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[mbmonk]

Second, the fact that he would apologize for those paid for videos hosted by Machinima by implying that the footage speaks for itself and that people could just turn down the sound if they wanted to is a pretty amazing piece of self rationalization. I honestly don't think he would ever come to that kind of conclusion if he didn't have a friend directly involved in it. At least, I hope he wouldn't.

Et Tu, Garnett?

Members of the gaming media are unmasking themselves one post at a time.

 

[demidar]

Their editors post reviews, but she seems to be part of a "network" not the editorial staff at Machinima. I frankly don't care what you call it. Anyone that is paid by a company to post videos, you are compromised, end of story. Especially if you don't make it clear to me that you are being paid by the company.

I advocate prefacing any review/critical analysis with relationships to the object to be questioned. That way, readers can apply their own weighting to the review/critical analysis. I mean, it's only fair.

 

[EternalGamer]

I advocate prefacing any review/critical analysis with relationships to the object to be questioned. That way, readers can apply their own weighting to the review/critical analysis. I mean, it's only fair.

I agree with that. But I would go one step further for myself personally. If you are paid to talk about the game then I really don't want to bother hearing what you have to say about it. That is just me. Other people are obviously free to go ahead and not be concerned. I'll rather listen to the people who are not compromised in that fashion. A straight up PR person seems to be in a lot clearer ethical position than someone in that position is.

As for this particular case, one of the many things I find troubling is how Andrea Renee continues to dance around the topic. When someone brought it up to her on twitter and linked to that post, her response was to say that no one in her network was paid to review the game. She specifically makes the qualifier "review" the game. It seems to me she hiding behind the idea that they are not reviews in order to avoiding admitting they are paid. That is pretty disingenuous.

Now maybe these particular people are not paid at all and I am wrong. This whole thing with Machinima and EA is just pretty gross, though, regardless.

 

[More Fun To Compute]

Total Biscuit has been paid to stream games but I think he only agreed to do it on the assumption that he could tell people he was paid and could still trash the game as much as he wanted to. He isn't part of the Machinima network and I have to say that I don't know much of how they operate in any detail. But maybe they like it that way?

 

[EternalGamer]

He isn't part of the Machinima network and I have to say that I don't know much of how they operate in any detail. But maybe they like it that way?

I spent about 20 minutes today trying to figure out what the exact deal with their content is. I mean, we have confirmation that EA gave monetary compensation for videos. But I could find no mention of monetary compensation anywhere I looked via their website, their main youtube channel or in the descriptions in any of the content feeds I looked at.

Edit: Here is (one of?) Andrea's own Need for Speed videos from last week (before the embargo was up for press, but these guys had a special deal with EA as noted in those tweets earlier):

http://www.needforspeed.com/news/see-most-wanted-action-machinima

Here is the decription that video:

Our friends at Machinima enjoyed a two-hour Most Wanted session recently: one hour of single-player gameplay followed by a one hour multiplayer sesh.

You can see the highlights right here on the blog.

We also delivered 900 copies of the game to their army of video directors. We'll be collating

So, if you want to see Most Wanted in action, in the hands of the professionals, hit the link and check these guys out:

http://www.youtube.com/mostwantedpremiere

That goes right along with the earlier news that EA gave out 1000 copies and monetary compensation. But again, there is no direct reference in or around that video or any of the others I looked at in that "network" that mention the monetary compensation. Perhaps I missed it somewhere, though.

 

[More Fun To Compute]

I spent about 20 minutes today trying to figure out what the exact deal with their content is. I mean, we have confirmation that EA gave monetary compensation for videos. But I could find no mention of monetary compensation anywhere I looked via their website, their main youtube channel or in the descriptions in any of the content feeds I looked at.

Money goes in. Youtube content with high search rank goes out.

 

[JABEE]

They call themselves a "next generation video entertainment network" on their about page (whatever that means) with both editorial and user generated content.

I only knew about it through Weekend Confirmed, to be honest, but I sure as heck didn't know that the site Andrea worked for was responsible for hooking up its "content creators" (note the ambiguous phrasing) with money from publishers for posting videos about their games. That is a blatant conflict of interest in my opinion. You are getting paid by a game designer to talk about their game. There is no grey area there.

And they are big. They have 138 million subscribers and 39.9 billion video views according to their own stats.

I don't actually know what Andrea's role is at Machinima. I searched their site. It seems clear she isn't on the "editorial" staff and by her own blog and description I can only assume that she is one of the "content creators." Here is what Andrea said about it on her Twitter feed:





She or anyone else is free to come here and correct this but it seems to me that she is hiding behind the idea that the videos were not "reviews."

