Mystic removal discussion - The good and the bad

SRB2 will be fine, plenty of people are still here to support it

Not much else to say
In fact I'm confident this won't change much in the slightest, if not make some things better
 
Agreed. This is a tragic chain of events and all this "good riddance" talk makes it even more sad.

I used to be a dev for SRB2 until about nine years ago when I stopped participating actively on the team to refocus on college work. I never had any personal problems with anyone on the team and respected everyone I worked with, even those who my personality may have conflicted with.

To be very clear, I won't excuse what Mystic and Rob did. But a month ago I thought they'd accepted responsibility for it and moved on, so why are we looking for more excuses to hate them? Someone called Mystic a bigot, did he actually do or say anything racist, sexist, or prejudiced? Mystic was hardheaded and tactless but he was not maliciously offensive in my experience... neither Mystic nor Rob were a toxic presence to the team when I was around. The fact that another older developer (again, who has never been offensive as long as I've known him) has now been kicked out a month later and the general tone in this thread really makes me wonder if this is still about Mystic and Rob's actions or if at this point it has more to do with the devs' longstanding personal problems against some among their own ranks.

I have fond memories of SRB2. I may not know some of the newer users as well, but this was one of the places where I grew up. So this is difficult for me to watch.


....I don't get this 'go easy on them' mentality. If the majority of the devs have an obvious "good riddance" "actually things will get better" mentality about all this, isn't it completely logical to realize that just because you didn't personally notice anything yourself doesn't correlate to things being fine? Not just recently, not just lately, that maybe...people were just sucking it up behind the scenes for as long as you were unaware...? Isn't it better to look into stuff like that than be sad about oldbie statuses and legacies?

Mystic was hardheaded and tactless but he was not maliciously offensive in my experience...
I don't mean to turn up the stove right now, but any of you guys going easy on his emptyheadded ass needs to just do their research. He's actually always been unbearable in nearly every interaction I've read and participated with him in. There's endless dialogue you could pull from even in the irc days.
unknown-4.png


Edit: Tsuku-whatever is the name he chose after cussing out the entire community, calling them idiots both outwardly and behind the scenes AFTER unapologetically, calling out someone for being a pedo with no evidence or tact despite constantly talking about lolis in public channels with kids himself. I feel no reason to ever hide how much I hate that dude, he even packed his bags, left, and got away with everything and no one batted an eye.

He doesn't deserve sympathy, and there's more reason people don't like Mystic than him being petty with his frosted flakes cold-ass 'hot takes' on how much of a good game designer he thinks he is when he shuts people up constantly via his status and terrible explanations for everything with a catchphrase like "you're just the vocal minority". Miss me with that.
 
Last edited:
Mystic came up with .....

That's not to say that I'm unhappy he's gone. Far from it; I actively celebrated when I heard the news. But it's important not to let minor issues like how much he contributed to get in the way of the facts of his odious approach to community management, bigotry, and controlling nature. You can be the most profilic developer of the lot, but being impossible to work with will catch up with you eventually.


I actively celebrated when I heard the news.


Absolutely agree. Honestly, very good riddance. I understand him and some other people may have been removed for different reasons (and they very probably are better reasons than whatever gripe I or my friends had with the guy), but I see absolutely zero negatives in this. I do though sorta feel sad for some of the other people who decided to leave. But eh, that's their choice in the end.



As for what will be of SRB2 now, I doubt it will change too much, at least in spirit; it's been a community-backed and community-driven game for a very long time now and this is just part of its cycle, even though it was a rather tumultuous one. Will whatever small change that comes be negative or positive? For that we'll have to wait to know.


"you're just the vocal minority". Miss me with that.


I know, right? Like, fuck off.
 
Last edited:
Does this thread really need a Discord screencap with a racial slur in it? I don't think it's a good idea to turn this thread into a series of callout posts concerning Mystic, regardless of people's opinion on him. It just seems really weird and invasive to me, and doing this could easily leak unwanted information about other people as well.
 
It's uncomfortable, but the constant lack of transparency really had given people the wrong idea about the whole 'solid vision, good leader' nonsense he built around himself. Because it's not fun to bring up or actually provide caps and evidence with, it feels like no one will ever know or get the picture.

Unfortunately I'm just the impatient kinda guy who gets tired of seeing that happen, and hate seeing people stew in silence or in private about the obvious. I don't have any interests to turn it into a hate train, just clear up any semblance that he was fine.

This sounds immature, but I hope the sheer shock value of that one quote is enough to wake some people up who've been sleeping.
 
Last edited:
What VelocitOni said is basically right.

Nobody is trying to discount the contributions that Mystic has made, but as someone who's witnessed firsthand a lot of the incidents that led us here, there are VERY good reasons why he was removed from the community, and I wholeheartedly believe that overall, it's for the best.

