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Neato_Jinkins · Oct 10, 2012

gather round all, i'm about to reveal the greatest source of corruption in the game writing industry. this applies to both professionals and amateurs.

are you ready?

soon, you'll know exactly why you've felt burned every time you purchased a game in the last five years.

you sitting down? here goes:

people like everything too fucking much and when they can't articulate why they like something so much, they don't reassess their gut reaction but retreat to their pillow fort of torturous weasel words to haphazardly explain why they enjoy a game. this is why discussions of actual game systems are so infrequent outside of "blah blah mechanic works really well and is fun," and why discussion of writing and atmosphere dominate in place of anything concrete.

this is part stupidity and part self-defense. shit, i got death threats for reviewing a battlefield 2 mod poorly once, and every mmo review i did led to immense cascades of tears and insults. and when this kind of thing happens, you need to defend yourself to your editor and/or the higher ups. it's just straight-up easier to be positive.

GraveRobberX · Oct 10, 2012

I'm still waiting for the day were we find out that one gaming website literally was a shell for a publisher

I'm waiting for that day

/conspiracy theory

Geek · Oct 10, 2012

NBtoaster said:
I remembered some things incorrectly, but this is it

www.gamasutra.com/php-bin/news_index.php?story=18761

That was definitely not my experience and the experience of many people I talked to at the time. Yes, it was played in a hotel booked by Rockstar, but paid for by our outlet. Yes, there were Rockstar people staying in the hotel, but they stayed out of our way. I played the full game (and then some) over the course of five days and received retail code prior to release, just like the other two dozen people from various outlets I played online with before release date.

Don't get me wrong. I have heard some unpleasant tales of Rockstar being extremely aggressive internally and externally about the tone of reviews and preview coverage, but that was never my experience. And I have heard from former Rockstar people that higher-ups there don't like me personally (which I'm totally fine with), but I've not heard a story of the company paying for scores.

PFD · Oct 10, 2012

Victrix said:
You know how chat logs are fucking irritating and annoying and not funny?

Direct twitter quoting is exactly like that. Jesus what a mess.

This is worse, IMO. It was a pain to read.

Squire · Oct 10, 2012

Didn't know he was freelance. Interesting.

Corto · Oct 10, 2012

~Kinggi~ said:
You are also forgetting there is a surprisingly large % of gaffers that are viral marketers hired by companies. Cant source that though, but i do remember someone claiming people would be surprised if they heard numbers on that.

That's another can of worms. But I trust moderation and that earnest opinions rise to the top in the end. And in the long run blatant viral marketing will turn counterproductive. In this day and age a reasonable transparent approach (or at least a perceived image of transparency) can be the most positive viral marketing a company can have.

Lord Ghirahim · Oct 10, 2012

Is anyone surprised? I stopped buying Edge about 8 years ago, it got painfully obvious. I remember NGamer suffered from the same shit.

EmCeeGramr · Oct 10, 2012

Is anyone surprised by the CVG quote? They're notorious for misleading headlines: http://gamejournos.com/search/cvg

Do they still do the "post screengrabs from trailer as screenshot gallery" thing?

TheGreatDivide · Oct 10, 2012

A Edge 10 stopped meaning anything quite some time ago. That magazine has really lost pretty much all it's respectability over the last few years.

whalleywhat · Oct 10, 2012

~Kinggi~ said:
You are also forgetting there is a surprisingly large % of gaffers that are viral marketers hired by companies. Cant source that though, but i do remember someone claiming people would be surprised if they heard numbers on that.

Just read their posts.

GameE · Oct 10, 2012

EmCeeGramr said:
Is anyone surprised by the CVG quote? They're notorious for misleading headlines: http://gamejournos.com/search/cvg

Do they still do the "post screengrabs from trailer as screenshot gallery" thing?

Constantly
None of this surprises me, CVG always is hit hungry and Future Publishing is kinda shitty

Zia · Oct 10, 2012

Lord Ghirahim said:
Is anyone surprised? I stopped buying Edge about 8 years ago, it got painfully obvious. I remember NGamer suffered from the same shit.

