Game Journalism: A Table of Doritos

[Jeremy]

People are so fucking lazy these days.

QF™

[Shin Johnpv]

The "journalists" caught within in the industry have no power to stop how gaming journalism works now and to be honest, this is a consequence of all of the BS started from the 90's. I am going to stereotype here but many of the people in this industry are there because they've failed to become something else and using it to bide their time before the next step. The lifers are trying to ride the wave out as long as they can. In either case, they aren't going to cut off their life line by poopooing how their industry works and really, they don't have the influence (ie money) to change anything. It's the same case in Japan, where the publishers control your salary and coverage. You don't play ball, you don't get ads or PR support then go out of business.

I'd like to think most of the people on this forum can think enough for themselves that they can form better opinions than anything that's in print today.

It would seem to me then, that its time for Gaming Mags and sites to find sources for ads and thus revenue other than the gaming industry. They need to stop being on the leash of game publishers.

[Melf]

People are so fucking lazy these days.

I was thinking more about this last night. Could it have something to do with deadlines? I remember that Retro Gamer magazine released an article on the Sega Technical Institute exactly one week before I had planned to publish mine. It's article only spoke to one person, cited my own site, and had a bunch of factual errors in it. In contrast, I spoke to more than 10 people and had much more info. I was thinking that mine was more complete because I had no drop date or page limit, so I could take my time in tracking down people to talk to.

I have a historial on the Sega Sports brand coming next month, and I've talked to over a dozen former Sega people for it. I've been working on it since July though. Someone expected to produce for a magazine - or worse, a major online outlet - wouldn't have that luxury.

Of course, they could always do the article little by little alongside their monthly stuff and not publish it until it's ready. However, I'm not well versed in online media deadlines and such to know how feasible that would be. Frog? Razor?

[Some Stupid Japanese Name]

In a setting like that, dont you have multiple people working on multiple articles? It might take 6 months to get one done, but thats what staggering your schedule is for.

[Diff-chan]

Do people care about Sega Technical Institute enough to devote multiple people and 6 months? I don't think so. You can get way more hits by rewriting a Battlefield 3 DLC press release or posting a few pictures of cosplay.

[Some Stupid Japanese Name]

Does the vast majority of people care? No. But the vast majority doesnt want to pay for anything.
I would be more than happy to pay actual money for a mag (be it print or not) that actually got in depth like Melf does. I know I am not alone. That mag used to be Retro Gamer, but as time went on it got more sloppy and more repetitious. I havent bought an issue in probably two years now. I used to try to get it every month, $10 a shot.

[kedawa]

I stopped buying gaming mags when Next Generation became NextGen and turned to absolute shit.
If Edge had been more readily available in my area, I may have picked that up, but everything else is for mouth-breathers and kids.

[Hero]

Yeah, I could see myself paying for something with well-written, in-depth articles on the kinds of things I like. I used to get Animation Magazine, Creative Arts, Communication Arts, etc. until each one had to go for budget reasons. If I could find a mag that was about game creation, game history, and such it would be nice to have. I know it's a niche of a niche though :/

[kedawa]

In depth articles about the history and technology of games are about the only thing that makes any sense for print as far as I'm concerned.
Nobody wants to pay for months old 'news'.

[Melf]

Do people care about Sega Technical Institute enough to devote multiple people and 6 months? I don't think so. You can get way more hits by rewriting a Battlefield 3 DLC press release or posting a few pictures of cosplay.

Then the problem is as much the audience as it is the writer. As long as sites and magazines continue to cater to that kind of reader, that's all games journalism is going to ever be.

I WANT TO CHANGE THE PARA-DIGM!