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Made in us
Proud Triarch Praetorian





http://www.eurogamer.net/articles/2014-10-21-valve-pulls-game-from-steam-following-devs-tweet-threatening-gabe-newell


Spoiler:

Twitter has consequences. And so do death threats - even ones casually muttered as hyperbole. This is the harsh lesson Paranautical Activity developer Mike Maulbeck learned today when after a Steam snafu erroneously advertised his game as an Early Access title he crossed a line and tweeted a death threat to Gabe Newell. Following this outrage, the game was pulled from Valve's distribution service.

So here's how it went down: Valve promoted Paranautical Activity as a selection of Halloween-themed games on Steam. The problem was it marked the procedurally-generated shooter as an Early Access game when it actually had its full release a couple of weeks back.

"Valve marked our game as 'now on Early Access' as we released the final version (no longer in Early Access). I knew this would greatly cripple sales and confuse customers," Maulbeck explained to Eurogamer in an e-mail correspondence.

"I in fact had already begun getting tweets and e-mails from people claiming I marked it as Early Access myself to try and avoid criticism of the final version."

Dismayed at this harmful error, Maulbeck took to Twitter to blow off some steam about, well, Steam.

"ARE YOU F****** KIDDING ME STEAM? WE JUST RELEASED OUT OF EARLY ACCESS AND THIS IS OUR FRONT PAGE BANNER?" the developer railed in his first Tweet on the issue.

This was followed up by such messages as "First they force me to delay the game because I can't release on weekends, now this. Steam is the most incompetent piece of f****** s***," and "I am so F****** DONE DEALING WITH F****** INCOMPETENT S***s."

And then eventually, in the now-deleted Tweet (captured by Player Attack), "I am going to kill Gabe Newell. He is going to die."

Naturally, this did not go over well at Valve. Paranautical Activity was pulled.

Maulbeck forwarded Eurogamer the following e-mail he received from Valve on the matter:

"On your Twitter account today there were a series of messages where you expressed your frustration with Steam. We are generally comfortable with partners expressing this type of frustration or any other viewpoint directly with us or publicly through social media and the press. But one of your tweets this morning was a threat to kill one of our colleagues. Death threats cross a line. We have therefore decided to end our business relationship with you and Code Avarice."

"We've closed down your Steam admin accounts and we're removing the game from purchase on Steam. We will leave make Community Hub available so that existing customers will continue to have a place to discuss the game. Our understanding is that you're done developing the game, but if you need to ship an update to Steam customers, get in touch with us and we can help ship the update out for you."

Maulbeck reacted to the news with the following tweet: "Welp. PA no longer on Steam. I'm done making videogames now. It sucked while it lasted."

"It's just not possible to make a living in this industry without Steam, so I'm just out," he added, followed by, "Mike blows up at Valve on Twitter. Valve wins because Valve", and "I'm jumping back and forth between killing myself and getting a job at Radio Shack."

He then stated, "People telling me it's f****** stupid to say I wanna kill Gabe. Can I set up a 'no s***' autoresponse on Twitter?"

When pressed for comment on the matter, Maulbeck explained to Eurogamer, "This being a project I spent years of my life on, I was very frustrated by this mistake Valve made, so I tweeted a series of tweets calling them incompetent that eventually ended in me saying 'I swear I'm gonna f****** kill Gabe' or something. A statement I obviously didn't mean, but nonetheless was totally unacceptable and driven entirely by the heat of frustration I was feeling at the time."

"I have since obviously replied to them saying that I didn't mean what I said and pleaded that they consider the monopoly they have on the PC market before totally writing us off, but let's be real. If they took the game off the store, they're f****** sure about their decision," he lamented. "There's probably nothing to be done."

"My tendency to get heated and overly passionate has burned me many times in the past. Guess it was only a matter of time before it burned me to death."

For the record, Maulbeck told us that he did try to contact Valve about the error amicably before ranting on Twitter. "I of course brought the issue to Valve's attention as soon as I saw it," he explained. "The game still sat claiming to be in Early Access for a few hours waiting to be updated. I intelligently spent this time brooding until I eventually tweeted about it."

This is not Maulbeck's first row with Valve as he previously criticised Steam Greenlight when he was once told that he couldn't get Paranautical Activity on Steam directly through publisher Adult Swim since he'd already made a Greenlight page for it. Eventually the game was successfully greenlit anyway, but not through Adult Swim as that deal fell through when the publisher couldn't guarantee a Steam release.

Paranautical Activity may not be available on Steam anymore, but you can still purchase it through the Humble Store, Desura or the developer's website.

We've reached out to Valve to see if it's considering re-instating Paranautical Activity on Steam following Maulbeck's apology. We'll update should we find out more.

