriors trying to silence such efforts.

[@c-domination]

@@jernaugurgeh451 I rest my case.

[@MountainHomeJerrel]

Yep​@@c-domination

[@hipflipped]

Ah, the old "There's fine people on BOTH sides" tactic!

[@HarryPujols]

I am not supportive on staying "neutral" but certainly posting that crap on X is going into enemy territory and poking the beehive.

[@tlemo5859]

I don't know if this is worthy of a whole FORK of the engine, but it's definitely worthy of people getting fired. Community manager and moderators, namely. You never talk politics if you aren't a political organization.

[@ClockworkGearhead]

People are already forking it. Most were contributing (if they weren't being railroaded) and this just gave them an excuse.

[@pankoBreadCroisant]

what was political?

[@Ichthyodactyl]

Nobody is going to get fired. This isn't some kind of rogue CM acting against the values of the foundation, this is the veil slipping. It may not justify a fork now, but it won't stop here and plenty of people recognize that.

[@Ichthyodactyl]

Nobody is going to get fired. This isn't some kind of rogue CM acting against the values of the foundation, this is the veil slipping. It may not justify a fork now, but it won't stop here and plenty of people recognize that.

[@benhunter8551]

If anyone can direct me to a non-woke fork, that'd be great....

[@UlshaRS]

This is why unofficial discord servers should be avoided as a matter of principal. Many exists to be feifdoms for people not allowed the access they think they are entitled to in the actual pages, for good reasons.

[@MrHadane]

Official discord servers are not immune to having trigger happy moderators. Helldivers official discord is a good example.

[@mandisaw]

@@MrHadane Difference is, the devs have the power to remove or temp-suspend anyone out of line in an official channel, incl mods. Seriously, we fought all these "wars" and solved these problems back in the days of Usenet, BBS, and web-forums - it's like the young'uns want to relearn all the old lessons the hard way...

[@lucasljs1545]

The mods from the Oficial discord and this "unofficial" which was official until 1 month ago are the same. There are people being crossbanned in both.

[@wpshadow]

Really, I don't care what they are thinking about things... The engine is fine, works like it should and if they are thinking whatever they should. I'm using the engine because it's good. The only thing I would say to the Godot team is: "Please hire a community manager, that makes your own life easier"

[@RarebitFiends]

It was a tweet from a community manager who runs the X account that kicked off this mess to begin with.

[@IWillYeah]

A new manager*

[@DevLeoArchive_906]

It's crazy how there are devs already going crazy saying they're switching engines and shit, but like, godot engine is still fine to use, even with its current flaws/limitations

[@HarryPujols]

​@@RarebitFiends not exactly. The CM exposed the account to criticism and instead of rolling with it, made a dumb use of the block button.

[@agodelianshock9422]

Professionalism is about keeping this stuff out of our work and to a large extent, our art. There's a nuanced place for it artistically, on social media is not it.

[@ForeverJrad]

It’s so strange… Godot, NixOS, Gnome, there’s like a consistent wave of these situations. From the outside looking in programmers and foss people are mostly neuoro divergent people, but also think deeply about there media and software they consume. I think it’s important to remember that the breadth of color in our world is what makes it amazing, and to accept people that at first you don’t agree with but work to find common ground.

[@adrixshadow]

Because grifters come that take the hard work of those programmers and use it as clout for their agenda. They are the easiest prey. Especially for project that get popular and prominent that are worth infiltrating and taking over. It's also why it's a symptom when it's already terminal. They are going to alienate all the contributors until there is no real programmers work on the project. It's how open source projects die.

[@eugenech.2450]

Im still gonna use this engine, despite the drama going on online.

[@vaivs7903]

Me too

[@lucasljs1545]

Some devs already forked to Redot. Godot has some problems that the people who control the main branch aren't really wanting to fix for MONTHS now, it is a dead project. Hope the Redot fork can become something different.

[@erichzannbusoumuzan]

@@lucasljs1545 Oh, thanks for a fork namedrop!

