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Putting the Ly into Polygon, Crecente: "Oh, that I saw"

P

Pie and Beans

Look for me on the local news, I'll be the guy arrested for trying to burn down a Nintendo exec's house.
ShockingAlberto said:
Whenever someone at Polygon has their honor impugned for any reason, valid or otherwise, they basically all decide to jump the person later that night in the park and it's so stupidly childish each and every time.
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For all the good Jason and Stephen are trying to achieve, they (along with Kuchera and all the usual suspects) have been particularly fond of dogging Eric Kain recently due to his daring to speak out a little. Theres a lot of "dragging down with the rest of us" mentality going on.

The pools of games journalism have been stained notably red these past few months.
 
A

antitrop

Member
I love Walker, but I don't know how I feel about this line:

The Challenger had a more successful launch than SimCity.
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I'm no bastion of good taste and moral decency, but damn.

EDIT: Author is not Walker, Al Byrne. My mistake.
 
A

antitrop

Member
Nevermind, apparently the author is Al Byrne. For some reason I was under the impression that was Walker's blog, my mistake.

Either way, Al Byrne should tone down his hyperbole comparing national tragedies and video games.
 
N

Neuromancer

Member
"Polygon, that Microsoft-sponsored, humourless, 70s prog rock supergroup of games journalism."

"In essence [Crecente] went back in time to shoot himself in the foot"

Haha
 
S

ShockingAlberto

Member
Pie and Beans said:
For all the good Jason and Stephen are trying to achieve, they (along with Kuchera and all the usual suspects) have been particularly fond of dogging Eric Kain recently due to his daring to speak out a little. Theres a lot of "dragging down with the rest of us" mentality going on.

The pools of games journalism have been stained notably red these past few months.
Click to expand...

Games journalism has convinced themselves that occasional criticism of AAA games constitutes a valid and appropriate defense from the claims of sycophancy. Which is eye-rolling and dumb, but you know, it's there. The problem then sprints over the line when they start attacking people for, as far as I can tell, making waves by questioning whether this model is sustainable or good for consumers.

I feel like we've been on this crash course for over a year now and it would not surprise me if this level of rudeness and groupthink starts turning away people en masse.
 
N

Nibel

Member
partyphone said:
just gonna leave this here....



http://ridiculoushuman.wordpress.com/2013/03/20/pure-folly-miss-polygon/
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Polygon, that Microsoft-sponsored, humourless, 70s prog rock supergroup of games journalism. Expecting any kind of populist uproar from Polygon is like expecting One Direction to vilify the X Factor culture that spawned them – they’re entirely within the system, with no interest in existing outside of it. Probably the only thing you needed to know in order to be sure that Polygon was never going to change the world of games journalism was that they could afford to make a multi-part documentary trumpeting all the ways they were going to change the world of games journalism.
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ibeuyIT5QYfhiJ.gif
 
M

Mael

Member
ShockingAlberto said:
Games journalism has convinced themselves that occasional criticism of AAA games constitutes a valid and appropriate defense from the claims of sycophancy. Which is eye-rolling and dumb, but you know, it's there. The problem then sprints over the line when they start attacking people for, as far as I can tell, making waves by questioning whether this model is sustainable or good for consumers.

I feel like we've been on this crash course for over a year now and it would not surprise me if this level of rudeness and groupthink starts turning away people en masse.
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Wasn't that how IgnNintendo went to shit a few years ago?
 
A

akidnamededdy

Banned
Foxtastical said:
I feel similar. I was in the middle of my BA (in Journalism) during the fun 1UP days (2004-2008-ish). I had journalistic aspirations before college, but some of their work, mostly GFW related pieces, made me more interested in working in video game journalism. It wasn't my focus, but I certainly pushed myself to do some freelancing in the industry.

Then I went to graduate school and got my master's degree, and now I can't stand video game journalism. It's a collection of man children. Perhaps the industry has always been like that and pursuing a higher education finally made me realize just how childish it has always been. Or, more baby-like men have been getting jobs in the industry via nepotism and such. Maybe a little bit of both.

