Jim Sterling and The Slaughtering Grounds

After Jim Sterling did one of his usual videos accusing a game (The Slaughtering Grounds) of "using assets" (the only crime on Sterling's index) and not having an "artistic" arrangement for the buildings (what?), followed by a developer response in the form of a Sterling-style review of Sterling's review, the game got so many negative reviews on Steam from Sterling's fans that it was finally taken off Steam by the developers. I think the whole thing was despicable, because the game didn't look nearly as bad as Sterling claimed, the use of "assets" is routine for any indie developer, and his gripe about the lack of artistry in arranging the buildings doesn't make any sense at all.

I don't mind sarcastic reviews or criticisms, since I have made sarcastic criticisms myself, but I don't try to ruin someone else's financial prospects while doing so. Jim Sterling is the playground bully of the gaming industry (along with certain others who shall remain nameless since their fans will attack me), and it seems to me we should do something about him.

 

We just need to ignore him. He's only behaving in the manner he is because it's getting people to listen to him. If you try to do "something about him" that will only result in more people paying attention and that's a win for him.

 

I might be completely wrong (and this doesn't discredit any of your other points) but I thought the developer got banned for other reasons than just 'being bad'

Edit: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Slaughtering_Grounds#Lawsuits

Spoiler

On September 12, 2016, James Romine of Digital Homicide Studios filed a lawsuit against 100 Steam users for "personal injury" for a total sum of US$18 million.[3] This was followed by a request for a subpoena against Valve Corporation for the identities of those 100 users.[3][4] Later that day, Valve removed the entire catalog of Digital Homicide Studios, consisting of 21 games (including The Slaughtering Grounds) and 15 pieces of downloadable content, from Steam, stating that Valve had "stopped doing business with Digital Homicide for being hostile to Steam customers."[5] On October 2, 2016, Digital Homicide Studios dropped the lawsuit against the Steam users, with James Romine stating the studio was "destroyed" due to it.[6]

 

I, for one, enjoy Jim's content and think that the Unity asset store has allowed for quite a lot of garbage to flood the markets. I don't think Jim was attacking "use of assets" in general. He was attacking the specific use of assets in that game. He has stated that he is not opposed to use of assets if they're the basis for unique work that builds upon them. He is opposed to throwing assets together and calling it a game with minimal effort. And I agree with that.

 

I'm confused, all this happened a while ago and has been discussed here before. Why are you bringing it up again now? Did something new happen?

 

In the case of Digital Homicide Studios I'm on JIms side, very shady devs

 

This.

I’m gonna close this, because it has been discussed before, and because it really has nothing to do with game development or unity. It’s about (being polite here) one outspoken opinions and reactions to them. Not something useful. He has blogs/social media sites where you can give him feedback. Please use those rather doing promotion for him here.