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On Videogame Journalism 255

Posted by michael from the and-other-oxymorons dept.
Michael_Blessed writes "The most incisive critique of games journalism currently out there. I would say that as I participated, but there's some real illuminating stuff in there. And it's all true - I should know, being a games 'journalist' myself." It's a whole long series - read all 11 parts.
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On Videogame Journalism More

On Videogame Journalism

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  • Re: It's a whole long series - read all 11 parts. (Score:5, Funny)

    by Anonymous Coward on Friday August 22, 2003 @02:20PM (#6767180)
    No.

  • 11 Parts? (Score:5, Funny)

    by Anonymous Coward on Friday August 22, 2003 @02:21PM (#6767186)
    This is Slashdot, most people have trouble reading more than the headline.

  • Journalists? My ass. (Score:2, Insightful)

    by Anonymous Coward
    Journalism is "[t]he style of writing characteristic of material in newspapers and magazines, consisting of direct presentation of facts or occurrences with little attempt at analysis or interpretation."
    • "Journalists" take themselves too seriously as far as their writing skills. By far, most magazines and newspapers are written at a 5th grade comprehension level. If they werent, the target audience would be too narrow. The exception is usually highly specialized stuff like medical journals written for doctors.

      Game journalism has to be even lower than that, since 5th graders make up a part of the target audience. So they're written at an even lower level. My 2nd grader reads game magazines.

  • Huh? (Score:5, Insightful)

    by Anixamander ( 448308 ) on Friday August 22, 2003 @02:24PM (#6767213) Journal
    "The most incisive critique of games journalism currently out there. I would say that as I participated, but there's some real illuminating stuff in there. And it's all true - I should know, being a games 'journalist' myself."

    Well then, this is my critique of a game journalist: Always preview before submitting. Sentence structure is important.

    • Re:Huh? (Score:5, Funny)

      by Talez ( 468021 ) on Friday August 22, 2003 @02:44PM (#6767406)
      It's a known fact that video games "journalists" are intellectual wankers. Sometimes just plain old wankers but most of the time they're huge intellectual wankers.

      Here's a brief rundown of how each video game house reviews games:

      IGN - Is the company advertising the game on IGN? Yes? Then add 5 to the score.

      Gamespot - Is this game popular? If yes, demolish the score by at least 20% and make sure to have completely unrealistic expectations of the game.

      Gamespy - THIS GAME IS SO COOL! GET THE DOWNLOAD NOW FROM FILEPLANET FOR ONLY $9.95/MONTH!!!!! MAKE SURE TO LOOK AT ONE OF OUR KEWL FEATURES DUDE!

      HTH. HAND.
      • I used to read GIA a long time ago, but they're gone -- are there any good game sites out there? I'm mostly interested in quality reviews, rather than breathless previews. Writers who know the its/it's distinction would be great.
        • didn't many of the former GIA members found gameforms.com ? It's not a clone of the GIA, but it does do a good job of copying the quality.
        • Netjak.com is pretty good...but since I write for them, I'm what you'd call "biased". Games Domain is the only other source I look for reviews. They seem to be the only ones like-minded in actually expressing criticism, while also making sure they follow basic grammar rules.

    • Re:Huh? (Score:5, Funny)

      by prichardson ( 603676 ) on Friday August 22, 2003 @03:02PM (#6767548) Journal
      Hey, guess what. You're commenting on a comment on an article about an industry that reviews, rates, and comments on content. Quick, someone reply to me so this goes even further.

  • old man murray (Score:4, Insightful)

    by joe_bruin ( 266648 ) on Friday August 22, 2003 @02:26PM (#6767228) Homepage Journal
    old man murray [oldmanmurray.com], while probably not being so much of a video game journal itself, was much more of a meta-video game journal, in pointing out the whoring practices of most of the press out there as well as everything that is wrong in the video game software industry. their benchmark "time to crate" (the time it takes from when you start a first person shooter to when you see the first crate or barrel) is still a good indicator of at what point the developers ran out of ideas.

    sadly, these days it is just an archive of old articles. still pretty funny, though. you gotta love a site so dedicated to taunting john romero.
    • old man murray, while probably not being so much of a video game journal itself, was much more of a meta-video game journal...

      I also always found OMM to be an excellent source of bile.

  • 11 parts? (Score:5, Interesting)

    by stratjakt ( 596332 ) on Friday August 22, 2003 @02:26PM (#6767230) Journal
    To paraphrase Frank Zappa:

    Game journalism is people who cant write, interviewing people who cant talk, for an audience that cant read.

