Game Journalists Are Incompetent Fuckwits: Archive

Game Journalists Are Incompetent Fuckwits

August 2010

194 posts

Kotaku seems to have fallen off Google Cache

Interestingly if you Google for “kotaku” the “Cached” option still appears under the URL, only now it doesn’t work. A couple of other sites appear to have fallen off Cache as well. Interesting, eh readers? That’s okay, because I still have a PrtScr key on my keyboard, so I guess from now on I’ll just provide screenshots of their articles instead. Or...

Why would you post this, Bashcraft? Why would you... →

Brian Ashcraft proudly (?) demonstrates his technological competence, which seems to be below a significant portion (54 percent, according to Joystiq) of the Wii’s audience, a demographic composed largely of the elderly, married couples, and people who have a tendency to call Geek Squad when their cable goes out. I’d like to take this opportunity to remind you that Brian Ashcraft...

wardrox asked: Not taking notes whilst playing a game doesn't make the individual bad at being a journalist. Not least when they have more experience and skill than nearly every other professional in their field.

Calling somebody terrible at their job and incompetent (even though the article you linked to is, at least to my eyes, good) because they chose to do something in a way you...

thatninja asked: I've seen a lot of complaints about how you run things and what you have to say. I myself find nothing to complain about because nothing you point out or say comes across as anything I haven't said myself or over heard. It's been years since I've read any gaming related site or magazine, aside from the sites I "worked" for as an Editor. All of these places that...

Anonymous asked: http://www.gamesradar.com/ds/nintendo-ds/news/nintendo-announces-dsi-price-drop-foreshadows-a-200-3ds/a-20100830133920464097/g-20060308162345714070

Step 1: Nintendo Drops DSi prices
Step 2: ???
Step 3: 3DS will cost $200.

Wait, what?

Anonymous asked: Why exactly are Kotaku and Destructoid so popular? I don't see any reason anybody would want to read this self-indulgent drivel. Is it because our society, dumbed down by reality T.V. and 8 years of George W. Bush, is too stupid to realize that these sites are rubbish? Or are people just tired of the Gamespots of the world, especially after what happened to Jeff Gerstmann?

Anonymous asked: We just received this mysterious image. We haven't a clue as to what it is. It must be for a new game, though.

http://playstationlifestyle.net/2010/08/31/bizzare-mystery-puzzle-piece-teasing-new-game

We're idiots.

inthemindofagamergirl asked: I agree completely with you about writing notes why playing games. When I'm playing a game I'm almost constantly talking to my husband about what's going on, what I notice, what I'm seeing go wrong/right, etc. It also isn't that hard to pause the game after a fight or during general "down time" and type out a few notes on Notepad. I've never found it to take...

Anonymous asked: Another complaint, but from another perspective.

http://gamejournos.tumblr.com/post/1040099562/with-regards-to-your-recent-post-about-jeff-gerstmanns

Okay. First off, I am not a journalist, nor do I want to be one. I'm a
nerd with a blog that likes to write about games. I've submitted -one-
review to a gaming blog, but resigned from said blog...

“Gears of lawsuit”

– Eurogamer: Inversion Preview [August 30th, 2010] Tom spends a lot of time and energy in this article complaining that Inversion is “exactly like Gears of War. It’s uncanny. And a bit odd.” Yes, I’ll buy that the game may well have a similar mechanic, but visually it looks...

Anonymous asked: With regards to your recent post about Jeff Gerstmann's incompetence - do you feel it is always 100% necessary for a reviewer to take notes while playing a game for a review? I would have thought that in the majority of cases, the notable things about a game will stick in your mind. Taking notes while playing would surely make it more cumbersome (with the reviewer constantly pausing to take...

“So here’s something you might not know about me. I typically don’t...”

– Giant Bomb: This Is A Poor Excuse For A Halo: Reach Preview [August 24th, 2010] - NOTE: NOT A GOOGLE CACHE LINK This roughly translates as “I’m terrible at my job, and usually I’m lucky enough to get away with it, but on this occasion my incompetence is right out in the forefront....

Destructoid, Sims →

It seems Destructoid has ALSO picked up the Sims domain story as news, in the up and coming style of ‘lolololol we’re making jokes about it not being news and that makes it okay to post it as news.’ (Nick, to his credit, does point out that EA owns everything up to at least TheSims7.com, which hammers home just how much of a non-story this is. - Ed.)

