Nobody likes spoilers. Every good story has a flow, a structure, it builds towards something with all its twists and turns. Learning any of that in advance can disrupt that flow or even ruin the entire build-up. But in spite of that, some people intentionally reveal important plot details to people just to ruin it for them, just to get a rise out of them.
Spoilers can hurt for videogames in particular because you play an active part in discovering where the story goes; in some games, your choices can even change the story altogether. This is why people who watch Let's Plays tend to like blind playthroughs of videogames - so they get to experience that sense of discovery again, vicariously, through another person. However, playing games with an audience exposes you to many responses, and sharply increases the risk of being spoiled on the game. Trolls revel in ruining the experience for a public figure, and by extension, their audience. But sometimes the well intentioned fans can be just as bad, albeit unintentionally. I'm going to talk about two kinds of situations where well intentioned people can ruin a game and both of them hinge on underestimating the power of hindsight.
Secret Meanings
In well written stories, there will often be a few lines of dialogue that have an impact. Maybe a character suddenly reveals their true motivations in just three words that change everything, or maybe simple comment flips everything you thought you knew about the story around. The power of these lines is often the context in which they're said, or the build up, so the line doesn't mean a lot by itself in theory.
If an iconic line occurs in a videogame, fans will often say the line to a content creator playing it by posting it in the comments or chat, depending on the platform. This isn't done maliciously, these people probably believe that the line won't mean anything to the person playing the game. But the problem is that several people will be thinking the same, causing the phrase to be posted multiple times, which will inevitably make the player think about its meaning. And depending on the line and the times at which people say it, said player might figure out way more than they should know at the time. Games that depend heavily on their story, like Undertale and Doki Doki Literature Club, suffer from this in particular. I want to use the latter to give a clear example, but skip this next part if you don't want spoilers.
[Doki Doki Literature Club spoilers start here] - - -
The big twist in Doki Doki Literature Club is that the club president, Monika, is self aware and knows that she's in a videogame. She begins to interfere with the player's attempts to interact with the other girls, which eventually culminates in a scene where the phrase 'Just Monika' pops up - it's Monika's demand that you focus on her and no one else. The phrase quickly became an in-joke among the fans, many of whom love posting 'Just Monika' under the comments of any video and in the chat of any livestream. When confronted, they'll usually be coy and proclaim they said it because Monika is their favorite character. But because the phrase will come up so often, the player will inevitably suspect Monika of being behind the game's events - which she is.
[Doki Doki Literature Club spoilers end here] - - -
So, all in all, just because the line doesn't make sense out of context, that doesn't mean it won't spoil things if it's sent to a content creator playing the game blind. Particularly when combined with the kind of well meaning audience member I want to talk about next
Just Making It Worse
This particular trend is why I wanted to write this article. Sometimes the response by well meaning fans can turn what wouldn't have been a spoiler into a major spoiler. To illustrate, imagine the following two scenarios:
1. Fans are making comments like I mentioned in the previous part, removing a line of dialogue from its context and posting it in the comments of a video or the chat of a livestream.
2. The content creator makes an oversight, and uses material from future events in the game as a thumbnail or social media post (for example, there's a unique shot of the main character with a shocked expression - this expression happens when a major character in the story dies, but the content creator doesn't know and cannot tell from the expression).
These things risk spoiling parts of the game for the content creator, but some fans are so zealous in wanting to point that out that they cause the spoiler. Even just responding with "shut up, that's a spoiler" or "there's a spoiler in the thumbnail, just letting you know" makes the situation worse. This guarantees that the content creator will start to speculate on what the line of dialogue or the content of the thumbnail actually means, creating the situation that the well-meaning commenter was most likely trying to prevent.
I saw this trend come up a few times for YouTubers like Lucahjin and NicoB, who regularly play story-heavy games. They both had some occasions where a certain character portrait was used for a thumbnail in one of the videos, and instead of letting it go, fans had to unleash a flood of comments on the video criticizing the "spoilers" in the thumbnail - that no one unaware of future events, including the content creator - would have even known about.
When you see something that could potentially be a spoiler, the only winning move is not to play. It would be best if a moderator was informed in private, who can then decide if the comment or message should be edited or removed. And when it comes to a thumbnail, it's best to let the player know after the game is done; if no one says anything, no one would be the wiser anyway.
In Conclusion
It's better to be safe than sorry when it comes to any information about future events in media, especially when addressing to content creators playing games in a public space. Vague references to future events, as well as quotes, are risky business, especially because they're never said in a vacuum - the content creator will likely get the same quote or reference from many people. But people who are vigilant about pointing out these spoilers can make things worse, because they turn possible spoilers into certain spoilers.
I hope this is something young audiences learn as we and the Internet continue to grow, but until then, the only real solution is to not respond publically and to have moderators take care of it.
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So, that was another article! Instead of focusing on a specific game, I tackled a trend surrounding games this time. What did you think? Was it a worthwhile topic, or should I stick to specific games and series? Have you ever been in a situation where people spoiled a game for you, even though they didn't mean to? All comments welcomed!
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