    (He was talking about rock journalism but I think it applies here)

    There's no "game journalism" as I see it. Just text ads. I'm more likely to cruise various posting forums to see what the peanut gallery thinks about a game I'm interested in than to read a "professional review" from .

    And even then I tend to disagree with what's said most of the time. In fact, I think Metal Gear Solid, Halo, GTA3 and other popular titles are boring, yet I played Jak and Daxter for 8 hours solid until I'd 100% finished it. It entertained me, Halo didnt.

    So my answer? They're fucking games, just go play what you like and have fun and quit worrying about what other people think, only candy asses do that.

  • video games make us think? (Score:3, Insightful)

    by garcia ( 6573 ) * on Friday August 22, 2003 @02:26PM (#6767231)
    Hell, even that Denis Dyack character. Even games that do not strive for art have a cultural influence. Even BMXXX makes us think.

    Eh, I don't think that video games make us think all that much (sure, there are those that do, RPG, puzzle games, etc), but the vast majority of games are there for blind entertainment.

    Very little actual thinking goes into any of it (especially after playing it several times).

    Take any racing game, first person shooter, or even any random new board game... None of them are full of all that much thought. You sort of do them over and over again and don't even need to have your eyes open.

    I was playing a 1960's boardgame that my gf bought off EBay (nostalgia I guess, her mother had it in their house when my gf was little). "Careers" has WORDS all over the board. Directions right there on the board. You actually have to READ the directions to learn how to play.

    I was shocked. Now we are filled with games that require no thought (how many people bought GTA3 to actually PLAY the game?) I don't know anyone that came over to my place to play GTA3 that wasn't interested in using the weapons cheat and shooting the shit out of everything in sight.

    This guy is a gamer (has 600 titles). Of course he's pissed off about what media reports. Slashdotters used to be (and sometimes still are) pissed off about how Linux was portrayed.

    This article was too much.
    • The author of the article completely misses the point. Someone who has 600 videogames is a huge fan, and writes for a fanzine. That is not journalism. Videogame journalism and reviews are good for someone to decide which game to buy, and are not art critiques. Even tough, I never relly only on reviews: I generally try to play the demo first.

      The problem of game journalism is the opposite described in the article: it seems to me every review is only praises, ooh and ahhs, and don't seem reliable. As many re

      • You're not looking in the right place then. There are only two places I trust pretty much, "by default" to get an opinion of a game, Netjak.com (we don't get games for free most of the time.), where I write, and Games Domain, which I found because whenever I trashed a game on netjak, they were listed right next to my review on Gamerankings.com, because they had slammed it equally hard or harder.

        Easiest way to find out what a game's like...that the two extremes on Gamerakings. Find the most well-written h

  • Fvck terrorism, global epidemics, war, senseless murder, and the economy. I'm gonna report on... video games!!

    crowd cheers

    I guess it's better than reporting on Kobe Bryant.
  • It's almost as funny as journalism about sports, or journalism about porn, or journalism about journalism.

    Journalism means analysing things that are interesting and important. Games - sorry - are mental masturbation, neither interesting nor important.

    Now, journalism about the games industry, that is possible. Journalism about developing games, or about how the freakish death of twelve games writers in similar toaster-joystick-bathroom accidents. OK.

    But journalism about games? Gimme a break, it's almost as irrelevant as journalism about Slashdot.
  • The article was scatterbrained, at best. I couldn't make it past chapter 2. What the hell is this guy trying to say? The awful color scheme doesn't help, either; I don't like having to highlight text in order to read it.

    All that said, I offer my unasked-for opinion of "games journalism" on the Web: for the most part, it sucks. There are some really good sites that actually try to partake in real journalism, but there are far more sites that are just fanboy URLs to get free review copies from the games pub

  • If the article is an example .... (Score:3, Interesting)

    by binaryDigit ( 557647 ) on Friday August 22, 2003 @02:31PM (#6767271)
    ... Of what he's referring to, then I say thank god for the status quo. I barely made it through the first page and only managed to read a couple of paragraphs of the next. After reading the "intro", I still didn't have a clue as to what his point was. Is he saying that todays game reviewers are not "passionate" enough about the industry/segment/genre of which they are reviewing. He may have a bit of a point. I'm a big sports/racing sim fan, and I am usually disapointed in the reviews, esp of the racing sims, as many are done by those who aren't into the genre, and more importantly, the racing that the "game" is simulating. If that's his point, then I think it could have been said much more succinctly. I hope he isn't mistaking verbosity and useless flowery prose for interesting content, for they are not the same. One thing that makes me think he is (other than the article itself), is his reference to music reviews. Inevitably a great many of the music reviews you read are written by those who perhaps spend a bit TOO MUCH time and have a bit TOO MUCH "passion" for the thing that they review. Their reviews then become an unreadable, uninteresting, and most damning, unuseful bit of self agrandizing "techno speak" (as this post seems to be heading towards, so I'll finish up now).