[@SLSat]

It feels weird people not directly affected by this stop using the engine. Game engines are about the tool, not really about who's behind it

[@tequilasunset4651]

​@@SLSat I'd say its because they are worried they are the type of person who may have the same thing happen to them in the future

[@Greywander87]

Wrong answer, Godot. This is not a "little oopsy", your CM went rogue and screwed up big time. She/They's behavior is unprofessional and unacceptable, and she/they needs to be fired immediately. TBH, the only thing that would have gotten Godot out of this with minimal reputation loss would have been quick and decisive action. Instead they're doubling down. Now even if they decide to backpedal and fire the CM, there will always be doubts about their sincerity. Have fun getting the Bud Light Experience. Fortunately, Godot is free and open source, so we can continue to use it without given them a dime, and we can fork the project later if we need to. Can't do that with Unity or Unreal.

[@CD-vb9fi]

Exactly! "unacceptable". Termination or they are just gaslighting and projecting.

[@benhunter8551]

I was thinking hard about moving from UE to Godot for a while. Now I know for sure won't be contributing financially to Godot, even if I do use it. I guess I need to check out Flax again or maybe look into Unigen.

[@the_procrastinator8606]

100% agree on the "a game engine profile should only talk about gamedev" philosophy, like projects such as Blender do with their media... instead of you know, directly quoting a culture-war charged comment, no matter how "wrong" or absurd it was - Godot twitter profile has absolutely no business engaging in online discussions like some terminally-online twitter user. I don't really wanna know or bother with the political standing of my car company if I own/use a car, so why should it be any different here? Highlighting games from lgbt/queer/or any other minority of people is absolutely harmless, and many other CMs do it properly. The whole fiesta started with how Godot's CM introduced the post instead, with some sort of attempt at making a snarky remark/clapback to some total rando dude online. Not a professional behavior by any means, let alone starting a mass-blocking crusade right after, which only really shows how unfit that person is to manage such a community - their literal only job is to defuse situations and *unite* the users after all. Charity contributions and general highlighting of underrepresented groups in game-dev do 100x more for any cause than engaging in pointless keyboard wars anyway - which can be easily seen as empty virtue signaling. The apology itself was a nothingburger tbh. They've did the *bare* minimum about the blocks (likely gonna lose some people still), then for whatever reason made it about some Discord mod/adm... instead of you know addressing the elephant in the room that was what started it all in the first place. Attention diversion / damage control at best, disingenuous at worst. Better than not apologizing at all, tho that def sets a worrying precedent for how Godot deals with that sort of stuff in the future, especially so since it literally runs *on* community, of all kinds of people.

[@4.0.4]

That "community manager" should be kicked out, disavowed, and permanently blacklisted from coming back. Way to hurt the project for their personal beliefs.

[@at1965]

The Xananax guy probably forgot to take his Xanax pills on time... It happens sometimes...

[@mandisaw]

LOL My first thought as well

[@unicorn_tamer]

Wow... a youtuber that absolutely refuses to cover politics/drama? Man, I loved this channel so much, but just this video has made me appreciate it so much more! Genuinely, thank you for not pushing your ideas onto others like what feels like every other person on this platform!

[@mosemister]

Hopefully if my game releases, people have forgotten this and dont condemn my game for using the godot engine. Its too far in development to switch engine

[@gamefromscratch]

This will not happen, do not worry.

[@AdroitConceptions]

@@gamefromscratch you can't guarantee that for people.

[@mandisaw]

You'll be fine! Vast majority of players aren't game-devs, and very, very few game-devs engage with internet drama. It's a tiny-tiny minority of screamers. Also, literally no one playing cares what your engine was. Just whether the game is good & looks cool.

[@mosemister]

@@mandisaw im no artist so "looks cool" depends on if your meaning gameplay or graphics ;)

[@captainseagold3559]

I think you're safe, brother. "If you build it, they will come" -- Field of Dreams

[@themore-you-know]

TLDR of the statement: "We initiated a politically charged and divisive campaign, and we will now label ourselves the victims of people who push back against our violent attacks on freedom of speech and freedom of thought. If you believe you may have been hurt in the process of our aggressive campaign, people contact us (the aggressor) so we (the aggressor) evaluate your case. We firmly stand by our desire to write BS statements aggrandizing our self-righteousness."

