Print

Please login or register.
1 Hour 1 Day 1 Week 1 Month Forever
Login with username, password and session length

[Mizhara]

Slate article on the subject.

This article pretty much made it "click" for me. I've been lamenting the state of the gaming press for some time, pruning my bookmarks regularly until there's nothing left but a few youtubers, streamers and yahtzee (because eh, he's still kind of funny). This latest "Gamersgate" stuff has pretty much shown that there's really no love lost between the gaming press and gamers themselves.

The article touches upon a few interesting points as to why that is, some more obvious than others. One that really got to me was that this middleman between the game companies and the players is quickly becoming obsolete. Rehashed press statements and hype articles are increasingly redundant and pointless when the companies deliver them directly to the gamers now, and if gaming press can't provide something more substantial they have no purpose anymore.

The shift towards youtubers, streamers and social media over "official" press is interesting to me and hopefully a step towards a closer relationship between gamers and game companies without the money corrupting the industry at the core.

Game Journalism is hopefully dying, so it can be replaced by a new kind where the gamers themselves cover the news and message that needs to be sent. Given that the games press themselves are now declaring gamers to be a dead or dying demographic, I suspect they're actively but not necessarily intentionally eating a gun to facilitate this.

[Lyn Farel]

Removing professional reviews to let the gamer reviews dominating everything ? No thanks.

We need both, even if most of gaming journalism these days are either sold outs or amateurs. We need an amateur view (gamers/customers) as well as in counterpart a professional outlook (gamedesigners, devs, or pro journalists that actually know about their field and the development side of... games).

[Mizhara]

If only there were professional journalism in gaming, I'd wholly agree with you. Unfortunately, the only actual professional gaming news written is done by journalists in other genres. Forbes for instance have had a few interesting articles over the years. You won't find it in actual gaming media though, which is why it is on the verge of death. It'll take some sort of miraculous turn-around to resuscitate it.

[Morwen Lagann]

Removing professional reviews to let the gamer reviews dominating everything ? No thanks.

We need both, even if most of gaming journalism these days are either sold outs or amateurs. We need an amateur view (gamers/customers) as well as in counterpart a professional outlook (gamedesigners, devs, or pro journalists that actually know about their field and the development side of... games).

Let me know when truly bad games are getting the pre-release reviews they deserve on major sites instead of the false advertising the developers paid for.

Then I'll believe there's such a thing as professionalism in gaming journalism.

[Silas Vitalia]

Rock paper shotgun will save us all.  The staff is outstanding and the writing is often delightfully critical of mass market shlock.

I find their reviews quite even handed and they try to cover a full spectrum of indie and more popular games.

What I'd add is that they seem beholden to no one, so it's nice to hear that 'x' game that many other 'news' establishments lavish with praise is actually a mostly scripted game on rails that certainly looks pretty but is more of a movie. etc.

[Lyn Farel]

Removing professional reviews to let the gamer reviews dominating everything ? No thanks.

We need both, even if most of gaming journalism these days are either sold outs or amateurs. We need an amateur view (gamers/customers) as well as in counterpart a professional outlook (gamedesigners, devs, or pro journalists that actually know about their field and the development side of... games).

Let me know when truly bad games are getting the pre-release reviews they deserve on major sites instead of the false advertising the developers paid for.

Then I'll believe there's such a thing as professionalism in gaming journalism.

That's why I wrote " even if most of gaming journalism these days are either sold outs or amateurs." 

In any case removing a vital part of game journalism is not the solution, as bad as that part can be. Especially since it's not absolutely all of them...

Unless people are implying that they are ALL OF THEM rotten to the core ?

[Dessau]

Over.

This is my feeling on journalism in general.

Oddly enough, the only worthwhile takeaway from the collective conniption following the greenlighting of Depression Quest, that gaming press cannot be trusted to exercise ethical practices, was almost completely buried by the sputum of internet blowhards. They reframed the narrative to fit their opposing agendas, and the corrupt and click-hungry media was happy to have them in the driver's seat.

