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[Kinyou]

Apparently N'Gai Croal deleted Shagg's tweet about Wainwright's explicit comment on "It's a business, we have to make money by doing ad revenue."

sshhhh...

Journalists live from sunlight alone. What is this ad money you speak of?

 

[RionaaM]

Does anyone really know how it all came to this? How did PR people get so much power and influence over the gaming industry? How did they manage to put all the bigger sites and the so called journalists in their pockets? When did this "journalists" decide that the perks and free stuff they were getting from these companies were more important than integrity and honesty? When did the gaming sites' owners decide to turn them into marketing fronts?

I seriously can't understand how the situation could reach this point, with nobody stopping and saying "Guys, I think we may have come a little too far. This is just short of us selling out." Money before reputation and dignity, I guess I'll never understand it.


It's good that some are actually calling up on this BS. It may not be much, but helps making people aware of this (as was my case, for example).

 

[Rufus]

Apparently N'Gai Croal deleted Shagg's tweet about Wainwright's explicit comment on "It's a business, we have to make money by doing ad revenue." Talk about dismissing any form of engagement of his misunderstanding of the situation.

Sigh.

 

[FStop7]

I am furious. I am furious because yesterday the games PR and marketing men flung a few people under a bus, and today they’re probably sipping drinks at the Golden Joystick awards.

Rab got Gerstmanned.

And N'Gai is a chump.

 

[Lime]

Does anyone really know how it all came to this? How did PR people get so much power and influence over the gaming industry? How did they manage to put all the bigger sites and the so called journalists in their pockets? When did this "journalists" decide that the perks and free stuff they were getting from these companies were more important than integrity and honesty? When did the gaming sites' owners decide to turn them into marketing fronts?

I seriously can't understand how the situation could reach this point, with nobody stopping and saying "Guys, I think we may have come a little too far. This is just short of us selling out." Money before reputation and dignity, I guess I'll never understand it.


It's good that some are actually calling up on this BS. It may not be much, but helps making people aware of this (as was my case, for example).

Read LegendofJoe's good post on the increasing link between ad revenue and journalists:

The journalism industry is in crisis in just about every sector, not just in video games. In my personal opinion it's the largest impediment to progress we face today. They are supposed to be the bulwark that protects everyone from the excesses of industry and government. And almost across the board they are failing.

The core of the problem is where the media sources its income. Their customers are us, the people, not the industry/goverment they report on. Right now they largely receive their money from the people/companies they supposed to investigate and report on. When they become your paymaster corruption is inevitable. That needs to change as soon as possible. A la carte television, reader subscriptions, etc. need to replace adversiting dollars as the driving source of income in the media. The world will be a much more better place if that happens because there will be less PR washed bullshit floating around obfuscating the truth. As a result people will make better choices on the things they buy, places they support, people they elect, etc.

 

[Coxy]

Apparently N'Gai Croal deleted Shagg's tweet about Wainwright's explicit comment on "It's a business, we have to make money by doing ad revenue." Talk about dismissing any form of engagement of his misunderstanding of the situation.

that's why these people only argue on twitter, they can just block out anything they dont want to hear, hmm remind me how this thing blew up again? oh yeah.

 

[Shao Kahn Brewing a Stew]

Apparently N'Gai Croal deleted Shagg's tweet about Wainwright's explicit comment on "It's a business, we have to make money by doing ad revenue." Talk about dismissing any form of engagement of his misunderstanding of the situation.

Someone is bitter.

 

[Ragingbegal]

I think you nailed it in your first sentence. It is a stretch to call many of these people journalists at this point I just view them as an extension of marketing departments.

Don't get me wrong it sounds like a fantastic gig but seriously its not journalism.

That's the issue though; they should be journalists and there is a standard readers and they themselves should be held to.

 

[Curufinwe]

Because it needs to be posted on every page:

Five years ago we had Elliott on GFW Radio/1up. Now we have Gies on Rebel FM/Polygon. Talk about a downgrade.

 

[conman]

Does anyone really know how it all came to this? How did PR people get so much power and influence over the gaming industry? How did they manage to put all the bigger sites and the so called journalists in their pockets? When did this "journalists" decide that the perks and free stuff they were getting from these companies were more important than integrity and honesty? When did the gaming sites' owners decide to turn them into marketing fronts?

