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L.A. Times on Game Reviewer 'Playola'
madmancarman writes "Celebrity parties, target practice with automatic weapons, and free trips to spend the night in haunted castles are just some 'perks' game reviewers enjoy as described by this article from the L.A. Times. The reviewers say this has no effect on their reviews, but we've all heard politicians say the same thing with respect to their jobs. Maybe Ion Storm should have spent some more money on Daikatana junkets?"
At a minimum, these activities surely dilute the pen's proverbial poison when games are finally reviewed. Now I know why magazines like Gamepro, EGM, etc. rarely give a score under 6 on a scale of 1-10...If they give low scores to games from a big company they might not be invited to hang out with Heidi Klum at the Namco mountain retreat.
-Aaron
Maybe a little offtopic, but...
I never really understood the need for game reviews. The reviews, in my experience, never come close to when I actually play the game. It goes without saying that games are subjective and everyone's initial reaction depends upon a bunch of random variables. I always keep this in mind if I ever read a review.
Besides, I always have some friend who ends up beta testing or just buys the game, and that ends up being the best review I ever get.
I'm still waiting for my payoffs.
Seriously, while there is the danger of that - and I've been to a few events (like when they brought out the models dressed like Hooters girls to promote the terrible Hotters racing game) that do offer goodies.
The problem is, both reviewers and companies know you won't last long if you give a good review to a rotten game. It does happen that a reviewer likes a game that nobody else does, or hates a game that everybody else seems to like.
But most of the time, reviewers have to be honest, or else nobody will respect them, and then you lose readership. So all that these perks is that when you say "This game fucking sucks", you say "I just didn't seem to get into it". Instead of "The AI was dumber than Cattottop on Crack", you say "The AI wasn't challenging".
Lucky for some of us who run web sites out of our own pocket (yes, I'm self promoting damn it, and sorry about it), but at least when you don't actually "work" in the industry, you're allowed to say that the best part of Final Fantasy X was Lulu's cleavage every time she bent over. The rest of the game was so-so, but that alone kept me playing.
52 Weeks, 52 Religions with John Hummel
Perhaps this is why games with big budgets become more successful than indie games that can't afford to buy their way into the review rags despite how good/bad they are.
For example, one could argue that Q3A was just another Quake, but it got all kinds of press. Kohan, though, was a great game, but very few people have ever heard of it.
Also, there are several great open source games (Crystal Space, FreeCiv, BlueMango, FlightGear, Frozen Bubble, etc.) that are really good. Of course, since they're open source and can't afford to send out "press kits" to magazines and reviewers, they never get reviewed, and never get seen outside of a very small niche.
White Hat Research
Geek clothes at Low Prices. WHR Swag and more
Yeah, I spent a couple of years "in the biz". I was not paid, but worked voluntarily on an online-only game rag that has since bitten the dust. Anyway, before the speculation gets too thick on this thread, I'll throw out some info on the job of game reviewer, and how the subject of perks and such fit in.
Our mag was not one of the biggies, though we had a pretty fair readership. Aside from the publishers sending us games, and hardware companies sending us joysticks and stuff for review, there was not much else. Much of the hardware had to be returned after the write-up, but the games didn't. So, sure, I didn't buy a game for a couple years, and ended up with a few controllers and even a few sound and video cards.
The print guys definitely got more attention from the publishers, especially at E3, where they all got the special invitations to the vendor parties, and they may have even gotten some of the perks that the article implies, I don't know. The parties we did get invited to were often much like those timeshare gigs where you have to listen to a bunch of marketing hype in order to get a few chicken nuggets and two free beers, and maybe a can cooler printed with the game logo.
There was no real incentive to skew reviews. We got more games than we could reasonably play, and kept getting them from a publisher even if we had just poo-poo'd one from that publisher. One thing we tried to do, was to be objective. No game is completely bad, and we tried to point out any good points, even if the overall score was low. For instance a game might have had crappy controls, bad graphics, poor AI, and even an ugly box, but if it had good audio and soundtrack, we said so.
Then, the publisher would quote the line that said "Killer soundtrack and realistic audio effects..." on the "press" section of the game's web site and they just wouldn't mention that we thought the thing was sheer tedium to play. And they would send us another box full of games the next week.
