Apologise for that comment.
Why aren't you apologising?
Because of you I'm going to kick this puppy.
Sorry, but that's not how the world works. The blame of the harassment lies solely with the harassers.
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Games Journalism! Wainwright/Florence/Tomb Raider/Eurogamer/Libel Threats/Doritos
- Thread starter papersleeves
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Apologise for that comment.
Why aren't you apologising?
Because of you I'm going to kick this puppy.
Sorry, but that's not how the world works. The blame of the harassment lies solely with the harassers.
poorlonelycomputer
Member
Wtf did they have to "apologize" for? Zoe Quinn maybe fucking somebody she shouldn't have?
Cosmonaut X
Member
Still reading that, but this bit stood out in relation to YT channels/personalities:
"Game companies and developers are now reaching out directly to quasi-amateur enthusiasts as a better way to build their brands, both because the gamers are more influential than the gaming journalists, and because these enthusiasts have far better relationships with their audiences than gaming journalists do. (Admittedly, most anyone does.)"
Anyone worrying about corruption/disclosure in games journalism should be concerned about the way publishers and YT folk are climbing into bed together. It has the potential to be - and in some cases already is - far uglier than any perceived or real issues with magazine/website games coverage.
People actually bringing up some writers saying that "gamers" are over or whatever as the cause for all of this. That shit was just being used by the more extreme people to justify the hate they were already expressing towards people like Zoe Quinn before those articles started appearing. No one got that angry about some columnists talking bad about gamers that they went on this hate parade.
Some YT personalities doesn't give a fuck about ethics. See Yogscast and their whole "we'll get a cut from every sale of your game if we're covering it" program, which is far and away worse than anything any game journalist has ever done. Oh, but they're "entertainers" so I guess it's okay...
Some YT personalities doesn't give a fuck about ethics. See Yogscast and their whole "we'll get a cut from every sale of your game if we're covering it" program, which is far and away worse than anything any game journalist has ever done. Oh, but they're "entertainers" so I guess it's okay...
seriously, fuck these people. this is so frustrating
@frankcifaldi 28m
Remember how pissed a lot of us were that Kotaku caved to these idiots and changed its Patreon policy instead of standing up to bullies?
@frankcifaldi 28m
How a lot of us saw this as an admission of guilt that gave these people ammo?
@frankcifaldi 27m
Well last night @jennatar was harassed to the point of leaving video games behind because she gives money to @TheQuinnspiracy's Patreon
@frankcifaldi 26m
She happened to name Zoe in an article to The Guardian, and DISCLOSED THAT to them. http://infinitelives.net/2014/09/01/regarding-the-conflict-of-interest-in-my-latest-piece/
@frankcifaldi 27m
It was THE GUARDIAN that cut that information out of the article. And still, pretending this is about "ethics," she was made to feel unsafe.
@frankcifaldi 26m
At this point I consider any video game website that is not directly combating this idiocy to be complacent in it.
@frankcifaldi 25m
Jenn quit video games because she felt like it wasn't a safe environment to have a child in. Think about that. That's crazy.
@frankcifaldi 24m
And the harassment that led to this could have been curtailed if gaming sites had the courage to show volatile readers the door.
@frankcifaldi 23m
There is no excuse for what is happening. None. This is all happening because "gamers" won't accept outsiders into their hobby.
@frankcifaldi 22m
So they started using "ethics" as this weak-ass excuse to harass people. Journalistic ethical concerns that THE GUARDIAN FOUND IRRELEVANT.
@frankcifaldi 23m
THE GUARDIAN.
@frankcifaldi 21m
Video game sites need to step the fuck up and say something. Now. This is only getting worse.
@frankcifaldi 20m
The only thing you have to lose are the volatile readers that hate you anyway. Close your god damned Omniture reports and stand up to this.
@frankcifaldi 17m
These internet harassers and bullies have convinced major media to report on "#GamerGate" because video game websites have been silent.
@frankcifaldi 16m
Al Jazeera reported on this yesterday. And there was hardly a dissenting voice because gaming websites are hoping this all just goes away.
@frankcifaldi 28m
Remember how pissed a lot of us were that Kotaku caved to these idiots and changed its Patreon policy instead of standing up to bullies?
@frankcifaldi 28m
How a lot of us saw this as an admission of guilt that gave these people ammo?
@frankcifaldi 27m
Well last night @jennatar was harassed to the point of leaving video games behind because she gives money to @TheQuinnspiracy's Patreon
@frankcifaldi 26m
She happened to name Zoe in an article to The Guardian, and DISCLOSED THAT to them. http://infinitelives.net/2014/09/01/regarding-the-conflict-of-interest-in-my-latest-piece/
@frankcifaldi 27m
It was THE GUARDIAN that cut that information out of the article. And still, pretending this is about "ethics," she was made to feel unsafe.