[@computersciencestudentriverbat]

Game development is for everyone, not every game project is for everyone (which is totally fine to be honest), but game development is for all. That said, I still think social media for the most part is the biggest arena for unforced errors in all of cyberspace. I'm all for keeping spaces free of hate, discrimination, and other harmful behaviors and I generally agree with the sentiment the GamesFromscratch is making. I also appreciate the measured commentary he is making here. Keeping it focused on the the game development side of things is a tough task. Drama for its own sake isn't helpful for any aspiring game developer.

[@sergeantsapient]

I was wondering if this drama was going to make it's way over to this channel as I feel you've made a reasonable effort to keep drama out of the channel and I honestly appreciate it. I do feel like this drama has blown up in an unfavorable way for Godot and the project leaders need to take the reigns back on their community staff. It doesn't even have to involve being fired, just an apology and a promise to keep their personal opinions out of the engine's official accounts.

[@mdstevens0612]

This is one of those real everyone needs to log off kind of stories. Don't go make the moderators jobs hard by yelling at them, but the moderators also seem to have been overzealous and unprepared to handle the negative attention that a post in the vein of American partisan politics can bring. It's good that Godot tries to make the space safe for people of all walks of life, it's admirable, but it has to be your first day on the internet if you don't think word "woke" isn't going to invite a shitstorm in the replies, whether you're left or right. The best thing we can all do now is just go touch grass and come back more level headed.

[@dermond]

Oh I remember xananax Yeah checks out

[@kaiser9321]

Could have sworn I had heard about this name yesterday in Godot Cafe, a random user talked about them, then I saw the message but it got swiftly removed, don’t remember what it said

[@idoitonastick8689]

Yup, sound like a joke ran wild.

[@nushia7192]

It was a joke, you know both of the farthest side ones are so much of a snowflake.

[@andermetalbrasil]

It was not a joke. It was the opinion of a community manager that should be kept personal, not being brought publicly through the official Godot account. None of that thing would have happened if the community manager focused on posting about Godot itself or about game development instead of showing her opinion on political topic A or B.

[@idoitonastick8689]

@@andermetalbrasil Nope, the entire Godot upper management support that statement not just her

[@idoitonastick8689]

@@nushia7192 yes. I am distancing myself from both of them as far as possible

[@ryanvenjoyer]

Restricting paying donors and devs from having community resources over mild disagreements is no joke. The GitHub bans are ridiculous.

[@MisterBr0wn]

100% with you on this. politics interfering with game dev is just wrong and everyone loses.

[@nushia7192]

This is a nothing burger, let the illiterates fight each other and let the game devs make their games.

[@FineWine-v4.0]

Yeah those illiterates have money

[@lpnp9477]

​@@FineWine-v4.0how? All they do is lie and eat hot chip

[@idoitonastick8689]

@@nushia7192 why do you sound so angry in my head?

[@BobDevV]

Asmond getting stray bullets out of nowhere :)

[@raen5256]

Ikr?

[@pacman_pol_pl_polska]

He's a worthless thief that is pretty much immortal.

[@grimswell]

Absolutely no reason to bring up Asmongold. You could've made your point without mentioning a single other person...Now it feels like your point was "I only engage in drama because I don't want to engage in drama". Seems contradictory. O well still love ya!

[@poleve5409]

he apologized for the comment

[@gamefromscratch]

Yeah, that was a mistake in retrospect. Honestly his god awful coverage of the Unity situation really soured me on his channel and over all content. It does feel like outrage/drama farming coupled with low information takes on the subject. This is really my only exposure to his content, but its certainly not for me. But yeah, should have left that bit out.

[@grimswell]

@@gamefromscratch Yeah, he's a controversial figure with a large audience that's why I was surprised to see you mention him specifically.

