[Mr. Vega]

I think you can make a good case that he really is a pathological liar; i.e. he is compelled to lie even when it's clearly self-destructive. I don't think he's really a sociopathic con-man, because he'd be more competent if he was. He just can't stop himself from promising things he knows he can't deliver, and he can't accept responsibility for doing so.

Let's go with that. That "aw shucks, I just can't help myself" shtick may have been real at some point, but now it's become a mask to protect himself.

[Sushi]

Disappointed with RPS. You can be "hard hitting" without being antagonistic, and this interview went way over that line.

[rev_posix]

Jim Sterling, AKA The Jimquisition, just weighed in on this subject as well, and he does bring up a few points that I've not seen brought up previously...

[Phantom Hoover]

yt expects the video id, not the full url

[rev_posix]

yt expects the video id, not the full url

Oops.  Either way seemed to work for me, but meh, fixed.

[mjn.mixael]

Meh. That guy always bothered me. He always talks like he knows the magic secret to video games, and give the impression that he is infallible. And yet, proof is in the pudding. I don't even understand why anyone is still even talking about the man. As Sterling put it in that video... We've known Peter's schtick for years. Move on... This show's another repeat performance.

[Luis Dias]

The way that interview starts tells me everything I need to know about how despicable Rock Paper Shotgun is. Burn that site masquerading as a journalistic news source. Burn it to the ground.

Yes, why does this Walker guy think he has any right to not give Molyneux the same softball questions that he has been getting for years! How dare he open the interview with a line of questioning about the personal integrity of someone whose integrity is in question? Yes, let's burn RPS to the ground, because we don't need people who are confrontational in games journalism!

A bit late to this but here's my two cents: you don't have only the two options of either be a complete unprofessional asshole or a softballer questioner. You can actually be quite professional, quite civil and quite on point, asking all the tough questions that your readers will find important to be answered. Instead, we get a "journalist" asking Molyneux if he's a pathological liar at the very outset. What can anyone answer to this? What is even this? "Saying truth to power"?

Is that it? Saying "Truth to power"? Is Molyneux "in power" now? Or is he now a sufficiently weak target that can be abused in this manner for he's obviously in his "way out" in the least charming possible way by mismanaging horribly his latest decade of games development? I can guess the answer to that last one. I will never see a RPS journalist ever asking someone like, IDK, Anita Sarkeesian why she's a "pathological liar" for having constantly failed to produce what she has promised to deliver at all. The reason is simple. Some people you are allowed to bully in interviews, others you are not. In this we recognize who is truly in power.

Not that I would ever hope for that to come. It's a despicable attitude and lack of civility, and as I would never like to see someone like Anita being treated that way by any reporter, I also didn't like having seen Molyneux being treated like this. I said it and I say it again: it's incredible how someone manages to make me defend Peter. In-****ing-credible. And yet, this guy managed to do so. Un-****ing-believable. Almost an impossible mission in itself.


It's not even a true question at all, I don't think Molyneux is a liar. He's obviously pathologically optimistically deluded, which is a very dangerous trait to have when you are managing other people's lives, money, etc., but a liar? Even if he is, even if we grant Vega his "outrage" at this old man, what is the value of this question? If anything, it just exposes how terrible you are at thinking about hard questions when you have spent hours thinking on the very first one you would ask of him and the thing that pops into your head is "I'm gonna insult the guy real hard, that's just how I roll".

About Peter Molyneux? Meh. I've played Godus. Uninstalled it already, it was meh. I still remember I loved Black and White. I loved Syndicate. ****ing loved it. What is this journo ever been famous for? Outside of calling a well known developer a "pathological liar"?

Right.

[The E]

Okay, so thinking back on it, yes, Walker was unprofessional in this interview. He was obviously enraged and had an axe to grind.

But at the same time, I cannot bring myself to be sympathetic with Molyneux. He does his best to paint himself as the aggrieved party, as the dreamer who dared to dream and learned to fail, but I for one cannot buy it. Not with his history, not with the way the whole Curiousity/Godus fiasco shaped up.

I also cannot agree with your point about RPS "masquerading as a journalistic news source". RPS has a style, a unique editorial voice, and pieces like Walker's fit right into it. Why burn it to the ground, when this is one small misstep in its history? I for one will continue to read it, because Walker, Rossignol, Smith, Meer, O'Connor and Warr produce some of the best news in PC gaming for me.

Then there's your question about "what this journalist has ever been famous for". It doesn't matter. It really doesn't. It's the "Why don't you make your own games" argument again, and we all know how bad and fallacious it is.

(Also, preemptive notice because it's become unfortunately necessary: The second anyone jumps on Luis' dig at Anita Sarkeesian, this thread is dead. Yes, I too would like to argue about it. But we've been down this road, and nothing good ever comes of it. Please keep that in mind.)

[Luis Dias]

I was being hyperbolic in my "burn it to the ground", don't take me that seriously. Regarding Molyneux, this interview comes after an opinion piece on his faults. I didn't comment on it, I haven't read it yet but I do know it is quite critical of him. That's 100% fair, and it can even be journalism if it actually informed the viewership on the tribulations of his latest career and the whole shenanigans regarding godus and so on. (If the article is the one that focuses on the kid who won an award from a previous game, I did read it). If you want to criticize all the wrong things that person X did while promising the moon, you are 100% entitled to do so, and if you are a journalist, it's even your duty.

But an interview is not the place to grind axes. It's a place for asking questions. And if a journalist has the utter lack of civility and humility to understand this, if he has sufficient arrogance to call him names on the spot, then yes, I'm entitled to ask about him, who the **** are you to speak in this tone?

Regarding my example, I just brought it up because I know you and Vega like that particular person, that was the only motivation for me bringing it up. I repeat, as much axes I would have to grind about anyone, say, Kissinger, say Cheney, say Bin Laden, this is not how a journalist works. As an aside, Notch immediately tweeted after the fact, "Note to self: don't agree to interviews with RPS." So, hurray?!?

[Grizzly]

(Also, preemptive notice because it's become unfortunately necessary: The second anyone jumps on Luis' dig at Anita Sarkeesian, this thread is dead. Yes, I too would like to argue about it. But we've been down this road, and nothing good ever comes of it. Please keep that in mind.)

Hopefully Luis' question can be answered in a very innocent manner: The reason why Anita Sarkeesian will not be interviewed by RPS is because RPS is a website about games criticism, not games criticism criticism. Anita Sarkeesian falls outside their scope.
As such, the two articles about Sarkeesian on RPS have been about the harassment aimed against her rather then her work. Contrast this with how much coverage Peter Molyneux gets, which is not only an order of a magnitude greater, but also about him and his work.