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State of Play, Journalism Ethics, and Paid Fly-Ins
81 Plays25 days ago
In Episode 133, Spencer and I break down the latest State of Play, talk through what worked, what felt safe, and where Sony might be playing it too cautiously. The conversation shifts into remake fatigue, nostalgia-driven marketing, and how publishers lean on familiarity instead of risk. It’s a grounded discussion about expectations, audience memory, and what actually moves the industry forward.
00:00 – Intro and catching up
02:48 – State of Play overall impressions
06:32 – Specific showcase highlights and misses
12:14 – Remake fatigue and audience expectations
18:07 – Nostalgia marketing and why it works
24:36 – Risk vs safety in modern publishing
31:18 – Live service hesitation and platform strategy
37:42 – Wrapping up thoughts on Sony’s direction
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Transcript
Azaria's Fashion Faux Pas
00:00:21
Speaker
Hello and welcome to episode 133 of Game Chat. I'm a little talking a little slow because I so saw myself. I snuck a a look at myself in the video and i'm I'm realizing I'm wearing the same sweater as last week and I apologize. Zarya doesn't change his clothes. yeah i Yeah. That's what everyone's thinking and I decided to address it. I'm addressing it in the front.
00:00:49
Speaker
I'm wearing the same sweater one week since you changed your shirt. It's you know, you know what I told you before the show to that I was like, give me 20 minutes. I was I had every I had every ah I like I was going to take a shower and like do my hair and get ready and and and look good for you. And then I started like so like checking my in inbox and started responding to emails. Next thing I know, dude, it was like 23 minutes later. And I was like, God damn it. I can't do that. decision He's waiting. He's waiting at the edge of his fucking seat for me. He's it is very nice that you put in that much effort for these watchers because I don't do shit. I like look in the mirror and it's like I go like.
00:01:32
Speaker
Okay. And then then I go in front of the guy. i In 2015, I did an unboxing for Op Rainfall.
Body Image and Personal Growth
00:01:40
Speaker
Maybe it was 2014. And fourteen it someone says, man, Azaria is fat.
00:01:45
Speaker
my God. my God. It just in my head, dude. Every time. I'm still thinking about it. That was 11 years ago. Maybe 12 years ago. You'd be a 2% BMI and you'd be like,
00:01:59
Speaker
dude, I'm still fucking fed. That guy on the opera, you might be like dead by now after that much time. Like, that person might not have made it through fucking COVID. And you're like, those words they said when they were 12 haunt you because it was so Assholes, man.
00:02:14
Speaker
And you know what, though? i was pretty fed. that's yeah know That's the real that's the challenge with it is when you look back on those videos and then like you look at yourself and you're like, ooh. Maybe I was mad at them because they were right.
00:02:29
Speaker
It's great. I can go through like, I can watch this podcast for like, because we do it pretty. Someone's going to be like, you guys don't do it weekly. We do pretty consistently. We do it pretty weekly.
00:02:40
Speaker
So I can watch through like the last, what, four plus years of like weekly to monthly-ish. and then be like, oh, wow, I was really fucking fat in 2022. It'd be like, oh, wow, okay, I'm getting a little better in 2025. It's very interesting to have that like moving scale visually available at all times. It's very strange.
00:03:00
Speaker
i I think gradually over the years I've i've i've definitely learned to maintain my weight, but I've also gotten better at doing my hair. Yeah, hair's thing. Yeah, i was I've had my moments. If you go to the 2019 shows of Noisy Pixel, wasn't at my best. but But we live and we learn. we Exactly. We live and learn just like in Sonic Adventure 2.
00:03:25
Speaker
Yeah, no, I feel it. I'm lucky that my hair just does this. I don't need to put any thought into it. Perfect. So I can just, I wake up and I'm like all right ah But it is, if it wasn't a style that worked on me, that would suck. and I would have to learn as well how to ah
Workout Woes and Leg Day Humor
00:03:39
Speaker
how to do it. Well, I'm sorry for that tangent, but let's get let's get back to business.
00:03:44
Speaker
Yes. Here with me to today is no other than my perfect haired brother, Spencer, the legacy. Hello, everyone. my Thighs and ass are sore because I started a new leg day.
00:04:01
Speaker
and it's it was two days ago. And i'm so I still, when I go to sit down, I go, ah, ah. Can I tell you, i skit yeah I skip leg day because I say I say i run. i don't need to do leg day. But when I do leg day, I still get the two days of Sorn Tense.
00:04:19
Speaker
But you know what? That means it's frigging working. That means I'm going have Baki character legs soon. So we'll be we'll be perfect. You had to do those cacao stretches and get that dumpy looking.
00:04:32
Speaker
that Yeah, big ass Ace Bonanza booty. Get that Ace base ba Booty. but oy nans yeah as Booty Booty Nanz. It was like before i was just like leg press and leg raise and stuff, but now it's like the step ups and and you have the resistance band around your ankles and you're doing the roll. It's murder. Boy's going to get a dumpy.