Regardless I find the whole idea of of publishers paying these "content creators" disgusting.

I didn't think people thought she was reviewing the game. She was paid by EA to put up content relating to the game and to promote the game through her YouTube channel. It doesn't matter that they weren't reviews. Garnett brought her on the show and did not require her to disclose this information when making qualitative judgements on games.

 

[EternalGamer]

I didn't think people thought she was reviewing the game. She was paid by EA to put up content relating to the game and to promote the game through her YouTube channel. It doesn't matter that they weren't reviews. Garnett brought her on the show and did not require her to disclose this information when making qualitative judgements on games.

I totally agree. Actually the guy she responded to on Twitters specifically said that getting paid to do "previews" could hurt WC's reputation.

Her response was that she did not get paid to give "reviews." She avoided addressing the fact that he was talking about "previews." As I said, hiding behind the idea that you weren't "reviewing" the game when you are clearly offering your impressions of it without revealing your monetary compensation is disingenuous at best.

 

[JABEE]

It also seems like she is doing one for Assassin's Creed III today.

In response to a reader asking about the "verdict" on Assassin's Creed III

@Ozz_Mejia Too early to say, but let's just say, I'm deciding between "Good" and "Awesome" - more details this afternoon

https://twitter.com/andrearene/statuses/263349996211040256

 

[conman]

I didn't think people thought she was reviewing the game. She was paid by EA to put up content relating to the game and to promote the game through her YouTube channel. It doesn't matter that they weren't reviews. Garnett brought her on the show and did not require her to disclose this information when making qualitative judgements on games.

Gross. You're right. It doesn't matter if they're "reviews" or not.

 

[EternalGamer]

This whole youtube commentator business is really, really gross. Total Biscuit is right when he said it was far worse than even traditional games media. If he is really correct that this is the "future" of game media content then screw that.

Is this how younger gamers/non-hardcore gamers get their info about gaming? I have never watched any of this stuff in my life before this all came up.

 

[Victrix]

This whole youtube commentator business is really, really gross. Total Biscuit is right when he said it was far worse than even traditional games media. If he is really correct that this is the "future" of game media content then screw that.

Is this how younger gamers/non-hardcore gamers get their info about gaming? I have never watched any of this stuff in my life before this all came up.

Very much yes. Youtube 'superstars' and twitch streamers are extremely popular, and hit a huge swath of the game playing public.

I had a very popular channel streaming on jtv before it became twitch, and I would receive endless friend requests, constant messages, and live questions non stop. And yes, one or more 'hey, try out this gaming related product' messages.

Had I been streaming just one year later on twitch, I suspect those 'hey try out this freebie' messages would be even more common.

edit: Side note - I actually think youtube videos and livestreams are just about the best way to get a real view of how a game is, but the people who stream them are often young video game fans, many of whom are making ad revenue/partner revenue off their streams/videos. This makes them incredibly, incredibly succeptible to industry influence, something that PR is finally picking up on. It also means that yes, some of them are going to be the future of 'gaming press'. Some already are, people just haven't noticed yet, for whatever reason.

 

[Squidofman]

Is this how younger gamers/non-hardcore gamers get their info about gaming? I have never watched any of this stuff in my life before this all came up.

Pretty much. People got disillusioned with sites like IGN and shot straight past the middle ground to vulnerable, isolate, opinionated kids on YouTube who say shit they agree with.

The number of views these people get would boggle the mind of anyone who runs a major gaming site.

 

[EternalGamer]

Very much yes. Youtube 'superstars' and twitch streamers are extremely popular, and hit a huge swath of the game playing public.

I had a very popular channel streaming on jtv before it became twitch, and I would receive endless friend requests, constant messages, and live questions non stop. And yes, one or more 'hey, try out this gaming related product' messages.

Had I been streaming just one year later on twitch, I suspect those 'hey try out this freebie' messages would be even more common.

edit: Side note - I actually think youtube videos and livestreams are just about the best way to get a real view of how a game is, but the people who stream them are often young video game fans, many of whom are making ad revenue/partner revenue off their streams/videos. This makes them incredibly, incredibly succeptible to industry influence, something that PR is finally picking up on. It also means that yes, some of them are going to be the future of 'gaming press'. Some already are, people just haven't noticed yet, for whatever reason.

Andrea Renee seems to fall under that description.