I've read a few Polygon feature stories. I can't remember the writer, but the ethnography-ish articles have been rather good. I really liked them. The rest of the site, though, does nothing for me. I very much feel as if I am their target audience, and I feel nothing but pushed away by the personalities at Polygon. People, like Gies, are the exact people that I strived so hard to avoid in graduate school. Such negativity.

While they constantly downplayed their importance, the cast and crew of GFW did some hot shit. Wonderful content, but at the same time, they did that content with the most humble of attitudes. Personalities that didn't push you away. Positive people that realized the fortunate positions they were in life (and acknowledged it constantly). That's shit I respect.
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Yeah, I'm sure it's a bit of both. I'd like to be able to look back at those EGM days as a better time for the games journalism industry, but even then I remember reading about pubs threatening to pull ads if the games got low reviews.

Then again, even if everyone back then was some kind of terrible proto-Gies, they at least didn't have Twitter to humiliate themselves with. Someone needs to put Gies on a leash, and quickly.

I keep hearing about how the feature stories at Polygon are good, but I just can't bring myself to go to the site to check 'em out.
 
M

monkeyhat

Member
Whiteshirt said:
Either you go the personality route like Giant Bomb where the aim of the game is entertainment or you act like proper journalists. Believe it or not but journalism isn't about self-important guys discussing their lovely gaming room or self-righteous people flailing about. Its about people behaving like adults and questioning events and information with some amount of critical thinking.
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I guess my problem is that I don't think "journalism" and "entertainment" should be mutually exclusive. When writing about an entertainment-based hobby, journalism shouldn't lose sight of why it exists - there's a balance that needs to be struck. Don't get me wrong, there are serious things afoot - I know the Sim City launch was an epic screw-up - but is it right to paint it as some huge anti-consumer conspiracy on EA's part and make that the whole issue? Personally, I don't think so. As other posters have said, all the does-it/doesn't-it stuff with servers clouds the fact that the game itself is seriously flawed (that's the entertainment part).

Whiteshirt said:
As for the Crecente thing, this is a bit of a problem.
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Well yeah - but surely the real story was the guy on Reddit proving the game could work offline, rather than RPS' older story that some mysterious Maxis source claimed it could? It's the older story Walker asks whether Crecente's read. I don't see him saying he read the RPS interview (Walker himself repeatedly says that the Polygon article is not plagiarism), or see any reason why Crecente couldn't have started writing his story based purely on the Reddit post. Just seems Walker was a bit upset that Polygon interviewed the same source and got similar answers, wrote a passive aggressive tweet about it, and then got bullied by Polygon staff? Whole thing seems pretty out of proportion from both sides.
 
J

jordn613

Unconfirmed Member
Pisses me off that Anthony Gallegos was used by Arthur as a step-ladder to get to where he is. Arthur also treats Anthony like a child on RebelFM.
 
V

Vyse The Legend

Member
jordn613 said:
Pisses me off that Anthony Gallegos was used by Arthur as a step-ladder to get to where he is. Arthur also treats Anthony like a child on RebelFM.
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Huh? They were both friends long before they worked in the industry. That's how friendship works: you help each other out. Arthur didn't use anyone.

Now, Jade, on the other hand, (Chuff's Gamestop crush)...
 
M

monkeyhat

Member
RobbieH said:
https://twitter.com/crecenteb/status/313259869895548928
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Oh! Fair point - managed to completely miss that bit. So Crecente either has amnesia or a lack of respect for other journalists. It seems that the issue here is just about how these people are handling themselves on Twitter, though. If Crecente had said "yeah, I read your interview and the Reddit article and contacted the guy for an interview" (which is presumably the truth) that would've been fine.
 
S

SneakyStephan

Banned
akidnamededdy said:
Yeah, I'm sure it's a bit of both. I'd like to be able to look back at those EGM days as a better time for the games journalism industry, but even then I remember reading about pubs threatening to pull ads if the games got low reviews.

Then again, even if everyone back then was some kind of terrible proto-Gies, they at least didn't have Twitter to humiliate themselves with.
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Are you a games writer? I'd read your stuff, that quote made me laugh out loud.
 