00:04:52
Speaker
have a big dumpy everyone's gonna be like everyone at uh everyone at at pack oh i won't have a bike that's like less than that's a month away that's but but they'll be like i see it developing yeah i see i see uh visions of a dumpy i see a little vision they'll be like i saw your dumpy um oh host i've I've been working on my dumpy. I can't wait to show you. But aside. That's the real thing about that. That's why we're meeting up is we're going to compare asses. We're going to post NoisyPixel. Don't be off. Who has the best ass And it's going to be up to you, the viewers, to decide.
00:05:36
Speaker
Speaking of viewers, a couple... you recorded this episode a couple weeks ago, but um we posted it on YouTube and it got some... ah it got we'll We'll open the show this week because we don't have much to talk about other than some of the games we're um playing and general stuff like
Reactions to Games Media Collapse Episode
00:05:52
Speaker
that. But...
00:05:53
Speaker
We posted ah ah our podcast episode 131 about the games media collapsing and a lot of people had some stuff to say. see things about it and I kind of want to put it to the show and then we can kind of discuss.
00:06:09
Speaker
Yeah, so we're going to debate you. Yeah. Mm hmm. Mm hmm. So let's go to the the most like. ah I guess ah What is the word for when you're antagonistic one? i was going thought of so many funny, and i nasty words I could have said that would have been very funny. Yeah, yeah, I was like, that's what they were going through my head. They were going through my head. I don't even mean them. They just would have been funny to say in that moment.
00:06:38
Speaker
So Kirill Neko says, Okay, I rarely post. it And they said really post, but I'll fix their grammar because I'm an editor. We're already getting bitchy.
00:06:52
Speaker
And I'm able to do that. Two words in and we're getting... We got Joan Rivers on the podcast. Okay. I rarely post, but this is getting ridiculous. Oh, stop it. They don't know.
00:07:06
Speaker
We got this out during the GG decade. We got this out during GG decades ago. They knew and they did. Remember the Mass Effect 3 review from IGN?
00:07:18
Speaker
Yeah. The only page that was made that way. With ME3 ads across all of it and the rest of the website. With an IGN employee being in the game itself. Stop BSing us folks.
00:07:31
Speaker
Or Dragon Age 2 reviews from game trailers where the other journals called out the reviewer for b s four BS review score. Or Battlefield 4 from EA fly-in event for journals to review the game in Vegas for supervised six-hour review sessions.
00:07:46
Speaker
F off. Stop covering journals' assets. well i think we can I think really there's three. After reading it, there's three
Controversy Over IGN's Mass Effect 3 Review
00:07:54
Speaker
points here. So let's start with Let's start with the remember Mass Effect 3 IGN review, the only page that made that was made this way with ME3 ads across all of it. do you have any Do you know why this happens?
00:08:10
Speaker
Well, I, IGN companies like IGN as well that are that are that large, the editorial department and the marketing department are different. They're not, it's such a big company and I, this isn't me making this up. I years ago interviewed Colin Moriarty and asked him about this.
00:08:28
Speaker
And he told me this is yes, the editorial department and the marketing department they aren't very involved with each other at all because they're entirely different things with entirely different purposes. Marketing department figures out the ads and how they get the ad sense revenue and whatnot from that.
00:08:44
Speaker
And then the editorial department's on some of the things. So the marketing department doesn't go over and say, well, we're getting ah some banner ads from Mass Effect 3. So and you need to give it at least an eight. and eight That's not, that's not i understand how these assumptions come about, but I think there is a, an admittedly confusing tendency to see outlets as hive minds where it's like, like the, the, I'll admit it's a very funny post, but the, the imagine babies God hand.
00:09:16
Speaker
Comparison of the scores where they're like, well, GameSpot gave imagine babies a higher score than hand. And it's like. the The games came out years apart on different consoles with by different reviewers at one outlet. So it's like, it it is funny, the concept of that post, but that's not, the same person didn't play God Hand and Imagine Babies. And even if they did, they're reviewing them based on like what they're going for different things. So it's yeah they're like, its yeah, it's not IGN isn't giving the score. The person at IGN is, and that might be IGN's score,
00:09:50
Speaker
But that does it's not coming from a ah collective. It's coming from one person that maybe they talk with an editor and they're like, I was thinking an eight for this. Does it read more like an 8.5? And then they think about blah, blah. There's no there's there's there's no conspiracy.
00:10:05
Speaker
behind it because i and at the thing I think at this point is why would there be nobody trusts game journalists anymore and nobody trusts outlet scores anymore. So what incentive would there be for for Capcom to be like give Resident Evil nine a ten and then they were to do it. Everyone would be like, oh this is bought. So what What would the incentive be? you can't really afford everybody, right? No, like what would the incentive be at this point for paid reviews from outlets that everybody decries as corrupt anyway? Like, it doesn't really, i don't know. i I don't think scrutiny of media outlets is an inherently bad thing. I think it's an important thing to a degree because you want to keep them honest.
