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Unbiased Game Reviews Through Micropayments

Posted by Hemos on from the cool-ideas dept.

a reader writes:"Fed up of games reviewers giving in to advertiser pressure to go easy on high-budget turkeys? A group of distinguished British videogames journalists has set up an independent site called Digiworld. It's funded by an interesting micropayment system: you pay 50 pence (about 80 cents US) a week for full access, although new content is available for free on weekdays (details here). For extra geek appeal, the look of the site imitates the 8-bit Mode 7 graphics of Teletext, a British system that uses spare TV signal bandwidth to transmit pages of textual information (some of the staff previously worked on a Teletext gaming page called Digitiser). Even if you're not a gamer, the bizarre humor and characters make the site worth checking out."

48 comments

  1. Micropayments and Slashdot by AtariAmarok · · Score: 0, Offtopic

    I now have a system whereby -1 Trolls now give me micropayments every time they post on Slashdot. I expect to turn my first million dollars by the end of the week (including my own contributions)

    --
    Don't blame Durga. I voted for Centauri.
  2. Teletext is horrible by PyromanFO · · Score: 2, Insightful

    I don't know what kind of crack these guys are smoking, but Teletext is a horrible way for a website to look. The writing is pretty good too, I wish it was just a normal website where I didn't have to sacrifice babies to the Interface gods to read it.

  3. Micropayments don't work by NetDanzr · · Score: 3, Insightful
    Having unbiased reviews is certainly a good intention, but in the current competitive environment, micropayments don't work. They are moderately successful in small, niche markets or foreign languages, but not in gaming review sites written in English. If you really want unbiased reviews, you head to sites like Gamerankings that lists all reviews, and you'll find something you need.

    The only time micropayments work is if everybody else in a niche uses some sort of payment. This niche can be either topic-oriented or language-oriented. The important thing is that it has a limited audience that is unable to reach quality free content.

    1. Re:Micropayments don't work by Goldberg's+Pants · · Score: 1

      At least someone is trying to make the business more honest. I was a software reviewer until recently, and discovered that you're expected to lie if a game is trash. I didn't, and it cost me my job because the publisher gave my bosses a ton of shit and cut off the supply of review product.

      I'd rather be out of work than whore myself to these assholes.

    2. Re:Micropayments don't work by NetDanzr · · Score: 1

      I'm sorry, but I think you are generalising too much. There are plenty of sites who post unbiased reviews, without demanding any payments. True, they are smaller and don't pay their reviewers, but they don't suck up to publishers, either. I write reviews for Netjak, and have yet to hear about a company successfully forcing us to improve a rating for a review. The same goes for plenty of other sites I know, such as The Adrenaline Vault (they made it all the way to the top of the Lucasarts black list), Four Fat Chicks, Zen Gamer, Quarter to Three and others. Your comment is unfair to those sites and not really addressing my main argument that Digiworld can't possibly hope to collect enough revenues to survive if the competition is free.

    3. Re:Micropayments don't work by Goldberg's+Pants · · Score: 1

      For starters, do you get FREE review product from the games companies? If so, have you honestly ever given a game a bad review? And we're talking Amiga Power levels of bad here. (Like giving a game 2%).

      I won't name the game company which is now deceased which gave me shit, suffice to say everyone who has read the review felt it wasn't that bad. In fact my editor loved it. Then when the company gave him a load of shit, he turned on me, said it was bad etc...

      As for micropayments, you never know. I'm far from being the only one that thinks most of the reviewing business is corrupt. The system they're choosing to use guarantees unbiased review.

      Basically, if you're GIVEN free product (and my guess is these payments will be used to buy the actual games) or advertise games, you can't be trusted to be entirely honest. Not talking giving crap games good reviews, but maybe giving a higher mark because you want to stay in good with the company.

    4. Re:Micropayments don't work by NetDanzr · · Score: 1
      The site I write for is very small, and still we get free stuff. We got some nasty responses from Lucasarts and Electronic Arts so far; in fact, EA almost managed to shut us down. Still, we do get free games, most notably from Dreamcatcher. As it so happens, I'm the one on the site who likes adventure games, so I get to review all of them. My ratings of these games range from 40% to 80%. Not a single one so far became a top pick, and there were quite a few we didn't even include a buy link to, because we felt nobody should play them.

      Of course, you are right that a site that rates games objectivelly doesn't get too many free games. However, there are people who review games in order to get free copies, and then there are people who like to play games and happen to be willing to review them. The latter group will get the game no matter what, out of love for gaming. This attitude makes me to trust them a little more, as well.