You stopped buying EDGE because a score was changed pre-publication?

Empty · Oct 10, 2012

certainly wouldn't surprise me if these allegations were true given driver 3 and future magazines doing exclusive reviews. future owning edge is conflicting in a similar way to murdoch owning the times.

SatelliteOfLove · Oct 10, 2012

ShinobiFist said:
Fucking reading Twiiter quotes, outside of twitter, is confusing as hell sometimes, fuck my brain. On topic, is this the new trend in the gaming industry now? Burning bridges and all, I mean, fuck, didn't some dude from SONY PR department did the same thing?

Backs are against the wall financially. Dogmas are losing their power over the faith of the industry. New models and hot genres are arriving constantly, with a fresh wave of them coming soon.

iammeiam said:
Because a AAA game can't review as merely good, it has to review like the virgin Mary herself birthed it unto gaming to save us all from the sins of past, inferior games. It has to revolutionize gaming, redefine storytelling, and melt faces with eye-popping graphics. B-tier studios crap out good games all the time that land in the bomba bin; Rockstar delivers genre-defining Oscar-worthy tour de forces and goddammit press outlets better recognize.

(seriously I think score inflation is a big problem--having your game review as an 8 is bad, bad, bad, which means your game can't just be good, it has to be amazing, which leads to tons of pressure.)

I don't know that they outright paid for reviews, but I can easily see RS strong-arming publications that fail to be appropriately blown away by their latest.

The problem with the swing-for-the-fences AAA model is that you cannot NOT do it. The idea of half-heartedly tossing an 8-digit cost game out there to the press without softening them up with an echo chamber of schmoozing and horseshitting (like you alluded to) is suicide as everyone else is. No one can flinch on this; they'll end up like FFXIII or an EA Partners game.

King of the Potato People said:
If GTA V started scoring in the 8s, I somehow doubt it would significantly affect sales.

I'm just sayin'...

Neato_Jinkins said:
the reason blowups like this occur so infrequently in the games press is this shit right here:

the moment someone steps forward to lay out precisely whats wrong with the industry, a bunch of shitheads pop out of the woodwork to out-blase each other.

that's the trouble with blowing the whistle when the stakes are so low. the only person who gets punished is the guy you should be supporting, while the game publishers and magazine management continue on their merry way.

Us "hardcore gamers" or whatever is kosher to call us nowadays are out of the loop as we've as a group lost respect for the field and their words fall on deaf ears for our crowd, we are too well informed, too burned by hijinx, too cynical.

I feel that most of them aim their work at smart casual fans googling the name and Metacritic (which is a WHOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOLE nother level of crazy).

RichyDevil · Oct 10, 2012

Nobody pays gaming sites for high review scores. It's the biggest myth in the business.

Ace Harding · Oct 10, 2012

Dammit he wants to post here...

@RichStanton said:
OMG I'M ON NEOGAF

@RichStanton said:
Problem is, I can't fucking register to add to their thread. Gmail's not good enough!

@MUWANdo · Oct 10, 2012

Neato_Jinkins said:
gather round all, i'm about to reveal the greatest source of corruption in the game writing industry. this applies to both professionals and amateurs.

are you ready?

soon, you'll know exactly why you've felt burned every time you purchased a game in the last five years.

you sitting down? here goes:

people like everything too fucking much and when they can't articulate why they like something so much, they don't reassess their gut reaction but retreat to their pillow fort of torturous weasel words to haphazardly explain why they enjoy a game. this is why discussions of actual game systems are so infrequent outside of "blah blah mechanic works really well and is fun," and why discussion of writing and atmosphere dominate in place of anything concrete.

this is part stupidity and part self-defense. shit, i got death threats for reviewing a battlefield 2 mod poorly once, and every mmo review i did led to immense cascades of tears and insults. and when this kind of thing happens, you need to defend yourself to your editor and/or the higher ups. it's just straight-up easier to be positive.

THANK YOU.