00:10:51
Speaker
But I think it's very strange to hone in on review content in that regard rather than like the actual news side because reviews are opinions like at the end and everyone has drastically because there's another comment somewhere in there about it's like well uh you can't say that the journalists aren't biased when they liked dragon age veil guard and it's like i that doesn't that that's a review like that's what a review is i love lots of games that people hate and i hate lots of games that people love and that's what you get from a review is
00:11:27
Speaker
the person's perspective. um Obviously, there are bad reviews. Like if you if you see someone like a one out of ten for a completely functional game, but they just didn't like it, then it's like, yeah, that is extreme.
00:11:40
Speaker
um Like i someone did that for Hogwarts Legacy and I don't agree with J.K. Rowling. I hate that nasty witch and her evil beliefs, but that's not a one out of ten game.
00:11:50
Speaker
Yeah. that's not So that kind of thing, I understand that being like, okay, that's not a fair review. But as long as it's as long as you're justifying in your review, which I guess most people aren't reading, they skip to the scores that might lead to this situation. But as long as you're justifying and explaining why you feel a way about a game and that kind of lines up with your score...
00:12:09
Speaker
um I don't think there's an invalid review. There's certainly ones where you'd be like, well, I don't feel that way about that aspect of a game, so I would enjoy it. This person gave this game a four because they don't like turn-based or slow progression systems, but I like those things, so we disagree on that. I can see why they gave it a four, but I like it. So there are different perspectives for sure, but I think you'll you'd be surprised at how few professionally done reviews are actually unfair or not true compared to Sorry, I kind of went on a tangent there.
Subjectivity in Game Reviews
00:12:42
Speaker
but i No, no. you yeah no you're you're doing you know i
00:12:45
Speaker
it's ah It's tough to say because the way that this person presents this argument is that as a very specific IGN Mass Effect 3, in my head, the the problem with that, though, is that Mass Effect 3, critically, is a 93 on Metacritic.
00:13:07
Speaker
um It got... over 10, but our 10 out of 10s, but IGN isn't even one of those 10 out of 10s. They gave it a 95.
00:13:20
Speaker
Okay. So in your example, you're telling me that all of these other websites gave it a 10 out of 10 and they didn't even get paid by EA. So, so. It's because IGN's the big one that everyone can name. They can all go to, Well, he hand spelled ignorant without IGN and yes, okay, it's clever back then. But yeah, i guess it doesn't make sense. Yeah, I guess the IGN employee being in the game didn't get it a 10 out of 10, huh? It just gave it a 90. I can understand feeling uncomfortable with that, but also like, was that employee
00:13:57
Speaker
involved in the review at all? Why not do a little bit of investigative journalism? Azaria was in Life is Strange and I reviewed it, would not like, this game's good because Azaria's in it. I'd be like, I still don't like this, but it's funny. You know who reviewed Mass Effect 3?
00:14:14
Speaker
Colin Moriarty. Colin Moriarty. Okay, there you go. I don't even need to fucking check, you fucking bitch. i don't even need fucking check. Colin doesn't give a fuck who's in Mass Effect. If it's not Colin who's in Mass Effect 3, he does not give a fuck. Let's see. I understand people having um perspectives on on on Colin one way or the other, etc. But I don't think you can argue that when it comes to like his journalistic principles, especially at IGN, like he was not the type of person to be swayed by an IGN person being in the you don't understand, dude. Guess who the fucking character in Mass Effect 3 is? it's Guess who the IGN person?
00:15:00
Speaker
Deep cut, dude. Deeper cut. Jessica fucking Chobot, bro. Jessica Chobot? Wow. thats She's a developer now. She fucking works in game development. Like, Leo...
00:15:12
Speaker
yeah Yeah, okay. I can i think i we can say with 100% certainty... Jessica Chobot....Moriarty's perspective on Mass Effect 3 at all. dont And I'm not... We're laughing and saying and I'm not saying this to like demean you, the person who commented, and be like, you're a fucking idiot. Because these are i understand where these perspectives can kind of come from, especially in it's such a highly vitriolic... um internet space as it is now. And i again, I understand the tendency to scrutinize large outlets is an important thing in a lot of ways. But I do think you need to kind of, I think this kind of thinking can be the result of an echo chamber. And if you zoom out a little bit, like we said, you see, oh, 10 outlets gave it a 10 out of 10. And
00:15:57
Speaker
one of the ones that didn't is the one that was bought is like, ah it's a little absurd. And again, and I can understand, you don't understand, like if you don't know that editorial and marketing are different. So you go, oh, well, it's weird to see an an ad for this game on a review of the game. I can understand why that would visually, if you don't know a lot about journalism and large sites and stuff like that, be like, that's weird. But yeah, pretty, if you look into it, it's it's pretty clear cut that it's not,
00:16:26
Speaker
There's not an IGN deep state doing anything nefarious for Mass Effect 3. It's not that crazy. And Colin is probably the one person. Yeah, and if anybody, you could be 100% sure, wasn't going to be affected by Jessica Chobot being in Mass Effect 3, it was Colin Moriarty.
