News from the the other side: A PR person posts on Shoe's blog

[zabuni]

http://sorethumbsblog.com/post/48781...herperspective

I really didn't like the piece. It seemed to much like weaseling:

Right off the bat, it needs to be remembered that most serious games are projects that have involved dozens, if not hundreds of people for years (not talking about the licensed crap). The developer, in most cases, kills itself to get a game completed.

Don't care. Really don't care. If you spent hundreds of man-years on a piece of crap, the end result is still a piece of crap.

The fact is game journalists – of which there are hundreds at the moment – are living off the blood sweat and tears of creative people who love games and regularly work 100 hours weeks. The fact they casually rip on a game gives others involved in the development and marketing process good reason to pissed.

Still don't care. And why can't they casually rip into a game. Is he really asking for fawning praise?

I understand his point about not giving the FPS dude a JRPG, but I think that insight can be gotten by having reviews by someone with "a deep history of playing games". And as Tom Chick's reviews show, this does not automatically lead to a better score.

[Sol Invictus]

Yep, a piece of crap is still a crap. I can understand people having sympathy for a developer that spent thousands of hours working on that piece of crap but that doesn't mean Hellga^H^H^H^H^H^Hthe crappy game deserves anything less than a D+.

Ultimately, they're still trying to sell their shoddy little product to the otherwise unwary customer for 50-200 (for those of you who got suckered into the Lifetime sub). The customer would be unwary, of course, if it wasn't for the ethical game reviewer. Good reviews save you your hard earned cash, and if a game is a two bit piece of shit, it certainly doesn't deserve to sell hundreds of thousands of copies when decent games like Psychonauts and Beyond Good & Evil struggle with sales because the PR effort was nonexistent compared to some fat guy's hype all over the place.

[Jason McMaster]

What a load of crying baby bullshit.

[JZigish]

I'm just going to throw this out there, it's a very controversial statement:

You know how in every other medium in existence, much of what is created ends up sucking, despite best efforts? Yeah, games are in fact like everything else ever, and are not some sort of oasis of greatness.

Books/theater/music/tv/films have gotten used to bad reviews, so can games.

[Jason McMaster]

You know, this whole thing is bullshit. I posted my thoughts, but what the hell, I'll post them here too:

While all of this is compelling, there's one thing that seems to be overlooked here: if your game is not fun or interesting, no matter how many developers worked on it or love it, it's still not fun or interesting. Not everyone that plays your unique snowflake of a game is going to think it worthy of praise. There's a reason that "Cop Rock" was canceled, and I'm sure a lot of people worked on that. When it comes down to it, a review is an opinion, and whether you like it or not, not everyone is going to think that whatever new product you're pushing is the best.

This reminds me of Mr. Show, the episode about "Coupon" the Movie. In this episode, the public dislike the movie so all the producers are very upset. They go out and sue the entirety of America and force them to watch it. The satire involved is that just because you spent a ton of money and time on something, doesn't mean that people will like it.

What this really brings up is whether or not YOU know anything about the games industry. Most people don't read reviews. They go into a store, pick up whatever trash may have just been shoveled out, buy it and play it. When the games industry stops making crap, people will stop calling it that.

"Right off the bat, it needs to be remembered that most serious games are projects that have involved dozens, if not hundreds of people for years (not talking about the licensed crap). The developer, in most cases, kills itself to get a game completed. Any good PR people working for a game publisher understand what a developer goes through, and should fight hard to get the game looked at by journalists fairly. This is not to say a bad game should get a free pass, but every game should be given a fair appraisal, with considerations made for target market and price."

SO? When I review a game, I think about the fact that they cost people, on average, 60 bucks each. Not everyone works in a job where they can go out and just throw away 60 dollars. So, if your game is not good, and I don't think people will enjoy it, I will tell them so. We owe you nothing. I'm not asking for my ass to be kissed, I could care less if you do, but I'm asking that you stop crying whenever your latest FPS clone comes out with a new, brightly-colored gadget and it's not enough to give you a 10/10. Life is unfair.

You know all those authors that work for years writing a book, getting a publisher and then getting bad reviews? How about the movie industry. How about EVERY industry. That's how business goes. Take some responsibility and stop trying to blame people.

[Michael Fitch]

Originally Posted by zabuni

Don't care. Really don't care. If you spent hundreds of man-years on a piece of crap, the end result is still a piece of crap.

Still don't care. And why can't they casually rip into a game. Is he really asking for fawning praise?