I seriously can't understand how the situation could reach this point, with nobody stopping and saying "Guys, I think we may have come a little too far. This is just short of us selling out." Money before reputation and dignity, I guess I'll never understand it.

As others have pointed out, it used to be worse. The gaming press grew out of PR departments back in the day. It's only fairly recently that this deep connection has become an issue. Sites have pulled away from PR to establish credibility. But those deep channels are still very much there. There was a sweet spot 5-10 years ago when sites were able to do their own thing and be successful, but publishers got wind of it and have made stronger inroads of late. Now we seeing some push-back again.

To cast a better light on all of this, we're seeing the gaming press confront a crossroads. Either they remain with the status quo and decide to remain a branch of publisher publicity, or they stake out the road less traveled and do something more challenging, critical, interesting, and gamer oriented.

 

[Relaxed Muscle]

This has nothing to do with disagreeing. People want to believe that positive reviews are bought and paid for, and no amount of evidence to the contrary will sway them. There's no debating with that kind of mindset.



Like I said above, challenging people's childish ideologies on a message board accomplishes nothing for them. N'gai's comparison to conspiracy theorists is spot on: no reasonable person bothers "debating" 9/11 nutters because they know everything they say will fall on deaf ears. The same is true here.

You, like N'Gai, are missing the whole point. Is not anymore "this reviewer abviously get paid for this". We're seeing a very insidious powerful PR machine that gains the favour of gaming journalists which dosn't necesarly translate to giving a bad game a good score and isn't necearly concious.

If something Lauren is the perfect example of it: Her ideas of what a normal gaming journalist should do is actually a baffling transgression of every journalist writer ethics should be.

 

[Kraut]

I don't think everybody believes positive reviews are bought out or payed for. A lot of discussion earlier was how people can be influenced on a subliminal level, and choose to say it's impossible such a thing can happen. Shawn Elliot posted something earlier in this thread citing some evidence for that.

No one is saying they just go around handing out great scores, but that the relationship between a Journalist and a PR should not be something as comfortable as it is now.

His comment certainly needs specific examples. If he's categorizing the whole, then it's completely unreasonable for the reasons you and others have pointed out. I'll leave it at that because I agree that even if he is only addressing a small contingency of extremists, the ambiguity of his post is enough to dismiss the strong and well-supported arguments being raised.

 

[AkuMifune]

The shame in all this is...what can we do about it? Two things: jack and shit.

Gaming sites and journalists are so entwined with gaming PR they've become some kind of pathetic symbiotic creature. We'd need to go all Project Mayhem and destroy metacritic, take out the system. But then another head of the hydra would rise. It just makes my stomach turn.

 

[Gomu Gomu]

Does anyone really know how it all came to this? How did PR people get so much power and influence over the gaming industry? How did they manage to put all the bigger sites and the so called journalists in their pockets? When did this "journalists" decide that the perks and free stuff they were getting from these companies were more important than integrity and honesty? When did the gaming sites' owners decide to turn them into marketing fronts?

I seriously can't understand how the situation could reach this point, with nobody stopping and saying "Guys, I think we may have come a little too far. This is just short of us selling out." Money before reputation and dignity, I guess I'll never understand it.


It's good that some are actually calling up on this BS. It may not be much, but helps making people aware of this (as was my case, for example).

My guess is that most of the people in the gaming press start as fanboys who want to play games and write about them. When big companies spend millions on developing and publishing games, they make sure they hire the most cunning PR teams. These guys know that people in the press are clueless about work ethics and integrity, and all they want is to be allowed to play games and travel and have a good time.

Now, these journalists are used to the idea of being spoon fed all the things they need to write about. PR now have something called a black list, so that if you don't behave yourself, you are not gonna get anything from us. But if you do, oh boy, you're gonna get all the scoopz and early access to play all the games.

This is over simplification, I know. But I think it shows how the system has reached the point it has now.

 

[NervousXtian]

Because it needs to be posted on every page:

Yeah, of course it works to some extent because they wouldn't pay the money if it didn't. I guess the argument is how well does it work because honestly it's not going away.

Also, does it mean the review score is better.. or that they get more coverage? One is pretty unethical.. the other, not so much. Previews have the ability to sell just as many if not more games than reviews in the end.

