Game Journalism: A Table of Doritos

[Diff-chan]

Eurogamer tightened their standards to basically not let their writers or freelancers do the sort of things that Wainwright (and probably everyone else) was doing.

[Frogacuda]

I have witnessed people who had a sexual relationship with PR people and didnt feel the need to stop covering said companies games or even disclose their relationship.

You know, I don't think this has come up in the thread yet, but yeah, I've seen this happen.

[kedawa]

I'm sure a few have been raped by Seth Killian.

[station82o]

Read this entire thread, and this type of stuff isn't limited to gaming journalism. In niche music genre publications there's a lot of hidden and stealthily applied pressure to (for example) metal websites and especially print magazines to pad review scores. The scale is smaller than the gaming industry both in terms of readers/viewers and advertising dollars of course but the same principles are at work. I've heard of really good, independent metal bloggers getting shafted out of media access to a record label's artist roster, promotional copy(ies), and getting just plain ignored by label PR reps if that blogger had given one of their top acts a mediocre to scathing review. When a print magazine like Metal Hammer would hype up a particular album in previews and ultimately a review that the majority of metal fans on truly independent websites received lukewarmly -- it does begin to add up to being a rather suspicious pattern.

I'm just a small time nobody, fan blogger who runs his own metal based opinion blog. I've applied for media credentials access to a couple different labels since I've been getting some pretty heavy traffic due to articles of mine going semi-viral on twitter and reddit, and while most of the requests were simply ignored, I was told via email reply by one that they'd be taking a look at me and "seeing how things go". WTF does that mean? It basically means if I give their superstar bands a less than stellar writeup, I might not ever see credentials.

Its not really a big deal to me, because I don't get money off advertising, its just a hobby that I end up having to pay out the ass sometimes to do, but I enjoy not having to answer to anyone about anything. Point is though that the same shit ends up in every toliet -- its just that the ppl with money at stake will make sure their toliets are the jet engine flush kind, they'll suck down that shit no matter how big.

[Frogacuda]

That's pretty bad. My experience with game companies is more like what Ali said: They try to butter journos up with trips and booze and friendly meetings so that the writers feel like they're "friends" with the dev/pub and don't want to trash them. But it's never been framed as this "we need a good score or else" kind of thing. Usually they know if their game is bad or if a review is fair.

I know movie studios have been known to use a lot of similar strategies to ply reviewers.

[kedawa]

I have a friend who is in the RC car business, and his experience with RC car magazines is that they basically devote more coverage and give favourable reviews to companies that buy advertising in their publications, and from the examples I was shown, it's pretty blatant.

[Diff-chan]

Sayre's law, it's probably worse as the stakes get lower. The game industry is huge and the companies are large, but RC cars and metal?

[station82o]

Well I dont know about metal issues being more bitter. It also works inversely that there's less for someone like me to lose. I dont make money doing this so I don't need to kiss ass unlike say someone who works at ign.

[Frogacuda]

No one at IGN "has" to kiss ass, it's more that the whole business is very incestuous and you get to know the people working on the games by covering them over the course of your development, and that's going to color what you write compared to some anonymous blogger who's totally divested.

That said, I could give two fucks about review scores, and kind of don't like that they're the only part of game journalism anyone ever focuses on.

[bahn]

I kind of wish that more game journalists would take their work seriously. Too many times I've read articles that are only sourced off the web or have just a single source. Part of doing good work is to thoroughly research the topic, and I've read far too many poorly researched pieces "professional" sites and magazines. It kind of pisses me off that so many are published and widely read, when those of us who actually take the time to get things right have to struggle for exposure.

I just want people to read my stuff, but I'm not after hits or views. I actually don't even know if Sega-16's traffic is decent, great, or bad. What's the standard for a "popular" site?

Bro, I can definitely tell ya that not only people read your stuff, but they appreciate the amount of work you've put into it. Sega-16 has come a LONG way and it's definitely a solid resource.

As for some of the "pro" sites, I think you know my thoughts on that. In any case, give yourself a little bit more credit!