A lot of negativism towards gaming journalism?

[manolocego11]

Hey guys, I wanted to talk about something that I've been noticing for a while. There's been a lot of negativism towards gaming journalism like when users are discontent with the score that has been giving to a specific game. I admit I saw a review once here that was the complete opposite of what I thought and went to reddit to discuss and even share some negativism towards the website (I'm sorry escapist people, you have a great website going on) however after later on I realized that the reviewers are people just like us. They are in a way sharing an opinion with more detail.

It's true that there is possibly reviewers that get paid to give good scores and all that but I still think that there shoudn't be so much negativity towards a reviewer that gives a score you don't agree with.

 

[Saelune]

Does being a reviewer even count as journalism? I don't think movie reviewers count as film journalists, since journalism is news.

But as you said they are people too...people who are flawed, have biased opinions, and don't speak for everyone, and that's where a lot of the negativity comes from. I know I hate most Dynasty Warriors reviews cause they rarely are aimed at me and usually aimed at people who already dislike the series anyways, so its hardly a worthy review for anyone, as one example.

 

[mduncan50]

It's not just gaming, it's any medium with a degree of fanboyism. Just look at how the critical response to Dawn of Justice was met with screams of "bought by Disney" or "hates comic books". End of the day, a review is just one person's opinion of their experience with a product. Your best bet is to find a few that seem to have the same sensibilities that you do, and not pay too much attention to the rest, and you'll make yourself a lot happier.

 

[DefunctTheory]

He's only got four post! He's obviously a gaming journalist implant, sent here to garner sympathy!

Kill him!

The above was a joke. Please don't moderate me, or worse, actually attempt to kill anyone in this thread.

Gaming Journalists are in a rough spot. On one side, they have gaming companies, who are more then willing to black ball entire sites or individual reviewer/journalist at a whim whenever something is said they don't like, and it rarely seems to cause too much of an issue for them.

On the other side, they have a rabid, split fan base. One that will never be happy - The reviewer/journalist will always be too casual, too elitist, too artsy, not artsy enough. They'll always like what the fans hate and hate what the fans like. No matter what, some subsection of the fan base is going to being flinging shit at them.

So, really, I do feel sorry for them. Except for the ones I hate. They can all go burn in hell.

 

[NewClassic_v1legacy]

They are in a way sharing an opinion with more detail.

This is, in reality, all game reviews are. They're opinions about a game contrasted with defended assertions. I'm going to use myself as an example:

From the Escapist's Firewatch review [http://www.escapistmagazine.com/articles/view/video-games/editorials/reviews/15411-Firewatch-Review-Campo-Santo-Games]:

In those first fifteen minutes, Firewatch quickly unfolds into a rollercoaster of joy, tension, sadness, jubilation, hard choices, heartache, and uncertainty. All of the decisions Henry and the player have to make in these moments pulls another piece of Henry's life apart. There's a building unease to the choices, both highlighting the little laughters and relentlessly bring up excruciating decisions. By the time Henry arrives at his new life, his old one is almost entirely unraveled. Neither Henry nor the player are meant to arrive at the watch tower with a clean slate.

The phrase "Firewatch quickly unfolds into a rollercoaster of joy, tension, sadness, jubilation, hard choices, heartache, and uncertainty." is an assertion about the game's prologue. This is a statement I'm making about a quality of the game. I'm further elaborating on this idea by explaining the assertion with: "All of the decisions Henry and the player have to make in these moments pulls another piece of Henry's life apart. There's a building unease to the choices, both highlighting the little laughters and relentlessly bring up excruciating decisions."

These points exist to explain and identify why I feel Firewatch is a tense, effective, and emotional experience. Essentially, the argument is following a basic format: , , . Repeat until total point is made about game.

Snip.

All of these things are contingent on the idea that there is a single, acceptable way to perceive a game.

I'll say that most gaming reviews tend to be really badly made in general, sites want to be the first to give a review, so they either A)sell their souls to the publishers to get early copy or B) race through the game and don't really experience it as intended.

This implies that there's an inherent intention to please publishers or developers, for fear that they'll be cut off. But any enthusiast press is going to be a symbiotic relationship. If a developer or publisher blackballs every site that posts criticism, then there would be no sites that will cover a any given game, causing it to get no press, which is worse for brand knowledge than bad press.