Obviously, most of the people in the SRB2 community aren't personally familiar with what happened, but these things still did happen, and saying things like "I don't think he's all that bad..." is incredibly ignorant.

In the end, most of the people who actually created the content we got that made 2.2 so great are still on board, so there's really no reason to be worried about the future of SRB2.
 
Last edited:
I've been in this community for a long time now. I'm fairly familiar with most of the current developers and honestly?... I have full faith in the current team! The current team is full of very positive and great people! Not only that... they're EXTREMELY talented! I'm sure SRB2's future will be bright!
 
Does this thread really need a Discord screencap with a racial slur in it? I don't think it's a good idea to turn this thread into a series of callout posts concerning Mystic, regardless of people's opinion on him. It just seems really weird and invasive to me, and doing this could easily leak unwanted information about other people as well.

Well... I guess I did ask. Yeah Mystic's behavior in that screencap is inexcusable... I never saw any of that during my time in 'dev so consider myself informed. I like to see the best in people but I will not defend a guy who would use racial slurs, especially these days.
 
Last edited:
I've only been on the dev team for a very short period of time but the atmosphere of dev has been a night-and-day change. People are more comfortable proposing their ideas and concepts now and we've gotten some really good momentum going towards development already.
Somewhere in the multiverse there's an alternate timeline in which the old guard isn't held accountable for their actions and the members of the team leaving would've been most of the talent actually developing the game, myself included.
 
It's uncomfortable, but the constant lack of transparency really had given people the wrong idea about the whole 'solid vision, good leader' nonsense he built around himself. Because it's not fun to bring up or actually provide caps and evidence with, it feels like no one will ever know or get the picture.

Unfortunately I'm just the impatient kinda guy who gets tired of seeing that happen, and hate seeing people stew in silence or in private about the obvious. I don't have any interests to turn it into a hate train, just clear up any semblance that he was fine.

This sounds immature, but I hope the sheer shock value of that one quote is enough to wake some people up who've been sleeping.

Alright, with all due respect there's been some people in here that made their case very eloquently, like TehRealSalt, but you seem to want to obliterate the man on full power, in a similar fashion to today's cancel culture, "I hate this person and instead of trying to see the problem from both sides I'll just let the hate grow and find every single thing I can to shit on him"

Whether or not he built the "good leader" image on his own through manipulation is debateble, he's proved himself through the years on different occasions, but of course this is not something to take into account if he's presenting hostile or unreasonable behaviour that holds back progress or just simple the harmony and joy of working on the game.

There is good and bad in everything, hence why I renamed the thread.

But I fully agree that there shouldn't be much doubt around this decision after all, I should know, I was guilty of it myself.
 
If we're going into quote mining now, I guess someone will have to supply the context (full disclosure: I removed unrelated lines that were posted in between. This was a public conversation, so you can look up the entire thing yourself if you feel like it):

[12:12 AM] Tsukuyomi: I mean, I'm pretty sure the word then was "tranny"
[12:12 AM] Tsukuyomi: Which has been in use for a long time
[12:13 AM] Monster ɪestyn: that just seems like a malformed version of "granny" somehow
[12:13 AM] Monster ɪestyn: how can it even be used as a serious non-insult way
[12:13 AM] Tsukuyomi: Slurs are weird, MI
[12:14 AM] Tsukuyomi: I mean, why is "nigger" offensive?
[12:14 AM] Tsukuyomi: It is because it is.
[12:14 AM] Tsukuyomi: There's not a specific reason why one word is offensive and another isn't

And to just make it extra clear, from earlier this year:
[4:49 AM] Tsukuyomi: Really, I wouldn't suggest using the word "nigger" or "nigga" anywhere on the internet except when talking about it.
[4:49 AM] Tsukuyomi: It's not an acceptable word to use

he even packed his bags, left, and got away with everything and no one batted an eye.
Not sure how being banned counts as "getting away with everything".
 
So if Mystic is fully aware that these words are offensive... Then why did he just throw the N-word out there like that?? Quotation marks aren't magic word pixie dust that prevent damage. It's still a perfect example of pinhead dialog from Mystic.
 
I used to be a dev for SRB2 until about nine years ago when I stopped participating

You have been away FAR too long, actually. Speaking as a friend, nine years is way too long for you grasp the full picture, and without that context you're running the risk of seriously undermining good changes.

All the stuff that's happened in dev, well, if they say it's dirty laundry, it's dirty laundry. But this stuff has been happening in the community, too, for the past few years.