In related news, the UK is in the midst of making legal changes to really crack down on online trolling. Do you reckon Maulbeck's punishment in this case was too harsh or not harsh enough?




I agree with Valve, he crossed the line and now he has to pay the consequences for his actions. They should not let him back on Steam.

Edit: Typo in the title, I am the best at this.....

This message was edited 2 times. Last update was at 2014/10/21 13:49:46


 
   
Made in us
5th God of Chaos! (Yea'rly!)




The Great State of Texas

Several things here:
*I don't know who Valve Steam et al are, or what any of that is.

*This guy is an idiot. If I were Valve(?) I'd have also called the police and filed a report on his ass.

*Those posts reminded me why I don't have Twitter. Thank God. Its like reading the rantings of a 3 year old with a keyboard.

-"Wait a minute.....who is that Frazz is talking to in the gallery? Hmmm something is going on here.....Oh.... it seems there is some dispute over video taping of some sort......Frazz is really upset now..........wait a minute......whats he go there.......is it? Can it be?....Frazz has just unleashed his hidden weiner dog from his mini bag, while quoting shakespeares "Let slip the dogs the war!!" GG
-"Don't mind Frazzled. He's just Dakka's crazy old dude locked in the attic. He's harmless. Mostly."
-TBone the Magnificent 1999-2014, Long Live the King!
 
   
Made in de
Experienced Maneater






Totally justified reaction from Valve. What an idiot.
   
Made in us
Proud Triarch Praetorian





 Frazzled wrote:
Several things here:
*I don't know who Valve Steam et al are, or what any of that is.

*This guy is an idiot. If I were Valve(?) I'd have also called the police and filed a report on his ass.

*Those posts reminded me why I don't have Twitter. Thank God. Its like reading the rantings of a 3 year old with a keyboard.


Valve is a video game developer that also runs Steam, which is a marketplace for PC Games.

Welcome to Steam!
   
Made in gb
Lord Commander in a Plush Chair





Beijing

Threatening to kill people does tend to break business relations. He's lucky they don't make more issue of it.
   
Made in us
5th God of Chaos! (Yea'rly!)




The Great State of Texas

 Dreadwinter wrote:
 Frazzled wrote:
Several things here:
*I don't know who Valve Steam et al are, or what any of that is.

*This guy is an idiot. If I were Valve(?) I'd have also called the police and filed a report on his ass.

*Those posts reminded me why I don't have Twitter. Thank God. Its like reading the rantings of a 3 year old with a keyboard.


Valve is a video game developer that also runs Steam, which is a marketplace for PC Games.

Welcome to Steam!


Wow thanks. I thought you just, went to the store or did a google search.

-"Wait a minute.....who is that Frazz is talking to in the gallery? Hmmm something is going on here.....Oh.... it seems there is some dispute over video taping of some sort......Frazz is really upset now..........wait a minute......whats he go there.......is it? Can it be?....Frazz has just unleashed his hidden weiner dog from his mini bag, while quoting shakespeares "Let slip the dogs the war!!" GG
-"Don't mind Frazzled. He's just Dakka's crazy old dude locked in the attic. He's harmless. Mostly."
-TBone the Magnificent 1999-2014, Long Live the King!
 
   
Made in gb
Avatar of the Bloody-Handed God






Inside your mind, corrupting the pathways

I would expect most people to be able to distinguish between genuine threats and someone just mouthing off.

In this instance I think Valve were just flexing their muscles to swat an annoying fly and at the same time put the pressure on anyone else who might be unhappy with them. Not that I particularly see it as a bad thing for companies or individuals to cease interactions given insulting messages.

Though it would be interesting to see the contract to see whether Valve are able to just cancel business dealings whenever they wanted (I imagine that they are).

Another example of why you should never post while angry (or use Twitter, but that is another thing )

This message was edited 1 time. Last update was at 2014/10/21 11:54:40


   
Made in sg
Longtime Dakkanaut




Why do so many indie developers behave like Phil fish

My warmachine batrep & other misc stuff blog
http://sining83.blogspot.com/ 
   
Made in us
Proud Triarch Praetorian





Sining wrote:
Why do so many indie developers behave like Phil fish


My theory is that there is a reason these guys are Indie Developers, they do not work well with others.
   
Made in us
Longtime Dakkanaut






So instead of contacting Valve to rectify the situation, he goes on a twitter rant ending in a death threat.

Play stupid games...
   
Made in gb
Stealthy Warhound Titan Princeps





South Wales

And wasn't it that his game was 3 hours late in being taken out of early access?

Prestor Jon wrote:
Because children don't have any legal rights until they're adults. A minor is the responsiblity of the parent and has no legal rights except through his/her legal guardian or parent.
 
   
Made in us
Proud Triarch Praetorian





 streamdragon wrote:
So instead of contacting Valve to rectify the situation, he goes on a twitter rant ending in a death threat.