 

[conman]

Very much yes. Youtube 'superstars' and twitch streamers are extremely popular, and hit a huge swath of the game playing public.

I had a very popular channel streaming on jtv before it became twitch, and I would receive endless friend requests, constant messages, and live questions non stop. And yes, one or more 'hey, try out this gaming related product' messages.

Had I been streaming just one year later on twitch, I suspect those 'hey try out this freebie' messages would be even more common.

edit: Side note - I actually think youtube videos and livestreams are just about the best way to get a real view of how a game is, but the people who stream them are often young video game fans, many of whom are making ad revenue/partner revenue off their streams/videos. This makes them incredibly, incredibly succeptible to industry influence, something that PR is finally picking up on. It also means that yes, some of them are going to be the future of 'gaming press'. Some already are, people just haven't noticed yet, for whatever reason.

What's strange is that this is more or less the critique I used to level against Giant Bomb for their Quick Looks. They always seemed a cheap, under-digested way to present gaming content ("by fans for fans"). But now--between hearing a series of eloquent responses from Jeff and hearing about this crap surrounding Machinima, et al.--I'm realizing that Giant Bomb is perhaps one of the last bastions against this crap.

In short, I was railing against the right kind of content, but the wrong people.

 

[Victrix]

The connection to the audience is immediate. There's nothing quite like livestreaming. The influence is pretty amazing. Plus you get to ban trolls in realtime, that's always fun.

Youtube is a bit behind that, but they both play a role. I also had constant, constant requests from people for my youtube channel, something I never really used.

Honestly in retrospect, I should have kept with it, had my timing be slightly different, I'd be happily receiving my paychecks from Machinima, google adsense and Twitch right about now - you'd be blown away by how much money some of the more popular people are making.

Then I could be sitting in my smug fortress of mountain dew and doritos laughing at this thread (hint: I doubt if many of the big streamers/youtubers are even aware of this thread or care about if they are).

 

[Freshmaker]

The connection to the audience is immediate. There's nothing quite like livestreaming. The influence is pretty amazing. Plus you get to ban trolls in realtime, that's always fun.

Youtube is a bit behind that, but they both play a role. I also had constant, constant requests from people for my youtube channel, something I never really used.

Honestly in retrospect, I should have kept with it, had my timing be slightly different, I'd be happily receiving my paychecks from Machinima, google adsense and Twitch right about now - you'd be blown away by how much money some of the more popular people are making.

Then I could be sitting in my smug fortress of mountain dew and doritos laughing at this thread (hint: I doubt if many of the big streamers/youtubers are even aware of this thread or care about if they are).

Do most streamers care about much more than showing game footage? I doubt most think of themselves as journalists at all.

 

[Huevos de Oro]

It's great to see this thread still going strong, and with even more feedback/input from people who have had first-hand experience with the issues being discussed.

I can only hope this will lead to an overall improvement, both in terms of the actual quality of journalism as well as our stance in the level of quality we demand from the sites we read or visit.

 

[Interficium]

If this goes on much longer I predict we will start to see a massive backlash from games journalists worried that they will suffer permanent prestige loss.

This implies there was any prestige to be lost in the first place.

 

[TheSeks]

This implies there was any prestige to be lost in the first place.

Scary Larry had prestige. ;___;

 

[EternalGamer]

Scary Larry had prestige. ;___;

Didn't Gamepro used to just have multiple people write under the same avatar? I know Gamefan did. I don't know that that particular action compromised the integrity of what they wrote. It was just weird.


Edit: I did not in any way mean to imply that either of these magazines ever had much journalistic integrity. Certainly not Gamefan, even though it was quite literally my favorite thing in the world when I was 15. I was not the smartest kid. What else can I say.

 

[not_so_special]

This whole youtube commentator business is really, really gross. Total Biscuit is right when he said it was far worse than even traditional games media. If he is really correct that this is the "future" of game media content then screw that.

Is this how younger gamers/non-hardcore gamers get their info about gaming? I have never watched any of this stuff in my life before this all came up.

thats a whole new can of worms,the world of proffesional youtubers its insane and pretty stupid if you ask me

Pretty much. People got disillusioned with sites like IGN and shot straight past the middle ground to vulnerable, isolate, opinionated kids on YouTube who say shit they agree with.

The number of views these people get would boggle the mind of anyone who runs a major gaming site.

the money some of these "youtubers" make is insane,belive me

 

[Risible]

Jeff, I think you should write a book.

FUCK. YES.