    Anyway, if anyone took the time to read the whole schabang and wants to paraphrase in one paragraph, I think most /.'ers would appreciate it.

  • What an idiotic statement... (Score:5, Insightful)

    by GreenCrackBaby ( 203293 ) on Friday August 22, 2003 @02:32PM (#6767289) Homepage
    Regarding game reviews:

    Objectivity has got to go, for one thing. Anyone who says that the personal experience of interacting with a game can be discussed objectively - well they're just flat out wrong to even try. Experience colors everything we write, being humans and all. What we have to do is weigh our desire to share our opinion, the one we're sure is right, against the fact that no two persons will experience something in the same way.

    WHAT!?! I don't care if this guy thinks games are evolving into an artform. That's almost meaningless in a game review. I buy a game for entertainment, and could care less if the creators think they are the next Piccaso.

    Objectivity is essential in a game review. I want to know if a game crashes, if the AI is a pushover, if the interface is garbage, etc. While there's some subjectivity in those things, a crash is still a crash.

    Sure, you need to subjective material in a game review. However, calling for the complete loss of objectivity in a review is just plain idiotic!
    • the games journalism has been to the shit for at least 10 years anyways, they aren't reviews anymore, rather they are news bluffs with commentary. as around then it become more important what you were reviewing than what you wrote about it, and what you thought that the audience would like the game to be more important what you yourself knew the game to be. i chose around 10 years because that is back when a local computer magazine went to shit. before that they had the balls to say if the game sucked tota
    • You don't get it.

      Yes, you can make objective statements about whether a game contains X or Y in certain amounts, but you can't put a number on whether it's fun, or imaginative, or addictive, or whatever.

      The best a reviewer can do is put across their take on the game and try to give the reader some contextual information (have you played X? Do you like the genre? Do you find this feature annoying on general principle?) to give them some idea as to whether they're likely to reach the same conclusion.

      They'r
    • Objectivity is essential in a game review. I want to know if a game crashes, if the AI is a pushover, if the interface is garbage, etc. While there's some subjectivity in those things, a crash is still a crash.

      I think what you mean to say is that facts are essential. Objectivity would be not particularly caring whether the game crashes. The objective writer tries to set aside his own emotional reaction (which if he cares about games, he presumably has), and rate a game according to some external standa

    • The rest of what he wrote is bunk, but he's right. Objectivity is this wonderful impossible bullshit that nobody ever really achieves. You're reviewing something, so you're giving an opinion -- be forthright about your biases. Give me that over false objectivity any day of the week (and twice on Sundays).

  • Wow, This Was a Long Time Coming (Score:4, Interesting)

    by Painaxl ( 673056 ) on Friday August 22, 2003 @02:32PM (#6767293)
    Great set of articles. I've only recently come to looking at InsertCredit and Video-Fenky for insight into the Japan gaming world from an American prospective, but they've already both become a daily routine for me.

    These articles (especially Tim Rogers longer one) really do bring to light an aspect of gaming journalism that I've recently started searching for. I get four game magazines and have a subscription to a website's "premium" service as well. They all seem to say the same things in regards to reviewing games, but then the scores usually vary quite a bit. I'm not saying that all scores should be uniform, but quite the opposite, the writer's personal experience of the game should become a more integral part of the review.

    This is something that I've found in InsertCredit's different features and have really enjoyed their viewpoints and style. This is something that I would like to see implemented more in the journalism regarding the industry. This shouldn't be in place of some standard technical, "objective" reviews, which still have their place, but sort of an aside for those of us looking for something more.

  • InsertCredit is insufferable... (Score:3, Insightful)

    by sbma44 ( 694130 ) on Friday August 22, 2003 @02:35PM (#6767320)
    Really, I've wanted to claw my eyes out after every article I've read on this cursed site. How navel-gazing can games journalism get? How drawn out and mundane can an article's introductory philosophizing be made? IC attacks both these questions with the gusto and insight of an 11th-grade blogger/lit mag editor.