Realistically, developers, publishers, and writing outlets typically are in generally friendly coexistence. This means that neither party will want to screw the other out of spite, for whatever reason, including poor review scores.

Add to it that there's a lot of amping up scores because of a series popularity and not actual quality (FF13), coupled with shitting on great games for daring not being made with huge budget (disgaea 3 on ign), not employing reviewers that actually play established genres (JRPG again) thus letting people who hate the genre make review of it.

This implies that there's only one accurate assessment of a game's value. But a review is something that means to capture a play experience for that player. It means that someone who doesn't normally enjoy RPGs might find something solid in a genre they typically dislike, or they might find that the game doesn't appropriately subvert the flaws of a genre that a die-hard fan would be willing to overlook. By your suggestion, anyone that doesn't like a genre should be disallowed from having a public opinion on it, and that scores should be artificially inflated by only allowing the genre fans to be the ones to influence it.

Scores being made artificially positive is just as big a problem as being made artificially negative, but in asking to remove the former, you're enforcing the latter.

And last, but certinely not least, the "progressiveness" reviewers that decided that a game that doesn't align to their world view should be burned or that they are above the "common" game players (the infamous Polygon Rock Band 4 review).

I'm assuming that you're using Polygon as your primary issue with progressive politics in game reviews. However, the game that is often trotted out for these discussions is The Witcher 3: Wild Hunt, which Arthur Gies rated 8 out of 10 [http://www.polygon.com/2015/5/13/8533059/the-witcher-3-review-wild-hunt-PC-PS4-Xbox-one], despite having mild criticisms about the game's lack of diversity in race. The piece most people use to make this point is an op-ed piece written by Tauriq Moosa [http://www.polygon.com/2015/6/3/8719389/colorblind-on-witcher-3-rust-and-gamings-race-problem], which isn't a review.

Nor is the Rock Band 4 piece [http://www.polygon.com/2015/6/1/8687867/rock-band-4-preview] you're referring to, which was from a press preview event. Polygon and Griffin McElroy rated it 7.5 out of 10 [http://www.polygon.com/2015/10/9/9484089/rock-band-4-review], which is generally favorable.

 

[Fat Hippo]

It's not just gaming, it's any medium with a degree of fanboyism. Just look at how the critical response to Dawn of Justice was met with screams of "bought by Disney" or "hates comic books". End of the day, a review is just one person's opinion of their experience with a product. Your best bet is to find a few that seem to have the same sensibilities that you do, and not pay too much attention to the rest, and you'll make yourself a lot happier.

I think you've hit the nail on the head. It's the aspect of geek culture I dislike most. They invest so heavily into whatever appeals to their tastes that they start to feel this extreme protectiveness for it, and their game/movie/comic/etc. must be defended from all who would say bad things about it. Or on the other end of the spectrum, they grow so very angry whenever somebody makes something that offends them or their tastes in any way.

There's no real rationale behind it, they aren't helping their respective medium with their misplaced rage, they just make thing harder for everyone. It's bloody everywhere in the sphere of video game culture. I really doubt theater or music critics have to deal with the level of vitriol that game critics or journalists so frequently do. Whereas here, it's more like: write one review that a lot of people disagree with and hear shit about it for years afterwards.

 

[Maximum Bert]

You put your opinion out there you are going to find contrary ones. I feel a lot of the negativity towards your opinion can be dissuaded as long as you explain your stance in a fair and coherent manner i.e explaining why you like x or why you dislike z and not glossing it over.

I must admit I am jaded by a lot of sites and publications because I really feel to many reviews are influenced by outside sources in some way. I do not resent contrary opinions especially when they are well thought out and explained but I feel I cannot trust many reviews to truly reflect the reviewers opinion either good or bad.

I am not going to go out and complain loudly about it (maybe a bit of whining here and there over something I take strong issue with) I just dont buy that magazine or vists that site or youtube page again if I feel it is untrustworthy or ignore reviews of a certain type from them i.e AAA, certain studios, indies, certain genre, whatever if I can identify a pattern to the ones I find sketchy.

