Game Journalism: A Table of Doritos

Smarter articles get hits too, though. There are times when editorial will go with the weaker article out of cynicism and it clearly does worse.

The trollish stuff gets circulated, but the flat-out dumb stuff with short paragraphs and lots of pictures really doesn't.

Not ones on TNL

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Originally Posted by Fe 26

Is there a game site that reviews games months if not years after the game was released? After the dust has settled? I'd like to read something like that. I rarely if ever get games at release now. Reviews about a game at release aren't very helpful. Telling me that something was hot in 94 is not the same thing as being fun in 2012. It would have the added bonus of not having to deal with this crap. You wouldn't have to suck corporate dick for a review copy.



Question: How did news and journalism fund shit 20-30 years ago? Because funding sounds like the real problem. Magazines and websites are dependent on the game producer for review copies, image/press packs. hotel rooms, parties, dinners and shit. How does a real journalist cover these costs when the corp tit is taken away?

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The Time Extend column of Edge is my favorite part of the mag. Never gotten worked up over game journalism. Hell Gamefan dedicated monthly space to gloating about the free PR shit they received, sucks for the folks that take it seriously.

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Originally Posted by Frogacuda

Smarter articles get hits too, though. There are times when editorial will go with the weaker article out of cynicism and it clearly does worse.

The trollish stuff gets circulated, but the flat-out dumb stuff with short paragraphs and lots of pictures really doesn't.

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It's about cost-benefit. A bunch of small paragraphs and pictures takes an unpaid internet an hour to put together.

Buzzfeed gets all of its money by barely paying a bunch of hipsters to surf the internet every day and cobble together stuff to get cheap hits. Even if 1 out of 100 becomes widely circulated, its easy money.

Honestly, it should be taken seriously. I mean, I love games and don't care directly what journalists do. I don't personally care that people think games are for kids, etc etc. However, it just makes me think of the hypothetical. If you had real journalistic integrity, what kind of positive impact would that have on the industry as a whole? Would games be even 1% better for it?

Right now all you have is Doritos and Mt Dew and VGA stupidity. Which, again, is whatever, but it could be a little more professional. I don't need the industry to be snobby. It is already though, in a different way.

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Originally Posted by Diff-chan

It's about cost-benefit. A bunch of small paragraphs and pictures takes an unpaid internet an hour to put together.

Buzzfeed gets all of its money by barely paying a bunch of hipsters to surf the internet every day and cobble together stuff that gets cheap hits. Even if 1 out of 100 becomes widely circulated, its easy money.

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There's a lot of truth to this; game journalists are overworked and often pressured to churn out fast content over stuff that requires a lot of legwork. But having seen it first hand, there's also a lot of cynicism and selling the audience short as well. Combination of both.

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Originally Posted by Diff-chan

Buzzfeed gets all of its money by barely paying a bunch of hipsters to surf the internet every day and cobble together stuff to get cheap hits. Even if 1 out of 100 becomes widely circulated, its easy money.

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Bleacher Report.

Yea, just sold for what, $175 million? Huffington Post is the same way.

Awful. Just awful.

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Originally Posted by Frogacuda

I was speaking more about the non-review content. Writing these dumb features with salacious headlines like "Are Videogames Porn?" or "Top 5 Head Explosions" or what have you. They'll turn down a long, detailed article with insightful first-hand interviews in favor of something with a picture for every paragraph like the audience is on the reading level of Clifford the Big Red Dog.

I'd like to make a distinction between game journalism and game criticism. They're not the same thing.

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A lot of web surfers do carry themselves like morons though.

We have a whole generation of web users that primarily access the internet with their phone. They like for reviews to break up nicely into pics and little paragraphs that fit on their smart phone screen. They get frustrated with articles that take up multiple pages on a computer screen. TL DR, etc.

a lot of consumers have ego, laziness, and apathy issues. Sure, they're about to go home and waste a day on the newest sports game, but they still think their time is too valuable to waste on reading a good intricate review that doesn't fit on their phone. They have things to do. They're important.