tpaterniti
August 17th, 2007, 09:31 AM
Good read on how the video game media can be biased and "paid off" in a sense. Since I'm a video game journalist as well, I can attest to the fact that whenever you give a glowing review, they (publishers/developers) offer to fly you out to their headquarters for an "exclusive view" of next year’s title. Just wanted to let you guys know.
Interesting thought is how come APF is receiving such lackluster reviews compared to the competition. Both games appear solid with its collection of flaws; however, it cannot be argued that APF received significantly lower scores across the boards. The superior game play battle is arguable but I say APF wins and the “competition” only gets the “nod” because of the Professional license.
Remember when information was scarce and we were all dying to get every little bit of info on APF 2K8. Well, perhaps gaming journalists are taking their revenge for being left "out of the loop". The media can make or break you, and gaming developers/distributors/publishers know it. Does Take Two/2K sports get it? Aside from online forums (such as OS) dedicated to presenting objective reviews, can we trust the big revenue generating websites/magazines to be objective as well? You be the judge.
PR And The Game Media: How PR Shapes What You Think About Games
http://www.gamasutra.com/view/feature/1542/pr_and_the_game_media_how_pr_.php
“If you disagree with me, you do so at your own peril,” wrote Trip Hawkins, president of the now defunct game publisher 3DO, in an irate e-mail to the editors of GamePro magazine in 2001. “....And do not patronize me by telling me the reader is the customer—your real customer is the one that pays you your revenue. And it is game industry advertisers.”
In a way, he's right. Advertising dollars from game publishers and hardware manufacturers pay for the production of the popular gaming magazines. But it's your interest in candid stories about those products that makes ad space valuable in the first place. And that's when marketing gets more subtle. It should be obvious to any reader that marketers control the content of their ads, but did you know they have a hand in almost every story a game magazine prints? This isn't some conspiracy to secretly sell you junk you don't want.
It's the natural consequence of an undeniable fact: The games press is almost entirely dependent on access to information, people, and products that only game publishers can provide. You want the latest details on a game that's still a year away from release? What you get, when you get it, and who you get it from are ultimately decisions made by that game's marketers.
Think of it as a giant information spigot. The folks with their hands on the valve—the ones who tell games journalists about upcoming games (or don't), set up interviews with the game's developers (or don't), and eventually send out early review copies of that game (or don't)—are the publicists, or in the insider lingo, PR reps (public relations representatives).
You've probably heard the term thrown around, but what, exactly, does a PR rep do? “I work to educate and inform the media about our new product offerings and services,” says Michael Wolf, the PR manager for Games for Windows (the initiative, not the magazine). “The job of the media, in turn, is to carry their opinions about what I’ve told them to the public. The ultimate goal being to get coverage through online outlets, print publications, broadcast media, podcasts, etc.”
Wolf's diplomatic description of PR represents the ideal relationship between game industry journalists and the products they cover. But more often publicists seek not just to drum up press coverage, but to deliver positive coverage, preferably framed by certain points the game's marketers have deemed important to get across to the public (Spore is about evolution. Crysis is pretty, etc.). In short, they try to influence what the game press tell their readers, and how they say it.
As a simple fact of life, game writers and editors work with publicists on a daily basis, gathering the stories that populate their publications. But does PR really influence coverage? Do publicists really affect what you read in gaming publications across the web and on the newsstands? The very existence of the profession would seem to imply so. The real question is: How and to what extent? To find out, we spoke to several current and former game industry publicists—though many representing top-tier publishers refused (or were not allowed) to be interviewed—about their methods.
The Carrot: Exclusives
The motivation for companies to court and shape media coverage of their games and products is obvious. “If I can get Prominent Games Magazine X to publish a six-page spread of my title for free,” says Laura Heeb Mustard, a long time game publicist who has worked with Namco, Enix, THQ, Midway, and Majesco, “why would my marketers bother tacking on an advertisement to the end of that? The message is already in there. And if it's preview material, it's all but guaranteed to be a positive one. That's just good business sense."