Greetings:
So, in case you don't already know, I work at a publisher and am therefore appropriately biased. I also came out of development and work closely with developers, so I'm biased there, too.

Here's why I think it matters: it's easy to criticize, but hard to create. Even the best, most thoughtful, most thorough reviewer spends a tiny fraction of the time evaluating the game and writing his/her review as any one of the developers spends making the game. That's a fact, and it's not going to change, nor should we expect it to.

Where it becomes a problem is when reviewers spend so little time and effort in the evaluation or the writing that they miss important aspects of the game, mislead the public with bad information, and/or fail to see past their own expectations or experience to understand the appeal a game has to other players.

Reviewers speak as authorities. When they pass judgment on a game, implicit in that is that they know enough to do so, that their perspective is sufficiently representative to be of value to a wide audience, and that they have put in the time and work to do a full evaluation of the game. I'm not saying that reviewers can be objective, but they can be sophisticated and skilled and dedicated to their craft.

When someone casually rips into a game without the expertise or due diligence to really understand what they're ripping apart, they're disrespecting all of those people who invested years of their lives into making the game. They're doing a disservice to their readers. They're lowering the standards for games journalism. That's a problem.

Yes, a piece of crap is a piece of crap. Hell, those are the easy ones. The difficulty lies in the middle ground, of games that are good but not great, or mediocre but not bad. If someone bashes a game like it is a piece of crap because that's the easy path, when there's something of actual value there, have they really done their job? Don't the people who made that game have a right to be mad about it?

Truly great games are rare. There's a handful of them every year. Most of the industry works on games that will never reach that level. Having someone call your game crap because it's not Halo or Bioshock or Grand Theft Auto, well, it sucks. Having someone call your game crap because it's for kids or based on a license, well, that sucks too. Having someone call your game crap when they haven't played it enough to understand it, or are so biased that they can't see what it is for what they would rather be playing, that sucks.

I can call a review crap, and I'm disparaging maybe a couple weeks worth of work (MMO reviews aside), and nobody reads it because I'm not published under the banner of an established media organ. And everyone will think it's just sour grapes. Or, they'll think I'm just shilling for my company. That's a mighty difference; it's an unfair playing field. I, for one, am glad that there's a PR rep out there who actually gets it.

You may not care, as a consumer, but as someone whose work is criticized publicly, often by amateurs, occasionally on false premises, it does matter to me. Or, YMMV.

Best,
Michael.

[DeathMonkey]

Originally Posted by Michael Fitch

You may not care, as a consumer, but as someone whose work is criticized publicly, often by amateurs, occasionally on false premises, it does matter to me.

I intended to write something along these lines, but Michael said it much better than I could.

[RobotPants]

Of course there are reviewers who don't properly give a game a fair evaluation, but that doesn't seem to be what this guy's talking about here. He seems to be lambasting the entire community of game reviewers by saying that they shouldn't be giving games bad reviews since so much work went into creating them. This quote here:

"The fact is game journalists – of which there are hundreds at the moment – are living off the blood sweat and tears of creative people who love games and regularly work 100 hours weeks. The fact they casually rip on a game gives others involved in the development and marketing process good reason to pissed."

And that's just plain and simple bullshit. He didn't say "some journalists who aren't thorough with their reviews". He said "journalists". So yeah, if you make a game and someone gives it a bad review, you have every right to get pissed. But that doesn't mean that bad review is automatically unfair just because it was written by someone who didn't spend hundreds of hours making the game. That's no different than the whole argument often heard over professional sports that says people don't have a right to criticize a team for playing badly simply because the criticizing person doesn't have the athletic ability to play pro sports.

[Fugitive]

I don't really see much wrong with the basic message that reviews should be done fairly because they have a disproportionate effect on the game's sales if they're done poorly. I'm just not sure why it's coming up here since the talk was mostly about bad games getting good reviews because of institutional corruption or influence (I doubt they're going to complain too much about getting more sales than they deserved), not good games getting bad reviews because some reviewer sucks.

[Fersis]

Im with Michael, but im biased too ,i work as a game programmer.
Gamming journalism is on his 'teen' stage, theyre really dumb.
some gaming press site editorial ,tries to be funny and tries to use internet memes, and being 'cool'.
On the other hands some others thinks that being 'serious and proffesional' is to bash and demolish games on his reviews.
I dont know if it is allowed on the forum to name sites and stuff , so i cant put examples.

[zabuni]

Do they have the right to be upset? Yes. Do they have the right to pull money from people whose reviews they disagree with, and then claim they want unbiased reviews? No.