 

[BrawlMan]

I'll say that most gaming reviews tend to be really badly made in general, sites want to be the first to give a review, so they either A)sell their souls to the publishers to get early copy or B) race through the game and don't really experience it as intended.
Add to it that there's a lot of amping up scores because of a series popularity and not actual quality (FF13), coupled with shitting on great games for daring not being made with huge budget (disgaea 3 on ign), not employing reviewers that actually play established genres (JRPG again) thus letting people who hate the genre make review of it.

And last, but certainly not least, the "progressiveness" reviewers that decided that a game that doesn't align to their world view should be burned or that they are above the "common" game players (the infamous Polygon Rock Band 4 review).

All that and a bag of chips. The only game reviews sites I like are Jim Sterling, Hardcore Gamer, and certain independent reviewers on YouTube. And even when I disagree with my favorites, they do no act like know-nothing-know-it-alls when voicing their opinions. Polygon are all assholes, I don't even know how go in to the game journalist industry.

 

[Saelune]

This implies that there's only one accurate assessment of a game's value. But a review is something that means to capture a play experience for that player. It means that someone who doesn't normally enjoy RPGs might find something solid in a genre they typically dislike, or they might find that the game doesn't appropriately subvert the flaws of a genre that a die-hard fan would be willing to overlook. By your suggestion, anyone that doesn't like a genre should be disallowed from having a public opinion on it, and that scores should be artificially inflated by only allowing the genre fans to be the ones to influence it.

Might be cumbersome but I think it would help if reviewers made it clear their base point of view to such games. Someone who hates RPGs reviewing an RPG wont be of value to an RPG fan, though it would be good for people who also don't generally like RPGs. So when an RPG fan finds the review and its negative, but its not apparent that the person generally doesn't like RPGs anyways, then its likely to make the fan mad. (Might still be mad regardless, but it wont be so specific to the game but their dislike of the genre). Its my big issue with Dynasty Warrior reviews since it almost always equates to "same as the last one" but if you didn't play the last one then this doesn't matter. Or to me who knows that but wants to know specifics to the series.

I know Jim Sterling generally likes Dynasty Warriors though, so any review from him would appeal to me, a fan, though might not as much to someone who is unfamiliar with the series. Its a lot to do with matching biases and opinions, since no reviewer is going to be universally appealing, since what one person likes, another may hate and vice versa.

Side note: Neat having a reviewer's pov, since as it kind of supports my point, who says it is as important as what is said.

 

[MysticSlayer]

Reviewers put their opinion out there and try to argue for it. Basically, look at the way people respond to politicians who say something they don't like. Now, instead of drawing the line along ideological differences, draw it along tastes in entertainment. You can sort of see why some people respond the way they do to reviewers.

Edit: I'm not trying to justify the behavior, just point out that it exists.

 

[Erttheking]

It's less negativity towards gaming journalism and more negativity to anyone who isn't inside the echo chamber of the angry person. Happens all over the place.

A)sell their souls to the publishers to get early copy

Uh, that's pretty standard. If you're going by that, every single reviewer who ever released a review before a game came out sold their soul. Which I'm pretty sure is the majority of them. Not just game reviewers either, film critics get early screenings.

 

[Gordon_4_v1legacy]

I think a major mistake made here is that we confused 'Entertainment Opinion Writer' with 'Journalist'. I could write a review on a video game I'd played enough times, that doesn't make me a journalist.

 

[DefunctTheory]

It's less negativity towards gaming journalism and more negativity to anyone who isn't inside the echo chamber of the angry person. Happens all over the place.

A)sell their souls to the publishers to get early copy

Uh, that's pretty standard. If you're going by that, every single reviewer who ever released a review before a game came out sold their soul. Which I'm pretty sure is the majority of them. Not just game reviewers either, film critics get early screenings.

While some film reviewers do have to sell their soul, many don't. Vanity Affair, for example, has had several critics publically laugh off black ball threats from the movie industry. The most famous probably being Christopher Hitchens, who once remarked that Vanity Affair could get any movie it wanted to, no matter what.