    Please -- no more lectures on journalism. And stop confusing nostalgia for games from your formative years with Socratic ideals of gamehood.

    I don't want this to just be a flame, so here's some constructive criticism:

    1. the cliche "write write write" is indeed good advice. But then you need to edit edit edit.
    2. If your average paragraph length is two sentences, it may owe more to a personal penchant for melodrama than to skillfully pacing readers through your world-shattering insights

    Damn. I guess that was a flame after all.

    • the cliche "write write write" is indeed good advice. But then you need to edit edit edit.

      I really have to agree with you here and toss in my own cliche:

      "There is no good writing, only good rewriting."

      Sure, you have to "write write write" to get all your ideas down; then you should spend twice as much time on rewriting as you did on the writing.

      This guy seems to think that "games journalism" won't be any good until it's primary target audience is 45-year-old, unmarried female high-school literature tea
    • Um. I think Insert Credit's main focus are the non-feature articles. All the updates on random Japanese games that I've never heard of, etcetera.

      Sure, those aren't the things that hit /., but they occupy most of IC's front page. So, I'd say most of their stuff is very un-navel-gazy.

      And maybe Mr. Sheffield could have better emphasized his thesis, which is, "Gaming journalism sucks even though games don't. You seem to think it was, "Gaming journalists should be more like me." I just don't read that.

      I've go
  • even though, I as many of you, find the site eye-clawing.. he does have a point about it. I used to surf about trying to find the "worst" game reviews because they were too funny.. (i.e. PC Gamers review of ExtremePaintball3D, the lowest rating ever given to a game, or a review of RailroadMaster 3d from a site that is no longer around.) .. but that was because the reviews in that format, fit the game.. But it seemed the "good" reviews were lacking.
    If someone could come out with a new format for rating games

  • Is it just me? (Score:5, Insightful)

    by Anonymous Coward on Friday August 22, 2003 @02:40PM (#6767373)
    Or was that one of the least incisive, most boring diatribes that has ever been written? It reads like it was written by a self-impressed thirteen year old who just discovered criticism. It's less about education than edification. Less about helping journalists than it is self-aggrandizement. He doesn't even offer any of his own work as an example of "goodness". It basically comes down to: "My work is better than yours, and your work proves it."

    Furthermore, it reads like an inside joke and in my opinion is much more likely to alienate journalists than give them a reason to think.

    I tried, but didn't gain anything from the article but a distaste for the author. Maybe it's just me.

    • Re:Is it just me? (Score:3, Interesting)

      by Mephie ( 582671 )
      I agree. Not to mention the fact that he should take some of his own advice. He certainly touts professionalism and correct grammar while filling grammatically incorrect sentences with a fairly significant amount of curse words.

      While I'm not anti-cursing (in most cases), I don't particularly find the frequent use of curse words (especially in "journalism") professional.

      • Sssssshhhhhhh.....

        He was trying to be "edgy". Which is fine, except that when most people try to be "edgy" they really come off as unprofessional. Hint to "edgy journalists": using the common language and grammatical structure of a 14 year old does not constitute "edgy journalism" even if one is 14 years old.

        I'd also like to add that the article - rant really - has to be the most boring, overblown, ego tripping, artsied up language piece I've read since I started blocking John Katz articles.
  • My biggest problem with game journalism is when these rags go on to say that a certain game is the next best thing since sliced bread. We all recall Daikatana, don't we, yeah, that was supposed to be the greatest thing ever, and when it came out eighty-five years later, it wasn't even a half-way decent game for the time they had started it at.

    My criticism about game journalism is the same that I have about other entertainment journalism, 90% of it is whoring out to get to talk to famous people, get into co

  • i must have ADD (Score:2, Funny)

    by Anonymous Coward
    that or the article is just really not that exciting
  • What kind of lame crap is this? I managed to get through three "chapters" before spewing. After three chapters:

    1) I have no clue what they're talking about
    2) I want to punch them in the face
    3) I wonder what this has to do with video games

    Save your time, don't read this crap.

  • 11 parts of rambling, inchoate thoughts (Score:4, Funny)

    by hiero ( 75335 ) on Friday August 22, 2003 @02:51PM (#6767464) Homepage
    It takes

    11 parts

    because of all the

    space between the

    one line

    paragraphs.

  • Small white text, black background, dark purple links.

    Do they expect anyone to read through eleven long pages of this when a single half-page is enough to give anyone serious eyestrain?

    Those who live in glass houses...