 

[Victrix]

Do most streamers care about much more than showing game footage? I doubt most think of themselves as journalists at all.

They care about hits and views, above all else. That's how they make money. Anything they can do to attract more viewers and subscribers means more money.

That can mean anything - in the case of most CoD youtubers I've seen, it means pretty vapid videos churned out at an amazing pace. The better ones are interesting, informative, funny, or some mix of the above.

Streaming is a bit different - seeing/hearing people play games can be more interesting, or a lot worse, depending on the person (realtime raging!).

There are some people are are in a weird place as far as 'journalism' goes. They do what amounts to reporting news. Some do what amounts to reviews, or previews.

Honestly its a new medium, and sort of a wild frontier. The popularity of the bigger channels exploded over the last few years, and they've created thousands of imitators.

The imitators are actually pretty fucking annoying, a very regular thing that youtube people do is take someone ELSES video, post it up, and slap their commentary on top of it. This is especially hilarious when this is a partner posting up, say, an official trailer, and they're making money off this. But sometimes it's not even an official PR piece (who I'm sure are happy to be getting even more exposure, because it'll get MORE hits on that page than the original), it's another youtubers video!

The end result though, is that searching for something on youtube often winds up giving you a shitload of copycat videos that are just someone reposting someone elses video over and over again, all with slightly different headers.

Seriously, go try searching for 'BO2 guns' or something, you'll get a shitload of people talking over footage of BO2 trailers, gamescom footage, or even BO/MW3 gameplay.

Note that developers and publishers are getting in on this as well, there are livestreams direct from devs (sometimes with amusing results). I would not be even the least bit surprised to see some of these people hired directly by companies to act as their 'face' for the internet.

 

[Gomu Gomu]

thats a whole new can of worms,the world of proffesional youtubers its insane and pretty stupid if you ask me

Yup. So there was a local gaming event a couple of weeks ago, where people like Harada of Tekken series & wrestler Mick Foley (to promote WWE 13) were there to engage the fans.
What no one expected was the HUUUUUGE amount of kids/teens that blew them over and made a scene around some locally famous youtube commentators. I'm talking about perhaps hundreds of kids around this one guy, getting pictures taken and fucking autographs and shit. It was surreal.

I mean here we have some actual significant people, who had amazing careers and traveled from far away to attend this event, only to be brushed off because there were 17 year old kids who figured out how to make youtube videos.

I never gave it that much thought at the time, but now it seems to me that youtube and the live video streaming people are going to be a big part of marketing a game. They adhere to no standards, and are pretty much swayed at the lowest of prices.

 

[McBradders]

Yup. So there was a local gaming event a couple of weeks ago, where people like Harada of Tekken series & wrestler Mike Foley (to promote WWE 13) were there to engage the fans.
What no one expected was the HUUUUUGE amount of kids/teens that blew them over and made a scene around some locally famous youtube commentators. I'm talking about perhaps hundreds of kids around this one guy, getting pictures taken and fucking autographs and shit. It was surreal.

I mean here we have some actual significant people, who had amazing careers and traveled from far away to attend this event, only to be brushed off because there were 17 year old kids who figured out how to make youtube videos.

I never gave it that much thought at the time, but now it seems to me that youtube and the live video kids are going to be a big part of marketing a game. They adhere to no standards, and are pretty much swayed at the lowest of prices.

God dammit man it's Mick Foley. MICK!!!!

 

[Jake Tower]

Didn't Gamepro used to just have multiple people write under the same avatar?

The opposite. They had a staff of like 3, that wrote reviews under something like 20 aliases to give the illusion of having a bigger staff/contributors.

I've been doing some nostalgic reading of old GamePros from retromags.com

 

[Huevos de Oro]

God dammit man it's Mick Foley. MICK!!!!

Whoa, MikeBradders, there's no need to get so angry.

Spoiler

 

[not_so_special]

At this point, we can write a book about this stuff.

this is nothing compared to the gaming press on spain XD seriously this is childs play

 

[EternalGamer]

Yup. So there was a local gaming event a couple of weeks ago, where people like Harada of Tekken series & wrestler Mike Foley (to promote WWE 13) were there to engage the fans.
What no one expected was the HUUUUUGE amount of kids/teens that blew them over and made a scene around some locally famous youtube commentators. I'm talking about perhaps hundreds of kids around this one guy, getting pictures taken and fucking autographs and shit. It was surreal.

I mean here we have some actual significant people, who had amazing careers and traveled from far away to attend this event, only to be brushed off because there were 17 year old kids who figured out how to make youtube videos.