@frankcifaldi 26m
At this point I consider any video game website that is not directly combating this idiocy to be complacent in it.
@frankcifaldi 25m
Jenn quit video games because she felt like it wasn't a safe environment to have a child in. Think about that. That's crazy.
@frankcifaldi 24m
And the harassment that led to this could have been curtailed if gaming sites had the courage to show volatile readers the door.
@frankcifaldi 23m
There is no excuse for what is happening. None. This is all happening because "gamers" won't accept outsiders into their hobby.
@frankcifaldi 22m
So they started using "ethics" as this weak-ass excuse to harass people. Journalistic ethical concerns that THE GUARDIAN FOUND IRRELEVANT.
@frankcifaldi 23m
THE GUARDIAN.
@frankcifaldi 21m
Video game sites need to step the fuck up and say something. Now. This is only getting worse.
@frankcifaldi 20m
The only thing you have to lose are the volatile readers that hate you anyway. Close your god damned Omniture reports and stand up to this.
@frankcifaldi 17m
These internet harassers and bullies have convinced major media to report on "#GamerGate" because video game websites have been silent.
@frankcifaldi 16m
Al Jazeera reported on this yesterday. And there was hardly a dissenting voice because gaming websites are hoping this all just goes away.
Of course but unlike the real world, they hide behind anonymity online which means it's very hard stop.
Back on topic game journalism perhaps should do proper journalism before they become irrelevant to us gamers, instead of declaring we are dead.
benicillin
Banned
If they would actually admit that then their whole argument would fall apart - this has never been about corruption or disclosure in games journalism, it's just been a witch-hunt for people they don't like based on a constantly shifting set of criteria. It's Internet mob mentality at its best.
Gsak
Member
Actually this is a rather good read with some interesting points.Yet as a counter-point, the recent debate about Youtube disclosure of financial deals is also interesting.
timetokill
Banned
I admit it, I laughed.
Which is quite insane, why does it take a mainstream media outlet to provide an objective article on the present situation. The gaming press has circled their wagons and one of the biggest story on gaming journalism has not gotten a single story from the gaming press.
Why is it aljazeera and slate are the ones give an objective story on game journalism?! Where is the gaming press?
timetokill
Banned
the slate article along with another that I read today (I'll try to find the link) are interesting in that they describe all sides as being essentially afraid and lashing out because of it.
I think when you read the article you get the answer. What they are doing is accelerate their death, they misewell just ignore it if the very mention of it makes them more irrelevant.
You think the gaming press is going to write articles criticizing the gaming press? Sounds naive to me.
aljazeera?
That's actually not true! Large outfits changed or clarified their policies towards crowdfunding and disclosures! argh why why why
Cosmonaut X
Member
Seriously. "Reaching out directly to quasi-amateur enthusiasts as a better way to build their brands" is not positive, and it's something that's hugely concerning for anyone who wants some integrity out of games journalism.
Even just limiting the role of games journalism to its historic position as, essentially, product reviews, players should be concerned at publishers cosying up with the people doing the reviewing/promotion, especially when you're talking about "quasi-amateurs" who, frankly, are even less likely than your typical games writer to be abiding by any institutional ethical code.
It's publishers seeing the power of YT personalities and exploiting that to "put across their message" and "build their brands", and it should be a concern for anyone who values independent voices and integrity over funny scarecam videos and YT "characters".
Gsak
Member
Let's face it. Most of the gaming press' income come from gaming related ads. Those ads are given by the game companies. See the problem?
Non-gaming press does not have this particular problem, so it's easier for them to present a more impartial picture of the situation. Yet, even there there are problems. Al Jazeera's piece quoted Ian Miles Cheong, yet put Jenn Frank as an example of corruption. The exact opposite should have happened.
Except for people blowing everything out of all proportions and the abuse that followed, what's the big story here exactly? And yes, I read the Slate article.
IrishNinja
Member
wow, this with MH's reveal are pretty telling
i'm not as familiar with Brice's work, can anyone provide some links? just gonna bum me out now anyway, but still
it's an awful list, but i wonder if even being doxxed will keep Fish away.
this is really disgusting to think about, ugh
Cosmonaut X
Member
There isn't necessarily a problem with specialist journalism taking ads from the companies/products it covers, but it requires a cast-iron division between advertising and feature/review writers. This is something paper publications have dealt with over the years, and a number of websites have a similar setup (I believe RPS has a firewall of sorts between its ad peeps and editorial). Non-gaming press does also have this same problem, though it's obviously more of an issue where your advertisers are also the people you cover.
Another serious problem is that no gaming company is required to give anyone any look at a game prior to release, which means they hold exclusive power over all the information game press covers.