  • "Journalist"? (Score:3, Insightful)

    by PincheGab ( 640283 ) on Friday August 22, 2003 @02:56PM (#6767502)
    This guy calls himself a journalist ans writes imcomplete sentences like these:?

    The most incisive critique of games journalism currently out there.

    This is only a subject and no verb. The sentece says nothing. Sorry, but I cannot take anyone seriously when their writing gets in the way of the message, whatever the message is.

  • A "need" for game Journalism? (Score:4, Insightful)

    by decipher_saint ( 72686 ) on Friday August 22, 2003 @02:59PM (#6767520)
    What I managed to get out of the first two pages (which wasen't easy, this guy apparently hasen't heard about paragraphs) was that there is a need for more+better video game Journalism. But I really have to question this, I don't know about others but when new games come out all I'm really interested in are the technical details; Look? Cost? Run? Let me figure out if it's fun. But then again the same thing could be said about about movie reviews couldn't they? I'm not interested in someone else's opinion on their level of enjoyment gleaned from a title or how this game might or might not impact society or how it might alter our culture. To be honest I find that most reviews are fairly pointless.

    He then talks about the current situation of game Journalism, which basically boils down to reviews (and not so much comment). To me, reviewers have no choice but to compare their own (jaded?) experience towards game reviews and will lean harder on games that might well be fun for you and me.

    I guess it will always boil down to what my personal preferences are, not what some "journalist" thinks.

    I'd also like to point out that the author of this feature tries to validate himself as an authority on gaming by telling us how many games he has in comparison to his pissing-contest-winning music collection. How does this make the reader respect the opinion of the author exactly?
  • "Write about a game set in the 80s as though you were writing it from the 80s. Do this without being trite, and you're on the track."

    You know, I'd REALLY like to read his review on Sim Ant.

  • I found it - interesting (Score:5, Interesting)

    by Dark Paladin ( 116525 ) * <jhummel.johnhummel@net> on Friday August 22, 2003 @03:10PM (#6767617) Homepage
    And still am, and I'm only halfway through the articles, and I plan on printing them out for a long, leisurely read later, perhaps in a bath full of bubbles.

    What the articles are about is not about gaming journalism. Oh, they talk about games and writing and things that "real journalists" take for granted, like "fact checking" and "verifying information with sources" and the like.

    What the articles are about is an awakening. Some people will say "What's the big deal - they're only games, why all the interest in how games are discussed?"

    It's because I believe games are starting to reach a certain cusp. It's barely there, and underneath the rush to make the next Murder Death Killer and Massive Movie Franchise Game Version and Hey Kids, Here's a Bright Light - there are stirrings of something different happening.

    Some games are getting shorter, like "Silent Hill 3", and some developers are starting to use words like "mood", "emotion", "art". We have people like an interview with series producer [ign.com], Keisuke Kikuchi for Fatal Frame 2 have this moment in an interview:


    IGN: You've told us once that you think the sight of a frightened girl is one of the most beautiful images. Can you elaborate on this?

    KK: I believe that human emotion is a conductive thing. We feel naturally emotionally attached to something weak such as I mentioned above. I think that the ultimate in horror is watching that weak entity, struggling against its own fear, obsessed with trying to stay alive.


    Why are game developers talking about beauty? Everybody knows that games are just for teenage kids and immature grownups who just want to get their kicks and watch big breasted girls bouncing about!

    The articles at insertcredit.com are talking about a new need that is going unfilled - the need to have games thought about, talked about, researched about, and written about in an intelligent way. Still funny at times, not at others, but they're talking about a desire to have games written about with the same care and attention as a movie, a painting, as an NPR show talking music CDs and the trends and how one piece of music gets its inspiration from something else.

    Games are becoming art. Oh, not yet - I'd say we're still 20 years away before the industry settles down. Like movies, there will always be the big budget big explosion big breasted girl games that appeal to a lot of people. But there will be more games like "Ico" that are just beautiful and haunting. Or games that that will do for interactive entertainment what "Saving Private Ryan" or "Momento" or "Gone with the Wind" has done in movies, or "War of the Worlds" for radio.

    We're still on the cusp of this idea. But I think insertcredit's articles today are a part of that idea that were moving from "games are just fun!" to "games should be taken a little more seriously and a little more professionaly."

    Eh - or I could be totally missing the point. But that's just my opinion on the matter.
    • But I think insertcredit's articles today are a part of that idea that were moving from "games are just fun!" to "games should be taken a little more seriously and a little more professionaly."