The difference between an ad and a published story, of course, is that a writer can say anything he or she wants about a game. But in allowing a publication access to a game and the people who created it, publishers exert a subtle influence. The greatest tool in their arsenal is the exclusive, often taking the form of a sought-after cover story for magazines.
In this age of instantaneous online news distribution, print publications rely on exclusivity deals with game publishers to give them a leg up on the electronic competition. The publisher gets choice real estate (several pages of story and an eye catching cover image peeking out from newsstands across the country), while the magazine gets a promise: Their publication will be the only place to read about that particular game, at least for the time being. No money changes hands, of course, and the publication gets to present that info (and any opinions they might have about it) in whatever way they choose.
But trouble can arise from how publishers distribute those prized cover stories. According to sources interviewed for this story, the doling out of exclusives and cover stories can either be a simple business decision (Who sells more magazines?) or an unsaid reward for previous positive coverage (What have you done for me lately?).
“It's a business,” says Tricia Gray, Marketing and Communications Director for developer Flagship Studios. “...The good of my product comes before all other considerations. And if I deem Magazine X is the best option with the most numbers, I go with it. There's no sinister plot, no conspiratorial agency, no bribes, buyouts, threats, or clandestine operations.”
Todd Zuniga, a writer who served a stint in PR with publisher Rockstar Games before returning to journalism, had experiences to the contrary. “In part, it’s a numbers game,” says Zuniga. “Otherwise, it’s history. Who wrote negatively about the games, and who hasn't? We never worked with [gaming website] GameSpot while I was there because 'they just didn't get it.' Same with Wired [magazine] because of a story in 2002 by a writer who now teaches high school in Indiana.”
Sometimes exclusives are given less as a reward for previous coverage and more as an insurance policy for publishers unsure about how a game will be received by the press. “I have chosen an outlet for an exclusive review based on who I thought would give it the best review,” says Mustard. “That's not unscrupulous. It's smart. You should never, ever consider letting the first review of your game go to an outlet that you have any doubt likes your game.”
She says that publicists can usually get a feel for how a game will be received through a publication's previews and other early coverage. “That's not to say you negotiate the review. It means that through the course of working with outlets, you know who likes the game and who doesn't. However, an exclusive review doesn't guarantee it’s going to be good.”
Interesting thought is how come APF is receiving such lackluster reviews compared to the competition. Both games appear solid with its collection of flaws; however, it cannot be argued that APF received significantly lower scores across the boards. The superior game play battle is arguable but I say APF wins and the “competition” only gets the “nod” because of the Professional license.
Remember when information was scarce and we were all dying to get every little bit of info on APF 2K8. Well, perhaps gaming journalists are taking their revenge for being left "out of the loop". The media can make or break you, and gaming developers/distributors/publishers know it. Does Take Two/2K sports get it? Aside from online forums (such as OS) dedicated to presenting objective reviews, can we trust the big revenue generating websites/magazines to be objective as well? You be the judge.
PR And The Game Media: How PR Shapes What You Think About Games
http://www.gamasutra.com/view/feature/1542/pr_and_the_game_media_how_pr_.php
“If you disagree with me, you do so at your own peril,” wrote Trip Hawkins, president of the now defunct game publisher 3DO, in an irate e-mail to the editors of GamePro magazine in 2001. “....And do not patronize me by telling me the reader is the customer—your real customer is the one that pays you your revenue. And it is game industry advertisers.”
In a way, he's right. Advertising dollars from game publishers and hardware manufacturers pay for the production of the popular gaming magazines. But it's your interest in candid stories about those products that makes ad space valuable in the first place. And that's when marketing gets more subtle. It should be obvious to any reader that marketers control the content of their ads, but did you know they have a hand in almost every story a game magazine prints? This isn't some conspiracy to secretly sell you junk you don't want.
It's the natural consequence of an undeniable fact: The games press is almost entirely dependent on access to information, people, and products that only game publishers can provide. You want the latest details on a game that's still a year away from release? What you get, when you get it, and who you get it from are ultimately decisions made by that game's marketers.