00:16:49
Speaker
Because he, yeah, like, come on. um I'm going down. Now i'm I'm looking into the other parts of the comment for Dragon Age 2. ah us us Kristen ah Steamer reviewed Dragon Age 2 for I haven't talked to her in a while.
Media Outlet Opinions and Reviewer Perspectives
00:17:08
Speaker
Anyway. um Oh, OK, so the next point.
00:17:13
Speaker
is on Dragon Age 2 review by Game Trailers, where the other journals called out the reviewer for a BS review and score. I'm not going to look too much into this. What I will say, though, and you can kind of jump in and say how you feel about this idea, is that There's been reviews put on noisy pixel where I want to call out BS, not on the, not on the score, but on the review, like hundred game that I thought sucked and the person gave it a nine or a game I gave a nine and someone else thinks it sucks. Absolutely. There any outlet that has like any more than one or maybe two people you're going to disagree.
00:17:55
Speaker
with weekend get yeah people's scores or thoughts on games because you have different values and different opinions on what makes a game good and what makes a game bad and what you enjoy in a game. So 100%, like it's not, you don't have to be steadfast and like resolute in in being like, no, we all agree with, and that's again, an extension of the hive mind kind of thought of an of an outlet that they all have to think that, but no, like it's a bunch of editors and writers and they all are completely different people and they all have their own perspectives on these things. So it makes sense that a lot of people can be like, that's not great. If you're calling it out publicly, that's a whole other matter, but that's still just a matter of disagreement on on the but game. Like I don't. Yeah. I think it's what's interesting is about reviews, i feel I feel are the easiest things to write.
00:18:45
Speaker
I think they playing the game is the hardest thing, but reviews are- Pre-release. Yeah. Reviews come really easy to me if I just sit down and and start writing. Um, but even I've written bad reviews, even I look back at some scores I'm like, you know what, i maybe I was just a little too hyped, but the idea of the score, the idea of the score and the idea of your feelings on it is a very moment to moment thing. And I think, I think there are reviewers who,
00:19:20
Speaker
who tend to, and even maybe I give a little grace in some scores depending on budget, team size. And, and that all comes down to the person again, yeah not the other person. And yeah, there is like a, a hundred percent have reviews that I could look back and be like, Oh, that sucks. Like that's like a different brain wrote that it does. Like that's so different from the way I think now, but like,
00:19:43
Speaker
that that's also just part of growing is when you get, if you don't look at like your past stuff and be like, I would improve this or change this, then you might not have developed that much. So it's a good thing to to be like, oh, look how far I've come.
00:19:56
Speaker
Or like, look, I don't agree with that anymore. That kind of thing. That's just the passage of time and progression of your person, I assume. Yeah. Yeah. And you know what? If you think that not other journals still don't talk shit about other people's reviews, then you're wrong because we all... maybe It's a high school bitchy clique. Yeah. a hundred percent this This is the interesting point where I i kind of think we can both ah vouch for and and talk on. And I think we might even have differencing opinions on it. um They mentioned the Battlefield 4 event where EA flew
Understanding Supervised Review Events
00:20:32
Speaker
in. The event was a sticking point for some people.
00:20:36
Speaker
In Vegas, yeah, for a supervised six hour review sessions. um This happens. ah this i don't huntunt him to I don't I wouldn't say there.
00:20:48
Speaker
i think there might be a bit of misunderstanding about what supervised me. Yeah. They're not going like, you like this, right? you like it's the developer It's the developers that are standing behind you. They're not paying for security or people. It's just the developers taking notes on what you're doing. Largely for cargo purposes. It's largely making sure you're not like filming...
00:21:06
Speaker
the pre-release footage on your stuff like that too it's not in every obvious like i can't speak to every event ever but i've been to a lot of preview events and review events and press shows and they've never i've never had them try to sway my perspective during like closed doors, supervised thing. It's truly like the supervision part is mostly either embargoes or so that they can be like, they see you get stuck in a bug or something. They'll be like, Oh, press these. And then you'll go to the dev menu. and But that kind of it like, it's not,
00:21:41
Speaker
Yeah, it's not what you think. And again, I will say not attacking you. yeah These are things that you wouldn't know if you're not. Well, there might even so be some truth to to this, too, because and and and I think it could be a product of where the industry is on paying these writers a a living wage, because I can promise you The most hard to find the, the, the, your, your average writer that maybe you see is probably making around 30,000 a year.