Lord Ghirahim · Oct 10, 2012

Zia said:
You stopped buying EDGE because a score was changed pre-publication?

Read the OP.

@MUWANdo · Oct 10, 2012

Fong Ghoul said:
Dammit he wants to post here...

Why is this stupid requirement even in place? Does anyone really believe it somehow leads to a better class of posters? It's just irritating.

Zia · Oct 10, 2012

Lord Ghirahim said:
Read the OP.

Yes, I've read the OP. And have commented on Rich's thoughts, and have posted my own (as someone that's freelanced for EDGE). I'm not sure what you're getting at... ?

Ace Harding · Oct 10, 2012

@MUWANdo said:
Why is this stupid requirement even in place? Does anyone really believe it somehow leads to a better class of posters? It's just irritating.

Pretty sure its so we aren't flooded with alt accounts. If people could use any free service it would be much easier to make an alt. Doesn't stop people, but makes it harder.

Or is there another reason?

Visualante2 · Oct 10, 2012

It'd be nice if the admin approved his account.

Corto · Oct 10, 2012

RichyDevil said:
Nobody pays gaming sites for high review scores. It's the biggest myth in the business.

So publishers threaten or hint to remove ad space or facilitate review copies of their games to reviewers in due time to release the review in a meaningful time window in terms of hits. That is well known.

Zaventem · Oct 10, 2012

te he i am drunk X

Why do people do this? Is saying you're drunk doesn't give you a free pass.

Kagari · Oct 10, 2012

Visualante2 said:
It'd be nice if the admin approved his account.

Noted.

RichyDevil · Oct 10, 2012

Corto said:
So publishers threaten or hint to remove ad space or facilitate review copies of their games to reviewers in due time to release the review in a meaningful time window in terms of hits. That is well known.

Do they, especially nowadays?

Not being snarky, I don't really know. As someone on the fringes of the biz (I know people in it but am not in myself), all I hear are complaints that PR chronically sends review copies late no matter what, controls their own message now via social media, and generally treats most media as a barely necessary evil.

What they've told me 1000 times is that even if they wanted to get paid by a publisher to write a good review (which they don't, they're joking) they couldn't.

Lord Ghirahim · Oct 10, 2012

Zia said:
Yes, I've read the OP. And have commented on Rich's thoughts, and have posted my own (as someone that's freelanced for EDGE). I'm not sure what you're getting at... ?

Dunno, the FxxK incident maybe? Exclusive previews of games which then proceeded to mysteriously score much much higher than in any other publication? Perfect scores and reviews that failed to address even objective failings like glaring pop-in and framerate? I got sick of it eventually.

JasonUresti · Oct 10, 2012

Neato_Jinkins said:
gather round all, i'm about to reveal the greatest source of corruption in the game writing industry. this applies to both professionals and amateurs.

are you ready?

soon, you'll know exactly why you've felt burned every time you purchased a game in the last five years.

you sitting down? here goes:

people like everything too fucking much and when they can't articulate why they like something so much, they don't reassess their gut reaction but retreat to their pillow fort of torturous weasel words to haphazardly explain why they enjoy a game. this is why discussions of actual game systems are so infrequent outside of "blah blah mechanic works really well and is fun," and why discussion of writing and atmosphere dominate in place of anything concrete.

this is part stupidity and part self-defense. shit, i got death threats for reviewing a battlefield 2 mod poorly once, and every mmo review i did led to immense cascades of tears and insults. and when this kind of thing happens, you need to defend yourself to your editor and/or the higher ups. it's just straight-up easier to be positive.

That is the impression I've developed from the bulk of game reviews. Not much thought put into it past "I really like it!", and then the same recycled phrases and even format to fill out the rest of the required content.

Never knew you took so much abuse for that Battlefield mod review. I'm not too surprised that the small fanbase, dedicated to a niche, "realistic" mod for a war game would start making physical threats over someone not liking their game.

Is that really something you had to talk with editors at the magazine about, or was that more of a bother on a personal level?

