Integrity for some, Money for others

I have three other articles waiting in the wings, but I had to get this out.

I visit several sites to keep up with the games industry, one of the better known is IGN. They have an amusing cast of characters that review all platforms though they tend to have a bias, I won't say for what though. I use IGN only as a means to get hard news and to get a taste of what people are saying bout games. Their reviews are… alright generally, but I would never go on that site's opinion alone. Previews and Rewind Theater are where they really shine.

That said I have found another editor to cross off my list of credible writers on that site. Here's looking at you Michael Thompson . To understand my current distain I have to take you all the way back to the year 2007, and the debut of a little game called Kane and Lynch. The Editorial Director of Gamespot.com Jeff Gerstmann gave a less than shining review to the game. Well Eidos wasn't to happy with that, as they were currently paying money hand over fist to Gamespot for advertising, and Jeff was fired. Of course Gamespot would later refute the claims that his termination was related to the review and offer other reasons as to why he was fired, but it was laden with the stench of corporate BS.

Flash forward to 2010, we have a black president, Justin Beiber is the new hot thing, and Kane and Lynch 2: Dog Days just burst onto the scene… to reviews ranging from average to abismal. People did not like this game, it was over stylized, short (> 4 hours), and had buggy mechanics. This game was set to drift into the discount bin, hopefully abolish all chances of a sequel, and be forgotten. That's what I thought, until I logged on to IGN this morning.

Edgy right?... Right?

There was an article posted on the front page (You can read it here, though I suggest you don't waste your time: http://ps3.ign.com/articles/112/1123230p1.html ). The article was written by one Michael Thompson, though to be fair the bulk of it was just the words of Karsten Lund, Creative Director at IO interactive. It boils down to this, Karsten is defending his games against the bad reviews by saying that he didn't fail, it was just that no one got it. I have some bad news for you Karsten. If no one understood your point it is because you failed. Ouch, I know. If you are trying to get a point across or deliver something, anything, and your audience is left scratching their heads it is because you did a poor job in translating the message you wanted to deliver. Don't blame it on your audience.

The article is clearly an attempt to drive of sales of the dismal game, and I'm not surprised to see it on IGN with all the banners and full page ads they had for Kane and Lynch 2: Dog Days. Need more proof, IGN has never done this before. They have never given a developer a rebuttal against reviews as a whole. As far as I see it, the game is already the defense of IO's credibility as a developer, and their defense wasn't up to par.

Your defense is supposed to speak for you, so when it doesn't do that you have done something wrong, not the public, not credible professional reviews, but you the developer. Even Shia Lebouf had the doodledingers to admit a lot of the crappiness of Transformers 2 and Kingdom of the Crystal Skull was on his shoulders. He didn't go out whining about how the movie going audience didn't connect with his character because they didn't get what he was going for, or that his performance was revolutionary and simply beyond the average mind to comprehend.

I played the demo of Kane and Lynch 2 and I thought, "eh, it's alright." The visual style was unique but it was so much style over substance. That and the game play mechanics (ya know, cause its a game that you play) just weren't very good. I had an easier time with Dark Void, which got pretty dismal reviews as well. Honestly I bet I could pick up Kane and Lynch 2 and have an ok time for an afternoon, but to read this article… to talk about this game like it's an evil-ish-anti-hero-kill-fest Citizen Kane. No. No. No. Go back to writing reviews of Halo games please.

Also, don't say it's an acquired taste and then present that taste as being intellectual. I once saw a video on the news of a man that ate only expired rotten food, seriously, his body was acclimated to it. Guess what he said: "It's an acquired taste" why? because it tastes like crap. Just because you get used to something doesn't make it good. Remember that IO.

Your defense has failed, court is adjourned.