  4. This is marketing bullshit by BobTheLawyer · · Score: 5, Insightful

    80c per week is not a micropayment: it's just a low subscription fee

    A micropayment is when a vendor charges an amount which is almost imperceptible to the purchaser. The example normally given is a teenager paying a few cents to listen to one-time-only Britney Spears single on their mobile phone.

    Mobile phones are ideal for micropayments, because their fee structures are designed for charging lots of small amounts. Credit cards are not, and the fees merchants are charged reflect this, which is why this website uses Paypal and Nochex. Personally I wouldn't trust either: they are as fragile as any other internet business and when they go bust you are most unlikely to see your money again. (And, getting off-topic, it's scandalous that they are effectively acting as banks but not regulated as such - expect much wailing and gnashing of teeth when people lose money.)

    1. Re:This is marketing bullshit by Eustace+Tilley · · Score: 1
      Arguably this is a micropayment, because one pound per fortnight is on the boundary of perceptibility.

      Yes, mainstream periodicals also offer refunds for the unused portion of a subscription, but
      • the initial investment is five times larger (a full year, fifty weeks as compared to ten)
      • The refund granularity is four times greater (four weeks versus one week)
  5. gah. horrible site design by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 4, Interesting

    If I'm going to pay 80 cents a week, as low as that is, I want to be able to read the site. God, the design of that site is *horrendous*. I gave up after the second 'tour' page and just started randomly clicking. It turns out the entire *site* is just that bad.

    I've got a 1920x1200 screen but their pages display about 30 words per page, have awful colors and one of the stupidest navigation systems I've ever seen.

    I can only imagine that a half-decent game review will take up perhaps 3,000 words which, at the words per page rate of the examples I saw, would take probably 50 pages - not including any screenshots they may want to offer.

    Gaaah. My head hurts.

    1. Re:gah. horrible site design by msoya · · Score: 1

      They manage a review in under 10 pages, and don't need screenshots. They're good, but it takes a while to get used to.

    2. Re:gah. horrible site design by KDan · · Score: 1, Offtopic

      Agreed 500% - this site looks absolutely awful.

      Daniel

      --
      Carpe Diem
  6. MicroPayments by Johnny+Mnemonic · · Score: 4, Insightful


    Simply paying for content isn't enough to make it unbiased; I pay for subscriptions to Electronic Gaming Monthly and IGN, and that doesn't guarantee bias-free reporting.

    The only thing that would help is to have ad-free mags, which means that the readers would have to pay enough to support the entire costs of the mag, and I don't see that happening with micropayments. And even at that, it would only be part of the puzzle--developers would still be able to hold out carrots like "privileged access to employees", "exclusive first reviews" and access to games and hardware to hold over the head of reviewers they don't agree with.

    --

    --
    $tar -xvf .sig.tar
    1. Re:MicroPayments by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1, Informative

      >The only thing that would help is to have ad-free mags

      Digiworld IS ad-free. That's the entire purpose of the micropayment system. If you read the site's FAQ, you'll see that the whole reason it was opened was to provide the first ever truly ad-free professional games journalism in history.

    2. Re:MicroPayments by Eustace+Tilley · · Score: 2, Informative

      Consumer Reports, which accepts no ads, has been in operation since 1936. The online version is $24 per year. I think it is fair to characterize $2 per month as a micropayment (the Digiworld subscription is roughly 89 cents per week), so this is proof by example that the business model can work.

    3. Re:MicroPayments by darylp · · Score: 2, Funny

      Site design like that does NOT qualify as "professional journalism" by any stretch of the imagination.

      Hell, it makes the evil purple of Slashdot Games look positively well-designed.

    4. Re:MicroPayments by Daetrin · · Score: 1

      It's not _just_ ads, although that's certainly part of it. The pre-release review copies offered by game companies to those review mags/sites they get along with are also a big factor.

      --
      This Space Intentionally Left Blank
  7. why pay? by roegerle · · Score: 3, Informative

    why pay when there are sites like www.snackbar-games.com honest and humorous reviews...enjoy

  8. Slashvertisement by DavidLeblond · · Score: 3, Funny

    Here are 2 tips on how to spot a Slashvertisement:

    1. The submitter's name is "a reader"
    2. The article praises the site's design, when the site's design looks like it was done by a five year old.

    1. Re:Slashvertisement by Kris_J · · Score: 1
      The article praises the site's design, when the site's design looks like it was done by a five year old.
      As does what content I could find.

      I actually like teletext, visually and as a concept. This is not "just like" teletext, it's just a crap template with a non-proportional font. Bring back Gif News.