Play stupid games...


He contacted them ahead of time, but after waiting a few hours for it to be fixed, he decided to act out on Twitter. He did contact Valve about it before his Twitter rants. It does not justify his actions in any way, however.
   
Made in us
Last Remaining Whole C'Tan






Pleasant Valley, Iowa

He's kind of lucky that ending their business relationship was all they did.

 lord_blackfang wrote:
Respect to the guy who subscribed just to post a massive ASCII dong in the chat and immediately get banned.

 Flinty wrote:
The benefit of slate is that its.actually a.rock with rock like properties. The downside is that it's a rock
 
   
Made in gb
Decrepit Dakkanaut




UK

He is indeed an idiot,

I've seen plenty of indie developers mouthing off against Steam without any obvious consequence

(although who knows if steam would accept subsequent titles from them)

but death threats, especially in the context of other death threats floating about in the gaming community clearly crossed a line and he's lucky he's not having to talk to the police about it too


 
   
Made in us
[MOD]
Solahma






RVA

My tendency to get heated and overly passionate has burned me many times in the past. Guess it was only a matter of time before it burned me to death.
Translated: "don't you guys see? I am the victim here, me the guy who goes ape gak and threatens lives."

   
Made in nl
Pragmatic Primus Commanding Cult Forces






I may hate Steam as well, but what Valve did here was completely right.
Getting mad and blowing off some steam (no pun intended) is all well and good, but threatening to kill someone definitely goes way too far. The guy got what was coming to him and he is lucky he didn't get arrested.

On the other side, a mad game developer assasinating Gabe Newell would make a hilarious story. Too bad it would probably do nothing about Steam's near-monopoly.

This message was edited 1 time. Last update was at 2014/10/21 13:52:50


Error 404: Interesting signature not found

 
   
Made in us
5th God of Chaos! (Yea'rly!)




The Great State of Texas

Manchu and I agree. These are scary days indeed.

-"Wait a minute.....who is that Frazz is talking to in the gallery? Hmmm something is going on here.....Oh.... it seems there is some dispute over video taping of some sort......Frazz is really upset now..........wait a minute......whats he go there.......is it? Can it be?....Frazz has just unleashed his hidden weiner dog from his mini bag, while quoting shakespeares "Let slip the dogs the war!!" GG
-"Don't mind Frazzled. He's just Dakka's crazy old dude locked in the attic. He's harmless. Mostly."
-TBone the Magnificent 1999-2014, Long Live the King!
 
   
Made in us
Decrepit Dakkanaut





 SilverMK2 wrote:
I would expect most people to be able to distinguish between genuine threats and someone just mouthing off.



While true, I don't think that anyone can really afford to legitimately act as though an online threat is anything but genuine.


Meh... I think this is a genuine case where "Blame the Victim!" is entirely justified. He did decide to wear those clothes after all
   
Made in us
Decrepit Dakkanaut





Biloxi, MS USA

 Dreadwinter wrote:
 streamdragon wrote:
So instead of contacting Valve to rectify the situation, he goes on a twitter rant ending in a death threat.

Play stupid games...


He contacted them ahead of time, but after waiting a few hours for it to be fixed, he decided to act out on Twitter. He did contact Valve about it before his Twitter rants. It does not justify his actions in any way, however.


My question is why he didn't wait for a response back telling him that they received his communication and that they were working on fixing the issue? It seems a bit self-centered to think they would drop everything to get this fixed just because he e-mailed them. They probably get tons of communication from developers daily and there's no guarantee that they even saw his before he decided to rant.

You know you're really doing something when you can make strangers hate you over the Internet. - Mauleed
Just remember folks. Panic. Panic all the time. It's the only way to survive, other than just being mindful, of course-but geez, that's so friggin' boring. - Aegis Grimm
Hallowed is the All Pie
The Before Times: A Place That Celebrates The World That Was 
   
Made in us
Decrepit Dakkanaut





 Platuan4th wrote:
 Dreadwinter wrote:
 streamdragon wrote:
So instead of contacting Valve to rectify the situation, he goes on a twitter rant ending in a death threat.

Play stupid games...


He contacted them ahead of time, but after waiting a few hours for it to be fixed, he decided to act out on Twitter. He did contact Valve about it before his Twitter rants. It does not justify his actions in any way, however.


My question is why he didn't wait for a response back telling him that they received his communication and that they were working on fixing the issue? It seems a bit self-centered to think they would drop everything to get this fixed just because he e-mailed them. They probably get tons of communication from developers daily and there's no guarantee that they even saw his before he decided to rant.


Also, I would wonder if there's some sort of "developer hotline" that he could use a phone to call them up to let them know the issue, possibly with the end result of it getting fixed quicker, due to talking with someone directly. Ya know, as opposed to an email, which as you rightly point out, probably receives a gak-load of messages a day, and will probably get buried fairly quickly.
   