Outside of minute and isolated pockets of academia, such as the erudite folks in this community, the internet is no longer a facilitator of discourse. The appeal to the 'great equalizer' has left us with a quagmire of lowest common denominators, an exponentially expanding landfill of junk data.

Get off my lawn.

[Mizhara]

And just as I mention Forbes, they post what I have to say is probably the best summary and opinion piece on these last few weeks of fuckery I've seen so far. I must say I disagree with a few of his points and opinions, but I have to respect the level of research and the aspiration towards nuance the article is showing.

If we can't get this kind of journalism in the gaming press, it might as well just die so mainstream media can pick up the pieces and try to do it right.

[Arista Shahni]

I let Mirage do all the garbage sifting (which is a mix between articles and them forum threads on games on several sites).  For games I like to be good, I pray to heathen gods and roll the dice.

And Yahtzee has nearly made me pee several times.  He's funny.

[Kala]

Let me know when truly bad games are getting the pre-release reviews they deserve on major sites instead of the false advertising the developers paid for.

I agree, and that needs to be addressed.

But that's not the kind of games journalism that Cara Ellison is doing:http://embedwith.tumblr.com/post/84351690332/embed-with-katharine-neil-and-harvey-smith

or Jenn Frank: http://www.unwinnable.com/2013/04/05/that-dragon-cancer/#.VAotfvldVI4.

And those are the sorts of people who are being driven away. 


As a personal aside, I want someone's genuine opinion on the game they are playing.  What their impressions were, what they liked, disliked, how it made them feel.  I don't want them to try and pretend to be 'objective' or 'unbiased' because there are no such things.  If they tell me honestly what they liked about something and explain why, I will get a better idea if I'd like it or not.

It's also far less likely to be open to corruption than a scoring system if their response is a personal one. 


On a slightly different note, I've been following all this for a while - #gamergate and whatnot. So here's what I think re: gamers are dead vs games journalism is dead.    (and some other observations).  Re: gamers are dead - I remember Leigh Alexander's piece on that, but I'm sure there were others in a similar vein.

See, when you're a woman playing games, and have an opinion, you may well come across someone who says "yes, but they aren't *for* you.  you aren't the main demographic, gamers are. women should just go make their own if they aren't happy." (I've come across this on numerous occasions). Hang on though.  it is my own.  I bought it.  as a consumer, I'm entitled to have an opinion on a product I bought.

(additionally, I've been gaming since the atari and spectrum, you little sack of shit  but this is what I say in my head)

So there's a kind of interesting relationship going on between 'gamer' and 'demographic' and whether or not you can comment on content:

It's annoying to hear someone complain about the content in a game, when the game was clearly designed for a different target demographic.

(from here: http://www.examiner.com/article/the-gaming-community-is-not-a-wretched-hive-of-sexism-and-misogyny)

Ok, so, what is the intended demographic for most AAA games?  Who are the safe target market you are appealing to? 14-19 year old males? 15-25 to be generous?  I dunno, but we're talking young men here mostly.

Ok, well, I don't how old most of you are, but I know plenty of gamers who are 40 or over.  Adam Baldwin, the vociferous supporter of #gamergate is 52.  Guys?  If you bought a AAA game, you probably aren't the target demographic here. You're too old.   Does this mean you can't complain about content not meant for you? In the games you've bought?

Now, I know many, many more people actually play those games than just that safe target market - of course.  I am one of them.  I happen to think anyone gets an opinion on the games they play.

I also happen to think anyone gets to call themselves a gamer if they play games.   As far as I'm concerned, that's the criteria.  Playing games.  I also don't care, crucially, about the type of game.  I don't care about the genre.  I don't care about the platform.  I don't care if it's deemed 'hardcore' or 'casual' and I don't care how many hours you pour into it; families, jobs and time permitting.