[@blossomcherrypink]

​@@gamefromscratch Lol. I was wondering why you despised him but his coverage on that situation was particularly horrible. He is a fantastic critical thinker and has a broad worldview to base his opinions off of but in cases like that he has a critical flaw of having no previous exposure to the field and thus defaulting to being too reactionary. His channel / community is filled with negativity but his ability to think rationally and articulate himself is admirable. Wanting to stay away from his content makes sense though. It's infused with negative discussion and can be draining or boring.

[@TheEx404]

They should learn something from the dustborn, concord, AC shadow etc....maybe... just my 2 cent.

[@nushia7192]

Huh? You didn't know about Alan Wake 2? Oh yeah, dustborn has a good story, just the story though.

[@nushia7192]

Don't tell me you only play fps games... that feels so boring not much variety.

[@Artemisarrowzz]

@@nushia7192 Dustborn is the Tumblr satire of a videogame, it's awful

[@lucasmarciel1527]

Just like stellarblade

[@lindseylinck]

​@@nushia7192 Alan Wake 2, the game that didn't make money for the developers because it's sales were not enough to cover the loan from Epic Games? A big case of "games production should not be so expensive".

[@brezanac]

The long history of incidents like this is exactly why I never could take Godot seriously. Just imagine the horror of suddenly being denied access to the engine source code (github) over someone's meltdown. I miss the good old days of Irrlicht and Ogre when we were only fighting about shaders...

[@domi_dreams]

MIke, as long as I like you - and admire your work - you screwed this one here :( Can you spend some time and follow way of thought that individual claiming to be Godot's CM ? He seems to get too much of a power and is abusing it towards anyone NOT straightly following their cult-like view of world. Also - have you check that post you showed here on their official Godot Discord? The ONLY allowed reaction is "thumb's up". Doesn't that look a bit fascist ? Don't get me wrong - I'm developing in Godot for over 6 years already, I know its history pretty well, I've even contributed myself to the engine, but since juan started focus on engine's monetization and making it more commercially viable, he also gave his silent permission for that kind of gross ideology, where there is more politics and rainbow-friendliness than in any other engine and anyone having slightest detour from their way of thought - is instantly blocked. Have you seen similar nonsense in any other major engines? Have Epic/Unity/GameMaker ever pulled something like that off? No, because they know how to NOT allienate users/customers - silence is gold, and engines - as being primairly technical products - they should NOT have any colors or propaganda.

[@_vofy]

Following the immense success of Concord, here we go yet again. Yes, I want them to focus on the engine and not politics. Maybe fix the Skeleton2D IK mirroring? Games kinda need characters to face left sometimes.

[@luuuucas]

"Woke" has nothing to do with success or failure. See Baldur's Gate 3. Godot is open source, so if this feature is important, you can fix it yourself.

[@_vofy]

@@luuuucas True, I can choose to spend however much time I need to understand how that works and maybe succeed at fixing it. It was foolish of me to assume it would just work. For the other thing, I do not agree. We might need a research paper to settle it.

[@ramoncf7]

Is Godot's CM working for Unity? This proves not all publicity is good publicity, just when Godot was starting to gain momentum... I hope gamedevs realize the engine is still a great tool and those that were blocked from github get access again. Gamedevs need alternatives to Unity/Unreal and making an engine from scratch is not one for the majority of them.

[@mandisaw]

True. But it'll be an interesting test-case for the folks who said they like Godot because they could fork or self-maintain it at any time 🤷‍♀

[@JerziTBoss]

Find the situation completely stupid. Don't mix work with religion, culture and politics if your work is not in that field. Being Engine dev is not place for religion, culture, politics. Just write down code that will do its job well. I'm apolitical so I would prefer if game engine companies would stay away from politics so I don't have to have my youtube feed filled with videos about politics drama... This was pretty dumb.

[@ElasticGiraffe]

Agreed. This whole "everything is political" mentality among ideologues who can't tolerate neutrality, let alone open disagreement, is ruining the culture.

[@HE360]

I appreciate everybody who is a gamer/game developer!

[@lpnp9477]

I hate them. All of them. Including myself.