And one other thing. Heaven forbid your game get judged by amateurs. What do you think we do on this board? Are you saying it would be wrong for me to have an opinion about your game?

[mystery]

Don't the people who made that game have a right to be mad about it?

If the review was based on false pretenses, then they certainly have a right to be mad about it. If the company developed a bad game and the reviewer is being honest, then they need to shut their traps, be honest with themselves about how their process failed, and either revise their game to fit the market standards of quality (i.e. no bugs, complete game, etc) or take their lessons and apply it to their next project.

The amount of blood, sweat and tears that went into creating a specific title should not impact a reviewer's bottom line score. I'd like to say that all reviewers were completely honest in their reviews, but I can't (some rate more positively than others because they're easily swayed by swag, but that's a different conversation). What I can say is that if you make a crappy game, you're bound to get crappy reviews. You need to whine about that? Look in a mirror.

[Jason McMaster]

The whole article has this sense of self-entitlement that is staggering. The people purchasing your product really don't care how many hours you put into it. No one cares if you're upset that people don't like your game.

Are there people who write terrible reviews? Sure. Of course. Is it everyone who doesn't give you a great review? No.

[Jason McMaster]

Also, let me say one more thing: I agree that there is a LOT of room for improvement in game writing. I totally agree. It would have been awesome if the anonymous awesome dude had managed to actually bring any of those points up instead of insulting game reviewers with every breath.

No, the real point of this article is that a lot of people worked on the game, so now you have to buy it or 100 dudes will be very sad and possibly throw away their pokemon collections.

[mystery]

Originally Posted by Fersis

Im with Michael, but im biased too ,i work as a game programmer.
Gamming journalism is on his 'teen' stage, theyre really dumb.
some gaming press site editorial ,tries to be funny and tries to use internet memes, and being 'cool'.
On the other hands some others thinks that being 'serious and proffesional' is to bash and demolish games on his reviews.
I dont know if it is allowed on the forum to name sites and stuff , so i cant put examples.

I hope English is your second language, man. Any game I reviewed with your kind of response (wickedly bad grammar, strawman arguments followed up by "i cant put examples", statements that paint an entire industry as juvenile) as an integral part of the design or, god forbid, writing, would not only receive a bad review from me, but I'd go on a crusade against it.

[Kyle Wilson]

Right off the bat, it needs to be remembered that most serious games are projects that have involved dozens, if not hundreds of people for years (not talking about the licensed crap). The developer, in most cases, kills itself to get a game completed.

As one of those developers, the idea that a PR guy at some big publisher is motivated to pull ads, bribe reviewers and strongarm publishers solely based on his love of me is sort of hilarious.

What many gamers don’t understand is how busy journalists can be – and also how lazy.

Game developers all think that reviewers are lazy, yet half the reviews I read complain about lazy developers. (Especially the ones explaining why games look like ass on the PS3.)

As far as I can tell, most reviewers and developers both are working their asses off in different ways for low pay because of their love of games. Despite their similarities, I don't think either group understands the other's job very well.

And I don't think the level of work, pay or love is quite the same in PR.

[slantz]

Of course developers and publishers are professionals who work hard. So, in most cases, are the writers and editors that make up the press.

The press exists precisely to call something crap when that's what, in good faith, occurs them with due diligence of research, experience, and context.

If a given press entity is irresponsibly reviewing something, not being fair, and not conducting due diligence of research, then it's up to the consuming public and even the competing press to call them out on it.

There's a reason developers/publishers aren't trusted to give reviews/ratings to their own products. There's very little difference between that and condemning a poor review they disagree with. Obviously devs/pubs think their products are top-notch, or at least want them to be perceived that way. There is a a complete and total conflict of interest with devs/pubs interfering with or directly contributing to the objective editorial process.

If the audience (press included) isn't 'getting' your game, then who's fault is that? The audience's?

For whatever it may be worth, I work in a game development studio, and my degree is in journalism.

[Fersis]

Originally Posted by mystery

I hope English is your second language, man. Any game I reviewed with your kind of response (wickedly bad grammar, strawman arguments followed up by "i cant put examples", statements that paint an entire industry as juvenile) as an integral part of the design or, god forbid, writing, would not only receive a bad review from me, but I'd go on a crusade against it.

Indeed my good friend ,English is not my mother language , i will start to put something like : 'Sorry for my english' on every post.
And yes my response is filled by strawman arguments ,mostly because its hard to me to write it down. (i wrote in english but the sentence sctructure is basically spanish)
So from now on , i will post fewer and shorter comments.