However.  Some people (and I have encountered a few of them, frequently, over the last few days) do not feel this way.  They believe that the title of 'gamer' is reserved for that target demographic, that only playing AAA games make you a gamer; sometimes more specifically action or shooters and console games.  (for some reason).  Someone else described this as an example of The One True Scotsman Fallacy, with the goalposts continually being moved of what it takes to qualify as 'a gamer':

"I've had this argument with people before (about my wife) and it's gone like this:
A: Mrs Lentoon isn't a gamer!
Me: yes she is, she likes playing Rayman, phone games, the sims and civilisation. She's got a 3DS and we play pokemon together when she's travelling
A: Ah! But she doesn't play AAA games!
Me: Well, not often, no, but she's played skyrim and enjoyed it and AC4
A: Ah! But does she play insert AAA game name here!
(and so on and so forth)"

So there's my idea of a 'gamer' (playing games as a hobby) (A), there's the idea of 'the real true gamer' - some mythical point of credibility you need to reach to be considered one of the club (B), and then there's the 'gamer stereotype'; the stigma.  The fat basement dwelling nerd with no social skills. (C)

When Leigh Alexander wrote her piece, I think she was referring to category B.  When she said 'the gamer' was dying, I think she meant the idea of people being gatekeepers of gaming, the narrow demographic that is catered for as a safe target market and therefore feels games are for them and no one else (despite anyone being able to buy them) - is dying.  Because games are broadening out beyond those confines and having wider appeal.  These distinctions no longer become relevant.

I think some people are very threatened by this idea.  People have spoken about being scared of losing their gamer identity.

She may have also meant the stereotype of the gamer was dying.  I hope so.  It's not a good one, and there's a vocal minority  intent on living up to that stereotype.

I wonder also, re: people being threatened, that it's not just a concern about the demographic widening, but about the type of games that already are more broadly diverse.  Because along with the Zoe Quinn stuff meaning Depression Quest has been brought up (and blasted), I've seen Gone Home brought up a few times in conjunction. It's always had this criticism from certain quarters, but it's resurfaced in this 'debate' - the idea that Gone Home is 'not being a real game' or 'barely being a video game at all' because it doesn't meet certain expectations, in the same way certain people are not considered 'real gamers' if they do not meet certain criteria.

(Therefore it must be due to corruption that Gone Home received the recognition it did.  Yes, I've heard that argued).

It's perhaps easier to go for, and to accuse, the indy scene of corruption because it's a smaller-scaled aspect of the industry, therefore more incestuous (people will know eachother).  But it really seems like going after the wrong target to me. 

I wonder if part of this is a schism between wanting gaming to develop creatively, to innovate and to broaden demographic vs. wanting games to stay exactly the same, keeping a sense of identity and exclusiveness. 

(Or centrifugal and centripetal forces)

There's a couple of articles I read a while ago that are (tangentially) related.  One completely bashed Bioshock, but had some interesting points about reviewing (and how it should be done), and the other made the argument that AAA are meant to be boring and unoriginal.

http://tevisthompson.com/on-videogame-reviews/

http://www.newstatesman.com/games/2013/10/aaa-games-are-supposed-be-boring-and-unoriginal

I really agreed with this statement:

 

Tough criticism is an act of belief. It is sincere in its hopes for the future but clear-eyed about the present. Most videogames are disappointing, and disappointing in dependable ways. But it is possible to love individual games, to be ignited by them, and see a future worth pursuing. We’re not at all sure what this medium is capable of, but it certainly deserves more than our regular pronouncements of excellence and the glib advice that we simply accept every familiar trope and gameism. [...] We should marvel at a medium that allows us such room to play, to explore, to bring ourselves to bear on the experience and make it our own.

I think criticism, proper criticism, where people are genuinely engaging with the content, and holding it to a high standard, should be part of our review system.
Not just scores out of 10.

and firmly disagreed with this statement:

So don’t bemoan the lack of originality in AAA gaming, because AAA isn’t about originality, that’s what indie games and the small developers are for. AAA gaming is about getting you another shot of your usual, hopefully a little better than last time.

Because while I agree it's probably the case, it shouldn't be, and is a sad state of affairs if it is.  Not saying we can't have the same things over and over for those who want it, but in a creative medium, I would've thought originality and innovation is what everyone should be aiming for.  I would've thought it'd be the prime objective and the only way to really improve.