      I hardly think unprofessional, self-involved hack-work like that is going to make anyone take games more seriously or professionally.

    • IGN: You've told us once that you think the sight of a frightened girl is one of the most beautiful images. Can you elaborate on this?

      I'd be happy to. After all, how else can you explain people's obsession with a petrified, hot-grits covered Natalie Portman?

      With that said: in my opinion, the only thing worth reading in the entire lot of it was WARNING SIGNS THAT YOU ARE A BAD VIDEO GAME JOURNALIST [insertcredit.com] , the majority of which is applicable to most forms of journalism.

      Most of the remaining ten sections

  • About Game Journalism (Score:4, Interesting)

    by coreytamas ( 411374 ) on Friday August 22, 2003 @03:12PM (#6767627) Homepage
    The number of "Flamebait" and "Offtopic" replies to this story should clearly show how the public at large - even game players - have a hard time really accepting that game journalism is an important part of the media stream. Personal experience has definitely shown this to be the case, despite the explosive rise of the video game industry (which is rumored to overtake the movie industry in yearly profits). You can't slight people for this; the game journalism scene has a long way to go still.

    This causes me to think: If the public doesn't take game journalism seriously, how seriously do you think the journalists themselves can take it? Having spent the last five years working as a game reviewer and editor, I find the biggest problem I have with the reporters who work under me is that they themselves don't totally believe the work is "legit". As a result, game reporters don't believe in the worth of their own professionalism and, therefore, most of my hardest struggles in these past five years has been to raise the bar so that people do, in fact, take us as seriously as any other news outlet.

    The good news is that it is, in fact, getting better...
    • "Games are a valid medium for artistic expression. As the uses of the medium become more thoughtful and sophisticated the criticism associated with it must follow."

      Two sentences. I think that about does it.

      The high incidence of flamebait here is because the writing in this IC article is pretentious, self-aggrandizing and drawn-out. They're taking gaming journalism in a new direction, all right -- but it's a pretty insufferable one.

    • Games are supposed to be fun and stimulating. Pretentious game journalism is not fun and stimulating.

      I'd rather read something completely open and to the point. Building up videogames into some sort of magical art form is just trying to justify the amount of time spent on this hobby. Reminds me of this idiot Battle.net player I once argued with who kept referring to himself as a professional who was in "USWest Top 1000." I couldn't have given less of a shit.

      They're games, people. Even good, deep ones

  • I clicked thru all the pages. Here is my journalistic report on "gaming journalism" in ELEVEN steps.

    1. Loose your mental balance.
    2. Surf the web like crazy and start bookmarking obsessively.
    3. Look at the sequence in which you created the links.
    4. Add a little about the links to some of the links.
    5. Hmm. Makes no sense.
    6. So add a little of your personal opinions which are already not making sense.
    7. Try to explain the non-sense.
    8. Add some "passion" to it, whatever that is.
    9. Get it up on slashdot. Expect a
  • I used to subscribe to EGM. I used to like it a lot. I enjoyed the layouts, I enjoyed all of the cool import news, I enjoyed the psycho mail of the month, I enjoyed the little cartoon drawings of the review crew (especially Sushi-X). Every month I looked forward to getting a magazine thick with gaming goodness.

    And then almost suddenly it began sucking big time. I don't know what it was? The original publisher was bought out and something about it changed. The noticeable thing is that the issues seeme

  • You know an art is nearly dead... (Score:3, Insightful)

    by Qbertino ( 265505 ) <moiraNO@SPAMmodparlor.com> on Friday August 22, 2003 @03:33PM (#6767883)
    ...when it's got critics like classical music and literature.

    Honestly, I used to be annoyed about the fact that literature critics would constantly run circles around 'Ulysses' and have not half a word for 'Snow Crash'.
    Now I've come to notice that I don't want the forms of art I like to be handled by 'professional critics'. Be it the art I do myself or the art I enjoy. Critics suck. Especially when applauded by people who think they are essential to art. And those applauding suck even more. Both of them aren't essential either to making or enjoying art. And they never will be.
    Trust a guy who was/is a professional artist, enjoys art and also enjoys analyzing art. Allthough I'd rather shoot myself than do that for a living.
    • I'm not sure you get it, fully.

      When you do something for yourself, there are different motivations and expectations than there are for those viewing or otherwise using your art. At the very least, the number of producers and new works is likely to be so large that the user has no way to properly sample all of them. In this sense, there is no substitute for a critical press or other filtering mechanism to allow consumers to experience the things they generally want from art.