Sorry for my english.

[Angie Gallant]

In my experience in the industry, the people doing the grunt work on the game are more pessimistic about how it will be reviewed and end up being pleasantly surprised, while the people working normal hours (executives, marketing) have an inflated view of the game and are the ones who end up upset. There are exceptions, such as when someone played the game for 5 minutes before writing, or when a grunt worker has invested way too much ego into their corner of the game, but that's how it's always shaken out among my QA and developer friends.

Or when seeing a game pre-release, the journalist complains about things in the game that are obviously work in progress.

And this right here is bullshit. You can't expect people to peer into the future and know what state things will be in at gold. You can give someone a limited pre-release version that doesn't show the unfinished stuff, or you can deal with it. I can't think of a game that hasn't launched with cut features, changed features, and a whole pile of bugs that get thrown into Known-Shippable by a producer so that they don't have to be addressed.

[wigglestick]

Didn't read the article, but... If someone makes sweeping negative generalizations about movie critics, are we to assume that they are also including people like Leonard Maltin and Roger Ebert in that? Or are we to assume their statement carries an implicit exception for "professional" critics, or critics they like and agree with.

Gaming is still a rather nascent medium, but eventually most or all game reviewers will be actual critics rather than just enthusiasts, and arguments like this will disappear.

[Adam B]

Originally Posted by Michael Fitch

You may not care, as a consumer, but as someone whose work is criticized publicly, often by amateurs, occasionally on false premises, it does matter to me. Or, YMMV.

I agree with the rest of Michael's post -- i.e. that crappy reviews are crappy reviews and should be called out as such -- but I just wanted to pull this little tidbit out and point out that this statement here is true of everyone who creates entertainment, anywhere.

Of course it sucks when someone who has casually glanced at your work comes out and says "LOL garbage 2/10" without any true understanding of what it is you do or whatever. OTOH, we all have to suck it up and move on.

[mystery]

Originally Posted by Angie Gallant

And this right here is bullshit. You can't expect people to peer into the future and know what state things will be in at gold. You can give someone a limited pre-release version that doesn't show the unfinished stuff, or you can deal with it. I can't think of a game that hasn't launched with cut features, changed features, and a whole pile of bugs that get thrown into Known-Shippable by a producer so that they don't have to be addressed.

Not to mention that many, many publishers with which I've dealt expect glowing Previews, as well as glowing reviews, and will cover you in swag just to get it. Previews are assembled Googles of general bullshit, and that's all they'll ever be.

[Jason McMaster]

yep, previews are a double edged sword.

[Johan A]

Originally Posted by Michael Fitch

Here's why I think it matters: it's easy to criticize, but hard to create.

Word.

Anyone can have an opinion. In this internet age, you don't even have to be able to articulate your opinion very well to get it read.

However, Its extremely easy to get defensive when someone dislikes the work you poured down a significant part of your life into. After all, its only human. The problem comes when someone get the bright idea to "lean on them, they need our money" when they dislike the writings of someone.. which is too damn easy to do when you go defensive and just think of short-term impact.

I have to admit that the day after I saw the EU:Rome review by Tom where he gave it rather bad remarks I was like.."feh, tom hates me, why did I go all the way to the usa to talk to him, etc..". Which is natural for a human being when someone critize your efforts/work/etc. A person that does not get upset by someone disliking their work lacks passion and should not be in a creative industry.

But you must NEVER let those emotions impact anything professionally. Reviews are supposed to be HONEST opinions, and not affected by how much you like the developer, or how much the publisher advertises on your site/magazine.

[Angie Gallant]

I would be delighted to see previews go away. Getting a preview build ready creates a ton of extra stress on the milestones and ends up being more crunch time for everyone.

[Gladguy]

I, too, work as a Product Manager at a publisher, so I am on that side of the table. I am also a "trained journalist," having graduated from the Carleton University School of Journalism and have, in the past, written a half-dozen or so game reviews. So there're my credentials/disclaimers.

I think there's a couple issues being argued here. Firstly is the issue of publisher trying to influence the objective journalistic process. Secondly, we have raised the issue of review(er) quality and/or qualifications.

First let's cover the junkets and the swag. The reality is, free stuff has always been part of the press game. It was part of the game before there was a gaming press, it was part of the game before there were games. When dollars are at stake -- and the game business is indeed a business, there will be people trying to buy influence. It happens everywhere, but I assume most people here, being the reasonable bunch we are, understand that. What I don't get is the apparent outrage that this sort of thing goes on.