There's a great little video here about gaming as a narrative medium by Daniel Floyd from Extra Credits (which I link over and over again, as I think it ties into this whole discussion):  https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1jdG2LHair0&list=PLFA6389395ACC2E42

I think we're at a point, largely, where we're deciding where we want gaming to go.  What we want 'gamers' to mean. How we want to identify ourselves.  Who we want to write about games.  I don't think anything is going to die - I hope not.  Gaming journalism dying, the gaming journalism I like (such as people like Jenn Frank and Cara Ellison) would make me sad. I like reading people being thoughtful about games. But hopefully things can change and grow a bit in the aftermath of this.  I don't know. Maybe not.  Maybe it will just drive people away.

[Lyn Farel]

As a personal aside, I want someone's genuine opinion on the game they are playing.  What their impressions were, what they liked, disliked, how it made them feel.  I don't want them to try and pretend to be 'objective' or 'unbiased' because there are no such things.  If they tell me honestly what they liked about something and explain why, I will get a better idea if I'd like it or not.

That's also why I want actual, true professional insight beside amateur feedback done by players. The latter is absolutely essential, but I also think it would be good to educate players a bit about the process behind the development of a video game because frankly... Well, they know nothing, Jon Snow, and they are full of misconceptions and such. Which eventually lead to mountains of false statements, myths and urban legends, and those tend to frankly kill good games (or the opposite) when they are made.

The problem is that while game journalism as a whole is a bloated and corrupt - the publisher of my company told us straight forward once that they usually get crappy grades out of eastern europe and russian medias because it's expected there to pay journalists to get it, they are just more honest about it - the reviews done by players also have their lot of issues, and not the smallest ones of the two.

What makes a game to my eyes are two main things : the technical execution, and the fun you get out of it.

Some game designers are the perfect example of gamedesigners looking for the holy grail of fun, and still failing at finding it. Fun is the most volatile thing they will face and that is also where players and gamers insight is invaluable in reviews. There is no straight up, mighty law on what makes something fun and what makes something not interesting. The simple notion of fun is probably one of the hardest thing to achieve in a game. And most first drafts and versions of games are certainly not fun. That's also the job of game designers to make something fun, and they do not always succeed. But that's a true job in itself, and not an easy one. The problem with most gamers and players (and studio managers sometimes too) is that they believe that anybody can be gamedesigner. Well, yes, but maybe not the one doing an actual competent job.

You cannot truly say a game is fun because X, or that a game is not fun because of Y as a statement of fact, but as a personal opinion, indeed. That can't be objective. But you can comment on the technical realization of the game itself. And what is sad is that a lot of game journalists actually come from development studios, and they do not seem to really speak as the former devs they are, but as gamers speak, or as their bosses tell them to speak. One should not forget that most journalists are gamers like us and just speak through their heart, and will give good grades to something we will consider crappy, but that make a lot of players actually happy. It's nice and all to play game hipster and say things like "Stop sucking Activision and CoD and give them the actual grades they deserve !" but we often forget that it's one of the most successful franchises out there.

The same way you will have hipster critics as well as total mainstream critics in cinema journalism, or whatever. Honestly, it's an overtly complicated matter, but one thing most of us agree with is the state of main professional game journalism always favoring triple A's out of major publishers.

That's also why when you are looking at grades on metacritic for example, you usually subtract like 10 points out of 100 for indie games or smaller games to put them on the same standards than triple A's.

There is also something players tend to forget and that is :

1) graphics and visuals : you can say whatever you want but that's an integral part of the quality of a game. If someone plays on the same field than major studios, then he has to expect to be treated the same way when it comes to the visuals of his game. And most triple A's have outstanding graphic teams because they have fucking money to hire the best and most extensive artistic teams.

2) ergonomics and QA : same as above.

And for both those 2 points, a lot of lesser studios get smaller grades and appreciation exactly because they are not as good as their triple A's million budget neighbors.

And then you have smaller games like Bastion or Transistor that present more affordable visuals that do not require billions to make and can prove to be at the top, but just in a different style with different expectations.

