Howdy, Stranger!
It looks like you're new here. If you want to get involved, click one of these buttons!
Quick Links
TESO, GameInformer & Journalistic Integrity.
spankybus
Member UncommonPosts: 1,367
Complete unrelated to the actual Elder Scrolls Online game, I have been considering GameInformer's exclusivity for this reveal. Obviously, all opinions aside, we can agree that this is a big deal announcement. How did GI get such exclusivity?
I've been wondering, what could GI promise to gain such a huge article? But then, I went to http://elderscrollsonline.com/, which I think is the official website for the pending MMO? If you visit it, at the very bottom is a link to 'The GameInformer Hub'. Really?! Plenty of other sites have articles on this new, PC gamer, mmorpg. Com, etc....but they aren't linked on the official website like GI?
My predictin for the GI article, when it releases, if will glowing with positivity and excitement. No honest reservations regarding the deviation from the type of gameplay that is the hallmark of the single-player games. Completely devoid of honest journalistic objectivity.
Taken with the fact that anyone who signs up for a GameStop club card gets a free subscription to GI mag, it really got me wondering about the true nature of this magazine. So, I will just ask you guys the obvious question:
Is GameInformer anything more than an advertising platform for GameDevelopers? Can you really look to this magazine for an objective look at future titles? Is it a conflict of interest for a magazine that write game reviews to have this degree of integration on the official website of a game who's developers also advertise within their Rag?
Ok, no tin-foil hats lol I mean, this is not national security here, but it really does seem to cast GI in a compromised light. Do they write fluff articles when granted exclusivity?
Frank 'Spankybus' Mignone
www.spankybus.com
-3d Artist & Compositor
-Writer
-Professional Amature
Comments
Do you really think you can trust any magazine to give you a true review? I can't remember the last time I saw a game review that was actually bad. I guess I don't really get magazines that often, so I might be wrong...
IMHO to be a journalist, at least a good one, you have to be able to remove all personal bias and just report the facts.
Then again, I see all journalism these days as simply another way to make money and think that a reporter with integrity and an unbiased opinion is a thing of a past.
And the really sad thing.....the world is full of stupid people who lap it up and think the things these guys write about means something....
Scans of the article has already been leaked online. There's no personal prefence in them (positive or negative) from what I read.
Someone else had mentioned that, but when I visited the website in question, they had already pulled them for copyright infringement. Frankly I am amazed they posted them at all.Frank 'Spankybus' Mignone
www.spankybus.com
-3d Artist & Compositor
-Writer
-Professional Amature
I can't remember the last time I read a truly critical review of a major title release.
"Loading screens" are not "instances".
Your personal efforts to troll any game will not, in fact, impact the success or failure of said game.
I cancelled subscriptions to any game magazines I had years ago. They lost all objectivity when major companies like Sony and EA would threaten to take their business elsewhere if the reviews dropped below a certain number.
Think about your comment: If GameStop is offering you a subscription to Game Informer with a sign-up for their card, isn't that pretty much an indicator that you're going to be getting a product catalog disguised as a "review" magazine?
Bingo, my thoughts exactly.Frank 'Spankybus' Mignone
www.spankybus.com
-3d Artist & Compositor
-Writer
-Professional Amature
Only reviews I read now with any hopes of getting real information is from players not accosiatied with any website/magazine or anywhere else that might get some sort of revenue from game companies. So basically beta testers and other players like you and me, are the only people I listen too now.
The reveiws for SWTOR on this site was absolutly sickning, I am not even sure the authors wrote the articles. Hell it seemed like they came straight out of EA's PR dpt. I couldnt even believe what I was reading half the time. I still love the one "Innovations in SWTOR" then in the article each paragragh started out by stating "this isnt really innovative" or something of the sort, then went on to write a paragragh or two of utter BS. That was thetime I gave up all hope of MMORPG.com ever writting articles for mmo gammers. I realized they are in it for the cash and is just another advertising outlet for companies, that became more obvious once I saw EA single player RPG's plastered all over the site.
Waiting for:EQ-Next, ArcheAge (not so much anymore)
Now Playing: N/A
Worst MMO: FFXIV
Favorite MMO: FFXI
I don't know if you remember...
... the original Xbox promotional videos with the fully rendered butterflies, or the high-resolution video of the girl dancing in front of a robot that would mimic her every move, but I remember when GameStop had no problem showcasing the original promo video to sell Xbox units. Practically every image disappeared the moment they announced the Xbox title called "Malice" that was voiced over by Gwen Stefani.
The early promo videos were supposed to be "actual game footage", but whatever game that was supposed to be somehow got supplanted by the trash-heap that was "Malice".
What You Were Supposed To Get:
What You Really Got:
I happen to like the Game Informer website, its my second home for gaming next to this website as of late I've been spending more time over there actually talking about games and watching live streams of the GI staff playing upcoming games or Replays of classic and old school games PC and Console actually feel like a gamer again without the armchair economists and investors droning on about their claims about sub numbers= a good game.
But being back on topic I like to share the news articles from GI with this community give them something new to read or pique someones interest in a new game or new MMO or the Kickstarter Projects, its better than reading yet another GW2 is the messiah threads over and over again.
lets not forget a certain site sold their souls to EA/bioware but to be fair bioware is more like a soulless minion of evil then a master of darkness
Ok, in complete fairness i have now read the Leaked GI article. Special thanks to the individual in question who pointed me in the right direction.
Now, I have to say that there was more objectivity in the article than I came to expect! There were a few parts that seemed to get a little yellow brick road in regards to features that are either too different from the single-player paradigm of TES games or not completely fleshed out yet. But really, this was not overly done and they were mostly stating the various aspects of the game as facts, without any fluff one way or the other.
I hate to say it, but I think a lot of the stuff I have read on this website (mmorpg.com) recently has made me a little jaded. A few here have already commented on SWTOR article that read more like a rejected blurb for the game box back panel. I would say to the writers and editors here at mmorpg, check out this article. This is how a journalist should write an article about a pending game.
Do not make it exciting, leave your adverbs a home. Be objective and factual, if you wanna spew opinion, write an editorial.
In so far as the topic on hand, must say that GI proved me wrong in this case. But given their continued integration with TESO website, you should always read anything they write about this game with the proper amount of skepticism. If nothing else, they have already proved to me to be more capable to keeping it real than anything I've read on here in a while!
Frank 'Spankybus' Mignone
www.spankybus.com
-3d Artist & Compositor
-Writer
-Professional Amature
I dislike Game Informer as a whole but they didn't write anything outlandish or that would make me think something was going on.
HAHA
no