Destiny 2's former community manager, Dylan Gafner, who is better known under his in-game alias of dmg04, said that it's virtually impossible to avoid harassment from the player base. Having officially been hired as a community manager in 2017, during the time of the game's Curse of Osiris expansion, Gafner has spent a fair bit of time with the game's community, learning how it breathes and behaves.
Now that Gafner is stepping down as a Destiny 2 community manager, he has had the opportunity to discuss some of the things he's experienced during his tenure at Bungie, and he's done so in a candid interview. Though mainly positive about his former job, dmg04 didn't mince any words when it came to explaining how important mental health is, providing valuable advice to other community managers and beyond.
"If you're lucky enough to work at a studio that openly stands for equality, stands against hate, and is continuing to build better equity and diversity for its people," said Gafner, "you can and likely will become a target of harassment." One of the more recent examples of dmg04 publicly taking a stand against player harassment came up in July 2022, when Bungie was forced to address Destiny harassment issues after individuals hurled death threats and abuse at one of the developers on Twitter. In his interview with Forbes' Paul Tassi, Gafner explained the importance of boundaries and not letting oneself get consumed with the job of being a community manager. He explained how important it is to be able to block toxic members of the community and build rapport with those who are genuinely constructive in their criticism.
Following Destiny 2's Twilight Garrison harassment incident, the developer that was targeted by certain members of the community ended up temporarily closing down their social media. The bigger problem for the community at large, however, was that Bungie as a whole decided to reduce its communications with the player base to protect its workers.
The developer of Destiny isn't always as passive as it was in that particular case, it's worth pointing out. Though Gafner didn't reflect upon this particular case of dev harassment, Bungie recently sued a Destiny 2 streamer who threatened to burn down the studio, making it clear just how seriously the issue is taken. Gafner did say that he will "forever" be thankful to Bungie for how it handled some problems he had personally experienced in 2022, implying that more such examples might've gone down in the background.
It seems like something is always up with Destiny, too. While no actual harassment seems to have come up as a result of this "prank," data miners spread a false Destiny 2 rumor that referenced a nonexistent subscription service with falsified bits of code. Given just how tumultuous 2022 has been for Bungie and Dylan Gafner, it's not hard to see why the studio never ended up commenting on the rumor in the first place.
Destiny 2 is available now for PC, PS4, PS5, Stadia, Xbox One, and Xbox Series X/S.
Source: Forbes