      From this perspective, criti
    • You know an art is nearly dead ... when it's got critics like classical music and literature.

      Pick better examples, dude. Or tell me what's dead about literature.
  • So, ok, the guy in this article says that games journalism needs to be more thoughtful. Ok, whatever. Sure. That's a good idea.

    What I think is the most significant problem with games journalism, though, the guy seems to have completely missed -- people who review games almost universally give a game a good rating when they have a preview copy of it.

    This makes games reviews completely irrelevant.

    It derives from ego, and their ability to say that they have a spiffy new game before anyone else. When they sa
    • The real reason has nothing to do with ego. Everyone knows that they get preview copies of games, they don't need to rub it in.

      The real reason is that giving a game less than a 7/10 could cost them advertising revenue if they piss off a publisher with a negative review.

  • Auto-summary of long rant (Score:4, Informative)

    by Animats ( 122034 ) on Friday August 22, 2003 @03:40PM (#6767967) Homepage
    Save yourself some time. Here's what you get if you run the article through Auto-Summarize in Microsoft Word, set to retain 10% of the content:
    • Chapter 1
      Games are ever becoming a more powerful cultural weapon. The idea began when discussing Blessed Magazine's ideas about alternative game journalism. Why not introduce genre into game journalism? Can you imagine I-novel game journalism? Gonzo journalism? It doesn't exist in 95% of game writing on the internet. But you deserve it, because you care about games.

    • Chapter 2
      Life is above us. We've even lower standards. You can call it art, if you like. "Art" is merely what happens when the listener starts to apply that entertainment to his own life.

      It's the same as with anything in life.

      When we review, we review games as product. Videogames are objects. Journalism is meant to inspire free thought. I've a question to ask. It seems this pisses some people off. Online gaming media, at that. The idea behind art is to allow people more flexibility in their thought. The study of art is the study of life. People are intelligent. People care. They've just been abused, and neglected by the media bombardment of our post-modern world. Ask questions. The goal for game journalism should be to point readers toward the truths that matter in life.

    • Chapter 3
      I might owe my entire career in video game journalism to Paul Magliulo. This small-time operation died out when I started to write video game reviews for the sixth-grade newspaper.

      By the time I reached eighth grade, Arnie Katz had pretty much succeeded at fostering a video game fanzine culture and, reading Fandom Central in the then-new Electronic Games magazine, I thought, you know, I could do this. Arnie reviewed it in Electronic Games. Okay, I'm joking around - video game journalism is not really crap. I find varying degrees of merit in dozens of video game-related websites and print magazines. 1. You call Shigeru Miyamoto anything other than Shigeru Miyamoto. Details are sparse at the moment, but if other games in the ______ series are any indication, this game will feature ______.

      I've read some Wind Waker reviews in which the game is referred to as Zelda 9 or, for extra pretentiousness, Zelda IX. What the hell game is that?

      Transitioning between gameplay and graphics is not - unless you're a bad video game reviewer, in which case you just write "For a game with such good graphics, the gameplay is lacking."

      People reading your writing might be doing it to glean information on a game that they're thinking about buying. Well, you're not going to if...

      Some people are correct to think this, and some people are dead wrong. See if they laugh. Let's say you're writing a review of a piece of shit game - a veritable humor goldmine if ever there was one:

      So consider, then, Kohler's Hierarchy of Video Game Reviewing Skills, from bottom to top:
      / TEACH! \
      / ORIGINAL STYLE \
      / BASIC WRITING SKILLS \

    • Chapter 4
      I visit gaming sites primarily to be enraged.

      There is value, when disparate individuals share experiences. I don't need any Maxim-esque man talk, I'm there to talk games when I visit these sites - they don't need to make gaming seem cool because it already is cool.

    • Chapter 5
      What needs changing about game journalism? Pick up an issue of Electronic Gaming Monthly, Game Informer, PSM, GMR, GamePro, Official Xbox Magazine, Videogame Underground, Official PlayStation Magazine, or GameNOW (or, if you prefer, visit IGN.com, Gamers.com, Gamespot, Gaming Age, or any of a thousand fansites and you won't find gaming journalism anywhere.

      Roughly, there are three categories: hard journalism, academically-oriented criticism, and consumer-oriented reviews.

      "All game writing is based on the same template. What makes that not journalism?"

    At this point, even Auto-Summarize was bored.