  9. digitiser by johndoejersey · · Score: 1

    was a teletext based service which had a pretty cult following before it was shelved (dont know why)
    Before clicking on the link I was quite happy to see the return of some of the (excellent) reviewers in an online format.
    I was fully prepared to shell out my 50p a week to read the site, however the design is so abismal I refuse to pay that (very) small price.

    1. Re:digitiser by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Have some of you people even *tried* the "TV Tuning" function on the site, which lets you massively change the way it looks to suit different monitors, resolutions etc?

    2. Re:digitiser by darylp · · Score: 1

      No, because it's yet another example of an inappropriate design metaphor, to paraphrase Jakob Nielsen.

      It's yet another gimmick site, only one that expects the gullible public to cough up money.

      And no, I haven't read a single line of editorial. Whatever good intentions the authors had have been destroyed by the infantile behaviour of the website.

  10. Good lord, the lazy geeks strike again... by EdFear · · Score: 2, Insightful

    It astonishes me how many people just don't get it. It is an emulation of Teletext, because that's where Digiworld's roots lie. Digitiser, it's Teletext-predecessor, was funny not only because it had excellent, sharp, honest writing, but because it had hilarious characters drawn using the teletext limitations.

    If Digiworld did not use the teletext style it wouldn't be able to carry off the characters in the same way.

    I'm just astonished that you guys can come up with all these excuses not to read it. Just how lazy are you? Disappointed that it doesn't run in 1900x10000000 resolution? What website does! You're all missing out on the best gaming journalism that exists out there at the moment, and the first professional ad-free gaming journalism venture, and you people won't read it because you have to click the right arrow button now and again.

    Stop a moment and think about this, about what you are saying. Are you saying that you want truly independant journalism to die? And don't go plugging your website and saying you're independant and great, or whatever, because you're in no way professional, whereas these guys are award winning journalists.

    Fine, whatever. Maybe you don't deserve it. Just go back to your Official magazines and realise that they are all funded by advertising. Did they score Enter The Matrix highly? Hmmm, I wonder why.

    (Oh, and I'm not a staff member of Digiworld - I am a paying customer, though, and am of the opinion that everyone should be)

    1. Re:Good lord, the lazy geeks strike again... by Lewisham · · Score: 1
      Chief, you need to calm it down. The site violates every single human interface design idea in the book. That's fine. But give me an option to turn the display off and read it the way the web was intended, and I'll be a happy bunny.


      I love Digitiser as much as anyone, but to say that just because it was Teletext needs it means to be Teletext is an insane argument. Paul Rose (Mr. Biffo himself!) did plenty fine when he launched the now-defunct Bubblegun.com using the aforementioned characters.


      It is fine journalism, yes, but don't make me think, or I'll be as angry as Mr. T having his bins knocked over. Independant journalism won't die, remember at least two of the journos (Gillen and Rose) there work contribute to Future Publishing magazines, and I never found either of them to be bent. I'll stick to Edge and the free GameCentral (the very decent Digitiser replacement) for now. You know, using display formats suitable for their medium?

    2. Re:Good lord, the lazy geeks strike again... by NetDanzr · · Score: 2, Interesting
      The site may show some "truly independent journalism", but that doesn't automatically translate into good journalism. Good journalism is not only good writing, but also getting the message across in a readable format. While some may enjoy the endless scrolling through monstrous letters and a very narrow review column, others would rather go to other independent review sites like Netjak, Quarter to Three or Four Fat Chicks, whose reviews are easier to decipher.

      (Personally, I'd like to see a sample review or two before signing up. After all, if I pay it's because of the content and not the design.)

    3. Re:Good lord, the lazy geeks strike again... by EdFear · · Score: 1

      It doesn't cost anything to sign up and you only need to put in a username and e-mail address. You only have to pay if you want to read the Weekend edition or any back issues. Soon they may only allow the first week to be visible to un-paying readers and lock the newer content - they don't want to do this but are going to have to. So there's absolutely no risk. Also, you can get a full refund of any unspent money at any time.

  11. Best things in life are free.... by MBraynard · · Score: 1
    Forget paying professionals for reviews - games or movies. I use to write them for a magazine and can tell you that my opinion is no better than yours.

    The *best* sources for reviews of games are the comments on Amazon or EBGames. Amazon is particularly good for getting reviews because you can sort them on how helpful they have been rated. I typically look at the reviews that were voted most helpful and for the reviews that are lowest rated.

    Another great source are the newsgroups and various game boards out there

    So buy the magazines for the demo disks and previews, but the best reviews are definitely the free ones.

