The Craft of the Graft

Joe Markert writes "Gamehelper.com's Mike 'Vansau' Thompson takes a look at integrity and graft in the world of gaming journalism in his recent article, appropriately titled: Integrity: The Craft of the Graft From the article, '...it's easy to play the card of honesty, objectivity, and moral nobility when you have the financial backing of a major publisher like Ziff Davis or IDG. Without that support, though, the thought of advertisers threatening to take their business elsewhere creates valid concern.'" A follow up to Dan Hsu's editorial about pay-for-play in game reviews.

True across other industries

[MBraynard]

It is nearly impossible to get an objective or head-to-head review of triathlon gear from either of the two major publications - Inside Triathlon or Triathlete Magazine.

The latest example was a review of the latest wetsuits. No word on what they thought was best - nor were there any negative words about ANY of them. Absolutly useless.

And as you flip through the magazines - over half advertising - you never find a negative word about any equipment.

There are a lot of debates between the lower-weight versus better aerodynamics for bikes - but they NEVER do a head to head to show which bike is tops. Does that have something to do with not ever wanting to say something bad about the people paying for three of the four covers on the magazine?

This is probably less of an issue for the gaming zines in question. Do GOOD reviews with GOOD articles and snappy writing and people will go to you - and let the adword-types pay your bills. The more savage a reviewer is known to be, the more readers he tends to have, and the advertising services of Google/Yahoo/MS don't care what you say about them or their games (in the case of MS - hell, they even advertise here on hashpot, home of the MS Haters).

But what is this guy saying?

[larsoncc]

This article is nothing but an editorial piece. Another desk jockey that isn't doing anyone any favors.

What "games journalism" needs is an expose'. What we need is a solid reporter with nothing to lose (and everything to gain). Someone to rat em all out, with solid proof.

People that are behaving in this manner need to be shamed out of the shadows.

What we need is a Woodward or a Bernstein. And not just for the games industry - we need solid product reviews as consumers. Journalism, even in product reviews, is a matter of the public trust. It's being whispered that we can't trust "someone". We need to know who.

If this ever actually happens, this is a saga that likely won't see an end-game inside the games press. It'll likely play out in the "real" news, with cascading results. As each scandal is covered, more will be unvieled.

And heck, it may even bring in some readers, which is what the game is all about in the first place.

Check out Fangoria...

[__aaclcg7560]

A bit off topic... but look at an issue of Fangoria [fangoria.com]. Tell me it's not a coincidence that Fangoria does a review or an article about a movie and the ad for the DVD is on the next page over. Then again, maybe that's how they know when new stuff is coming out. Go figure.

Magazines should come with game purchase

[garylian]

Considering that pretty much every gaming magazine is just a scream-sheet for the game manufacturers, they should just give you a 6 month subscription with each game you purchase.

The magazines won't bite the hand that feeds them. They only give an occasional poor review, and usually for some product that doesn't advertise with them. I think one issue of Computer Gaming World had one poor review... On a mouse made by some small company that doesn't advertise in them. Nothing else got less than 4 stars.

That didn't use to be true,

[Cadallin]

I remember when CGW regularly gave negative reviews, and even reviews that were positive presented objective criticisms. Unfortunately, that's been years now.