Mandoric · Oct 10, 2012

RichyDevil said:
Do they, especially nowadays?

Not being snarky, I don't really know. As someone on the fringes of the biz (I know people in it but am not in myself), all I hear are complaints that PR chronically sends review copies late no matter what, controls their own message now via social media, and generally treats most media as a barely necessary evil.

What they've told me 1000 times is that even if they wanted to get paid by a publisher to write a good review (which they don't, they're joking) they couldn't.

Why pay the reviewer cash? They appreciate swag and junkets more anyway, and usually want to like whatever they're set up to review. The money enters into it from the sales end of the operation (and this is in large part gamers' fault, because they're fine with Axe and liquor ads on Live but have a complete meltdown when these show up in their magazines even though they're stage 0 of editorial independence.)

mujun · Oct 10, 2012

I'd love to see someone in the industry gather up the most "respected" writers and really get down to the heart of this problem. Seems like the topic comes up on GAF a million times a day and also gets mentioned regularly by the writers themselves.

@MUWANdo · Oct 10, 2012

mujun said:
I'd love to see someone in the industry gather up the most "respected" writers and really get down to the heart of this problem. Seems like the topic comes up on GAF a million times a day and also gets mentioned regularly by the writers themselves.

The heart of the problem is that professional games writer can't fucking write.

mujun · Oct 10, 2012

@MUWANdo said:
The heart of the problem is that professional games writer can't fucking write.

Sure, stuff like that. Define the relationship between the pubs and most mags (most because that's what the audience will judge all of them by at the end of the day). Decide whether they think they are journalists or not, etc. Still feels really muddy to me as someone who digests a fair bit of the games press' output.

Neato_Jinkins · Oct 10, 2012

JasonUresti said:
Is that really something you had to talk with editors at the magazine about, or was that more of a bother on a personal level?

i don't want to get into it too much because i still have friends working in the industry. suffice it to say i had a great run as a freelancer specifically because of the people i chose to do work for. i never interacted directly with pissy PR flak. all i had to do, thankfully, was clarify my thoughts on occasion to my editor so he could run interference more effectively. that is the ideal scenario for writer/PR interaction, as far as i'm concerned.

funny story: i once listed one of my character's names in an mmo story, and a PR guy jumped all over the review (which came out weeks later) because he looked up that character's play time and found it lacking. unfortunately for him, that was my alt--i had another character sitting near max level. it was a good reminder that you're always being watched.

things got a little weird at the end of my run as a freelancer, but what really drove me out of the job was the fact that games writing is such an unmitigated love-fest. granted i swing towards the "hater" side of the spectrum, but it gets tiring to feel like a curmudgeonly stick in the mud because you don't see the sheen in every polished turd.

Margalis · Oct 10, 2012

Nobody pays gaming sites for high review scores. It's the biggest myth in the business.

True but also irrelevant.

I am a large publisher with a hyped game coming out. You are a magazine looking for a cover story. I agree to give you a lot of exclusive access to my game for your cover story, in return you agree to give the game at least an 8 and assure me that it will most likely get a 9 or above.

Kosher?

No money changed hands, sure. But that's still hardly appropriate.

EXGN · Oct 10, 2012

mujun said:
I'd love to see someone in the industry gather up the most "respected" writers and really get down to the heart of this problem. Seems like the topic comes up on GAF a million times a day and also gets mentioned regularly by the writers themselves.

Honestly, it seems more like one of those things that happens only rarely, but when it is brought up, NeoGAF explodes so everyone remembers it.

Neato_Jinkins · Oct 10, 2012

@MUWANdo said:
The heart of the problem is that professional games writer can't fucking write.

that too. and i gladly include myself among those who probably shouldn't be writing professionally.

writer first / gamer second philosophy was abandoned long ago, and that's assuming it ever held any traction to begin with.

Ace Harding · Oct 10, 2012

Lord Ghirahim said:
Dunno, the FxxK incident maybe? Exclusive previews of games which then proceeded to mysteriously score much much higher than in any other publication? Perfect scores and reviews that failed to address even objective failings like glaring pop-in and framerate? I got sick of it eventually.

