Whatever you may think of the Codex as a whole entity, I really don't think the point to be raised from this concerns them (or the debatable merits and faults of Avadon) at all. It's about the dangers of artists insta-publishing online while they're feeling emotional - and, indeed, the problems of responding to critics.
Mr Vogel really isn't meeting criticism head-on. He's bemoaning his own audience very publicly and with fairly obvious emotional attachment. If he'd wanted to meet his criticism head-on, he might have written a blogpost saying, 'Why the demo is what it is, and why I still think that's a good idea' and left it at that - assuming we take 'meet' to mean 'deal with and analyse' rather than 'lob retaliatory mud'.
But rather than just drinking half a bottle of Laphroaig and cursing all Codexers to eternal death in his living room, then waking up the next morning and setting himself the challenge of trying to figure out if there maybe was a way the demo could have been more exciting, he:
a) declares on his blog that an online community which, relative to most games it discusses, does indeed support his efforts, and whose members presumably do make up a number of his audience, is full of people who hate him and even hate the fact that he's alive.
b) quotes extensively (and, indeed, selectively) from feedback he's read there, what reads like lazy criticism from a few individuals and picking it apart in more detail than it deserves.
c) as members of this audience in question rush to his blog (unsurprising) and, one or two morons aside, defend their position and their criticisms calmly and maturely (perhaps surprising), he begins to quote more and more examples of when individuals from that community have been rude about him, revealing how much he really does take this stuff "to heart".
d) Finally, despite the - generally - perfectly fair level of discourse in his comments section, he says that the 'RPG Codex crowd' are simply too impatient to enjoy his game if they're only willing to play 15% of it before losing up - again, in response to a single poster - claims he'll never visit it again, and closes down the discussion.
Sorry, rant over. But instead of taking his own advice - not taking unconstructive criticism to heart, mentally sidelining malicious or silly individual feedback in favour of useful individual feedback, and keeping it all at arms' length - he's let himself be upset by what a few individuals have written about him online and paraded his sensitivity in public while slagging off a lot of people who like his games. It's just a bit silly, really, it's quite a good example of how you shouldn't respond to critics, and I do feel for him.
Mr Vogel really isn't meeting criticism head-on. He's bemoaning his own audience very publicly and with fairly obvious emotional attachment. If he'd wanted to meet his criticism head-on, he might have written a blogpost saying, 'Why the demo is what it is, and why I still think that's a good idea' and left it at that - assuming we take 'meet' to mean 'deal with and analyse' rather than 'lob retaliatory mud'.
But rather than just drinking half a bottle of Laphroaig and cursing all Codexers to eternal death in his living room, then waking up the next morning and setting himself the challenge of trying to figure out if there maybe was a way the demo could have been more exciting, he:
a) declares on his blog that an online community which, relative to most games it discusses, does indeed support his efforts, and whose members presumably do make up a number of his audience, is full of people who hate him and even hate the fact that he's alive.
b) quotes extensively (and, indeed, selectively) from feedback he's read there, what reads like lazy criticism from a few individuals and picking it apart in more detail than it deserves.
c) as members of this audience in question rush to his blog (unsurprising) and, one or two morons aside, defend their position and their criticisms calmly and maturely (perhaps surprising), he begins to quote more and more examples of when individuals from that community have been rude about him, revealing how much he really does take this stuff "to heart".
d) Finally, despite the - generally - perfectly fair level of discourse in his comments section, he says that the 'RPG Codex crowd' are simply too impatient to enjoy his game if they're only willing to play 15% of it before losing up - again, in response to a single poster - claims he'll never visit it again, and closes down the discussion.
Sorry, rant over. But instead of taking his own advice - not taking unconstructive criticism to heart, mentally sidelining malicious or silly individual feedback in favour of useful individual feedback, and keeping it all at arms' length - he's let himself be upset by what a few individuals have written about him online and paraded his sensitivity in public while slagging off a lot of people who like his games. It's just a bit silly, really, it's quite a good example of how you shouldn't respond to critics, and I do feel for him.
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