@Kevin-V Curious if press releases go into detail about the quality of the game in an honest manner. Do press releases tell me if the controls are tight? Do they explain that their is pop in? Do they tell me the the story is gripping and will have you at the edge of your seat? And if it does, is it trustworthy? Don't press releases come from companies paid for by the people who publish the game? Can readers trust them? I thought it was for the aspects listed about that reviews were created.
I did not think reviews were created to cherry pick what hurts your feelings and what doesn't from a game. If I were poor and scrooge McDuck's tower of gold hurt my feelings would it be right to dock the score if I were in a position of power as you editors are? Would it be right to do so? Would you let my review be published on your site? Would you approve it if I worked for you?
@avalanche814 @Critical_man Exactly, or even a black rights activist playing GTAV, do you not think he would find something wrong with the way black people are portrayed in the game? But it didn't even get a word from Caro. That is what makes it wrong. Stick to aspects that effect everyone, is the story entertaining, are the controls tights, is their pop in etc. Don't tell me the game hurt your feelings.
@baltim123 @Kevin-V The issue that I see is that docking a score because a game does what it sets out to do is wrong. She lowered the score for being misogynistic, why wasn't the score also lowered for how it portrays many of the black characters? It is fine to point out that the game has strong misogynistic tendencies if you want to and let the reader decide if it is important to them (though be honest with yourself, it is GTAV, are you really surprised at the way women are portrayed). But to put it up on the header of the review as a "bad" element, to dock the score because of it, this is where the review REALLY crosses a line from objective review into an editorial masquerading as a review.
@Zaershan Exactly! you got my point to a tee! I have a longer post below that goes pretty in depth in both this review and their policies in general, if you have a few minutes, I think you'd find it eye opening.
@Zaershan It is hard to give precious space to something like "is it better on 360 or PS3" when you are too busy speaking out against the satirical gangland type game's treatment towards women.
6. Objective vs. Subjective: Of course you should let readers know that a game lets you commit horrible crimes in a horrific manner, but don’t tell me that you don’t like the fact that I have the ability to torture someone in a game. Tell me that I can sleep with a stripper in GTAV, but don’t tell me that if I do I am a misogynistic monster. You can elaborate on the quality of what the game set out to do, but you should not hold all games to a moral code they never intended to keep. See the difference between objective and subjective?
7. Now this is where it gets dicey for me. I cannot believe the pompous arrogance of Van Ord telling people not to frequent GameSpot or any site in search of game reviews, because we do not agree with his polices, which as discussed are not GameSpot’s policies. As stated before, if your policies changed, state them on the website. Where is your journalistic integrity, when you cannot even follow your own made up rules? Beyond this, most websites, while having some flaws of their own, tend to keep things more objective and do not let the morals of the game, or their own conflicting morals taint their reviews. You do, you state you do, and you tell your readership to pound sand because they don’t like it. You are not a business man are you? Do the business men you work for like the fact that you break your own coda and tell your readers to screw?
8. Speaking of business men; do you think that possibly in a crazy scheme to make money, strippers and such were intentionally put into the game because it is what their audience actually wants? Or do you think that these immoral elements were added just to get on people’s nerves? Rockstar is a for profit business. All the elements of the game are put into place with the intention of being fun and making money. You cannot judge a huge commercial release with many millions of dollars on the line the same way you would judge an indie game where the developer just wanted to put his vision out there.
9. Kevin brought up some other reviews. His review of Happy Feet for example, he wasn't a fan of the phonetically spelled subtitles and their sporadic use. I ask you, 1. Did it lower the games score? 2. How big do you think the games QC budget was? 3. Do you think that was on the top of the list on fixes on a game you gave a 3.9? And in regards to ALL games mentioned in Van Ords’ post only one of them listed any kind of moral issue in the “bad” section of the review, and that only said “weird dabbling in morality". So these moral infractions couldn't have been all that bad. Certainly not on the level of what GTAV has done, since it is "profoundly misogynistic; right Caro?
10. Know your audience GameSpot. I am not sure because I am not privy to such metrics, but I imagine most of your audience in male, straight and younger than middle aged. Now I hate to tell you, but that audience actually likes scantily clad women. Right or wrong, that is what it is. As a game journalism website, keep your opinions on the morality of games to editorials. If you want to be a niche site that discusses the artistic merits of games or stands up for minorities, the LGBT community, the disabled, or anything else, go for it, more power to you, but do not masquerade as something you are not, and when you are called out you just tell your readers to leave.
11. Maybe your ads should change as well. If you are so against the misogyny in GTAV, why take a paycheck from a company that gets its money from links like “50 hottest female athletes”. Little double standard?
So there you have it; my rebuttal to Kevin Van Ord’s post. Hope it clarifies a few things that were said by Kevin.
Fairly sure she did, however, it does seem obvious that when there are only too things mentioned as negatives in the review header, those two things influenced the score. Wouldn't you say?
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