00:22:16
Speaker
If, if, if, if that guys, and, and that's from like a bunch of different outlets in freelance. And it's like, it's not, it's, it's not a salary before, before, um,
00:22:29
Speaker
Before like two before COVID there was a lot less of these events and they were more designed for, um, content creators. Like, like I remember Elden ring having like a content creator specific press event. Um, maybe it was dark souls
COVID's Impact on Media Events
00:22:45
Speaker
three or something. I don't know. It was one of those, but, um, but and And I say that because before COVID everything was either LA or San Francisco. So you could just have your press event in San Francisco and get game spot.
00:22:58
Speaker
IGN, uh, get, to get some people to, i I would drive in there and then I lived in, I lived in Oakland, so I didn't need to, to go very far, but you had to, to live around there to go. oh will monster vine, um, Spencer's website, uh, he lives in San Francisco. So it's like,
00:23:16
Speaker
you would have to move there to be in the industry. And after COVID, I think once IGN closed and all the offices closed, there was, uh, there was definitely a hard part, uh, for the PR and marketing teams of these developers to try and fill in these preview events when nobody was centrally located anymore. Everybody moved away. Everyone, uh, moved back home for a lot of, yeah.
00:23:43
Speaker
And, uh, So the industry did kind of change in that I, after COVID, I saw a lot more. And after the lockdown stuff, I've been seeing a lot more like paid, um, come fly in events.
00:23:59
Speaker
I do think that it is that it, and I can't speak for everyone in this industry, but I think depending on the person's circumstances, it could be a very big, uh,
00:24:12
Speaker
incentive for them to, to work in this industry, to be flown out to, LA or, or Vegas or something. It could, it could be nice for them, um, to get out, but in my years, there's never been pressure on these events and I go to more than you do. So I'm trying to like, I,
00:24:38
Speaker
I live in the middle of California. So if I can, i will drive to these events, but there are times where I, I've accepted flights, the flights in the hotel. i don't like it because it means that I'm stuck in a hotel and I can't review anything or I can't write anything pretty much just sitting in there. But sometimes it needs to be done. It's
00:25:01
Speaker
it's a
00:25:05
Speaker
It's weird. I don't. i I think it also really comes down to the individual. Like there's not, there's no pressure. It's gotta the individual. Yeah. Like there's no, I've never, and I'm sure that it's happened before.
00:25:21
Speaker
But I've never experienced, from any the PR people that I've worked with, like any form of pressure to to enjoy or like be positive about. I've been flown to Vegas and San Francisco and LA. And it's i think it's the individual who's writing because i feel like we mentioned this on a previous podcast, but um game journalism A lot of people who enter it don't necessarily have journalistic training or education. So they don't necessarily like when I went to I went to college for journalism and you learn about like ethical practices and how you go about reporting and ah like the the kind of code kind of thing that you'd like stick by for yourself.
Ethics in Attending Press Events
00:26:10
Speaker
So people who don't learn that stuff.
00:26:14
Speaker
might just be like, wow, this was all so fun. And they might be more prone to be positive about it. But that's more because they don't get it. And is that an issue with unqualified people?
00:26:28
Speaker
oh that's the name of our podcast. Unqualified people being given these these jobs without training? Yeah, 100%, you can argue that. like That's an issue. But i I truly don't think that it's the PR or the outlets responsible for that kind of positive because i like i was flown to to vegas to cover i think it was like a monster energy racing game and i had a wonderful time in vegas um i met lots of press people and pr people and it was it was wonderful um and they spent a lot of money on food and stuff and i gave it like a two out of five because it wasn't a good game like most people are able to just kind of separate the like though the reason i went was the opportunity to preview it play yeah
00:27:10
Speaker
to network and stuff like that. Yeah. And like in the preview, I was like, oh yeah, these things look neat. And like, this could be a lot of fun. And then when I read it, i was like, oh no, it's not fun. It's ah kind of janky and busted and it's not very enjoyable.
00:27:23
Speaker
So that's what you write. Like it's not, it, I think it really is the individual because that's, it depends on how you approach that kind of thing. And and I, outlets could definitely maybe, ah what's the word like filter better to be like little more transparent. This person has less experience, so they're probably going to be like,
00:27:47
Speaker
more swayed by this experience or if anything, like train them. Be like, yeah this is like, you can't, this doesn't affect your opinion. This is just like an opportunity to preview it early.
00:27:59
Speaker
Everything else is just slow like strenuous. How doesn't how doesn't it it affect your opinion when you go to Disneyland? If you were asked to write a journal entry immediately after you went to Disneyland, you're going to be a little more excited. Yeah. You're going to be, you're going to be writing that hot. you're like, yeah, that iing was exciting. And then you're like, tell me about this movie. But then like you was sitting with it for a couple of days and you're like, Oh, maybe. yeah And that's just humanity. That's just human. Like to, yeah. And you know what? Like, so I went to the, the EA event that I went to that was big was the, um, star Wars, um, as a Jedi, one for the new one. Yeah. Okay. Yeah. Um, uh, and, uh,
00:28:43
Speaker
ah and When I got there, I didn't really understand what I was. I thought I was just playing the game, but it was it was a Disneyland trip and it was this um after party and then it was the preview event the next day.