If I had not written fair, honest reviews, pretty soon, no one would believe me. It makes no sense to lie to your readers. It was funny, I would usually head out on the web to read the other site's reviews of a game after I had posted mine. More than once I would flame a particularly bad game, only to find that some other guys were raving about it. I wondered at the time if there was some sort of "playola" going on or if my opinions were just that much different. But I never ran across any proof.
Incidentally, as for game reviewing = "vagina testing", well, allow me to dispute that somewhat. First of all, I often had been assigned two or three games per week. Which means I almost never finished a game, since I also have a day job and a family. Had this been my living, I imagine I would have had considerably more assignments, and so the result would have been the same. Also, you have to write the reviews, which takes time, writing skill, and overall, a desire to write. I dare say that not everyone who wants to play lots of games also wants to produce the equivalent of an english paper after each one. Luckily, I can spell, and write reasonably well, and so I enjoyed the writing as well as the game playing.
Of course to write a critical review, you must do more than just play. You must play while honestly evaluating the various elements of the experience, and maybe even pausing to take notes, or replaying a section just to verify some item or glitch you did not get a good look at the first time.
Often you are playing beta or even alpha quality games for previews, and so crashes and configuration hassles are not uncommon. You don't generally have time to play much on advanced levels, because you want to get to as much of the game environment as you can in a short time.
Yes it was a lot of fun, especially at first, and rewarding most of the time, but it was definitely not the easiest, sweetest gig you could imagine. Eventually, I burned out, and bid the reviewer's podium adieu. It was at least a year before I played another computer game after that.
-- Don't call me "Sir," I increase entropy for a living!
Look at the 'top' PC games of the year. Sierra's Arcanum won PCGamer RPG of the year, yet its one of the worst released. The graphics are mid 90's, the gameplay is terrible.
Then there's Black&White which won best PC game of the year from several places is nearly impossible to control, and while cute, has little real gameplay.
On the other hand, there's Gothic, a German import, which was great, and if it wasn't best game of the year, it was far better than the two mention above, yet it got terrible reviews by the rags.
Its infuriating because I went out and bought those games on the reviewer say-so, and would never have even looked at Gothic had I found the others so bad I needed anything for a fix.
I think the article really only touches the surface of the problem. Many of the rags are completely in the pocket of Sierra and EA its clear. Another problem is that they rate games before their release, based on beta copies. Thus there is absolutely no way they can honestly rate the games because they only get through the intro, which in fact is nearly always good in the big name games.
Also, I have seen obvious ballot stuffers and fake raters on the web sites, even the 'honest' ones. The game companies (one starting with M comes to mind) clearly stuff the votes with gushing reviews that pretty much quote their own marketing hype, and never say anything specific about the game. For example, go find the first-day reviews which mention no load screnes for Dungeon Siege. No gamer would ever rate that as a priority in the game, especially after the first game..obvious stuffing.
That would be better than the treatment I received from a particular software company that will remain nameless.
As a former reviewer, I hate to burst anyones bubble, but nobody in the industry cares about honesty or integrity. Basically they want a free advertisement for their game, no matter how crap. If you play nice and give good reviews, they'll pat your back. If you are honest however, they will shank you the first chance they get as I discovered.
No more review copies, removed from press release lists etc... Basically they act with the maturity of a spoilt 10 year old who takes their ball home.
In other words folks, ignore reviews. The review could very well have been bought since most companies go out of their way to screw you and get you out of the game, even going so far as to trying to get you fired (which with me they failed, despite my editors having no fucking backbone. Fuck you J and J).
So to anyone who's surprised by this payola, what rock have you been hiding under? The review business is as corrupt as politics.
//disc: I am an Australian journalist who
//works fulltime for an Ozzie PC magazine.
Articles like this really annoy me. They take the actions of several PR companies, the reactions of certain journalists/game reviewers/industry observers, pick one or two of the more outlandish *stories* and then proceed to generalise across the entire damned industry.
Let me tell you right now: the actions of PR companies, game publishers/distributors and other parties interested in getting favourable attention from gaming and hardware journalists does NOT have much of an affect on the majority of the PC mag industry. At least, thats the case here in Australia.
Case in point: A company holds a press party for their latest game. They invite a bunch of journalists, put on free drinks and food, throw a few PCs around with playable demos of the code and generally hold a shmooze-fest. People eat, drink, be merry and discuss everything under the sun - naturally including the product they are there for in the first place!
