I told you so (yet again)

[Rhomal]

when I posted a article about this issue on nwn2news several moons ago many people scoffed at it. Saying reviewers are not swayed/pressured to give good reviews of hyped titles and the fact the average scores for all the major sites over a 4 months average I did that were all near or over the 80% range was just a fluke.

 

Well this comes today from blues news:

 

GameSpot Editor Fired Over Review?

 

Primotech reports the firing of Jeff Gerstmann, long-time GameSpot editor, saying sources close to the situation indicate this due to his tepid review of Kane & Lynch: Dead Men for Xbox 360, pointing out Eidos had invested in a prominent advertising campaign on the site. The article points out this Penny Arcade comic offering a typically searing take on the situation, along with another indication this unconfirmed story is making the rounds. A later update on DESTRUCTOID reports the departure of GameSpot editor Tim Tracy though it's not clear if or how this may relate to the situation described above.

 

*cough*

[Meshugger]

I will wait to comment about this until there is a somewhat official statement from the guy.

[Tale]

It's still only a rumor. You can't "I told you so" over a rumor.

 

Of course, the notion that reviewers working for major sites or magazines aren't pressured to give higher reviews because of advertisers is ludicrous. Whether or not that pressure works is another matter. We have admissions from Penny-Arcade that Ubisoft was upset with them about what they said about Prince of Persia 2.

Edited November 30, 2007 by Tale

[Nick_i_am]

Nice work Nostrodamus.

[Musopticon?]

It's been pretty clear that the likes of IGN and Gamespot get paid for good scores. I mean, isn't it pretty nonsensical to even have a rating system if you give nearly every game in a span of two months(like last year's Christmas period) over 9/10.

 

Furthermore, bought reviewers are nothing new. Just look at movie and book critics.

[Volourn]

I don't think it's neccessarily true that they get paid for good reviews (though, I'm sure it does happen from time to time); but pressured/'swayed' into it; that's very believeable. No doubt about it.

[Morgoth]

Thanks god I always know which game (and why) I exactly want to get in advance. I'm usually trusting my favorite companies on this... no need for our "professional" game journalism.

[Deadly_Nightshade]

*Image very regretfully removed for bad language*

 

*It was quite funny, though*

[Hurlshort]

Wait a sec... if this rumor is true, it means that reviewers can be trusted. This guy lost his job to bring us an honest review, according to the story. Three cheers for journalistic integrity!

[Walsingham]

I agree. Integrity is good, but was it really worth his job to make us popcorn eating swine not buy a game?

[Tale]

I wouldn't be surprised if it went down like this:

 

Editor: Eidos is upset with us for the low score on Kane & Lynch: Dead Men and will be pulling advertising. I'm not going to take down your review or anything of the sort, but in the future we would appreciate it if you were a little less harsh in your reviewing.

Reviewer: **** you.

Editor: What?!

Review: I said "**** you." **** Eidos, **** Kane, **** Lynch, **** **** **** **** **** **** twilight princess **** **** **** the only good game is Tony Hawk **** **** ****

Editor: Get out!

 

Not saying that's what happened, but it would be funny.

[Pidesco]

Actually, what worries me about game reviewers is not that publishers might have them in their pockets, but rather that given the standard of gaming journalism, they don't need to have journalists in their payroll.

[Gorgon]

To me it serves to reafirm what I have always thought. The games companies need the reviews for the release spin, and the games sites need interviews with designers, and the ad revenue.

 

Not much incentive for straigth talk there, a microcosmos of how political reporting works most of the time.

 

Compare with food critics for instance, there the resturants need the reviews, full stop, no interdependence, which is why the reviewers merciessly butcher resturants they don't like.

Edited November 30, 2007 by Gorgon

[Tale]

The games companies need the reviews for the release spin, and the games sites need interviews with designers, and the ad revenue.

The games sites need readers to get ad revenue, and the readers need trust to read the game site.

 

Compare with food critics for instance, there the resturants need the reviews, full stop, no interdependence, which is why they merciessly butcher resturants they don't like.

Many food critics simply don't publish their bad reviews from what I hear. Which contrasts with what you're saying.

Edited November 30, 2007 by Tale

[Gorgon]

The games sites need readers to get ad revenue, and the readers need trust to read the game site.

