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[wotta]

Here we go again....

I don't think the person who wrote this likes Polygon much.

http://www.ruthlessreviews.com/20998/abcs-game-journalism/

Adclicks: The alpha and the omega, the end all/be all of the profession. This is why the usual rags update a hundred times a day, about anything that has even the flimsiest of connections to video games. You may think you got into games writing to share your love of the medium with a like-minded audience, but in reality, the powers that be only pay your meager wages to subsidize the sale of Halo/Call of Duty themed Doritos and Mountain Dew to children half your (biological, not mental) age.

Polygon.com: An insufferable game journalist supergroup which regularly trashes fantastic games for daring to have sex appeal, and can spend half or more of its famously, painfully underwritten “reviews” to grandstand about social issues. Imagine if Consumer Reports used their iPhone reviews to discuss the moral failings of Foxconn at length? Nobody would subscribe.

Related – Plante, Chris: Polygon’s henpecked editor-at-large is a man who once wrote an article decrying Bioshock Infinite, one of 2013’s masterpieces, on the basis that it was too violent for his wife to watch.

russ pitts gaming funny losers stupid hate gaming journalism bad writing

Related – Pitts, Russ: Polygon’s current features editor (and former editor-in-chief of The Escapist) can’t go very long without using the words “girls becoming women” in articles ostensibly about video games. And yes, he looks exactly like you’d expect after reading that sentence – you wouldn’t want to see him loitering outside a public restroom while your wife/girlfriend/daughter was occupying it.

@kezamacdonald: Astonishing bitterness, isolation and sexism.

- Former IGN Editor / Now Freelance

Never read so much shite about my job.

- Games Editor, CVG

The worst part of this...

Sexism: Your colleagues are obsessed with it because they’re a bunch of liberal vaginas who spend too much time on Tumblr. Your bosses are obsessed with it because whining about it brings in the clicks like nothing else. As a result, if a female character in a video game has a huge rack or is otherwise made to be visually appealing to the medium’s overwhelmingly male audience, you can set your clock to the fact that some chowderhead on staff is going to put it on the same tier of atrocity as gang rape.

 

[Kru]

Yay now the gaming journalists know their abc's, they can ruin gaming for you and me....


EDIT: This article is gold. I don't agree with everything, but it's definitely as harsh as it rightfully should be.

 

[8bit]

Someone's bitter that no-one wants to read his CV.

 

[paperboywriter]

never heard of this site

 

[FlyingSaucer]

Another good comment :

This is seriously one of the most bitter, childish, and awful things I've read in a while. It's like the sordid collective imagination of NeoGaf somehow gained sentience and wrote a piece of games "criticism."

 

[Ashes]

Why so serious?

 

[wotta]

never heard of this site

No me neither, just saw a few journos tweet about it, they were not very impressed that's for sure.

 

[daviyoung]

This is great

 

[ElectricBlanketFire]

"R" should have been "ruthlessreviews.com" so I could learn who they are.

 

[Parmenide]

Thank you very much OP, it was an amazing reading.
I agree with every single point.

 

[Data West]

Ben from game journos got a new job?

 

[SolidChamp]

Hardcore. No, wait, dude was too much of a pussy to put himself out there much beyond the name "George". So, not hardcore.

Still, he does bring up some valid points. Truth can be an abrasive bitch at times.

 

[Andeeeh]

Harsh and it hurts because it true.

 

[liquidtmd]

Sexism: Your colleagues are obsessed with it because they’re a bunch of liberal vaginas who spend too much time on Tumblr. Your bosses are obsessed with it because whining about it brings in the clicks like nothing else. As a result, if a female character in a video game has a huge rack or is otherwise made to be visually appealing to the medium’s overwhelmingly male audience, you can set your clock to the fact that some chowderhead on staff is going to put it on the same tier of atrocity as gang rape.

Not sure whether I'd word it this strongly but I certainly see what the authors going for

 

[wotta]

"Good writers might say more with less, but good games journalists will use five words where one would suffice”

I have to agree with this part at least. The amount of times I read pages of words, when one page could have said it all.

 

[renitou]

Well, if game journos are mocking it on twitter, it must have been getting something right.

 

[djplaeskool]

The Polygon segment made me chuckle.

 

[Jotaka]

I liked it lol

Development: “I’m only writing these glorified marketing pieces to pay the bills until I get my big break making games.”

 

[Einbroch]

Could have written it more professionally. Honestly hard to take seriously.

 

[Stop It]

From the article:

Development: “I’m only writing these glorified marketing pieces to pay the bills until I get my big break making games.” That’s what you tell yourself when you go to sleep at night, isn’t it? After all, the dude who made Bastion did it, you can too!

My biggest current bugbear with many so called journalists who don't care about their trade so much as trying to cozy up to developers/publishers for the next CM job etc.

The incestuous nature of the gaming media in this regard is bad enough, but it adds to the "us and them" culture where these guys fight for anti consumer practices (sometimes even fighting consumers directly) rather than the people they're meant to be informing.

 

[benny_a]

I think that article was garbage.

 

[Intheflorsh]

X-Rated: Once upon an Internet, attractive, work-adverse women flashed their goods on camera for items from an Amazon wishlist. No longer – today, it’s entirely possible to “pay for college” (or implants, purses, etc.) by spackling on the makeup and throwing on a Mario T-shirt (preferably with underboob).

This guy seems to have some, uh, issues.

 

[hammster]

I can't believe you guys are defending the original piece.

 

[SlowRevolution]

that was really bad.

 

[wotta]

I think that article was garbage.

Agreed. I think he makes one or two fair points, but it's a badly worded article really.

 

[jay]

The core male gamers never ending fight against feminism is fascinating.

 

[Data West]

This guy seems to have some, uh, issues.

mmmm'lady