And those games get similar grades to most triple A's, or even better. So with just that in mind, I will never swallow the fact that game journalism is totally lost or dead. And not just for the most unappreciated ones that you linked above, but even for mainstream ones.

Yes I hold those in a very poor view, but I also know that nothing here, absolutely nothing, even for mainstream journalism, is black and white.

[Lyn Farel]

Oh, also on the gatekeeper gamers dying and games audiences broadening you mentioned, I can only agree. After all, that's not a surprise that the 10 top most sold games are Nintendo Wii games, with the most casual games of all coming at the very top.

In your faces, hardcore gamers. Your games are actually the minority now, and you are just becoming the loud minority.

Ah, and the percentage of women playing games these days is barely lower than men's.

[Kala]

That's also why I want actual, true professional insight beside amateur feedback done by players. The latter is absolutely essential, but I also think it would be good to educate players a bit about the process behind the development of a video game because frankly... Well, they know nothing, Jon Snow, and they are full of misconceptions and such. Which eventually lead to mountains of false statements, myths and urban legends, and those tend to frankly kill good games (or the opposite) when they are made.

Sure.  and agreed.

But I'm also quite happy with a professional insight that combines a personal one; or certainly that a professional is allowed to have a personal response without criticisms of bias, lack of objectivity etc.

I really liked Alec Meer's piece on Gone Home:

http://www.rockpapershotgun.com/2013/08/16/gone-home-a-tale-of-two-dads/

where he uses it to talk about his relationship with his own Dad. and I can understand an immediate reaction of "but I don't care about Alec Meer and his Dad, I just want to know about the game!"  But it is telling you about the game as well.  It's just telling you about the game in an unusual way.

Honestly (and I don't want to be extreme, or anything) the idea that he shouldn't have written that at all, he should just stick with describing and grading the various features, makes me want to rip peoples faces off with my teeth (in my head, ofc). Because I enjoy reading thoughtful responses and engagement to games like this that much.  

(though no, he his not strictly speaking reviewing it, just talking about it, but that discussion is valid and should be a part of games journalism and writing, if for no other reason than I want to see it  ).

What makes a game to my eyes are two main things : the technical execution, and the fun you get out of it.

Heh    I think it's fascinating what games are to different people; what we get out of them, where the emphasis is on a personal level.

Because it's pretty different for me. Not saying those two aren't important to me, mind! They sound like perfectly reasonable suppositions for what makes a game. But for me the most important things are probably...immersion/escapism and scope/depth.

One of my favourite games of all time is Daggerfall.  I think the technical execution in some places could be described as lacking in that one...

and fun, hrm, sounds like it should be an obvious one.  But I'm quite willing for a game to emotionally abuse me horribly if I'm involved enough with it.  I'm thinking the original UFO, with the insanely hard aliens shooting far further than you can reach them, from the black fog where you can't see them, while your rookies panic and start shooting at eachother, because they are idiots. I'm not entirely sure the experience was enjoyable, in a traditional sense, from the amount of swearing and raging I was doing at those rookies.  It was very, very frustrating.  But ultimately, also, deeply compelling.

and in a way that, the remake, as much as I admired what they did and genuinely think they did the right thing in doing a modern take, didn't make me feel as tense, frustrated and...well, in danger, as the original.  (I could not possibly explain why those are things I appear to value in a gaming experience.  I perhaps need therapy).  But no, actually, I can - it adds an excitement, a feeling that the threat is real.  Which in a round about way, is fun...Just perhaps not in a traditional sense.


Was talking the other day with someone about what games were 'revelation moments' for us personally and why.  Or what games we think moved the medium onwards, progressed it's development as a whole.  I find it really interesting as everyone has a different take on what has value and where the emphasis is.

Oh, also on the gatekeeper gamers dying and games audiences broadening you mentioned, I can only agree. After all, that's not a surprise that the 10 top most sold games are Nintendo Wii games, with the most casual games of all coming at the very top.

Someone made a point I found interesting along those lines (in my internet travels):

I made this point elsewhere, but I think it's worth making again.