00:28:58
Speaker
And so we go Disneyland, dude, they they they took us all to Disneyland, all the press people to Disneyland. They shut shuttered up shuttled us, had like an after party. Dude, in that day, too, a bunch of like websites shut down. So there was writer there was websites there, writers there that didn't even have... They just off their forgo they just got yeah they just got laid off that day.
00:29:26
Speaker
that yeah it was like a I don't know. That's the industry. Yeah, it was it it was gamers or Valnet layoff, like a full sweep. Yeah. And then EA had layoffs there. And so what while I was at this after party, I was like, dude, if like I could have just did all this at home. And yeah anyway, I decided not to ah to to review that game because of this event. And those are my ethics. You know, that's my personal ethics, because I know that that I just went to fucking Disneyland. i just fucking play. They like, they gave me a lightsaber. What?
00:30:01
Speaker
Like.
00:30:04
Speaker
And I, I let me look, let's get this. Let's get this straight. I could have written reviewed it. I, I wouldn't, I'm sure you could have like, yeah, i mut it because that's capable doing that.
00:30:16
Speaker
I don't know these people, anything, if anything, they, um, but if you don't feel comfortable doing it that's also like a personal ethical decision to be like, I, I feel I could review this, but I don't know necessarily. Yeah. and And it was a preview event. It was not a review. yeah Um, uh,
00:30:39
Speaker
I think there's a lot more gray than people think in this. Right. it's not there are people There are people that don't sell their stuff. There are people that do sell their stuff. There there are there are people that won't um that only do guides, and there are people that only play a specific genre. There are so many writers out there, and to to to boil them delll down to...
00:31:00
Speaker
you're all corrupt is, is the, is the, the boogeyman way of, uh, $25,000 a year because they gave resident evil, a lower score, which means that they're part of a cabal of like open critic.
00:31:18
Speaker
It's just not how I can, like, I can assure you guys that content creator that's rage baiting is making so much more money. They're making more on that video. fucking the Yeah, then the journalists got paid for whatever they wrote. crazy It's crazy. And i like I think a big part of that is that rage baiting has become such, like the grift has become such an easy thing for people to make money off of because everyone is mad all the time because everything kind of sucks.
00:31:43
Speaker
a lot and is getting worse um but you also like i think it's kind of the same mind as conspiracy theories where people will be like if someone's like parent dies in a car accident some people are like well this is because um they they were a cop and there's this organization that wanted to take him out so it's blah blah but it's like no things are just like nothing's that things just happen like it if the the last couple years of like international politics haven't shown you that there is no secret group making things work properly.
00:32:17
Speaker
i don't, I don't like, there's not there. Everything is kind of chaos a lot of the time. And it's never as complicated as you might hope it is. It's truly just people like doing, doing stuff. And sometimes that is but like, there are bad things like yeah the Kanan Lynch thing with Jeff Gerstman, a hundred percent reprehensible thing that happened to him.
00:32:39
Speaker
And those things should be called out when they happen and vilified. But that's so much more the exception than the rule ti like a hundred times more than you think that. Yeah. Because whatever content creator that you're following that you think won't accept a hundred thousand dollar check to do something, you are fucking dead wrong. They don't even have the pretense of having to be professional. They're just mad that nobody's offering it to them guys. Like they, they,
00:33:06
Speaker
the I assume people get mad because journalists like journalism is supposed to be a pretty sacred thing. It's definitely not treated that way anymore by a lot of people, but it is supposed to be like a factual kind of sacred thing.
00:33:20
Speaker
um So like if you you go like, oh, well, ah journalists have to be more strict and held to morph code, which is true, but to to be like, content creators are are better.
00:33:33
Speaker
They don't Like I love lots of content creators and like they're pretty ah a lot of them are pretty open. They're sponsored by shit and that's fine. And you know, get that bag. I'm not holding anybody fucking. not being like you shouldn't take money from raid shadow like like if they rage out legends reset to a space right now. I would 100%. I fucking love Raid Shadow Legends. I'm sure everybody who knows you would be like, that's very clearly bullshit and he's just getting that money. yeah That's fine. get that. It's a horrible economic time right now. It's us against them right now. You need the money, sure. But I think you shouldn't be like, well...
00:34:12
Speaker
the real bad guys are are the game journalists because for like, and I, again, I understand that. I think I said this last week. I understand that a lot of games. Journalists can be really annoying on social media.