EA buys TheSims4.com, which is apparently news to... →

Come on, guys. We just talked about this.

Anonymous asked: Can you do something fancy to the "not shit journalism" posts so that I know what it is before I start reading? I read those articles and get confused halfway through how the subject is shit journalism and then scan through the many tags to see if the not shit tag is there. It just seems that posts which are so different from the general content on this site it should be more obvious,...

“I never went back to Super Mario Galaxy 2 and I just can’t; I don’t...”

– PSX Extreme: Ben’s Week In Review: August 29 [August 29th, 2010] Dutka proves that while everybody is entitled to their opinion, not every opinion is entitled to equal consideration. To my mind both Super Mario Galaxy and its sequel are easily the best games of this generation, and to see it...

GayGamer. Wii Party. Press release. A WORLD OF NO. →

The inclusion of entire fucking press releases in news stories continues to be a source of frustration for me, especially when the press release is available to read elsewhere.

“Telltale Games has released a brief teaser for an unannounced project which...”

– That VideoGame Blog: Unlikely crew to headline upcoming Telltale Games title [August 28th, 2010] If Hothead Games own the Tycho Brahe character then I’d say that Mike and Jerry got absolutely shafted during the On The Rainslick Precipice of Darkness licensing negotiations. Same goes for...

“Don’t freak out just yet though as this option is indeed optional.”

– PlayStation LifeStyle: GT5 Set to Start the Race with Hefty Install [August 28th, 2010] Oh, good.

Final thoughts on Joystiq

This is a simplified version of the conversation I’ve been having with Joystiq’s “Ludwig”: Me: Joystiq have gotten worse over the last few months. Ludwig: No we haven’t. You’re stupid. Me: Yes you have, and here are some examples. Ludwig: You’re still stupid. And you’re still wrong. Well, that’s me told, then. We now return you, etc.

Criticism is a hard nut to swallow, and I tend to keep stray thoughts off of the blog and on my Twitter feed, where earlier today I said: .@Joystiq are teetering on the edge of Kotakuitis. Their news stories are becoming lazier and lazier, each more badly-written than the last. I mentioned this because I’ve been looking at their news posts for the last few days and… eugh,...

Anonymous asked: Ash's eyes look different in the new Pokemon TV series in Japan. Bashcraft is all over that shit.

http://kotaku.com/5623422/ash-you-look-different

“So is this the beginning of whats to come of the digital release of games? Will...”

– Koku Gamer: No Birth by Sleep for PSP GO? [August 27th, 2010] Apparently SquareEnix’ deciding not to release their latest game for a failing system is a sign of THE END OF DIGITAL DISTRIBUTION AS WE KNOW IT!

It takes about twenty seconds, seriously →

<preamble> Intern Scoggins <pointless banter> Hey look, a Metroid: Other M review on Kotaku! Let’s see what they have to say: How can anyone dislike Samus Aran, who enters Metroid: Other M with the advantages of having a cool, iconic set of armor, a great rogues gallery of monsters aliens who sneak their way into most of her games and, of course, the can’t-miss great...

IGN Compares The Tech On The PS3 and Xbox 360 →

For some reason IGN has decided that it is newsworthy to compare the technical specs of the PS3 and Xbox 360 six years after launch. How is this at all newsworthy?

Infendo Suggest You Don't Have to Play Games To... →

So the reviewer at Infendo A) Wrote a mostly negative review of Metroid: Other M B) broke the review embargo to do so C) Then admitted in the comments he only played 5 hours of the game after multiple comments pointed out he made several factual errors about the game. This editorial is his claim that he didn’t really do anything wrong and all those people questioning the site’s...

Rock Band 3 setlist Asterisks

The Rock Band 3 setlist was officially confirmed this week, which is nice. A number of outlets have posted the news, including sites like Platform Nation, PlayStation LifeStyle, and CVG. Another thing sites like Platform Nation, PlayStation LifeStyle and CVG have done is copy and paste the setlist without really looking at it. Have a look at any one of those three links. Go on, have a look....

Maybe tomorrow, I'll find what I call home / Until...

I live next door to a KFC and across the road from a local park which attracts a fair few homeless people. On any given day you can walk past that KFC to find homeless people rummaging through the skip out the back of the store, foraging for whatever scraps they can find to get them through the day. Because they’re desperate. Because there’s nothing else. Game journalists, listen to...