Do you have any specific examples of the bolded? I'm looking through their review history on Metacritic and failing to see anything so obvious.

Edit: looking at their 8's-10's, I see a sprinkling of cases where they were significantly (more than 1.5 pts on a 10 pt scale) higher than average, and those look to all be niche titles they would have no reason to score high.

RichyDevil · Oct 10, 2012

Margalis said:
True but also irrelevant.

I am a large publisher with a hyped game coming out. You are a magazine looking for a cover story. I agree to give you a lot of exclusive access to my game for your cover story, in return you agree to give the game at least an 8 and assure me that it will most likely get a 9 or above.

Kosher?

No money changed hands, sure. But that's still hardly appropriate.

Does this happen in situations - nowadays - though? Again, not being snarky. Is there an example in the last 3-4 years where one site had a much higher review score than all others?

I can't imagine a AAA that's lousy getting a 9 from (let's just say) OPM and averaging a 6 on Metacritic for all other sites. Seems waaaaaaaaaay too difficult to do.

Publishers know if their game is 8-9 worthy well before they launch. Right? I can't imagine anyone is so deluded as to think otherwise.

BlackBanditSho · Oct 10, 2012

funkystudent said:
CVG misquoting devs for cheap hits?

youdontsay.jpeg

All the other stuff, I believe. Changing scores, cowering for pubs... I know that all it happens because I've seen it. That's just the gaming industry, sadly. We're a glorified PR arm.

Misquoting devs for cheap hits? NO FUCKING WAY is that true. Do NOT Believe this GAF. It's impossible. No journalism entity that I've ever worked for or with has EVER even considered it. It's absurd. That's not only lawsuit city, but in this industry, your rep is EVERYTHING. Do that shit ONCE and you can kiss relationships with PR bye-bye.

These threads are all fun and games, but when somebody starts saying completely ass-hat crazy shit like this, it's dangerous when it's so untrue.

Neato_Jinkins · Oct 10, 2012

mujun said:
Sure, stuff like that. Define the relationship between the pubs and most mags (most because that's what the audience will judge all of them by at the end of the day). Decide whether they think they are journalists or not, etc. Still feels really muddy to me as someone who digests a fair bit of the games press' output.

by definition, enthusiast media is beholden to the producers of the products about which they are enthused. they are not journalists. they're bound by no ethical or qualitative standards. more importantly, they're under no obligation to be on the side of the consumer.

that's not to say they don't try. plenty of writers would like this scenario to play out differently, as this thread indicates. but they're not the ones watching sales decline and clicks-through plummet.

Penguin · Oct 10, 2012

BlackBanditSho said:
All the other stuff, I believe. Changing scores, cowering for pubs... I know that all it happens because I've seen it. That's just the gaming industry, sadly. We're a glorified PR arm.

Misquoting devs for cheap hits? NO FUCKING WAY is that true. Do NOT Believe this GAF. It's impossible. No journalism entity that I've ever worked for or with has EVER even considered it. It's absurd. That's not only lawsuit city, but in this industry, your rep is EVERYTHING. Do that shit ONCE and you can kiss relationships with PR bye-bye.

These threads are all fun and games, but when somebody starts saying completely ass-hat crazy shit like this, it's dangerous when it's so untrue.

I think when they say misquoting devs

They make taking a quote out of context for the headline

So people click the links.. and that happens all the time. And CVG is extremely notorious for that.

RichyDevil · Oct 10, 2012

Neato_Jinkins said:
by definition, enthusiast media is beholden to the producers of the products about which they are enthused. they are not journalists. they're bound by no ethical or qualitative standards. more importantly, they're under no obligation to be on the side of the consumer.

that's not to say they don't try. plenty of writers would like this scenario to play out differently, as this thread indicates. but they're not the ones watching sales decline and clicks-through plummet.

So what you're saying is that Polygon is doomed?