A

Adam Blue

Member
I've mentioned this before, but this entitled gaming-journalist attitude comes from how young the medium is. There aren't many generations that grew up with gaming being mainstream...or even being much more than a core hobby at all.

Because of this, elitism exists, and out of elitism comes knee-jerk reactions and closed-mindedness due to that reaction.

I see gaming journalists make mistakes that then admit their mistakes... Others hold on to their original view-point for dear life - and you know they doubt themselves when they respond to negative comments in the same or escalated manner.

Adam Sessler and Stephen Totilo are some of my favs. They are real journalists - gaming comes second. They don't know 'everything' but can articulate an article well. They admit to the humanity in themselves...unlike the gamers-first style of journalism.

In the future, journalism will change and take on how musicians use the internet. Journalists will be trumped by personalities - those who have something good to say and are open to discussion and changing their view based on said discussion.
 
S

solarus

Member
EmCeeGramr said:
This is Gies' favorite tactic: Only He, Arthur Gies, Lord and Center of the Universe, is allowed to decide what other people's opinions actually are. He can't accept that people can disagree with him for legitimate reasons in good faith; they're all liars.

When Brad Shoemaker played ME3 for the first time a few months ago, Arthur was there to make sure that Brad knew that the only complaint people had with the game was that the "ending wasn't happy," and you are a liar if you say otherwise. When someone called him out for constantly erecting strawmen, his response was "What you call strawmen, I call getting to the root of the argument."


I'm nearly sure there have been other concrete examples of this exact same tactic; getting into an argument, shifting the argument, claiming that other people aren't smart or honest enough to realize what they're actually arguing for.
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This post killed me, this really is gies in a nutshell.
 
Q

Quentyn

Member
Well, look at that. There is progress.

Some long ass Twitter posts again from a discussion between Justin McElroy, Jim Sterling and Robert Florence. Sorry to the people that get annoyed by that.

ct8dNFl.png


xYatpil.png


BvYp7Gg.png


Robert Florence is spot on about the news coverage, the site has next to no identity right now. Also good to see that they get an opinion section. I will probably won't agree with them most of the time, but at least they get their opinion out there

And my favorite one:

3fYsqhL.png


Hopefully it is not all just talk and they actually change something.
 
S

ShockingAlberto

Member
I am willing to bet money that is bluster that leads to no real long-term changes and he would have been rude as fuck if that were anyone but colleagues and contemporaries (who recently have had high-profile altercations with this current form of Games Journalism) criticizing him.
 
N

nbthedude

Member
Robert Florence is spot on about the news coverage, the site has next to no identity right now. Also good to see that they get an opinion section. I will probably won't agree with them most of the time, but at least they get their opinion out there


Hopefully it is not all just talk and they actually change something.
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That is not Robert Ashley. That is Rab Florence of Dorrito Gate fame.
 
E

Empty

Member
ShockingAlberto said:
I am willing to bet money that is bluster that leads to no real long-term changes and he would have been rude as fuck if that were anyone but colleagues and contemporaries (who recently have had high-profile altercations with this current form of Games Journalism) criticizing him.
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yeah i'd love them to change, but i do find it hard to imagine him being this courteous to rab if it were six months ago before his article kicked everything off.

you see it a lot. if someone like jeff green criticizes polygon it's all humility and thank you for your concern, if it's a random tweeter or forum poster, just regular readers or potential readers basically, it's all retweet them so our followers can mock them with us, snark, haters gonna hate, or maybe a hasty block if things get too tough.
 
V

Vermillion

Banned
Alternatively, this was the plan from the start. You get no recognition if you just do everything right. Controversy brings attention, then you fix it.

...
lol

Anyways, I liked Polygon. Considering how you guys respond to it, I'll continue reading, McElroy.
 
A

akidnamededdy

Banned
SneakyStephan said:
Are you a games writer? I'd read your stuff, that quote made me laugh out loud.
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I wrote some small time stuff for some little independent sites years ago, more recently some news and reviews for the Examiner (though haven't done that in a while). Been talking with a friend about starting our own site soon, though work work keeps getting in the way. I do love writing though.
 
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