I never gave it that much thought at the time, but now it seems to me that youtube and the live video streaming people are going to be a big part of marketing a game. They adhere to no standards, and are pretty much swayed at the lowest of prices.

I hate to say this, but perhaps this is a giod thing about metacritic in a way. I mean, there are some shady media outlets there, but at least they are vetted and filtered to some degree.

"PhatzBlutz" Youtube scores don't get aggregated

 

[Gomu Gomu]

God dammit man it's Mick Foley. MICK!!!!

Hah, my bad . Never been much of a wrestling guy myself. It's a miracle I was this close to his real name in the first place.

 

[Empty]

Yup. So there was a local gaming event a couple of weeks ago, where people like Harada of Tekken series & wrestler Mike Foley (to promote WWE 13) were there to engage the fans.
What no one expected was the HUUUUUGE amount of kids/teens that blew them over and made a scene around some locally famous youtube commentators. I'm talking about perhaps hundreds of kids around this one guy, getting pictures taken and fucking autographs and shit. It was surreal.

I mean here we have some actual significant people, who had amazing careers and traveled from far away to attend this event, only to be brushed off because there were 17 year old kids who figured out how to make youtube videos.

I never gave it that much thought at the time, but now it seems to me that youtube and the live video streaming people are going to be a big part of marketing a game. They adhere to no standards, and are pretty much swayed at the lowest of prices.

there was an interesting eurogamer article about this a few weeks ago - http://www.eurogamer.net/articles/2012-10-11-an-audience-with-syndicate

it's incredibly interesting and for someone like me who is very familiar with the newspaper form and that kind of long form writing but just put online yet doesn't subscribe to a single youtube channel it's hard to understand this change in how people get information about games.

 

[Victrix]

I mean here we have some actual significant people, who had amazing careers and traveled from far away to attend this event, only to be brushed off because there were 17 year old kids who figured out how to make youtube videos.

FPS Russia is in the Black Ops 2 live trailer alongside Robert Downey Jr. Just saying.

 

[Jintor]

I never gave it that much thought at the time, but now it seems to me that youtube and the live video streaming people are going to be a big part of marketing a game. They adhere to no standards, and are pretty much swayed at the lowest of prices.

Participatory media, baby!

it's incredibly interesting and for someone like me who is very familiar with the newspaper form and that kind of long form writing but just put online yet doesn't subscribe to a single youtube channel it's hard to understand this change in how people get information about games.

Consumption habits are changing so quickly and so fast.

 

[EternalGamer]

there was an interesting eurogamer article about this a few weeks ago - http://www.eurogamer.net/articles/2012-10-11-an-audience-with-syndicate

it's incredibly interesting and for someone like me who is very familiar with the newspaper form and that kind of long form writing but just put online yet doesn't subscribe to a single youtube channel it's hard to understand this change in how people get information about games.

What in the ever living fuck:

Of course, however, his tremendous success has brought about a life that few could see as their own reality. "I'm living at home at the moment, and I've finally purchased my own property," he says. "I'm a home-owner at 19 which is pretty cool. I'm staying local to where I've always lived. I've got three ultimate goals in life - a job in the games industry, to travel the world, and create my own house. I used to like a lot of Grand Designs. So with the house I bought - I'm knocking it down. I'm going to build my own dream gaming house."

That dude posts youtube videos and there are picture of him in that story crowd surfing like a rockstar. I have never felt so old and out of touch. Hold me, Giant Bomb.

 

[Jintor]

get your old man germs away from me

 

[antitrop]

What in the ever living fuck:

That dude posts youtube videos and there are picture of him in that story crowd surfing like a rockstar. I have never felt so old and out of touch. Hold me, Giant Bomb.

What





The






Fuck.

 

[Jintor]

Letter from Edge

 

[Meccanical]

You know, I have though numerous times about getting into this youtube celebrity thing, it seems like it's so damn easy.

I have a radio quality voice, I could probably pull it off.

But at the same time, my fanbase would be the youtube community, and that's no good.

 

[Victrix]

You know, I have though numerous times about getting into this youtube celebrity thing, it seems like it's so damn easy.

I have a radio quality voice, I could probably pull it off.

But at the same time, my fanbase would be the youtube community, and that's no good.

It's not that easy. You have to devote hours to it, hours and hours and hours, and you have to be consistently producing something that catches the eye of enough viewers to make it snowball. Viewers are extremely fickle. I had one of the most popular MW2 streams on jtv, I stopped streaming because I got bored of playing, by the time I came back, other streamers had replaced me and my viewership tanked completely.