Made in hk
Longtime Dakkanaut




There's something so wrong with people who feel the need to shout every single thought that pops into their head into a public forum like twitter; ranging from sending death threats, sending dick pics and so on. Thank god I grew up in a time before twitter.

My warmachine batrep & other misc stuff blog
http://sining83.blogspot.com/ 
   
Made in de
Decrepit Dakkanaut





I'd have sued the guy's butt for openly insulting me in public.

Don't stop with burning down the farm, salt the ground.

This message was edited 1 time. Last update was at 2014/10/21 16:37:18


   
Made in us
Hangin' with Gork & Mork






 SilverMK2 wrote:
I would expect most people to be able to distinguish between genuine threats and someone just mouthing off.


I'm sure they knew he wasn't making a serious death threat which is why they didn't get him arrested, but it is also incredibly stupid and unprofessional which is why they removed him from their service.

Amidst the mists and coldest frosts he thrusts his fists against the posts and still insists he sees the ghosts.
 
   
Made in us
5th God of Chaos! (Yea'rly!)




The Great State of Texas

How would they know that actually? I would assume no such thing.

-"Wait a minute.....who is that Frazz is talking to in the gallery? Hmmm something is going on here.....Oh.... it seems there is some dispute over video taping of some sort......Frazz is really upset now..........wait a minute......whats he go there.......is it? Can it be?....Frazz has just unleashed his hidden weiner dog from his mini bag, while quoting shakespeares "Let slip the dogs the war!!" GG
-"Don't mind Frazzled. He's just Dakka's crazy old dude locked in the attic. He's harmless. Mostly."
-TBone the Magnificent 1999-2014, Long Live the King!
 
   
Made in us
Hangin' with Gork & Mork






 Frazzled wrote:
How would they know that actually? I would assume no such thing.


It is a guess as to why they didn't press charges and only removed him from their service.

This isn't a court of law so I assumed I didn't have to say 'allegedly' or 'it is possible' before every statement.

Amidst the mists and coldest frosts he thrusts his fists against the posts and still insists he sees the ghosts.
 
   
Made in us
5th God of Chaos! (Yea'rly!)




The Great State of Texas

Well you said you were sure they knew he wasn't a threat. Not meaning to belabor that, just that internet threats are still threats, by people you don't know. Never take any threat lightly.

-"Wait a minute.....who is that Frazz is talking to in the gallery? Hmmm something is going on here.....Oh.... it seems there is some dispute over video taping of some sort......Frazz is really upset now..........wait a minute......whats he go there.......is it? Can it be?....Frazz has just unleashed his hidden weiner dog from his mini bag, while quoting shakespeares "Let slip the dogs the war!!" GG
-"Don't mind Frazzled. He's just Dakka's crazy old dude locked in the attic. He's harmless. Mostly."
-TBone the Magnificent 1999-2014, Long Live the King!
 
   
Made in us
Longtime Dakkanaut






 Dreadwinter wrote:
 streamdragon wrote:
So instead of contacting Valve to rectify the situation, he goes on a twitter rant ending in a death threat.

Play stupid games...


He contacted them ahead of time, but after waiting a few hours for it to be fixed, he decided to act out on Twitter. He did contact Valve about it before his Twitter rants. It does not justify his actions in any way, however.


Gah, missed that. Still, like you said, does no justify his threatening to kill someone.
   
Made in us
Legendary Master of the Chapter






Well that was certainly a thing......

Steam did the right thing.

There is no excuse for rage posting like that :/

This message was edited 1 time. Last update was at 2014/10/21 18:11:26


 Unit1126PLL wrote:
 Scott-S6 wrote:
And yet another thread is hijacked for Unit to ask for the same advice, receive the same answers and make the same excuses.

Oh my god I'm becoming martel.
Send help!

 
   
Made in us
Decrepit Dakkanaut





 Ahtman wrote:
 Frazzled wrote:
How would they know that actually? I would assume no such thing.


It is a guess as to why they didn't press charges and only removed him from their service.

This isn't a court of law so I assumed I didn't have to say 'allegedly' or 'it is possible' before every statement.



Are you kidding... Dakka is totally the "People's Court"
   
Made in gb
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North West UK

 Ensis Ferrae wrote:


Are you kidding... Dakka is totally the "People's Court"


People's court of Dakka? I'm glad that's not a thing, that would be a lot of victims getting unfairly imprisoned and/or executed!

Not One Step Back Comrade! - Tibbsy's Stalingrad themed Soviet Strelkovy

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 Ouze wrote:

Well, you don't stuff facts into the Right Wing Outrage Machine©. My friend, you load it with derp and sensationalism, and then crank that wheel.
 
   
 
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