Party finishes. Journalists go home. A few weeks later, the gold code arrives. Editor picks a staffer to review the game, and he/she takes it home to play the S*#T out of for a week or more - whatever it takes to finish the game.
The journalist then proceeds to write his/her review. Said review passes through subedit and a few other misc publishing routines, and appears in the next issue of the magazine.
In my experience, parties and junkets are the norm when a company wants to promote its latest product - whether that be the latest router or the next hot FPS shootemup. However, these parties usually don't promote the product they are organised for!
Damn near every promotional party/trip i can remember had one affect and one only - networking. The entire reason journalists turn up to these events is simply because they meet new people, gain new contacts and thus extend their usefullness to their own company! We emphatically do NOT think to ourselves "wow, that party/trip overseas/weekend in a hotel rocked! I'm going to give this game/hardware/widget 90%!"
Anyhow, to sum up: the article is pure BS. Journalists possess something called ethics. Those who don't, aren't journalists for long. Once you lose credability in this industry, no-one - and I mean no-one - will touch you. In short: you're fucked.
Don't lable an entire industry corrupt because of a few over-extravegant parties/trips. Fine, if one or two individuals bias their reviews due to trips/parties, then they deserve all the ridicule in the world. It won't matter all that much anyway, as they will be out of a job before long if they continue on that tack.
We have ethics. We have morals. We do not bias reviews based on how good a time a company has shown us previous to sending us product. And don't you dare bloody insinuate that we do!
Janie took my gun...
When I used to work in a games store, we'd get the pluggers in every other week. He'd turn up with T shirts and mugs for everybody, and show us screenshots, fucking screenshots, and ask us what we thought of the game.
He rapidly gave up on me, because I'd just answer "I don't know, I've only seen a still" He didn't seem to be able to understand that, and kept asking me what I thought about the game. My supply of Tees and mugs dried up right about then, but colleagues who were willing to humor him still got rewarded. Guess I learnt not to hit the red button with my beak.
Slurp! The sound of me drinking out of my old Team17 mug on my desk.
yes, www.dotcomforwardslash.com is my real URL.
Amiga Power was excellent, simply excellent. Unfortunately, they sufered because of their honesty.. when they didn't rush round the latest media darlings (Team 17, at the time) and give glowing reviews like every other mag out there at the time to every single Team 17 game - Team 17 flatly stopped sending them material to review.
There was another comapny fuss with them as well... Don't remembe the name of the company but the game was called "Valhalla" Top down game thats main points were that it was coded from scratch in a week and that the main character talked at everything he did - AP gave it 18% while every other mag gave it in the 90's.
And AP were right, the game did suck.
Amiga Power WAS funny though - remember Isabelle Rees? The Matt Bielby golden era? Cam Winstanley's cries of "Hoora!! Tankie Tankie!!" (and his breakfast sandwich recipie)? Stuarts hair?
Thems were the days.
Meow meow meow meow, meow meow meow meow...
It's good to see that Computer Gaming World is one of the few magazines with the ethics to avoid this kind of thing.
I bought a subscription to CGW a year or so ago, and I was immediately impressed with the maturity, intelligence, and humor of the articles - but I didn't realize how rare these qualities were in the video game review business. More recently, I gained access to a number of other video game magazines, and the contrast is amazing. Most video game magazines seem to be targetted at 12 year-olds.
If you're a 30+ year-old gamer, CGW is an excellent magazine. Actually, I don't even play that many video games these days, but the entertainment value of the magazine alone keeps me reading it even those times when the content may not be relevant to how I spend my time.
Why are you letting these clowns ruin our country?
"Take Two Interactive [developers of GTA3] hosted an event in the Arizona desert to promote its new combat driving games. Writers, dressed in camouflage, practiced drive-by shootings with 9-millimeter Glock handguns while driving Jeeps at high speeds."
I never really understood the need for game reviews. The reviews, in my experience, never come close to when I actually play the game.
Because it's illegal to rent PC games in the USA, that's why. The first sale doctrine (17 USC 109) makes an exception for copyright holders of PC software, allowing them to monopolize all rentals of their software. (Rentals of software designed for computers sold explicitly as Video Game Consoles are subject to ordinary first-sale rules.) Yes, in theory, it's possible to license those rights, but I've never visited a rental shop that has done so.
Because not everybody has eight hours to spend online downloading a 120 MB game demo, and not everybody has upwards of $200,000 to spend on moving to an area where broadband is available.
Will I retire or break 10K?