 

[conman]

His comment certainly needs specific examples. If he's categorizing the whole, then it's completely unreasonable for the reasons you and others have pointed out. I'll leave it at that because I agree that even if he is only addressing a small contingency of extremists, the ambiguity of his post is enough to include the strong and well-supported arguments being raised.

He has no reason to post about the fringe. He's using a comment about the fringe as a way of unfairly characterizing the whole.

 

[Cerebral Assassin]

This has nothing to do with disagreeing. People want to believe that positive reviews are bought and paid for, and no amount of evidence to the contrary will sway them. There's no debating with that kind of mindset.



Like I said above, challenging people's childish ideologies on a message board accomplishes nothing for them. N'gai's comparison to conspiracy theorists is spot on: no reasonable person bothers "debating" 9/11 nutters because they know everything they say will fall on deaf ears. The same is true here.

Please show a post in which somebody has claimed that all positive reviews are paid for(when you can't perhaps you should stop creating strawmen)? I think given that plenty of evidence exists that some positive reviews have been paid for, that cover stories have been paid for(& have been for decades) I would suggest that anyone dismissing this has an axe to grind.

Again this has little to do with paid for reviews, & more to do with a distinct lack of ethical behaviour from people professing to be journalists, who instead of explaining their policies (& to be fair Polygon & Gamespot have both had people in this thread doing exactly that) express incredulity at the thought of acting like proper journalist/critics.

 

[iammeiam]

I don't see how it is remotely conspiracy theorist to suggest PR may offer goods in exchange for coverage when the whole PS3 thing just happened. That was literally 'tweet our game and maybe get something". They didn't offer PS3s in a raffle because they're awesome guys, they did it because they knew it would increase the number of journalists tweeting about their game. It's not about 5K for a 10/10, that's way too obvious.

 

[ElRenoRaven]

There's a great guest post by Robert Florence on John Walker's blog

http://botherer.org/2012/10/26/guest-post-robert-florence-on-the-last-few-days/

Really damn good blog. He's right on the money too. Focus on the bigger picture not just one person. I really do like his style. He's earned a follower after this. I wouldn't mind reading more of his thoughts and articles. Hopefully someone has the balls to hire this man.

 

[conman]

The shame in all this is...what can we do about it? Two things: jack and shit.

It's really not as hopeless as that. GAF does pretty well at finding and publicizing the writers and sites that do good work. And we're pretty damn good at digging up the shit behind the ones that don't.

 

[cRIPticon]

For awhile now, especially with the advent of video reviews, i've just been considering them straight up Entertainers and social engineers.

Is it any wonder the majority of "Gaming Journalist" who leave that career are going to jobs with gaming companies in their PR departments or as community managers.

You mean, positions where writing and communication skills are paramount? Where would one get such expertise and experience.....hmmmm.......

 

[AkuMifune]

It's really not as hopeless as that. GAF does pretty well at finding and publicizing the writers and sites that do good work. And we're pretty damn good at digging up the shit behind the ones that don't.

I know, it was very defeatist of me. But even if we discredit every paid blog/review and point out where money exchanged hands, it'll still continue as normal. The truth is that we're like the fleas on a homeless dogs back while the dog is content to go out out and fuck bitches.

The bitches just don't hear us screaming at them that the dog has a venereal disease.

 

[Lancehead]

Yeah, of course it works to some extent because they wouldn't pay the money if it didn't. I guess the argument is how well does it work because honestly it's not going away.

Also, does it mean the review score is better.. or that they get more coverage? One is pretty unethical.. the other, not so much. Previews have the ability to sell just as many if not more games than reviews in the end.

That's a good point. Traditional publisher model relies heavily on building the hype to get most sales in the first one or two months. From fans' perspective a lot of the time reviews end up a confirmation of their expectations and hype.

 

[Lime]

The shame in all this is...what can we do about it? Two things: jack and shit.

Gaming sites and journalists are so entwined with gaming PR they've become some kind of pathetic symbiotic creature. We'd need to go all Project Mayhem and destroy metacritic, take out the system. But then another head of the hydra would rise. It just makes my stomach turn.

Like I mentioned earlier, this industry needs to be burned down to the ground, so it's nothing but ashes. Preferably while listening to Neurosis.

 

[RionaaM]

Read LegendofJoe's good post on the increasing link between ad revenue and journalists:

Thanks, I hope this madness ends soon. This casts a shadow of doubt upon every gaming writer, where you question if they have a hidden agenda. The problem is that the biggest sites have too much power, and I don't know if there's a way for smaller and independent ones to grow.