“Next, Valve is holding another community contest. Sorry, boys, this one’s...”

– Destructoid: Breaking news on the Team Fortress 2 hat front [August 25th, 2010] If I worked for Destructoid I wouldn’t consider the written word to be art either. Also: Write a blurb about your favorite in-game hat, and you could get your writing inside of TF2 itself as an item...

“I think piracy wouldn’t be nearly as big an issue if we didn’t call...”

– Bitmob: News Blips: Halo: Reach Pirates Get Banned, Dragon Age: Origins Goes With Hunting, Pirates! on Wii, and More [August 25th, 2010] Bitmob’s Mike Minotti there, apparently auditioning for a position on Kotaku’s writing team.

Gaming Website Jumps To Conclusions →

Destructoid takes old-ass news, reports it as new. →

Destructoid reports something confirmed a week before E3 - back in May, mind you - as something totally new. Also, reporting it as something that requires effort on Harmonix’s part when the functionality has been built in all this time.

Anonymous asked: THIS HAS TO BE THE FUNNIEST TITLE I'VE EVER FUCKING READ:

http://www.vg247.com/2010/08/24/ids-hollenshead-3d-tvs-are-fucking-expensive/

id's Hollenshead: 3D TVs are "fucking expensive"

Wow. Developer states obvious. This is news.

“The Halo universe is famous for explosions and the colour purple. But pregnant...”

– Kotaku: The Day Before Halo: Reach’s Invasion [August 24th, 2010] I didn’t really need to name the source there, did I? You probably could’ve figured that out y’self. It’s shit like this that reminds you that you are, in fact, reading Kotaku. And yes, the writers there...

Downtime will be a bit downier than expected

Being unemployed is having two rather unexpected side-effects. Firstly, I’m playing a lot of Fallout 3. I’m doing this to distract me from the second side-effect, which is that I can now do a pretty good impression of Marvin from The Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy, only I haven’t quite figured out how to stop yet. Sigh. By these powers combined, I am Captain Too Busy...

Anonymous asked: Are there any sites like this for regular journalism? Being a journalist myself I would like to see such a site.

Land of Hope and Glory

I received this email last night from a fellow Brit who, unlike me, still lives in the Merry Old: If you ever feel a sudden, inexplicable desire to return to the motherland, just think about the Kotaku posts we have to wake up to on a daily basis when Ashcraft and Plunkett are left unattended in the admin tools for a few torturous hours. One case of a Japanese voice actress possessed by...

Not to be outdone by Kotaku, Destructoid posts an... →

They really are in a race to the bottom, aren’t they?

“I guess we’ll have to wait for Move to launch in order to know how Move...”

– Destructoid: M.A.G. playable with Move and DualShock at the same time [August 21st, 2010] My Jove I… yes, I think we will! You’ve cracked the case, Holmes! Jolly good show!

"Real" journos fuck up, usually always involving... →

This is certainly a different kind of incompetence, and one I think you overlook. It’s available here, and details one of the [regular] failings of reporting + journalism from the “pros”. (If there’s any stranger dichotomy than the “proper” journalists just not ‘getting’ gaming, and the gaming journalists just not ‘getting’...

I'm going to Disneyland

Anticipate a quiet weekend from me: On Saturday I’m going to be at Disneyland with my parents and wonderful girlfriend to celebrate said girlfriend’s return to LA and ease the pain of losing my job, and on Sunday and I’m going to be working on a couple of writing projects. Nothing industry-related there, if you’re wondering - they’re both sitcom scripts. I probably...

Cicholas Nage Blithers: A Moment of Clarity →

(The following post is the result of alcohol, I apologise for it being in that awful stream-of-consciousness style that I hate.) Sometimes, rarely, I have a moment of clarity. A single spark, an occasion where I think what is the point of all this gaming. MMOs have the treadmill of levelling and otherwise “normal” games come and go. We greedily consume them just to feed the hunger until the...

“A man who has been playing Lineage II for over 200,000 hours has decided to sue...”

– Destructoid: Man who played Lineage II for 200,000 hours sues creators [August 20th, 2010] 200,000 works out to be just shy of twenty-three years. For those of you who don’t know, Lineage II launched in the US on April 27th 2004, and the developer, NCSoft, was itself established as a company...