    • For even better results..

      cat navel-gazing.txt | jive

      et voila :

      Objectivity gots'ta gots'ta go, fo' one wahtahmellun. Anyone who says dat da damn sucka'al 'espuh'ience uh interactin' wid some game kin be discussed objectively sheeit deyre plum flat out wrong t'even try. Slap mah fro! Expuh'ience colo's everydin' we scribble, bein' humans and all. What we gots'ta do be weigh our desire t'share our opinion, de one were sho' nuff be right, against da damn fact dat no two sucka's gots'ta 'sperience sump'n in d
  • just because a lot of people have said things like 'this guy can't write'...

    notice how every page is written by different people.

  • Purpose of Game Reviews (Score:4, Interesting)

    by heidkamp ( 653609 ) on Friday August 22, 2003 @03:52PM (#6768061)
    When I read a video game review, what I want is the answer to the question "Is it worth playing?".

    Since print media is a non-interactive experience, and the author will be writing for many readers, the answer to the question is more than yes or no. However, it is still possible to describe a subjective experience in a way that will inform me what my experience is likely to be.

    The author of this article appears to think that game criticism should be deeper; it should tie together ideas from all over the cultural spectrum the way that movie, music, or literature reviews can...

    The only problem with this idea is that this is not yet how video games are developed. Movies have been around for almost 100 years, and have been gone through many periods of experimentation and cycles of influence. Literature and music have been around for thousands of years, and are universal, and touch almost every person in every culture, from world leaders to the poorest peasants.

    The reason video game criticism is not yet up to par with the criticism for the other media is that video games are not as advanced as these other forms of expression. 15 years ago, the idea of reading into the cultural implications of first generation Nintendo games would have been laughable (challenge: write a serious Ebert-style critique of Space Invaders).

    Video games are primarily pop-culture at this point, made by large production houses for the purpose of making money. When indie games start reaching the relative level of influence of indie music, cinema, and literature, when the mainstream of video game culture is informed by the cutting-edge lunatic/geniuses of 10-20 years past, then the level of critcism will rise to match the artistic quality of the games.

    Until then, just tell me how good the graphics and sound are, how much fun it is, and if its worth my $50 and time,

  • Important! (Score:3, Insightful)

    by Melchior_of_wg ( 633494 ) on Friday August 22, 2003 @04:09PM (#6768197)
    Something which most people seem to miss, is this important fact:

    There are 11 chapters because there are 11 writers!

    If you don't like the author of the first chapter, don't let that prevent you from reading what the others say. The 'quality' of the articles varies greatly.

    If nothing else, read chapter 7 by Jane Pinckard. I found that one to be relatively different than the rest, and actually easily readable.

  • Journalists with degrees from prestigious schools, writing about issues and events that have implications beyond how many Zokar-Blaster rounds one has left in his Zokar-Blaster, get paid little enough. You would not believe how little. These are people who can spell and use proper grammar, typing at 100 wpm whilst talking to both an editor and some bloke on the phone who says he has an Earth-shaking lead for your next investigative piece. I can't even conceive of the depths to which one's self esteem and sa
  • Oh no, this article did more damage to my brain than goatsex on a monday morning before coffee.

    Please, all the gods, spare us from this kind of thing in the future. I promise I will make regular sacrifices, only the best chickens, and the expensive vodka.

    Truly, that was a pretentious and stomach-churning piece of self-pretentious drivel written by someone who sounds like he has just figured out why the wax crayons break when you lean on them too hard.

    Oh... my.... god.... I can't believe just reading wo
  • First, let me confess that I broke all the rules and read the article in its entirety. (And whoever mods this as funny just proves that they are real Slashdotters; not even reading replies.

    The article is right in many points, but there are a few I'd like to criticize:

    1. "When we review, we review games as product. As a channel for discussion, we've become a weird mix of free PR and advertising, and the latest issue of consumer reports. Videogames are objects. The people behind them are their manufactur

  • I find it interesting to see these journalists point of view in trying to critique themselves. It seems (at a hurried skimming) that each of these people lament the lack of professionalism in their craft. The games are evolving, but the writing is stagnant.

    When I wrote an article [videogamestumpers.com] about game journalists, I wrote it from the perspective of a developer and as a fan. In retrospect, it's slightly eerie that I chose ethics as the number one problem in journalism before the New York Times scandals. In some re

  • I find it amusing, and somewhat sad, that people look for parallels between video games and movies more often than parallels between video games and other games. What about game magazines like GAMES magazine or Counter magazine? Doesn't anyone think there is something to be learned from them?

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