Nahh just dazzle them with screenshots and video and get it out before anyone else, the game companies don't even release demos anymore, too big a risk, it could show everyone what a POS the game really is.

 

If there are no sites anywhere that can really be trusted, there is no competition on quality and honesty. I take more stock of word of mouth, or word of forum than a review. Of course there are plenty of wringers in such places as well, trend setters who hype from behind their keyboards. It's all the hype in advertising nowadays, a way to get to the chronically distrustful, such as myself.

Edited November 30, 2007 by Gorgon

[SteveThaiBinh]

Short comment from Gamespot.

 

Firing a guy over a poor review because a sponsor complained is a very foolish thing to do. Firing a guy over something entirely different, around the same time he gives a major sponsor's game a poor review, is also a pretty foolish thing to do since it's fairly obvious people would leap to conclusions. All in all, a disaster of Gamespot's own making?

[mkreku]

Not sure if they're keeping their integrity by firing him or if they've just lost a lot of credibility.

 

We used to get a few sour comments from our distributors, but they never threatened us.

[Tale]

If there are no sites anywhere that can really be trusted, there is no competition on quality and honesty.

 

Bunk. Competition is never about being perfect. It's about being simply reasonably better. Appearing less corrupt than others is easily a point to compete upon.

 

Aside, Penny-Arcade practically proves it. They've lambasted plenty of games from plenty of companies and downright refuse to advertise a game they can't recommend. They've had companies threaten to pull advertising altogether over some of it, but the fact that Penny-Arcade is capable of getting the trust of its readers keeps the advertisers coming. Because the advertiser needs the reader.

Edited November 30, 2007 by Tale

[LadyCrimson]

I take more stock of word of mouth, or word of forum than a review.

That would be me, as well. I look at reviews sometimes, certainly, but since ANY review is only ONE person's opinion, I place much more importance on blogs/word of mouth/forums etc. for a well-rounded consensus than on 5-10 people from review sites.

 

However, I think firing a writer only because of ad pressure to write a review to pander to advertisers would certainly be bogus. No clue if that was actually so in this case ... I don't care enough about the case to research it ... I'm only saying that I'm against the notion in principle.

[WILL THE ALMIGHTY]

Frankly, when looking at game review, I mostly look at the good and bad comments about the game, not the score. You can't make a reviewer lie about graphics for example, or say the story is amazing when it's terribly shallow and everyone knows it.

[Walsingham]

I'm interested by this interdependence thing. I mean, how seriously do people expect integrity when they actually buy the official playstation magazine. A magazine owned and run by the company which makes the freaking games?

 

Actually, come to that, people read The Sun newspaper and listen to its reviews of Fox films.

[Hurlshort]

Well, I do expect a different journalistic slant when reading an official product magazine and a rag like PG Gamer. But the real reason I read magazines is for the pretty pictures and monthly gossip on what's going on in the game industry. It's not the Wall Street Journal, it's a magazine about games.

[Pop]

You can't make a reviewer lie about graphics for example, or say the story is amazing when it's terribly shallow and everyone knows it.

[Azure79]

You can't make a reviewer lie about graphics for example, or say the story is amazing when it's terribly shallow and everyone knows it.

 

 

As for me, I visit game sites to get news on games I'm looking forward to and the occasional nostalgia factor when the sites puts up a good read on past games and systems. I also like to keep track of the gaming scene in general, as in who is doing what, how the consoles are doing, new versions of consoles, price drops etc. I don't even own the current consoles but its cool to see what is out there.

 

Entertainment is another factor. There is one segment I enjoy at 1up called Broken Pixels where they make fun of laughably bad games. I enjoy watching that one.

 

I read reviews on games just to glean some information on whether I should consider it for purchase down the line, when the prices have gone down and I actually own the console they are playable in. An exceptionally good review won't make me rush out and buy a game. The full retail price tag is a sufficient deterrent in my case. I'm a cheap cheap man.

 

Anyhoo, its a shame if the guy did get fired over a negative review of a game. I try not to let review scores influence me that much. I've enjoyed some games that received somewhat negative reviews. (Warrior Within....I liked it), but I'll agree that honest reviews help give people a heads up on mediocre games that have been hyped entirely too much.

[SteveThaiBinh]

I rely on Gamespot for their reviews of traditional point and click adventures: "This game sucks, because it's got, like, puzzles and stuff, and some of them are like, hard and stuff - 3.6!!!"