 

[Redd the Sock]

Honestly, I'm starting to find the defensiveness of games journalists telling. While I can't argue the fanboyish nature to complain people disagree with them, little the typical gaming press puts forward is particularly defensible in and of itself. How often have 9/10s been accompanied by several sizable patches? How often does a franchise favorite seem to get preferential treatment to a new IP (ie: a JRPG with repetitive quests in the same areas is boring, but that isn't a mark against MGS5)? They now fight to not be objective, not make comparison grades, and show any level of favoritism they chose. That's fine for them, but for me, it means I'll have equal to better luck off user reviews no one has to pay for. Better still, I can look up gameplay footage and judge it myself.

Looking at it, I'm left to ponder why, if all that has been given is a simple opinion without the extensive work that would otherwise go into as fair and balanced a review as possible would have, why do journalists and some of their fans get so upset that someone that probably didn't put any more work into their rebuttal than the journalist did the original review, thinks it's wrong. What I figure is that game journalists want to be seen as smart experts in the field, on work that requires the least effort. To be seen as bright and insightful for something that was a hastily put together gut reaction based on bias, fanboyism, politics, or just mood, the kind of things that would make an opinion seem less well informed. When the accusation comes that their analysis is far from flawless, the wagons get circled, even if there's as much ill informed opinions, bias, and fanboyism as their is in the attacks on the review.

Sorry, there's an irony in deflecting accusations of bias and such, by being defensive of your own work from those that "can't take criticism". After all, you're probably very biased toward your won work.

 

[Bilious Green_v1legacy]

It's very hard to take seriously the opinions of organisations who derive the lion's share of their revenue from advertising purchased by the companies whose products they are proporting to review. How am I supposed to believe in the integrity of any review of Overwatch done by Gamespot, given that their website has been festooned with Overwatch advertising for months now? Any review they produce is going to compromised by the perception that the advertising dollars paid by Blizzard come with an assumed quid pro quo, especially if Gamespot wants to prominently feature advertising for future Blizzard games. Why should i take anything Game Informer says seriously when they are owned by Game Stop, and thus have a commercial interest in giving positive reviews to sell more games at their retail outlets? Personally, I think the "professional" video games media are nothing but a bunch of marketing shills and ideological barrow pushers and the sooner most of them go out of business the better.

It says a lot that I have way more faith in the integrity of Yahtzee's satirical reviews that I do with the "professional" gaming media. I much prefer to make my purchasing decisions based on the reviews of a handful of Youtubers whose opinions I have come to appreciate.

 

[Something Amyss]

Does being a reviewer even count as journalism? I don't think movie reviewers count as film journalists, since journalism is news.

Journalism is more than just news, and part of it is disseminating information to the public. There have been a lot of forms of journalism that were dodgier than film journalism.

I'm not really sure there's much in the way of gaming journalism that counts as journalism, however.

Uh, that's pretty standard. If you're going by that, every single reviewer who ever released a review before a game came out sold their soul. Which I'm pretty sure is the majority of them. Not just game reviewers either, film critics get early screenings.

No other major entertainment media I can name has to jump through the hoops games reviewers do. In fact, while gaming reviewers often have to jump through hoops, I've seen journalists who cover film, books, and music actively courted. I still get unsolicited media from companies 8 years after my last written review, and I was nobody then. Hell, some companies will send you material based on reviews you've written for Amazon or a similar site. Now, maybe that last one happens with vidya games, too, but I doubt it. I've seen the difficulty some of the major reviewers/publications have getting review copies or codes, and it ain't pretty.

But is there also an obligation to disclose your bias when you feel you might have one? To note where you are comning from when making assertions that might be influenced by things other than the game itself?

Who doesn't have a bias when it comes to the media they consume, let alone review?

 

[Erttheking]

Snip

Huh. I did not know that. And now I do.

Thanks!

 

[Zhukov]

Reviewers exist to confirm my opinions on specific games.

Especially when I haven't actually played the game yet and am therefore a little uncertain if my opinion is correct. Reading a preview/review that agrees with my preconceptions puts my mind at ease and makes me feel good.

So naturally I'm going to get angry when they disagree with me, when they give a high score game from a series or genre I don't like or a low score to a game I'm looking forward to. Because that means they've failed to do their job properly. And naturally I let them know this by sending them abuse and death threats and suggest that I know where their children go to school.

It's just part of the cycle of life!