In the end, the best way is still relying only on forums and comments from other gamers, and not on insiders from the gaming industry.

As others have pointed out, it used to be worse. The gaming press grew out of PR departments back in the day. It's only fairly recently that this deep connection has become an issue. Sites have pulled away from PR to establish credibility. But those deep channels are still very much there. There was a sweet spot 5-10 years ago when sites were able to do their own thing and be successful, but publishers got wind of it and have made stronger inroads of late. Now we seeing some push-back again.

To cast a better light on all of this, we're seeing the gaming press confront a crossroads. Either they remain with the status quo and decide to remain a branch of publisher publicity, or they stake out the road less traveled and do something more challenging, critical, interesting, and gamer oriented.

Are you saying it was always like this, or even worse? That's something I didn't know. Maybe I'm being naive, but I thought that only recently had PR guys gained this status of control over the gaming media. This is terrible, really.

 

[conman]

There's a great guest post by Robert Florence on John Walker's blog

http://botherer.org/2012/10/26/guest-post-robert-florence-on-the-last-few-days/

Inspiring. Some fantastic sentences and sentiments there. My favorites:

I am furious that some are saying that it’s “just games”. It’s not games. It’s writing. And writing matters. Writing always matters.

Those who have been angry about all this – don’t investigate the people, investigate the system. Please write about games. Don’t go to any parties. Don’t go on the trips. Don’t care about exclusives. Just write passionately about games. You can contribute hugely to the scene without ever once speaking to a PR person. Cut them out of the equation.

Awesome stuff.

IMO this blowup shows that much of the industry has already burned itself to ashes. What Florence realized was that the industry's been a PR shadow for a long time, he (and others) just didn't realize how true that was until the past few days. People might keep reading that swill, but that doesn't mean it isn't already ashes.

Again, inspiring. Thanks to Robert Florence.

 

[ElRenoRaven]

The shame in all this is...what can we do about it? Two things: jack and shit.

Gaming sites and journalists are so entwined with gaming PR they've become some kind of pathetic symbiotic creature. We'd need to go all Project Mayhem and destroy metacritic, take out the system. But then another head of the hydra would rise. It just makes my stomach turn.

Yes we can. We can quit giving any site and or publication our attention and dollars that shows it doesn't have any integrity. That's what gives them power. If enough people cease visiting a site or buying a magazine it dies. It's happened many times to both awful sites and magazines. It's sadly also happened to some very good sites and magazines too sadly. However that's how it works sometimes. Quit following these shills on twitter and facebook. Don't read their shit. Don't just stand there and accept it.

 

[spirity]

Only thing I can think to remark on here, is re: gaming journos being manipulated by PR people.

I do recall hearing from someone who went to an EA sponsored event that the room full of PR handlers basically foisted themselves on the game journalists invited. Did everything they could to become instant Facebook and email friends, and made a big deal about pretending to NOT talk about their job. The PR agents acted like "one of the boys" and as if they too were just passive observers there, in the same boat as the journos.

Take it as you will.

When promoting Saints Row 3, THQ were sending out groups of scantily dressed models to offices with goodie bags and purple dildos. All just sexy fun, no coercion at all.

 

[Effnine]

The shame in all this is...what can we do about it? Two things: jack and shit.

Ultimately, the viewers/readers have all the power. Sadly, most don't realize it.

 

[NihonTiger90]

Lauren Wainwright:

"This is how the journalism industry works sadly. It’s done all the time in all different journalism sectors.

Thing is journalism is a buisiness. People like to pretend that it’s not but the most important thing is page views and sponsorship deals. Without them you make no money and can’t pay your writers or host your website.

Also when someone is being interviewed they are still speaking on behalf o their company. Journalists aren’t just going to their houses and asking them questions about that person. It’s about the game and/or company. They have every right to attribute quotes to the company because of the way interviews are set up."​

Err... wow. See, this is the shit I'm talking about.

Being both a blogger and someone trained as a print journalist, I can say Lauren is full of shit on this. Yes, there's business elements that are important, but the problem here is this idea that everyone is corrupt or a corporate shill, so I can bend the ethical rules, too. As was said further up the thread, if someone in my regular line of work (not the blogging) was doing this, they would be done. Not just fired, but out of the industry.