[@mr_sauce_cooks]

​@@lpnp9477i just shat my pants

[@evanev7]

As free open source software, godot is making a political stance very explicitly, and to suggest that they "stay out of politics" is like suggesting unity should stay out of economics. All this "just focus on the engine" talk reminds of all the people I will never want to work with - people who think politics is something you can and should ignore. Game development is an art form, art is often revolutionary and I expect the artists making the paintbrushes to support the artists painting the future.

[@DocOmally101]

Not shoving your politics where they dont belong? Based Love you dude

[@Slabberchops]

He sympathizes with the nut moderator that's why. There is nothing wrong with calling out this kind of behavior from this moderator.

[@mastermati773]

I think this is cause by lack of competition, sic! Godoy maybe has „other game engines” kind of competition but there does not exist any „other foss game engine” which could compete. People treat the blue robot religiously only because of how fishy the proprietary engines are, while Godot is very fishy business itself.

[@Real_The_Goof]

I seen people getting blocked that were just like "can we please focus on the engine and bug fixings" they got blocked.. and it turned out they were a big time payer. The person at the helm was going nuts just blocking folks left and right.. it was crazy. (i spoke too soon, you covered the guy i was speaking of)

[@nushia7192]

How is a 100$ a big time payer?

[@trollgasm]

There's a South Park episode about Yelpers that perfectly encapsulates that Starkium turd. Even if he was right at first, he took it too far and has been on twitter for the last 4+ days arguing and milking the hell out of his 5 mins of fame. Maybe he can take that 100 dollars and start his own fork of godot. lol

[@realkauficroft]

@@nushia7192 For a free-to-use engine an investment with 3 digits is quite big. The disrespect for the people who care about the product and help with their time, effort and money, is astonishing.

[@TheGuyWhoGamesAlot1]

​@@nushia7192It is $100 a month, which would be $1,200 a year. For most non profits this is a sizeable donation amount, and donators of this size are good in the sense it helps make the foundation not overly reliant on one or two mega corporations. I wouldn't say losing it is the biggest deal in the world (obviously by itself won't make or break Godot funding), but it isn't small enough to ignore completey.

[@medo_0x00]

​@@nushia7192$100 per month is a lot. He could be paying a more advanced engine like unreal or unity or do something else with the money but he chose to support a free software in which he's under no obligation to pay for. If you treat them like that, then others who support the engine might stop donating to the engine as well even if they were not directly involved.

[@firetruck988]

2:40 Don't bite the hand that feeds you. Guess they'll learn that one the hard way.

[@bartscrush5064]

I am very glad that you do not talk about culture war stuff out of this channel. I come here for game dev stuff. I am not sure why you despise Asmongold. I was not a fan of them doing the pride month stuff because I follow them to get info on the game engine not to hear about lgbt+ people. I feel like you are under playing the biggest issue(at least for me). It was the fact that they put out something so divisive and could not take a ounce of criticism. The "unofficial" discord is linked to from the official website and has many of the same moderators as the official one. The person who posted that tweet knew it would cause criticism so their response is a load of shit. I wounder at what level they consider "harassment", considering how that Titanium level guy was treated when he reached out for clarification. They did NOT admit they messed up and I do not get how go that from their statement. They are at best deflected the blame to unnamed harasser for them getting involved in the culture war.

[@tomgrimard8075]

Much pondering to do here, I understand why you didn't want to make a video on it. Honestly I don't care much about their opinion on wokism or whatever is happening, Im not much into social medias on that side of things, im more just into sciences and stuff like that. I do understand they wanted to say their opinions as developpers though. I think they should have said they are more of a safe-space than something else. But banning of others accounts is extreme and indeed unprofessionnal. But I'm sure some people deserved to be blocked even if they were giving money, depending on the hate speech done at least. I bet some people just joined the firestorm to say bad things rather than say logical comment. I mean live and let live. As a game engine or community you should still accept criticisme. Instead of banning people, explain at least the point of view in a neutral manner. But man people complain about the slightlest things nowadays. But yeah they did screwed up, Im expecting them to lose some customers, I just hope it wont be some kind of unity major problem