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Kohnke v. Perpetual Suit Unveils 'Pay For Good Reviews' Angle
The recent debate brought about by Jeff Gerstmann's dismissal from Gamespot has focused a lot of attention on the role of advertiser manipulation of reviews. Now a lawsuit brought by PR firm Kohnke Communications against what remains of Perpetual Entertainment has unveiled an interesting element of their business relationship. From the language of the agreement: "Kohnke's public relations campaign was successful in creating pre-release 'buzz' around Gods & Heroes, and in convincing reviewers to write positive reviews about the game. In addition, on information and belief, Perpetual had signed up more than 100,000 beta testers for Gods & Heroes, a large number for an unreleased MMO." For another viewpoint on the Gerstmann issue, Dean Takahashi just recently interviewed the former reviewer.
I've been in the games industry for a while now and can tell you any one familiar with the inner workings of Game PR and Marketing would not be surprised by this, or the allegations being made. Many things happen between game media and game developers / publishers that result in a less than objective review. I won't spill all the beans, but for example: You know those top ten lists? You can pay to have your game show up on most of those. Companies I've worked at have bartered exclusive first looks at new titles for higher review scores on shipping titles. Our PR guys even wrote up material for reviewers to use in their reviews that highlight features we wanted to the public to get excited about. Those reviews are a lot less about journalism and are really an extension of Studio/Publisher PR and Marketing machines. Don't buy what any of the big sites say, just download the demo and make your own call.