Let's also state the obvious: no one is 100 percent incorruptible or totally unbiased. Not you or I or anyone else. We all have opinions, our favorites, which are biases. Be upfront about them. My readers know that I like certain things and I tend to get excited about them. It's hard to expect anyone not to run into any situation where they could be seen as being influenced (even if they aren't), in part because our own biases on how far the definition of "corruption" goes differs. Heck, there are differing arguments in this thread which seem to center around that. Though I think there's agreement that things like reviews being given a high score or written to be Godly in exchange for advertising, or being flown first-class to Hawaii for a seven-day review session at a five-star hotel with all expenses paid for would fall under that.

The key to actually doing good journalism from an ethical standpoint is to know where your lines are and make sure not to cross them. Make sure your are transparent with your readers when you go to events and such, and don't put yourself in situations where you know you can easily be influenced. If you get something, tell folks you got it. Be honest in all your reporting. Understand that there may come times when issues arise, and face them instead of cutting and running and hiding from them. The truth is people want to be able to trust you and you have to give them a reason to do so every time you post something. Every. Single. Time.

I'll cut myself off before I go off on an unrelated tangent, but the idea that this happens everywhere is wrong, and the idea that it's ok because it happens everywhere is even more dead wrong. As a blogger and a journalist in my two jobs, it makes me feel sick to my stomach.

 

[NervousXtian]

Like I mentioned earlier, this industry needs to be burned down to the ground, so it's nothing but ashes. Preferably while listening to Neurosis.

..and replace it with what?

You'd lose all access to all pre-release info.. because you'd really be asking them to ignore PR releases and investigate on their own.. but this isn't investigating crime or war or political corruption, or any number of actually important things... it's entertainment.

There just really isn't a whole lot of things going on other than PR hype and reviews.

I mean, shit we live with it on hardware.. check out the threads from the Surface PR event or any Apple event.. it's all PR being reported on.. and we accept that for what it is. We aren't asking the same thing from those reporters.... because what were people not attending the event going to report off of because going would be unethical? The reports of people who DID attend or the PR stuff MS or Apple put out.

Companies don't allow unfiltered access to work in progress anywhere. There'd be nothing to report on but how one doesn't know anything.

 

[Dr Dogg]

I used to like the old days when going in to the newsagents and having to walk to the back by the stationary was, to find a little basket, tossed on the floor to rummage through the Speccy games, none of which I heard of before and take a gamble if this was going to be any good and worth what little money I had saved up from my grueling paper round. No games mag reviews, no internet to guide me, no PR or marketing campaign to sway me.

Then again the choice was never as big as it is today. For example there was 784 SNES games released between 1991-98 compared to 2,016 PS2 games from 2000-2011. The age old debate of quality over quantity.

 

[FStop7]

Lol at N'gai.. I'd put him right up there with Keighley as a "journalist".

he isn't a journalist, he's a marketing consultant now.

 

[NervousXtian]

In the end, the best way is still relying only on forums and comments from other gamers, and not on insiders from the gaming industry.

..and where do the people on forums get their info pre-release?

 

[chickdigger802]

So in the end, the article writer was just pointing his finger in a general direction and unknowingly hit a direct target?

 

[Risette]

..and replace it with what?

You'd lose all access to all pre-release info.. because you'd really be asking them to ignore PR releases and investigate on their own.. but this isn't investigating crime or war or political corruption, or any number of actually important things... it's entertainment.

There just really isn't a whole lot of things going on other than PR hype and reviews.

I mean, shit we live with it on hardware.. check out the threads from the Surface PR event or any Apple event.. it's all PR being reported on.. and we accept that for what it is. We aren't asking the same thing from those reporters.... because what were people not attending the event going to report off of because going would be unethical? The reports of people who DID attend or the PR stuff MS or Apple put out.

Companies don't allow unfiltered access to work in progress anywhere. There'd be nothing to report on but how one doesn't know anything.

Sigh. Is this sort of non-response the line you're going to keep posting forever? I'll just repost this post that another poster made earlier:

There's some disappointing comments in this thread worth weighing in on. Specifically, those who have dismissed the controversy because it's just "games journalism" and not worth further consideration because it's about toys.