(not nice, I know)

Neato_Jinkins · Oct 10, 2012

RichyDevil said:
So what you're saying is that Polygon is doomed?

(not nice, I know)

don't know and have no opinion.

i've read maybe two pieces of game-related writing in the last year, and both of them were from people seeking advice.

the only reviews i trust are bro team videos.

Margalis · Oct 10, 2012

RichyDevil said:
Does this happen in situations - nowadays - though? Again, not being snarky. Is there an example in the last 3-4 years where one site had a much higher review score than all others?

Does this happen? Yes. (Clarification: By "this" I mean knowing the minimum review score you are going to get from a pub that you are granting access to) Do the scores for exclusives/cover stories almost always fall on the high end of the review score continuum? Yes. On GAF most people know to ignore exclusive reviews. It's less that exclusive reviews are way higher than other reviews, more that they are nearly always towards the top end.

Edit:

They make taking a quote out of context for the headline

Even in "real" journalism the headline is usually not written by the author of the piece and it's generally understood that the headline will be misleading and sensational. It's sort of an unwritten rule of journalism. Occasionally it is explicitly brought up, usually when a journalist writes a bad piece with an even worse headline and defends themselves with "well I didn't write the headline - it was chosen by the editor and I would have gone with something else."

Video games press are obviously not above taking quotes out of context for sensational reasons - that happens all the time. Quotes being wholesale made up in the body of a piece is probably pretty rare though.

corn_fest · Oct 10, 2012

I love it when corruption gets dragged out into the spotlight like this. Hopefully this incident will cause some game journalism outlets to reevaluate their relationships with PR. I think we have a long way to go before games journalism can be considered a legitimate professional field.

Yagharek · Oct 10, 2012

BlackBanditSho said:
All the other stuff, I believe. Changing scores, cowering for pubs... I know that all it happens because I've seen it. That's just the gaming industry, sadly. We're a glorified PR arm.

Misquoting devs for cheap hits? NO FUCKING WAY is that true. Do NOT Believe this GAF. It's impossible. No journalism entity that I've ever worked for or with has EVER even considered it. It's absurd. That's not only lawsuit city, but in this industry, your rep is EVERYTHING. Do that shit ONCE and you can kiss relationships with PR bye-bye.

These threads are all fun and games, but when somebody starts saying completely ass-hat crazy shit like this, it's dangerous when it's so untrue.

Eurogamer misquote people multiple times per week. Or selective and out of context quote, rather.

DSix · Oct 10, 2012

Just not worth it, we all already know "game journalism" mean jack shit. He's blown his career off to confirm what is pretty much common knowledge.

If Kane & Lich and Mass Effect 3 bullshit blowouts weren't enough to understand this, you're hopeless.

BlackBanditSho · Oct 10, 2012

Penguin said:
I think when they say misquoting devs

They make taking a quote out of context for the headline

So people click the links.. and that happens all the time. And CVG is extremely notorious for that.

Ah. Sensationalizing. okay, then. Yeah, sure. They do that all the time

Penguin · Oct 10, 2012

Margalis said:
Even in "real" journalism the headline is usually not written by the author of the piece and it's generally understood that the headline will be misleading and sensational. It's sort of an unwritten rule of journalism. Occasionally it is explicitly brought up, usually when a journalist writes a bad piece with an even worse headline and defends themselves with "well I didn't write the headline - it was chosen by the editor and I would have gone with something else."

Video games press are obviously not above taking quotes out of context for sensational reasons - that happens all the time. Quotes being wholesale made up in the body of a piece is probably pretty rare though.

Being the norm
Doesn't make it right
Nor does it mean folks shouldn't complain about it.
It's a bad practice.

Yagharek · Oct 10, 2012

BlackBanditSho said:
Ah. Sensationalizing. okay, then. Yeah, sure. They do that all the time

There was a case recently where eurogamer did misquote someone quite significantly. Cant find the exact link but it's not as rare as you assert.

I don't know if it was deliberately but it was certainly clickbait and gaming equivalent of gutter journalism

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