Slashdot Mirror
On Videogame Journalism
Michael_Blessed writes "The most incisive critique of games journalism currently out there. I would say that as I participated, but there's some real illuminating stuff in there. And it's all true - I should know, being a games 'journalist' myself." It's a whole long series - read all 11 parts.
"The most incisive critique of games journalism currently out there. I would say that as I participated, but there's some real illuminating stuff in there. And it's all true - I should know, being a games 'journalist' myself."
Well then, this is my critique of a game journalist: Always preview before submitting. Sentence structure is important.
Do not taunt Happy Fun Ball(TM)
old man murray, while probably not being so much of a video game journal itself, was much more of a meta-video game journal, in pointing out the whoring practices of most of the press out there as well as everything that is wrong in the video game software industry. their benchmark "time to crate" (the time it takes from when you start a first person shooter to when you see the first crate or barrel) is still a good indicator of at what point the developers ran out of ideas.
sadly, these days it is just an archive of old articles. still pretty funny, though. you gotta love a site so dedicated to taunting john romero.
Regarding game reviews:
Objectivity has got to go, for one thing. Anyone who says that the personal experience of interacting with a game can be discussed objectively - well they're just flat out wrong to even try. Experience colors everything we write, being humans and all. What we have to do is weigh our desire to share our opinion, the one we're sure is right, against the fact that no two persons will experience something in the same way.
WHAT!?! I don't care if this guy thinks games are evolving into an artform. That's almost meaningless in a game review. I buy a game for entertainment, and could care less if the creators think they are the next Piccaso.
Objectivity is essential in a game review. I want to know if a game crashes, if the AI is a pushover, if the interface is garbage, etc. While there's some subjectivity in those things, a crash is still a crash.
Sure, you need to subjective material in a game review. However, calling for the complete loss of objectivity in a review is just plain idiotic!
"The market alone cannot provide sufficient constraints on corporation's penchant to cause harm." -- Joel Bakan
Please -- no more lectures on journalism. And stop confusing nostalgia for games from your formative years with Socratic ideals of gamehood.
I don't want this to just be a flame, so here's some constructive criticism:
Damn. I guess that was a flame after all.
Furthermore, it reads like an inside joke and in my opinion is much more likely to alienate journalists than give them a reason to think.
I tried, but didn't gain anything from the article but a distaste for the author. Maybe it's just me.
"Journalists" take themselves too seriously as far as their writing skills. By far, most magazines and newspapers are written at a 5th grade comprehension level. If they werent, the target audience would be too narrow. The exception is usually highly specialized stuff like medical journals written for doctors.
Game journalism has to be even lower than that, since 5th graders make up a part of the target audience. So they're written at an even lower level. My 2nd grader reads game magazines.
I don't need no instructions to know how to rock!!!!
What I managed to get out of the first two pages (which wasen't easy, this guy apparently hasen't heard about paragraphs) was that there is a need for more+better video game Journalism. But I really have to question this, I don't know about others but when new games come out all I'm really interested in are the technical details; Look? Cost? Run? Let me figure out if it's fun. But then again the same thing could be said about about movie reviews couldn't they? I'm not interested in someone else's opinion on their level of enjoyment gleaned from a title or how this game might or might not impact society or how it might alter our culture. To be honest I find that most reviews are fairly pointless.
He then talks about the current situation of game Journalism, which basically boils down to reviews (and not so much comment). To me, reviewers have no choice but to compare their own (jaded?) experience towards game reviews and will lean harder on games that might well be fun for you and me.
I guess it will always boil down to what my personal preferences are, not what some "journalist" thinks.
I'd also like to point out that the author of this feature tries to validate himself as an authority on gaming by telling us how many games he has in comparison to his pissing-contest-winning music collection. How does this make the reader respect the opinion of the author exactly?
crazy dynamite monkey
Wtf ??? and more:
And that's just from the first page. Has there ever been a bigger bag of long-winded self-aggrandizing tripe than has been produced by these guys ? Not since Jon Katz, I'd wager. If we ever needed proof the editors here don't read the articles posted to... THIS IS IT !!!
Something which most people seem to miss, is this important fact:
There are 11 chapters because there are 11 writers!
If you don't like the author of the first chapter, don't let that prevent you from reading what the others say. The 'quality' of the articles varies greatly.
If nothing else, read chapter 7 by Jane Pinckard. I found that one to be relatively different than the rest, and actually easily readable.