Think of it as a giant information spigot. The folks with their hands on the valve—the ones who tell games journalists about upcoming games (or don't), set up interviews with the game's developers (or don't), and eventually send out early review copies of that game (or don't)—are the publicists, or in the insider lingo, PR reps (public relations representatives).
You've probably heard the term thrown around, but what, exactly, does a PR rep do? “I work to educate and inform the media about our new product offerings and services,” says Michael Wolf, the PR manager for Games for Windows (the initiative, not the magazine). “The job of the media, in turn, is to carry their opinions about what I’ve told them to the public. The ultimate goal being to get coverage through online outlets, print publications, broadcast media, podcasts, etc.”
Wolf's diplomatic description of PR represents the ideal relationship between game industry journalists and the products they cover. But more often publicists seek not just to drum up press coverage, but to deliver positive coverage, preferably framed by certain points the game's marketers have deemed important to get across to the public (Spore is about evolution. Crysis is pretty, etc.). In short, they try to influence what the game press tell their readers, and how they say it.
As a simple fact of life, game writers and editors work with publicists on a daily basis, gathering the stories that populate their publications. But does PR really influence coverage? Do publicists really affect what you read in gaming publications across the web and on the newsstands? The very existence of the profession would seem to imply so. The real question is: How and to what extent? To find out, we spoke to several current and former game industry publicists—though many representing top-tier publishers refused (or were not allowed) to be interviewed—about their methods.
The Carrot: Exclusives
The motivation for companies to court and shape media coverage of their games and products is obvious. “If I can get Prominent Games Magazine X to publish a six-page spread of my title for free,” says Laura Heeb Mustard, a long time game publicist who has worked with Namco, Enix, THQ, Midway, and Majesco, “why would my marketers bother tacking on an advertisement to the end of that? The message is already in there. And if it's preview material, it's all but guaranteed to be a positive one. That's just good business sense."
The difference between an ad and a published story, of course, is that a writer can say anything he or she wants about a game. But in allowing a publication access to a game and the people who created it, publishers exert a subtle influence. The greatest tool in their arsenal is the exclusive, often taking the form of a sought-after cover story for magazines.
In this age of instantaneous online news distribution, print publications rely on exclusivity deals with game publishers to give them a leg up on the electronic competition. The publisher gets choice real estate (several pages of story and an eye catching cover image peeking out from newsstands across the country), while the magazine gets a promise: Their publication will be the only place to read about that particular game, at least for the time being. No money changes hands, of course, and the publication gets to present that info (and any opinions they might have about it) in whatever way they choose.
But trouble can arise from how publishers distribute those prized cover stories. According to sources interviewed for this story, the doling out of exclusives and cover stories can either be a simple business decision (Who sells more magazines?) or an unsaid reward for previous positive coverage (What have you done for me lately?).
“It's a business,” says Tricia Gray, Marketing and Communications Director for developer Flagship Studios. “...The good of my product comes before all other considerations. And if I deem Magazine X is the best option with the most numbers, I go with it. There's no sinister plot, no conspiratorial agency, no bribes, buyouts, threats, or clandestine operations.”
Todd Zuniga, a writer who served a stint in PR with publisher Rockstar Games before returning to journalism, had experiences to the contrary. “In part, it’s a numbers game,” says Zuniga. “Otherwise, it’s history. Who wrote negatively about the games, and who hasn't? We never worked with [gaming website] GameSpot while I was there because 'they just didn't get it.' Same with Wired [magazine] because of a story in 2002 by a writer who now teaches high school in Indiana.”
Sometimes exclusives are given less as a reward for previous coverage and more as an insurance policy for publishers unsure about how a game will be received by the press. “I have chosen an outlet for an exclusive review based on who I thought would give it the best review,” says Mustard. “That's not unscrupulous. It's smart. You should never, ever consider letting the first review of your game go to an outlet that you have any doubt likes your game.”
She says that publicists can usually get a feel for how a game will be received through a publication's previews and other early coverage. “That's not to say you negotiate the review. It means that through the course of working with outlets, you know who likes the game and who doesn't. However, an exclusive review doesn't guarantee it’s going to be good.”