Are there any developers/publishers you boycott?

[Mobius and Pet Octopus]

I boycott Nintendo on PC. So far my efforts have paid off.

Real answer: Not really, no. Games are generally made by many many people, not a single director, executive, or bad actor.

 

[Hrist]

The only games I avoid that somewhat "hurt" (and thus count as boycott in some way) would be any future puzzle games by Jonathan Blow, the Wukong Devs, any work from the guy of Kingdom Come: Deliverance and THQ Nordic. Ie, any 8chan/gamergate connection and I'm noping out, and if one is as virulently misogynous as much as JB/Wukongdevs, well, they don't want me around so it's less a choice on my end anyway.

 

[Rune Walsh]

Activision
CDPR for their transphobic bullshit
A bunch of smaller devs who have outed themselves at bigots
Anything Harry Potter

 

[iceblade]

A personal one from Gearbox. Because Randy pitchford(?). I don't like the man

Click to shrink...

Yeah same here. Randy Pitchford is insufferable.

It helps that I don't like most Gearbox games to begin with.

 

[Suikodan]

No I do not.

 

[DrFreeman]

Naughty Dog.

 

[ASyS_Razia]

EA, 2K and Ubisoft but not in a boycotting way. I mostly play on PC and their launchers and intrusive shenanigans are a mix of infuirating and exhausting. If im craving one of their games to a point I cannot resist I would play it on PS5/Switch based on convenience.

 

[DaleCooper]

No gaming-related companies that I can think of… I find it meaningless to boycott any developer or publisher because if you dig into it, there will be corporate, tone deaf scumbags overflowing in 99% of them.

These days, Nintendo is the only company that may get my Day 1 Moneyz. Otherwise I wait for a >50% discount.

But I do boycott anything that Louis CK is involved in.

 

[Rinku_]

The point is if you are boycotting them in solidarity with workers… don't do that, because the workers don't want you to.

If you're doing it for any other reason, go for it.


Edit:

Personally I boycott products, but I don't really boycott studios or publishers, because I never square any of them as being significantly worse than the others. I boycott Harry Potter games, because JK Rowling. I boycotted stellar blade…because honestly the text of the game just looked and felt gross to me. If the text of the product isn't egregious though, I don't boycott unless the actual actions of the producer or studio are aggressively egregious.

Click to shrink...

That's fair, though I still find the original tweets mischaracterise boycotts as being primarily as a means of worker solidarity.

 

[SilentEagle]

No. If a game is a good game, then I'll buy it.

I stopped buying the same franchises I really liked because their quality is downhill.

I stopped buying CoDs with Ghosts and didn't buy any of them until MWII. I also passed MWIII and going to pass Black Ops 6 too. I don't think CoD is a creative franchise anymore. Pre-2013 CoDs were all innovative in terms of campaign and multiplayer. We've seen the most fun multiplayer maps between 2007-2012. For instance, all the MW2 (2009) maps were iconic. I was hyped for Black Ops 6, but I don't think it's a return to form either. So yes, I don't see myself investing hundreds of hours in new CoDs. Unless they make an iconic game, CoD I used to love is long gone. I just hope their studios become free from CoD. But I still support non-CoD games from Activision.

I did the same for EA games. I am not going to buy Dragon Age. I stopped buying The Sims 4 expansions. I stopped buying FIFA. I adored those games back in 2000s but I don't have interest in anymore.

 

[sha1ashaska22]

I boycotted EA after they got the exclusive NFL license (killing the NFL 2K series). I get that it was the NFL's call, but I was bitter for years. I've probably bought like 2 or 3 EA games new since then (Mass Effect 3, Mirrors Edge 2).

Been done with Gearbox since Colonial Marines, that game hurt a lot. Don't see that ending anytime soon.

 

[thillygooth]

Nope. Only time I've boycotted anything was Chic-Fil-A for like, 2 years and... I realized it didn't do anything. Protesting only works when the people you're protesting are inconvenienced or harmed by your actions, and these people won't miss my money because so many other people are buying their food. I just missed out on some good chicken sandwiches, and the only people that knew what I was doing were the people who'd ask why I don't wanna come with them to Chic-Fil-A for lunch. No one knocked me for it, but it began to feel more and more like virtue signaling and shaming my friends (who were all good people) rather than affecting any real change. So I stopped, and felt a lot better afterward.

Basically, if it's a game dev I don't agree with or who disgusts me, if the game isn't something I feel like I HAVE to play, I won't. If it is though, I counter my financial support by signal boosting what they did. At least that way the people working under this person isn't punished for the shittty beliefs of this one guy.

 

[aisback]

Tencent
Riot games
Blizzard.

 

[brawndolicious]

Have you heard the term "write what you know." It's not bigoted for white men to write stories about white men…because that's what they know. You aren't going to get minority lead stories from studios that don't have minority leadership.

We don't have to think about everything in terms of global power structures. What we need is more women and minorities in writing and leadership positions in studios and you'll get diverse characters.

Click to shrink...

Yeah, I can agree with both of those things and I did mention it a bit in the beginning of my second paragraph. Sorry if it was a little incoherent, had a lot of insomnia last night.