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Magazines Faking Game Reviews?
lunchlady doris writes: "With videogames becoming a huge business and magazines having large lead times, something has got to give if they want to compete with web sites. Planet GameCube has a story where it seems that some magazines have decided that eschewing actual journalism is the way to go, with both Extreme Gamer and Request Magazine having reviews for Nintendo's Eternal Darkness, a game that is currently incomplete and is only expected to arrive in stores at the end of June."
Some years ago we had some similar situation when a journalist, Francis Rozange, got some acrimonious game reviews stolen, then corrected to please the announcers who would not spend a single cent for advertising in a magazine that would just let such disadvantageous reviews... ...
Actually, the French law allow a typical magazine to be classified as information-press if its percentage of ads remains lower than 66%.
Where that's becoming quite outrageous is that most "honourable" magazine maximize this percentage to 65% so that they get the bucks along with the status.
Now, the problem with the press is that the newspapers mostly belong to some big media lobbies
So, I wonder why one should be surprised of such headline...
Trolling using another account since 2005.
Most games mags get "special" versions of the game at least a month before the game goes gold, along with a list of things that will be fixed before it hits the shops (frame rate improvements, bugs fixed, etc.).
The only time mags get final versions are if:
(a) The game is finished long before its release (i.e. they are delaying the game for the Xmas rush).
(b) The mag in question can't be trusted to ignore the faults in their review copy (mainstream "lifestyle" mags for example)
If you look carefully at the screenshots they use you will occasionally see how they are subtly different to the finished product.
To be honest, I just take this kind of thing as read. Here in the UK it seems to be par for the course that certain unscrupulous magazines will review unfinished code (favourably in most cases) and in some instances, you get the impression that the reviewer hasn't even seen the game. The cynic within suspects that deals for advertising may have been done...
One incident that sticks in my mind is the CUAmiga review of Elite: Frontier, which scored very highly, yet there was no mention whatsoever of the showstopping bugs that ruined the game. Having said that, CUAmiga was usually one of the more trustworthy magazines.
http://www.davetansley.com - you proba
PC Gamer in Europe, especially the British version. I remember when they gave Game of The Month to some game a couple of years ago (must have been a FPS, it's the *only* thing they like - probably Messiah) which was then delayed months because of severe bugs. They have also referred in reviews to features which have been dropped in the final version of the game.
The game publishers allow it becuase it helps build hype around their games before they are published. The game magazines do it because the one to publish the review first of the currently #1 hyped game sells lots of extra issues. The gamers do it because appearently the majority are idiots who don't notice or don't care that they are reading a review of an alpha version mixed with rehashed press releases and official screenshots!
One of the few magazines which have tried to change the trend is Computer Games, they have a policy (at least they used to) of reviewing only released games, as they are out of the box without patches.
/Lars Westergren
I ran into a problem with folks not reviewing games when the GBA (Game Boy Advance for the un-anointed) first came out. My brother and I were trying to decide which games we should both get vs. which we should just share. Bomberman Tournament was the title we'd anticipated most, so if there was any possibility of increasing the gameplay value by buying two, we were gonna do it.
And, after a quick perusal of two of the largest gaming sites around - Gamespot.com and IGN.com - we decided two cartridges were the way to go. After all, in Gamespot's review, Frank Provo writes:
Sounds good, especially when paired with David Zdyrko's comments in IGN's review:
So, we went and bought two copies, whipped those babies out, and set up a game. And, lo and behold - no multi-cartridge support. Yes, indeed, the single gamepak mode had lots of slow load times. But having more than one doesn't do you any good unless you lose a game in the couch cushions.
There was some moaning about this issue on the Gamespot forums, and as it turns out, the multi-cartridge support had not been brought over to the US version. Some of the reviewers had been given bad data by the company.
To which I first though, "OK, no big whoop. Shit happens." But the more I considered it, the more it bugged me. These two reviewers made claims based on information they got from the company that made the game - NOT their own experiences. They didn't test these features; they just threw them into the review.
I understand the most probable reasons: lack of time, only one cartridge to test with. But all I'm asking is for a simply "We didn't have two copies, so we can say for ourselves, but apparently..." Yes, it sounds a little wussy, but it makes the difference between journalism and an ad. At the very least, they could have corrected the error when they were notified; I'm aware of several people who have contacted both sites, including myself, and one Gamespot official even bothered to reply about it in the forums, but both still stand unchanged.
OK, this is a minor thing, I know. But it did cost me about 30 bucks, and it makes me wonder: how much else in these "reviews" is straight out of a press release?
Uhhhh....pre-sales??
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'Exclusive' reviews of incomplete (or in some cases entirely non-existent) games have been around almost as long as computer games magazines themselves. I remember back in the glory days of the classic UK games mags of the 80s and early 90s - the likes of ZZap, Crash, Your Sinclair, Commodore Format, Amiga Format etc - the surprise was when a review of a real, *finished* game was published (it was not unusual to see rave, 95% reviews of games which were never even written :-)
UK and Australian readers will probably know what I am talking about: I'm sure I'm not the only one who misses the zany yet sophisticated humour, and complete and utter lack of moral fibre, of the great UK games mags. The copious pop-culture references, the disturbing running gags and in-jokes, the barf-inducing layouts.... all seem to be missing from today's sanitised publications.
There was a terrific site set up by the staff of the short-lived (but truly surreal while it lasted) Amiga Power magazine, telling the inside story of the fake reviews, blatant plagiarism etc of the UK games mag scene of the period. Unfortunately it seems to have vanished.... hopefully someone might turn up with a URL.
-- briggers Remove blinkers to email me.
Because ign.com does tons of other stuff other than video games, they don't have this problem.
I own a GC, and am certainly experienced enough not to count on reviews of games before the game has shipped. IGN is good about this stuff. They play the games, and they dont go easy on them in reivews (I've found the X-Box team at IGN is more prone to 'gloss' for bad games), I'd say that they arn't afraid of biting the hand that feeds them.
I think the key is relying on sources that are:
a) knowledgable
b) cover a broader base of interests than those you seek, such that their business doesn't rely soley on the area of interests you are seeking objective info from
is the best way to go.
But people should already be aware of this. I mean, everyone has to dance with the one that brought them to the party, so just make sure you're not listning to those who wouldn't gave gotten to the party otherwise.
"Old man yells at systemd"
As someone who's worked in PR, I can speak from experience about journalistic ethics. While there are some ethical journalists, the reality is that ethics and objectivity in journalism all media died long ago. You would be horrified to know just how many 'objective news stories' you read/see in the mainstream press are mildy retouched press releases (I've had several news releases printed word-for-word and run as editorials in first-tier newspapers (think Wall Street Journal)). Magazines are usually much easier to manipulate (PR flaks frequently ghost-write the articles).
As a side note, I got out of PR a couple of years ago because it made my skin crawl. I can't imagine its gotten any better.
I worked for a major game company that makes lots and lots of sports titles. Anyway... we kept on getting e-mails from our PR people saying, "LOOK AT THIS GREAT REVIEW OF THE GAME YOU'RE WORKING ON!" [yes, in caps just like that] I'd click the provided link, and indeed there were GLOWING reviews for the game. I would then turn on my PS2 dev station, and look at the games athletes who were not even finished being drawn yet by the artist, hadn't been given emotions, major physics problems still existed, the scoring system wasn't in place, no music. I realized... They rated this game completely off of a couple of screen shots.
Faking Game Reviews Is Standard Practice In These Magazines. I have never trusted a magazine game review since.
TGEN
The Generation
I'd say something witty here, but I'm not that bright.
-jc