That means whoever gets the information the game companies give will ALWAYS have to 'play ball' with them, in addition to the fact that they're the primary source of ad revenue. The games press has too little power to pull back effectively.
Slow or fast that's not a power structure that remains completely uninfluenced. In a way I'm sorta surprised anyone expects it to be.
timetokill
Banned
Cosmonaut X
Member
I think it would be instructive to look at how the film industry press handles reporting, previews and reviews here, as it's perhaps the closest analogue to gaming that I can think of.
bishopcruz
Member
Yeah, but I think you are being far too kind to the Alexander piece, it was misguided at best and a ton of the escalation of the whole damned thing can be traced directly to it, and those that parroted it. Fact is, I know I would have never even HEARD about the whole damned story if not for that article, and as a way in, it comes off as attacking an entire community by conflating it with the very people she should be attacking.
And while I get her point on journalists needing to put more of themselves out there and curate a cultural space, the problem is that much of the gaming journalist culture comes off as middle class white liberals (not using that as a pejorative) telling gamers how to act and feel.
Adam himself is kinda a perfect example of what enough time in an echo chamber can do, or at least a great example of being relatively reasonable followed by slow downward trajectory that gets interrupted by a huge plummet. Though he did it in record time. He's kinda like Glenn Beck in that way, his insanity just bloomed over the years. Though to be fair, this can easily be my memory playing tricks on me.
Though again, Adam makes me thankful for being able to distance someone's political opinions from their work as an actor.
Entryhazard
Banned
That's not exclusive to games though, and goes for pretty much every part of pop culture media: Movie critic watch movies early to get a review up when the embargo is lifted, TV critics get screeners, while music critics get early copies of albums. Tech reviewers are by far the "worst" in that they get a ton of expensive shit for free, early, to review (and there's been some proven cases of some shady shit here IIRC). Also it's a pretty well known fact that most companies will not revoke early access to a game just because you gave it a bad score (R* did that with a few publications back in the day, Konami blacklisted Jim Sterling, but that's not the norm). Unless you break the embargo or something like that, you're fine, and that's how it seems to be in other entertainment industries too.
It's the exclusive previews and that stuff that's shady. That other stuff, not so much.
That's not that serious, movies release all the time without screening.
It's in the thread title Games Journalism
Cosmonaut X
Member
...and there tends to be an attitude among critics and observers that if a film doesn't get a pre-release screening, it's a stinker.
How nice it would be if the games press could try and push that for any game that has a launch-day embargo or that publishers refuse to provide to them for a timely review
hm?
...and there tends to be an attitude among critics and observers that if a film doesn't get a pre-release screening, it's a stinker.
How nice it would be if the games press could try and push that for any game that has a launch-day embargo or that publishers refuse to provide to them for a timely review
The attitude among movie critics tend to be that if they don't even get an early screening, the film is probably trash. I've never heard a consensus that the film will likely stink if they get to see early screenings but the embargo is lifted on release, because that's very common in the movie industry. Likewise with games, if reviewers aren't even given an early copy of a game, most seem to assume that there's a reason (and that the reason is a bad quality product). That's not an automatic assumption when there's just a launch-day embargo, which I agree with.
timetokill
Banned
Basically, the people that create games, the people that cover games, and the people that play games hate each other passionately.
This is a very good point (I mean the criticism of this model too). Advertising non-gaming products could also be an option where this isn't possible. I don't how to embed tweets or anything but I think Justin McElroy was making the point earlier today that video games sites rely too heavily on video game advertising, so I guess diversification of that would help allay peoples fears about corruption or bought reviews,etc.
NoirVisage
Banned
That says a lot about a lot of things concerning the way games journalism outside of the US is handled.
You claimed this is happening because journalists refused to respond to concerns! They did! And the shitstorm only intensified! This isn't about disclosure on crowdfunding anymore! There's nothing there!
All the other topics that are part of this huge mess. The state of game media relationships with developers, freelancers, indie devs, involvement in crowd funding campaigns, the "gamer" thing, online harassment. There are quite a few things that would be worth talking about.
I just don't think a straight reporting job would do anything when several people involved (and hurt) are friends of the site.
This. It doesn't matter the platform or the size of the megaphone offered to spread the word. They are always the problem.
benicillin
Banned
Giant Bomb tried to do that through their premium subscription but then you run into the fact that most people don't actually want to pay for content they consume on the Internet, so ad revenue is pretty much all you can rely on.
The people who cover games and the people who make games don't hate each other. A loud minority of gamers hate both of those professions, but that's not the norm either I feel. The faceless gaming sites are dying because there's no connection between audience and the publication, not because of some large scale hate.
The Premium stuff has actually been super successful for GB, and the reason why they're still doing what they're doing. But it's probably the only mainstream site with the kind of audience who's willing to pay for a subscription, so it can't really be replicated easily.