And there are plenty of cool fans out there, a good chunk of my nightly CoD/FPS console playgroup comes from stream viewers, as did all of my chat moderators (a necessity, once you get into the hundreds+ of live viewers, if you want realtime chat and you give a shit about having chat quality higher than that of the fighting game chat channels, which I did). Hell, some of them made the jump over to my PC gaming group, and I know a few of them personally now.

If anything, I interacted far more directly with my viewers than I do with anyone here on GAF, despite having posted here for something like what, seven years?

 

[Meccanical]

Yeah the problem with being an LPer, once you do that one thing that's popular, that will be all anyone wants you to do, and you pretty much have to do it consistently, otherwise you will be out of luck.

And honestly, I'm not sure I want to turn my hobby into a full time job.

 

[Victrix]

Yeah the problem with being an LPer, once you do that one thing that's popular, that will be all anyone wants you to do, and you pretty much have to do it consistently, otherwise you will be out of luck.

And honestly, I'm not sure I want to turn my hobby into a full time job.

It very much is. I know several of the most popular streamers and youtube personalities, and I know a fact that least one of them is completely sick of the main game he does videos for, but he keeps churning them out, because that is his job. I actually respect that, because he does put in the work to put up regular content, and he does his best to keep it interesting, at least on the level that his fans expect from him.

edit: This is straying from the thread topic, I'll stop this derail

 

[Huevos de Oro]

Wow at that Syndicate article. I feel so fucking old. But it's great to see he seems to be a pretty down-to-earth young man.

 

[antitrop]

You know, I have though numerous times about getting into this youtube celebrity thing, it seems like it's so damn easy.

Quite the opposite, I think. It's so overcrowded that it's damn near impossible to make a name for yourself anymore.
You have to get in early on something really huge. Several people managed to get YouTube rich off of StarCraft II by doing HD casts early on in the beta in 2010 (Husky and HDStarCraft, most notably).

Plenty of others tried after the games release, only to be met with no views.

It requires foresight, luck, and a ridiculous amount of self-promotion.

 

[Lancehead]

edit: This is straying from the thread topic, I'll stop this derail

Is it, though? I mean, youtubers, live streamers etc can be categorised under enthusiast media. The issue of ethics is still relevant in their cases also.

 

[EternalGamer]

Giantbomb is to us as Murder She Wrote is to our Grandparents.

Is it, though? I mean, youtubers, live streamers etc can be categorised under enthusiast media. The issue of ethics is still relevant in their cases also.

Which is what makes that Machinima stuff so gross.

 

[conman]

there was an interesting eurogamer article about this a few weeks ago - http://www.eurogamer.net/articles/2012-10-11-an-audience-with-syndicate

it's incredibly interesting and for someone like me who is very familiar with the newspaper form and that kind of long form writing but just put online yet doesn't subscribe to a single youtube channel it's hard to understand this change in how people get information about games.

Letter from Edge

Between these two things, something occurs to me:

The form of games writing that we're all trying to "save" might already be on its last legs. If we do manage to give the journalists a booster shot of integrity, it may be like convincing the captain of the Titanic to learn to sing opera.

I mean if a kid like that is earning that much money (and it sounds like many others like him are, as well), how can the traditional media hope to compete? What is it we're really hoping to preserve?

Man, do I feel old. I honestly had no idea. Props again to Eurogamer for keeping their ears to the ground.

 

[kms_md]

Letter from Edge

Excellent point here

videogame journalists should always remember that they are not in the videogame industry. They’re members of the global republic of letters. That ought to be a source of sufficient pride in itself.

 

[antitrop]

Giantbomb is to us as Murder She Wrote is to our Grandparents.

If this means that Angela Lansbury will be reviewing Halo 4, I'm perfectly OK with that.

I mean if a kid like that is earning that much money (and it sounds like many others like him are, as well), how can the traditional media hope to compete? What is it we're really hoping to preserve?

Man, do I feel old. I honestly had no idea.

I think YouTube is sort of a bubble, or at least it is in the current form. Not YouTube itself, but the sort of game-related content that you find on it.

I think there will always be room for TotalBiscuit-style game analysis and overview, but not for "360 QuIckSCOpE heADShot *DUBSTEP*" bullshit like these kids are getting rich off.

 

[Lactose_Intolerant]

If this means that Angela Lansbury will be reviewing Halo 4, I'm perfectly OK with that.

She needs the work