I've often bemoaned the fact that I don't have the budgets to buy the fancy full-scale armour sets, or throw parties in Las Vegas, or even items personalized with each editor's gamertag. Though, for me, I'm bummed because I want that stuff too!

Do I think that stuff buys influence... hell yeah. Sure, professional "Journalists" will swear up and down that it doesn't, but I've been there, and while one might strive to maintain objectivity, the reality is that getting cool swag, or going to an awesome party at the Playboy Mansion for a game you like only serves to deepen one's sense of "emotional attachment." That emotional attachment is what we marketing/PR flacks are striving for. If we get the journos emotional attached, we stay top-of-mind and can often translate into increased coverage. More coverage is our job, don’t forget. The most successful PR folks are the ones who can secure the best coverage for their game.

I won’t bore you here with my long story about Journalistic Ethics. Ask me about it next time we’re at a party or something, drinking sponsored drinks. Suffice it to say that the issue of Ethics is taught at every J-school around the world. It comes down to one’s personal moral compass; if you believe in the integrity of the process and refuse to accept any swag, you become a news or investigative reporter. If you like free stuff, you become an entertainment, travel or automotive writer.

In the end, the cream always rises to the top, and that’s when we get principled, credible, true Game Journalists (many of whom frequent – or own – this place). These guys get it. They know they’re gonna get free stuff so they take it with a gracious smile. But they also know they’re in it for the long haul, and are able to remain as objective as humanly possible, sometimes even more than would otherwise be humanly possible.

Because seriously… how many “Game Journalists” really got into the business primarily because they wanted free games? I know lots of them did. That’s why I wrote reviews back in the day. So, becoming indignant because this stuff goes on is really, to me, counter-intuitive.

Which raises the second issue, that of the professionalism of the gaming press. With the current state of the blogosphere, any jackhole can throw up a website and call himself a “Game Writer.” These are the guys who a) have the looser moral compass and are more easily swayed by free stuff and b) can, in great numbers, influence the public perception of your game.

Ultimately though, arguing for higher standards in writing or more stringent accreditation is like pissing in the wind. It’s not going to get any better. So, we figure out the system, and figure out how to make the system work. Ain’t Capitalism grand?

One more point: IMO, the feelings of the developer who toiled for years shouldn’t enter into this discussion at all. If the game sucks, it sucks. In the end, it all comes down to money.

[MattKeil]

The post/article reminded me of something that happened to me in line to purchase Windows 95 at the midnight launch at a CompUSA. We were in the long, snaking line for checkout, and along the line were strategically positioned kiosks with various PR dudes hawking their wares. One of them was for a 2D fighting game called Battle Beast.

The guy was very insistent that this was the premiere fighter of 1995. This had been made by some of the top people in animation and game design, and no other fighting game could possible match up to what these robotic animal warriors had to offer. After a little time with it (the line was impossible sluggish), it was clearly not that. The guy flat out asked me if I was going to buy it, and I said no. When asked why, I said that since I already played stuff like VF2 and Street Fighter 2, I didn't see a reason to spend money on Battle Beast. It was a pretty good fighter as far as PC games go, but it wasn't a good fighter in the grand scheme of things. So then this happens.

Guy: Do you do programming at all?
Me: No.
Guy: Okay, see, I don't think you understand how much work goes into making something like this.
Me: What does that have to do with anything?
Guy: Well, you can't just dismiss something with this much effort behind it just because you've already played Virtua Fighter.
Man Behind Me In Line: It doesn't matter how much work you put into something if it sucks, buddy. It's not the kid's fault if he's played better games than yours.

The PR guy proceeded to argue with the man behind me after that and the line moved on eventually. But that was the first time I encountered the idea that a bad game should be given a pass because making it was really hard.

[Lux]

Even when the gaming media matures there's still likely to be a divide between reviewers that use primarily critical criterion and those who like to rely on the subjective. Even in 'mature' media the most popular reviewers are those who rely on the subjective first, and the critical a distant second.

[Robert Sharp]

Originally Posted by Fersis

Indeed my good friend ,English is not my mother language , i will start to put something like : 'Sorry for my english' on every post.
And yes my response is filled by strawman arguments ,mostly because its hard to me to write it down. (i wrote in english but the sentence sctructure is basically spanish)
So from now on , i will post fewer and shorter comments.

Sorry for my english.

It was pretty clear that it's your second language. Ignore the haters. Mystery's review of your post was far too casual.

[wigglestick]

You waited in line to buy Windows 95?