    1. Re:Best things in life are free.... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Oh yeah, the EBGames reviews are great. Nothing like a 12 year old reviewing a game that hasn't come out yet.

      I THINK THIS GAME WILL BE THE BEST BECAUSE IT HAS LENSFLARE AND OMG 100000000 POLYGONS GREATEST GAME EVAR!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

    2. Re:Best things in life are free.... by MBraynard · · Score: 1

      Are you suggesting that you don't like JeffK?

  12. man, oh man by joshsnow · · Score: 0, Offtopic

    10 MODE7
    20 *VDU 128,2,21
    30 *VDU 19,2,2
    40:
    50 PRINTTAB(5,5) CHR$(7)"THIS IS A QUIZ ON"
    60 PRINTTAB(5,5) CHR$(7)"THIS IS A QUIZ ON"
    70 :
    80 PRINTTAB(5,5) CHR$(7)"HEAVY METAL"
    90 PRINTTAB(5,5) CHR$(7)"HEAVY METAL"

    er...

    75 FOR A%=1 TO 10000
    76 NEXT A%

    Um...

    ah...

    5 REM - School computer studies project 6 REM - March 1986 7 REM - Mr Murdochs class

    1. Re:man, oh man by joshsnow · · Score: 2, Interesting

      The parent comment is actually on-topic. Anyone who knows anything about teletext will undoubted recognise that this is a BBC basic program, written for the BBC model B machine using features of its inbuilt MODE 7 - which was the teletext mode.

      There was a joke somewhere in the notion of that program, but as usual, the /. crowd miss the point - just as they're all missing the point about the games review website look and feel.

      If you're too stupid to follow the teletext link in the story, I can't help yah!

  13. Best Server Error Ever Award by coryboehne · · Score: 3, Funny

    I just went there and was attempting to check out their site when I received this error,
    """
    Digi-me-don't: Unsuper Mess-up 500
    Mrrrrrr rrrrrr brrrr nrrrrrrr. Brrrrr nrrrrgh grrrrrr nrr rrrr.
    /
    Man, you've managed to bust us up good. That was no ordinary error, it was a 500 server thing, which means the Digi SCIENCE has coughed up its lungs. A report is on the way to famous technician Coleman Tillman so he can unbung the rubbishness. If you think you might know what went wrong, you can contact him: here: 500-me-do@digiworld.tv.

    In the meantime, poke listlessly at your browser's Back button or restart Digi. (The latter'll log you out, mind.)
    """

    Now, I agree about the teletext, but the error is just clever as hell...

  14. Teletext by Pentagram · · Score: 1

    Teletext, a British system that uses spare TV signal bandwidth to transmit pages of textual information

    I assumed Teletext was a fairly common system. Do you not have it in the US | $YOUR_COUNTRY ? If not, anyone know why?

    1. Re:Teletext by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      most of europe has it, notabily germany. USA is never did because NTSC is a piece of shit.

  15. Proof of paid-off reviews? by Winterblink · · Score: 1

    Does anyone have irrefutable proof that a major respected game reviewer/site has taken money from a publisher to jack of review scores? I've never read an article or news story anywhere that proves beyond a doubt this has happened, at least to any reviewer or site that anyone gives a crap about. Does anyone on /. have a link on this at all?

    --
    "I'm a leaf on the wind. Watch how I soar."
    -Hoban Washburn
  16. Perceptability bullshit by fm6 · · Score: 1
    The key word here is "subscription". Any subscription-based business can't hope to survive unless it minimizes "churn". So either they satisfy enough people to make them permanent subscribers, or they go out of business.

    Quoting a pseudo-minimal payment that's beyond "the boundary of perceptibility" is precisely why it's marketing BS. It's like those insurance offers that say, "Protect your loved ones for 10 cents a day!" They're trying to make something expensive look like a bargain.

    Micropayments don't just involve keeping transactions small, they involve flexibility. Like if you automatically pay a very small fee every time you look at a certain web page. A subscription fee that's due on a regular basis, whether you access the site or not, is as far from micropayments as you can possibly get.

    1. Re:Perceptability bullshit by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0
      A subscription fee that's due on a regular basis, whether you access the site or not, is as far from micropayments as you can possibly get.

      Of course, if you'd looked at Digiworld for more than five seconds you'd find out that you don't have to pay regularly. You pay a lump sum of a few pounds at the start to top up your digiworld funny-money account, and then you can buy an issue (or not) each week.

      So it's not a subscription, and it is a micropayment, you idiot.