00:34:25
Speaker
And I'm saying that I have been too. ever Like, everyone's annoying on social media. It's just that game journalists are, like, are part of everyone. So 100%. But that doesn't, someone being annoying doesn't mean they're in a, like, a ah shadow organization to get Dragon Age Veil Guard's score above an eight. Like, and also, didn't that team just, like, get canned anyway? So who cares if what what a company gave the Dragon Age game,
00:34:55
Speaker
Like, they're not making another one. So yeah you got what you wanted. So what you're picking it you're you're picking at corpses. Like, there's nothing... i think this all ties back to everyone needs to chill a little. Everyone needs to sit back and be like, it's video games. it's this is This isn't that big a deal. This isn't... And I'm not saying that in the way... i want to get ahead of it. I'm not saying that in the way that, like,
00:35:22
Speaker
game journalists should able to anything they want because it's not real journalists game. So they should be able to lie and cheat. No, but I'm saying like. There's so much stuff going on all the time and that it's easy to get caught up in it and and get mad.
00:35:36
Speaker
But like, again, most game journalists and stuff are just maybe annoying people trying their best to do stuff and make very minimal money. And they're, yeah.
00:35:48
Speaker
Yeah. Like I fully agree that there should be better training and, and, uh, education should be available to people to, to, to be able to be better journalists. If you look at it, look at, look at reviews from the nineties, dude, the ah reviewers then had to review every difficulty of a
Maintaining Ethics in Game Journalism
00:36:06
Speaker
game.
00:36:06
Speaker
Wait, if it had difficulty things like there was, there was, there was a different like reviews in general have changed to, to very much what I think is a personal ah blog, any, any by the writer. so I think the best approach as you as you move through video game, the industry, assign it like lock into the writers who you trust, who align with your ethics. If I can if i put my ethics on the table, NoisyPixel doesn't put any ah gambling links in our website, even though we're offered thousands and thousands of dollars for them. And all of your favorite websites probably include them, not Monstervine, Uh, noisy pixel does not, uh, put in those gambling links. We do not.
00:37:00
Speaker
Yeah. We don't accept gambling. Uh, uh, we don't accept, uh, sponsored posts on our website either. yeah That's another one. So like, if you go to like somewhere like Silicon era, you'll find like a post on a car and it's like, what the fuck? Like, and it's, ah it's just a random car post.
00:37:18
Speaker
Anyway, we don't do any of that. i um, When we do do sponsorships, the writer never, Ooh, uh, the writer, uh, doesn't talk to the marketing people, um, and doesn't, uh, or doesn't talk to the, um, the marketing people for sure. But, uh, the, the, the client or whoever is, um, paying for the sponsorship too. I separate all of that. It's, uh, it's, um,
00:37:46
Speaker
I separate from myself too. There are some things that i that that we have Nate, our marketing guy, just take. And this is a reason why last year we trained him up to just take it because in my head I was getting a little, but if I'm handling the sponsorships and helping writing them,
00:38:04
Speaker
that's like but so incentivized for me that it feels a little gross. And, and you know what? I think, I think I have to think this way too, because I do co-own the website with Mark. So we share a, a percentage of that. Yeah. The responsibility. And, and I would rather, i would rather just, um,
00:38:25
Speaker
put that all on, put that, that let that live somewhere else. And if I need to be brought in, I'll be brought in. But for most of the part, most of the time i don't need to be, um, into the conversations or like signing stuff or like talking about what, what goes into the video and stuff. I don't need to be in all of that. Um, uh, Nate knows our boundaries and it's, uh,
00:38:50
Speaker
it's a fine line because there is a lot of money to be made in this industry. If you know the right hands to shake, if you know the right people to talk to, yeah, it's, uh, what sucks is that you have to give up a lot of your independence for that funding.
00:39:09
Speaker
You, you, you, there is a, there is an implication that you are going to, ah be there if the, the, uh, relationship is live and, and like
00:39:31
Speaker
with the, so, so say like a tech company, uh, like Asus or something wants to like, do, do, do, uh, do work with us. Uh,
00:39:44
Speaker
If ACES wants to do work with us in a sponsored capacity, not not a general review capacity, there is an implication that one, we will respond to their emails. We will hit those deadlines that they propose. um But we also, there also becomes a mutual respect that if we do cover something that is on leaning maybe to a negative side of them, we now, before that, we'll reach out to them for comment, you know, on the coverage that we're doing. So there is, but that, but that only makes our connections better in my head.
00:40:20
Speaker
It's like, you're, I can't hide the news from people that we, I can't hide the news. We could just cover it, you know? yeah, but if there's some If it's someone that we're working with, I will always give them the opportunity. um i covered um oh i covered i the Critical Reflex over December.
00:40:44
Speaker
was an issue with their... there was an issue with their um
00:40:53
Speaker
It was like a sexual harassment thing with one of their higher ups. And the girl came out, the the young girl came out with all of her videos and stuff. Nobody wrote about it. I was the only one to write something about it because Critical Reflex is in this funding period where there are where they are actively funding...
00:41:11
Speaker
little pockets of this industry yeah and no one wanted to fucking touch this. I was the only one guys. It's crazy that, and I tried to send it to other writers. I tried. So in my head, i can go down the conspiracy hole all I want.
00:41:28
Speaker
Oh, this company. And I know they're in a funding boom right now. um they're not They're not paying anybody, but they are putting out releases and games that could bring a lot of traffic.
