GamerGate never would have happened if Eron and Zoe were swapped. The reason GamerGate blew up was because the reverse sexism in gaming press had gotten obscene, and this was just the straw that broke the camel's back. For years gamers were browbeat about how women in skimpy revealing outfits were going to give women body issues, while ripped-as-shit shirtless dudes were ignored or celebrated. Women put in situations where they were in peril were lambasted as disempowering, but of course nobody gave a shit if men were disempowered. The idea that you would is laughable. This one-sided slant is what made GamerGate what it was.

The fact that Zoe Quinn was able to have her dreadful game promoted as much as it was just because she was a woman who had some mean things posted about her was just more evidence of the double standards. Women are strong and independent and don't need the help of any men to make their way in the world, and that's why the brave men of the gaming press rush to her defense because someone online was mean to her! Buy her game! It doesn't matter if there's no graphics, or gameplay to speak of. She's a brave indie dev who's trying to be chased out of the industry! Save her!

If Eron had made the game that Zoe did, he never would have gotten any publicity for it. He wouldn't have been able to locate mean posts about it and use that to get attention, because nobody gives a shit when people say mean things to a dude. He'd have been expected by everyone to just ignore it like you would any troll. Without any way for Eron to get undeserved attention for a shitty game, then there would be no conflicts of interest. It would just be relationship drama involving an indie dev that nobody ever heard of or gave any shits about.

I'm not so sure about that. The reason Quinn was so "hated" by a large portion of the gaming community (primarily on the chans) were because of her actions on Wizardchan. Gjoni still could have had a falling out with Wizardchan, even if the media never would have given him any (or very little) coverage because of it. Quinn became something of a "lolcow" because of the WizardChan debacle and because she was considered a "Social Justice Warrior."

I've spoken to a lot of people who were involved in Burgers & Fries before GamerGate started and many of them have said that they first got involved because of the Wizardchan incident, not because of ethical journalism or harassment or anything along those lines. Though there were some people in Burgers & Fries who did care about corruption and ethics. And to be fair, there were a few people who legitimately supported harassment as well, but the logs show that they were in the minority and the channel operators banned people who advocated for threats, doxxing, hacking, etc.

While the Wizardchan incident is why Quinn got most of her press coverage, she was still friends with Grayson for at least two years prior to him writing his articles. It's possible Grayson still would have written the three articles about Gjoni's hypothetical game, simply to support a friend.

While we'll never know what would have happened, Burgers & Fries probably would have happened either way, simply due to Gjoni's cow status and history of attacking the chans.

And regardless of whether or not Gjoni ever got any press coverage, GamerGate likely would have still happened. Whether due to censorship of discussion about the Zoe Post or due to the Gamers Are Dead articles, which was sparked by Dan Golding's Tumblr post and a DiGRA paper by Adrienne Shaw. The premise of the Gamers Are Dead had been growing among the gaming press for years and this sentiment would have come out at some point.