Film was once looked on in this way. It was juvenile. Made for the poor masses and below any serious study. Then people started seeing the impact moving images could have and movies started invoking new emotions in their audiences. Do we not see the same in breath of themes in video games? And at a faster pace than in film?

Of course, if we choose to regard video games as mere toys then we'll likely repeat the same mistakes as those who disregarded the impact of early film.

The film industry eventually got thoughtful critics like Pauline Kael who pioneered film journalism. There are already some excellent writers like Tom Bissel who are doing this. There needs to be more.

Eventually, film critics did begin winning Pulizter prizes. For writing about movies. Even sports journalists — who are possibly the closest to video game reporters in that they're typically enthusiasts — are honored with the same award won by those who covered the Gulf War and life in Haiti. Should we not too demand the same level of thoughtfulness in the industry we enjoy?

There are strong stories out there worth telling. From the often deplorable working conditions of those who make the games we love possible to how a studio's vision can be too ambitious and come crashing down — and taking taxpayers with it. We need well-trained journalists to deliver these deserving stories.

Not demanding that kind of quality has enabled the kind of thing that has gone down during the past two days. Boiled down, video games may just be toys, but they're also a growing medium that continue to become more and more important to our cultural identity. That makes them worth writing about and giving serious consideration. This buddy-buddy club that has journalists in bed with PR and publishers undermines that, and it should be rooted out. So cheers to guys and gals like Rab Florence who see the state of things and do not so easily except them — and let all us readers do the same.

 

[ElRenoRaven]

Being both a blogger and someone trained as a print journalist, I can say Lauren is full of shit on this. Yes, there's business elements that are important, but the problem here is this idea that everyone is corrupt or a corporate shill, so I can bend the ethical rules, too. As was said further up the thread, if someone in my regular line of work (not the blogging) was doing this, they would be done. Not just fired, but out of the industry.

Let's also state the obvious: no one is 100 percent incorruptible or totally unbiased. Not you or I or anyone else. We all have opinions, our favorites, which are biases. Be upfront about them. My readers know that I like certain things and I tend to get excited about them. It's hard to expect anyone not to run into any situation where they could be seen as being influenced (even if they aren't), in part because our own biases on how far the definition of "corruption" goes differs. Heck, there are differing arguments in this thread which seem to center around that. Though I think there's agreement that things like reviews being given a high score or written to be Godly in exchange for advertising, or being flown first-class to Hawaii for a seven-day review session at a five-star hotel with all expenses paid for would fall under that.

The key to actually doing good journalism from an ethical standpoint is to know where your lines are and make sure not to cross them. Make sure your are transparent with your readers when you go to events and such, and don't put yourself in situations where you know you can easily be influenced. If you get something, tell folks you got it. Be honest in all your reporting. Understand that there may come times when issues arise, and face them instead of cutting and running and hiding from them. The truth is people want to be able to trust you and you have to give them a reason to do so every time you post something. Every. Single. Time.

I'll cut myself off before I go off on an unrelated tangent, but the idea that this happens everywhere is wrong, and the idea that it's ok because it happens everywhere is even more dead wrong. As a blogger and a journalist in my two jobs, it makes me feel sick to my stomach.

Perfectly said. It really does come down to honesty at the end of the day.

 

[Shadow780]

Don't focus on just one person, she's part of the problem, not the root of it.

A larger discussion can be had to address the problem of this whole industry.

 

[The Nature Roy]

Question -- why would developers/manufacturers hire journalists who are fans/alleged shills of their products to work for them? They are much more valuable on the outside, offering up 'unbiased' praise from free (or relatively little if you believe they are on the take).

I'd rather hire up the guy who is talking about how much my products suck and get him under my control...

 

[DangerStepp]

Yup...both him and Justin McElroy have been known to do that kind of shit multiple time in the past. They lurk here and then go on twitter to crap on the forums instead of simply engaging in the conversation and giving arguments. The worst kind of cowards.

It's easy because you ultimately rid yourself of the burden of reciprocity.

It's akin to a child plugging his/her ears..."NANANANANA I CAN'T HEAR YOUUUUU!!"

 

[WrenchNinja]

Hi N'Gai (lol).

https://twitter.com/ncroal/status/261918660216631296

Looking at all the twitter responses, everyone sure is smug.

 

[RionaaM]

My guess is that most of the people in the gaming press start as fanboys who want to play games and write about them. When big companies spend millions on developing and publishing games, they make sure they hire the most cunning PR teams. These guys know that people in the press are clueless about work ethics and integrity, and all they want is to be allowed to play games and travel and have a good time.