00:41:43
Speaker
So almost nobody wants to touch it because of the because coverage for those games will likely be um good. But you know what? I'll cross that bridge. And that information that should be addressed by more people.
00:41:58
Speaker
100%. Right. Yeah. Right. so So those are my ethics. And you know what? Some people don't like them. Some people do. i i know I can suck a dick. You know, I can walk into a room and fucking ah put myself out there.
00:42:13
Speaker
Yeah, I could. I could. I'm really good at that, but I'm also really good at standing on business and knowing that my community and the things that that my staff built are are fucking ah a they are. um Like, you can't touch them, you know, they are. lock Yeah, they're they are Everything they're the ring, you know, they are they're like.
00:42:41
Speaker
You can't touch it. You just you can't fuck with it. You can't cut the line. If I don't like your game, I'm not going to fucking cover it. You know, it's like, it's, uh, I mean, not, I mean, for sponsorships, I'll cover your game. If I don't like it, I mean, if for sponsorships, if I don't think it fits in the, in the noisy pixel world, I'll just say, Hey, this is not going to do well here.
00:43:04
Speaker
Yeah. Um, It's a, those are, those are my ethics, man. And you know what? Like, I understand why people think this way, because it's almost a projection of what they would do if they were in this situation, you know? Well, you know what, if I didn't have, if I got it this free backpack, I would definitely sell it on eBay for 500. Maybe you would, dude. But I still have my Attack on Titan Final Battle 2 backpack in my closet. It's also a snowball effect where it's like what started as like, yeah, there are legitimate things that should be confronted, kind of snowballed and was definitely egged on.
00:43:45
Speaker
by bad actors to the point where it's like everything from every game journalist is stupid and wrong and evil and corrupt. And it's like, just statistically, that's not possible.
00:43:56
Speaker
Like, yeah, it's just find the, I like, yeah, stay sharp and vigilant about that like bad, bad actors and bad press, but find for reviews specifically people whose ethics and tastes line up with yours and and follow them. Because like if you like games that if you're if youre like Dragon Quest and and things like that that I like, and then you see that I really like a game that you might not have thought of playing, then oh, then there's a good chance that you'll like playing it too because we're similar.
00:44:27
Speaker
But to be like, hmm, this person who is ideologically and in all matters of taste the complete opposite of me, like the game that I didn't like, they must be corrupt. It's like, no, they're just very different from you and they look for different things. Like,
00:44:43
Speaker
Yeah, i that's what I would say. I would say we've pretty much taken up a whole podcast. Yeah, sorry about that. I really don't want the commenter to feel as though this is like a um like a reply video. Remember those back in the day? Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. What they brought up is what I've heard a lot, though. So I appreciate I appreciate them even like being. This is not screaming at you. This is more us addressing a wider point that you mentioned that has been seen everywhere for 20 plus years.
00:45:18
Speaker
um And yeah, it it is just that, like, I understand why you you Yeah, because there's people that we......been conditioned to 100%. um But it's not really like that at all. um And the way that it is is a lot less interesting than you think it is. Because you know what? like We're defending the industry, but I'll tell you, there's not a lot of people that like me in the industry. There are huge issues in the games.
00:45:49
Speaker
journalism industry. here ah here I am defending them. here i Because I know they're good people. I know they're fine people. They don't like me. evil It's not like an inherently wretched and dark and evil thing at all. yeah it's It's just a thing.
00:46:05
Speaker
It's neutral, just as anything else is. And it's the people involved, the individuals involved, etc., who you have to look to and decide whether you want to follow them or not, just like you would with a content creator or anybody else.
00:46:19
Speaker
Well, but if you have any questions. Yeah, please let us know the comments below. Yeah, really, really don't want know. Sorry for taking the whole episode with that. Yeah. But you know what? we never did We've never actually done an episode like this. We always like touch on stuff, but we've never done full episode like, hey, this is how it typically works.
00:46:42
Speaker
I don't know. And yeah i guess I guess after all of it, I will say, comes down to the person because are there people out there that go on these events and and write something positive? Maybe.
00:46:56
Speaker
um sure. Statistically, yeah, there are. But I'm not one of them, and I don't know any of that are so that We know lots of people who aren't them, so we feel it's unfair to say that everybody is them. Yeah, how about this? If ever I find one, I'll tell you who it is. I have no problem. I have no problem. Yeah. it's yeah Nobody's going to do shit to me.
00:47:19
Speaker
It's really a... I don't know. I think that a lot of this just leads back to nothing. And it's like, if you don't like someone's reviews and shit, just don't read them. And then they won't get the engagement and they won't get the reads. And you're voting with your digital equivalent of a wallet instead of devoting frustration towards someone's thoughts on a game. It doesn't matter.
00:47:41
Speaker
doesn't. Well, everyone. Two weeks in a row. Can we do three? Maybe. We will see you next week. Bye, everyone.
00:48:04
Speaker
lay pixel