Yeah, honestly I don't see how that's a problem. In an ideal world, we probably wouldn't even know about games before they were released. It's presumably just kind of a race between games that led to us hearing about the games sooner and sooner, until now we're hearing about them years in advance of their release. I don't see how it would hurt the consumer in any way if there was never any pre-release coverage of games (though I'm not an economics expert, and could be wrong).
Edit: In retrospect, he was talking about the power wielded by publishers to decide WHO gets early coverage, not whether early coverage is available at all. Which is a different issue.
benicillin
Banned
Yes, very true. Giant Bomb is way ahead of the curve as far as cultivating an audience is concerned and I think that style of personality-driven niche website is the way more publications will go. You can already see them move towards that at GameSpot.
Cosmonaut X
Member
Yes, sorry, I should have been clearer - I was thinking more of no screening/no review copy=trash, rather than just embargo=trash.
That said, I'm not a fan of reviews that are embargoed right up to launch. I understand why a publisher would push for it - you don't want to put off any of your potential audience with bad reviews - but I think it's anti-consumer for the press to go along with it (even if I can see why it happens).
Again, using film as a reference: I can check my national papers the week of release (and occasionally the week before) of a new film and see dozens of reviews that discuss films in everything from basic ("3/5*!") to detailed (deconstructions of the film and its themes, brief discussion of director's history etc.) that cover the bases from product review to thoughtful criticism. I think that should be a basic expectation for any new game, and that any game that launches without any reviews or with reviews only when it's actually available should be treated with suspicion.
timetokill
Banned
Depends where you look. There are definitely game makers who hate those who cover games because they don't have a relationship with them and won't cover their games, so they view the games press as too cozy with their personal clique, etc.
Anyway, I think it's a minority of people in all sectors but they sure are loud right now.
ieptbarakat
Member
I've always thought it wasn't so much of male gamers not wanting women to be in the scene, as much as it is the women(not exclusively) in the scene demonizing games catering to the males.
It's even worse because they effect the overall metacritic score as well, gamers want to know the quality of a game, not if it a game like Akiba's Trip is the next sinister woman objectifying game. Or a review of dragon crown starting with "I found its over-exaggerated art style alienating and gross in its depiction of women even as it shines in building a world of fantastic monsters and environments", these don't do anything other than demonize the dev team and the people who buy these games.
Gaming should be more inclusive, it'd be awesome to see more games made with everyone in mind. Though it shouldn't come at the cost of stripping away the creative freedom of developers and/or shunning their target demograph.
Edit: I didn't mean for the gross over-generalization in this post, I was trying to comment about the influence game journalism has on gaming.
Empyrean Heaven
Member
I'm surprised this has been an issue just the last two weeks, as most Nintendo fans know, this shit has been going on forever. Hell, Amirox once called me an hopeless retarded anti-social piece of shit that should kill myself because I will only bring down society around me, just because I like Nintendo.
JesseEwiak
Member
So, it's OK to limit a reviewer's freedom when reviewing a game according to their own tenets, but limiting a creator's freedom is wrong, wrong, wrong?
If you don't want every AAA release to have a 90 Metacritic score, you're going to have to be OK with reviews that don't just focus on the "quality" of a game. I'm sure there was plenty of pushback to the original feminist critique of TV, movies, and so on. Fans of that stuff didn't have Twitter back in the 70's though.
MHWilliams
Member
Pretty much this.
That's not editorial. Editorial does not go to advertising and say, "get non-gaming ads". Advertising at most outlets exists alone for the very reasons people are worrying about corruption.
firehawk12
Subete no aware
I just think it's awkward for Jeff to mandate that they ignore it while Patrick and Alex say otherwise on social media and away from the site. Maybe no one feels comfortable talking about, but all it does is fuel the conspiracy theorists and whatnot that there's "something to hide".
For Japanese games specifically, I don't think it's an attack on the male demographic but more on the Japanese game "fan" demographic (or the anime fan, to be reductive).
What I find awkward about the reviews/criticisms of Japanese games is that fairly often the western games that feature the same problems tend to get ignored. I mean, GTA5 has Trevor basically murder a woman for being a "ball buster", but it's the greatest game ever in the history of video games.
It probably doesn't help that the western press has pretty much no relationship with Japanese developers and only interact with the localizers, if at all.
I don't buy this for a second. These people don't care about some woman giving a game a bad review score because it shows too much T&A, they just don't want "others" playing their games. And what if it was true, what if the reason why these guys hated women was because some women criticized a game for having too much T&A? That doesn't make the harassment any better or justifiable, it just shows you that these guys can't take any criticism. Feminist criticism has been a part of every entertainment medium, and it's the harassers who has to take all the blame here, not the women who dare to say that a game might have too much T&A.
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