    2. Re:Perceptability bullshit by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      >A subscription fee that's due on a regular basis, whether you access the site or not,

      That's exactly what Digiworld ISN'T, though. It's not a subscription. You pay for the equivalent of 10 weeks in advance, but if you only read, say, every second issue, your "subscription" lasts 20 weeks. You only pay for the issues you actually read, and you choose which ones they are.

      It'd be nice if people actually knew what they were talking about before they rushed off to rubbish things.

    3. Re:Perceptability bullshit by Eustace+Tilley · · Score: 1
      The well-informed albeit anonymous replys direct your attention to:
      As you can see, there's no subscription, no charging you for the week whether or not you read that ish: it's all under your control. Don't fancy Weekend Digi this time? Don't pay for it then. Too busy for a couple of weeks but now want to catch up? Buy 'em as back issues for the same price they'd've been at the time.


      So it appears to meet all your stated requirements for a micropayment system. Perhaps you have an axe to grind?
  17. I want them anyway by fm6 · · Score: 1
    The "micropayments" in this story are bogus, so we're offtopic. But I have to address your argument.

    I hear lots of theories as to "why micropayments don't work". But that's all they are: theories. Have consumers in the U.S. ever had access to a real micropayment system? If so, I it happened while I wasn't looking.

    Micropayments would be ideal for selling web based content. Pay a couple cents every time you read an article. That generates an income flow that's a nice alternative to subscriptions and advertising. We know that subscriptions mostly don't work. And there just isn't enough ad revenue to sustain everybody.

    Here's a non-theory: micropayments have a counterpary in the dead-tree world. You can subscribe to a newspaper, but if you just want today's copy, you go to a machine, stick in a quarter, and voila! If it were practical, there'd probably be a machine that would let you put in a penny for each article you actually read. On the web, that is practical. Why has nobody tried it?

    My own pet theory is that banks make too much money off of the exiting payment systems, especially credit cards. They're not about to support a competing system -- and you can't have money transfers of any kind without their support.

    1. Re:I want them anyway by NetDanzr · · Score: 2, Insightful
      You are right; there hasn't been a viable micropayments system in the US yet. However, I was working on one for a weekly magazine back in Slovakia where I'm originally from. The reason it worked there was because it was cheaper than buying the print version of the magazine.

      Consider this: You have a very limited audience, about 5.5 million people. 4 million of them don't understand any foreign language. You have a single magazine that catters to the political right, and thus its subscription base is relatively high - almost 10,000 people. The magazine sells about 50,000 copies per week. The readers have absolutely no alternative, mainly due to the language barrier. So if you put it on-line and charge 5% of the price per article, people may select to read only 5 articles, thus it costs them only 25% of the original price, but the overhead cost of the magazine is near zero, which means more profit for the publisher. Why would people pay? Because there's only one alternative (the printed version), and the publisher makes sure it's more expensive.

      Now consider the world of game reviews. For the sake of argument, let's say that one of the reviews on the site is for Elder Scrolls III: Bloodmoon. That game has been around for roughly 2 months, so chances are that all hardcore fans bought it and now only more indifferent people remain, exactly the kind of audience reviews are aimed at. I, as a potential buyer, go to Gamerankings and find that there are 31 reviews of the game. Will I ever pay for one of them when all others are free? Of course not!

      Now you may argue that the micropayments could be voluntary. For that, there are already two established services - Amazon Honors System and PayPal donations system. The site could've used those instead, and if they are really good, they would have received some revenue.

      I personally wish you were right and micropayments were an accepted part of on-line life. I'm running several sites, and would like to turn them to profit some day. For now, however, all I can do is to keep dreaming.

  18. Yes, Teletext... by Psychic+Burrito · · Score: 1

    It's still widely in use and extremely popular all across Europe. Every TV station has its own editorial department and most of them publish news 24 hours a day - like the web, but since the 80s...

    Can somebody enlighten me if there is Teletext in the US, too? If not, how did you have news, program guides, last minute travel offers and subtitles?

  19. OK, not a subscription. by fm6 · · Score: 1

    I'm forced to admit that I've committed the great Slashdot sin: I jumped into the discussion without RingTFA. You're right, it's not a subscription. Still, the payment system has too much granularity to be called "micropayments". "Minipayments"?

    1. Re:OK, not a subscription. by Eustace+Tilley · · Score: 1

      Your next lexicographical
      assignment is apparent. Nice work on VisiCalc.

  20. Gee... by Damodred · · Score: 1

    I've been doing the same thing for a year and a bit now, and I don't charge. Maybe if I start charging, I'd get Slashdotted too? Hmph.
    ---

    --
    www.wickedtoast.com
  21. last post winner by muirhead · · Score: 1

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