Now, these journalists are used to the idea of being spoon fed all the things they need to write about. PR now have something called a black list, so that if you don't behave yourself, you are not gonna get anything from us. But if you do, oh boy, you're gonna get all the scoopz and early access to play all the games.

This is over simplification, I know. But I think it shows how the system has reached the point it has now.

I believe your guess to be spot on. It's a shame, but there's probably enough people for whom money, short-lived fame and fun are way more important than their principles or integrity. It's not the purpose of their job to party with PR people. If anything, it's actually to give a fair critic of their studios' games.

 

[EternalGamer]

Question -- why would developers/manufacturers hire journalists who are fans/alleged shills of their products to work for them? They are much more valuable on the outside, offering up 'unbiased' praise from free (or relatively little if you believe they are on the take).

I'd rather hire up the guy who is talking about how much my products suck and get him under my control...

Because the goal of PR is to not seem like PR but to seem genuine and authentic.

 

[conman]

..and replace it with what?

You'd lose all access to all pre-release info..

Make publishers do their own dirty work and stop relying on everyone else to financially support your PR machine. It's a silly system where publishers assume that game sites will clamor for any tidbits of information, when the fact of that matter is everyone gets the same info. And it ultimately costs those sites money to host that info. Why? Because publishers can cut their marketing budgets tremendously by relying on gaming sites to disseminate their publicity.

I understand that this junk brings readers. So stop wasting time doing write-ups for it. Host the images, trailers, and interviews, but don't waste time writing anything for it. Readers all know it's the same BS you can get anywhere. Devote your time to things that actually set you apart as a site and show what real work you can do.

So, yeah, there's a lot you can replace it with.

Companies don't allow unfiltered access to work in progress anywhere. There'd be nothing to report on but how one doesn't know anything.

There'd be plenty to report on, but it might actually end up having to be actual *gulp* news. Reporters may have to do some actual work rather than just rewriting press releases or giving the same tired accounts of the same preview material or press interview content. Make publishers do the pre-release BS themselves. I mean, hell, Gametrailers is a site predicated--in the actual name of the website!!--on publisher PR handouts. It's a site built on trailers!

 

[XANDER CAGE]

Sigh. Is this sort of non-response the line you're going to keep posting forever? I'll just repost this post that another poster made earlier:

I think this is why it's important to draw a line between games criticism and games journalism. I'm far more interested in working on the former, but there is a definite lack of the latter in the industry.

 

[SolidSnakex]

https://twitter.com/ncroal/status/261918660216631296

Looking at all the responses, everyone sure is smug.

Director of Communications & Brand Management: Harmonix

Senior Features Editor Game Informer I wanna rock your gypsy soul.

General PR miscreant living abroad and working at Ubisoft.

Media critic/journalist, focusing mostly on games. Currently writing for @kotaku. Previously wrote for @time, @techland and @ifctv.

International Community Manager at @deepsilver.

PR Guy for Microsoft/Xbox.

Those are the occupations of the people joking around about that with N'gai.

 

[Risette]

I think this is why it's important to draw a line between games criticism and games journalism. I'm far more interested in working on the former, but there is a definite lack of the latter in the industry.

There's an equal lack of both.

 

[AkuMifune]

https://twitter.com/ncroal/status/261918660216631296

Looking at all the twitter responses, everyone sure is smug.

"LOLOL It's all a big joke to us because we're too afraid to actually look at ourselves in the mirror!"

 

[More Fun To Compute]

Yes, PR is well known for being powerless and inconsequential. Absolutely no effect on society at all!

 

[NervousXtian]

Sigh. Is this sort of non-response the line you're going to keep posting forever? I'll just repost this post that another poster made earlier:

He's comparing game journalism to actual journalism like there is the same level of stuff to report on.

There just really isn't. Maybe I'm different, but I don't read a lot of post release stories.. some here and there and there's some good stuff out there.. but I really doubt that is what most people are looking for when visiting the gaming sites. They are looking for previews and reviews, with the occasional fluff piece here and there (top 10 list, funny story, etc).

He even compared Sports Journalism to Game Journalism.. and they are nothing alike.

So you call it a non-response, but yet you bold one part and ignore the rest.