Stig79: http://thegg.net/wp-content/uploads/2016/04/dee-pennyway-beamdog.jpg Here is one of the devs trying to get Anita Sarkeesian's attention while blaming it all on transphobia. He doesn't use that word, of course, but the meaning is plain as day.
http://imgur.com/vZ0wqFw Here is the CEO playing the victim-card. Blaming the negative reviews on transphobia. Again he isn't using that exact words, but he is clear about the trans character being the main reason behind the poor reviews. Which is a downright lie because it was actually very few reviews that even mentioned that character at the time.
The removal of the classic games on GoG and Steam happened 3 weeks after SoD failed miserably. Beamdog are the distributors of the games now. They hold the rights to the BG games etc. Hence why they are also selling them on their own website. Beamdog are the only ones who has anything to gain from the bundling of the games. GoG certainly doesn't gain from it. The Classics were outselling the EE games by a mile before the bundling happened. WOTC doesn't gain anything from the bundling either. Having two versions of the game selling is better than just the version that sells the least be available. When the bundling got announced Beamdog and WoTC announced it together. This would be the "ultimate d&d experience" because of it. Beamdog greased some wheels over at WoTC and they got what they wanted.
Beamdog has everything to gain. The BG label is now, for most new players, a Beamdog thing. They soak up the credit for the games. And with the classics gone, everyone who now wants to buy the classics has to buy their version too. Hence every BG purchase goes into their pockets. If you are looking for a villain, always follow the money. You might notice Beamdog being very very deflective whenever this question pops up too. No direct answers.
As for the transphobic stuff at their forums. Yes it was there, but it was a very minor thing. What was a bigger thing, though, was everyone who complained about the shitty writing got labeled transphobic right off the bat. and the Mods at the forum let the masses attack them. Anyone who voiced a negative opinion got "yeah but what you really mean is that you hate the trans character". After that the person was fair game for everyone. Even former Mods at the Beamdog forum has spoken out about this attitude.
https://www.gog.com/forum/baldurs_gate_series/trolling_and_censorship_in_the_beamdog_forum/page1 You can read some of it here.
As for the trans character herself. She was a token. Nothing more. Even transgendered players had a negative reaction to the character. Something Beamdog tactically ignored when they did interviews with various "gaming sites" talking about the backlash.
https://us.v-cdn.net/5019558/uploads/editor/qz/42isa4r87ng5.jpg Another point about the trans character is that she is in fact lore-breaking. As you, a BG fan, know - there are magical items all over the Realms that lets you change your gender permently. There are potions and spells that does this too. Transgenderism is a non issue in the Realms. You switch your gender permanently - problem solved. Given that the character is also a Cleric makes it even more weird. Clerics have access to those spells that can change your gender permanently. This was a political statement, and nothing else.
Bonus. Mizhena, the name of the character, is Czech for "Man-Woman". Or 1 letter away from it. The author was clever and changed 1 letter. She might as well called the character Shemale.
In most rpg worlds this would not have been a lore issue, since those worlds don't have the gender-changing spells or items. Dragon Age, Diablo, Might and Magic, World of Warcraft, Conan, Mass Effect, Fallout, The Elder Scrolls. Perfectly fine.
Aye, you're right - they did back up their game using the transphobia that was somewhat rampant at the time. To be fair, though, I believe Dee has since left the team as well. Trent is still there though, as far as I know.
Thank you for those images. It doesn't change my views on the company as a whole, as I've gotten to know the current team fairly well, but it's good to see things from the past as well.
You're also correct about Beamdog and WOTC announcing the bundle - however, Beamdog did not by any means demand this be done. I'm sure that, had GOG and Steam spoken out against it, then a compromise would have been created. I myself would also like to see the originals advertised, rather than bundled, but I don't consider it a bad thing that they are. I also wish I could stop seeing people claim Beamdog ripped the originals from the shelves, as I think we can both agree that that is not what happened in the slightest.
I also wouldn't consider the transphobic stuff minor. I recall one time on the Beamdog forums, someone had taken screenshots from the time of SoD's initial release of quite a large number of people who had joined the forums just to spout their nasty views on transgender people in general.
I'm certainly not thickheaded enough to say that all the initial small-scale reviews of SoD were transphobic. I wouldn't even say half of them were. However, there were definitely a lot of them - and a lot of those went directly to the forums, wher the Beamdog crew are known to be fairly active with players. As such, I feel like the transphobic issue may have, for better or for worse, been at the forefront of a lot of people's minds who spent a fair amount of time on the forums.
Again, not saying it was right to blame transphobic people for every negative review, but I imagine its significant presence on the forums had something to do with that.
I'll also admit that Mizhena's presence was likely a somewhat poor attempt at inclusion. I've always said it could have been done better - I would have liked to see them reference the classic gander switching belt from BG1, personally. Perhaps Mizhena would have been in the market to get herself one, or to track down a powerful wizard who could cast the spell on her. It may have even been a cool side quest, considering the rarity of such enchanted items. But, perhaps that would have been too much, and given people even more reason to complain about a trensgender presence, I dunno. There was actually a thread on the Beamdog forums where people suggested ways she could have been written better, and a lot of people had a lot of great ideas. It was pretty cool.
There's also the fact that having a belt stuck to you forever just to feel like yourself sounds like an awful curse. But that's a conversation for another day. Hahaha.
At the end of the day, Beamdog definitely could have handled themselves better - but so could the public. I believe both parties have, for lack of a better term, matured over the years. A solid majority of people who still take it upont hemselves to give SoD a look, tend to actually review it as a game. In the same breath, Beamdog has learned a valuable lesson, let go of some less-than-fitting team members, and bettered themselves as a company. I think PST:EE is a good example of that - I've seen very few complaints about the game itself. Although I personally have yet to play it (or the original).
Actually. Someone posted a reply from GoG about the matter not long ago, in a different thread. Might be the Planescape Soundtrack announcement thread. GoG said they have no say in the bundling. They have to accept the bundling or not sell the games at all. That rules GoG out, which leaves WoTC and Beamdog. - the two that announced it and claimed it was the ultimate d&d experience.
Well you have to back up that claim. If someone posted nasty shit about trans people over there, you will have no problems finding screenshots of them. I remember it differently though. It was more a case of SJWs attacking anyone who made a slight complaint and then played the transphobic-card right off the bat.
Just look at the reviews here on GoG. And on Steam too, for that matter. You will notice very few of them even mention the trans character.
Yeah that belt was cursed. Edwin managed to do it by spell though.
Beamdog have learned absolutely nothing. They also got a ton of stick because of the bundling last year. What have they done since then? They bundled Planescape. And then began selling the soundtracks for the EE games separately - for as much as the classics, with the soundtracks included, used to cost.
They also got a severe backlash after the changes implemented with the 2.0 patch, and they have done nothing to fix that. All they would have had to do is make the unpatched game available for download with individual patches available as well. I actually asked on their forums why they didn't do that. The Dev who replied said it would "cost too much" to store the game on their servers like that. Uhm...yeah. A few gigabytes extra. So now you are forced to play with that moronic UI and those horrid sprites. They stuffed those sprites into the EE version of Planescape too. So..no. they haven't learned a damn thing.