Things like threatening forum raids on creators here in the community:

unknown.png


unknown.png


Things like reactionary, aggressive moderation, and outright flaming towards the community:

Discord_2020-05-18_00-54-27.png


unknown.png


ZTSUaW2.png


Discord_2020-05-18_00-40-28.png


Discord_2020-05-18_00-40-35.png


unknown.png


Discord_2020-05-18_00-41-03.png


unknown.png


BLATANTLY making pedophilia accusations against another community member, in public, in front of a 6,000 member discord:

unknown.png


And a disgustingly inappropriate history of talking about and glorifying lolicon, once again, in front of thousands of minors:

unknown.png


unknown.png


unknown.png


unknown.png


unknown.png


unknown.png


There's always been a huge problem with tenure in the srb2 community letting oldbies get away with way more than they ought to have been able to, and thankfully, after the events of the past few weeks, stuff that has been genuinely damaging to several community members, it looks like more responsibility and accountability are finally in the works.

And honestly, thank God.
 
If we're going into quote mining now, I guess someone will have to supply the context (full disclosure: I removed unrelated lines that were posted in between. This was a public conversation, so you can look up the entire thing yourself if you feel like it):



And to just make it extra clear, from earlier this year:



Not sure how being banned counts as "getting away with everything".

You literally just posted more context to a log explaining on its own that he's actually completely ignorant to why the word is offensive. "It is because it is". This is actually pretty relevant to another case about the whole t-slur that blew up in his own face and lost a couple devs on its own.
 
What you make of the log is up to you. I merely posted the context because without it, it looks like he's suggesting that the word isn't offensive, or shouldn't be considered offensive.

So if Mystic is fully aware that these words are offensive... Then why did he just throw the N-word out there like that?? Quotation marks aren't magic word pixie dust that prevent damage. It's still a perfect example of pinhead dialog from Mystic.
No argument there, although I will note there were many other people involved in that conversation who said that and other slurs in quotation marks.
 
Last edited:
God. I feel like a complete ass wasting even an ounce of energy trying to see the positives in him now. Yeah, good riddance.
 
If we're going into quote mining now, I guess someone will have to supply the context

Charybdizs said:
You have been away FAR too long, actually. Speaking as a friend, nine years is way too long for you grasp the full picture, and without that context you're running the risk of seriously undermining good changes.

I guess this is where I step out of the discussion then. I wasn't there and I don't have the full context (even with what's been shared) so my uninformed opinion can't be productive here.

As you said I am no longer a dev, so handling this fallout as maturely as possible is the responsibility of the new team. For the sake of both the good and bad memories, beyond doing what needs to be done, please be kind to each other and don't make the bad situation worse than it needs to be.
 


O, my days

Ffs, I'm glad I never got around joining that discord, at least with HIM around ://

Seriously, all this disgraceful loli talk alone made me go from "this dude was kind of an ass" to "this dude really needs help". Is he married? Maybe it'd get his mind off that crap.
Sad to see how people reveal themselves when they think they have a free pass on anything.
 
For the sake of both the good and bad memories, beyond doing what needs to be done, please be kind to each other and don't make the bad situation worse than it needs to be.

Preaching to the choir on that one.
 
Seeing the direction this thread is going, I've taken the time to reflect on my post back on the first page.

Saying I was cordial with Mystic was, quite frank, incorrect. And I apologize for saying something that was wrong on my part. I was professional for the sake of him being a message board admin at the time while I am a judge. Admins being the rule setters while judges just enforcing the submission rules, and all of that. (Although on the topic of submission rules, I will at least make it clear that when there have been rules I disagreed with such as the strict naming conventions that have very recently been softened up. I at least stood my ground in saying they're a bad idea to try and make a change. But that's not a Mystic issue, that is a Prime issue and I think one born of people struggling with the admin role rather than malice)

Really, I left the community for a long time during the time of SRB2 2.1 after Mystic had an argument with toaster and fickle about the t-slur, and his hard-headed refusal to acknowledge that he had done anything wrong in the face of directly insulting several community members and causing, to my knowledge, two developers to resign. (although toaster still contributed more on 2.2 in the end. I'm told she had quit permanently after this point)

I was only really comfortable coming back to the community after 2.2's release because I had found out that Mystic was no longer the lead developer of the game. This is something I confessed to a small handful of people in private, but it's nice to get this off of my chest now, phew. I do regret not having the guts to confront anyone on this at the time though.

But despite the dour tone this thread has taken, I still have a lot of confidence for the game and its community going forward, for the same reasons I stated in my first post. That hasn't changed here.

And perhaps I'm being naive, but I still wish people banned, for good reasons, the best of luck. Hoping maybe people can improve themselves over time and become better people as the years go on, even if it's nothing we get to see. But at this point, that's out of our hands.
 
Last edited:

Who is viewing this thread (Total: 2, Members: 0, Guests: 2)

Back
Top