This is what gaming is these days. It is no longer AAA titles dominating the market, it is not about FPS games and the "hardcore" versus the "casual". Here are the numbers, this is modern gaming. It is much, much broader and pulls in millions more people than it did even a few years ago. People who would be shocked by videogame misogyny are arguably the majority of people who play and buy games.

I'm beginning to doubt that the comfortable world of the "hardcore gamer" was ever the majority view, and I've been gaming long enough that I remember when all people ever played was Counterstrike, and before that, Myst.

Anyway, sales numbers. read them, mourn the death of your particular brand of gaming, or look forward to the future. Either way, not really up for debate.

The statement I was responding to (paraphrased)

"CoD is the most popular game of all time. CoD players are the majority of gaming. You're full of it if you think otherwise."

Modern Warfare 2 - 22 million copies
Flappy Bird - 50 million downloads
Angry Birds Franchise - 2 billion downloads
If we take Phones out of it altogether, Minecraft has been downloaded 54 million times, making it more than twice as popular as Modern Warfare 2.
Top games owned on steam:
Dota - 25.93 million
TF2 - 20.30 million
HL2 - 12.77 million

Not a single CoD game in the top 20. It's not even nearly the most bought, most owned, most played, most completed, whatever FPS in the rankings!

Hell, there are four versions of HL2 and something like 12 source-engine games that were all developed from HL2 in there. No Battlefield, no CoD.

Dota 2 has 3,828 million hours total played since march 2009. Civilisation V (no sexism there!) has 743 million hours played. Now, Modern Warfare 2 does crop up, with 625 million hours played.

Less than 50k people own MW3 on steam, now that's telling, right?

The top ten non-mobile franchises are Mario (and then Super Mario), Pokemon, Wii-branded motion games, GTA, the Sims, Need for Speed, Sonic, Tetris and then COD.

Now, hilariously, Wii Sports ALONE (110 million) nearly beats the entire, combined COD franchise (120 million).
It's not the best selling game in existence. It barely even registers on the top ten!

(though put in much stronger terms than I would make them; I tend to think everything is up for debate, for example  )

But yes; I think gamers and gaming is far more broad than is often represented.  Including how it's represented by the people who claim it belongs to them. (Which I think the CoD guy there was probably trying to do).

[Nmaro Makari]

This big pronouncement has something of the Kony about it.

[BloodBird]

Removing professional reviews to let the gamer reviews dominating everything ? No thanks.

We need both, even if most of gaming journalism these days are either sold outs or amateurs. We need an amateur view (gamers/customers) as well as in counterpart a professional outlook (gamedesigners, devs, or pro journalists that actually know about their field and the development side of... games).

Let me know when truly bad games are getting the pre-release reviews they deserve on major sites instead of the false advertising the developers paid for.

Then I'll believe there's such a thing as professionalism in gaming journalism.

THIS.

As an example, I was in town the other day, visiting game stop.

I found Gone Home in the shelf for new-ish PC games and the retailers ask for 'new game' price for it, 400 NOK.

No thanks. I might have been tempted to get it if

A) I had not known that the box art's claims are laughably off.
B) the game was worth more than the resources the box itself was made from.

A short, meaningless game that can be beat in about 15 minutes or so is not worth the hype it got, it is not news worth and it sure is not innovative, and I asked the clerk at the store what he felt about having to ask 400 for a "game" that short and pointless. He was honest enough to say that off the record, he was not happy about selling the thing at all, but he had to, because he's a low-end employee in game stop selling games in a local store.

Point here is, when Game "journalists" hype this thing up so much, supposedly because "lesbian girl runs of with girlfriend and leaves clues in her home for her sister to find" and any game reviewer on YT or any LP will show you how horribly short, pointless and over hyped this thing is, you know something is wrong with the so-called Game "journalists".

I want honesty and a pursuit of fun and games to return to gaming, and look forward to the day we get that, instead of this ideological BS ideas we got in recent years. I want gaming to be about playing games and having fun with them, optionally together with friends, gender and IRL situations be damned.