Guys, this is no hoax. GR, as of right now, really did remove GS from the system (Sure, there are GS reviews on the front page, but they lead to nowhere).

Just take a minute and search for five, random, big games and you won't find a GS review ANYWHERE.

Everyone needs to read Penny Arcade's editorial, because this is the closest to an absolute confirmation of the events that we're going to get for a LONG time.

www.penny-arcade.com

[QUOTE="ironcreed"]Why was he fired then?Jandurin

An Eidos programmer for the K&L ads mentioned that Jeff was skating on thin ice due to "Unprofessional conduct". However, that is pretty fishy when considering that Jeff had not only been working for GS for over a decade, this isn't the only "questionable" review he has given in the past 7 years, and that this guy was picked to replace Kasavin as a Senior Editior.

Saying that the K&L incident had no part in his dismal would be pure denial at this point, especially in the face of other GS editors who are alluding to the same thing.

The weight, however, truly is the rumor part at this point. And since Jeff might not even be legally inclined to speak, and we know that GS will never come clean with it, it all rests on how much info the gaming journalists out there can dig. And apparently, Penny Arcade has the full scoop, so that's something to wait on as well.

Either way, this is a pretty ugly situation for GS on all accounts (If he was fired for K&L, that spells obvious problems. If he was fired for other reasons, one would have to wonder why he had a leading position for so long without his "unprofessionalness" being noticed).

This whole event over the last 24 hours has made me reconsider my own views on critic scores. We've all heard conspiracy theories before on how companies buy good scores, but this is so blatant. So out in the open. It's shocking. I don't think i'll ever take another journalistic review seriously again. It almost makes system wars pointless. What does it matter if we switch from GS to some other site? Who's to say that they arent corrupt as well? Why do we argue over game scores in the first place?

Its a sad state, right now. Very sad.

TeamR

I do agree and can sympathize with the state of mind this has left you in. At this point, I feel that Gaming Journalism has been rendered almost pointless if we can't even certainly determine what games truly deserved their scores. Switching from GS to GR won't remedy anything at all, especially since GS would still be counted in the total. I think that a radical disregard for reviews would suffice at this point, but I know that a vast majority of people aren't going to let reviews go without a fight, especially GS reviews on SW.

But if sponsors seemingly have enough influence over scores to inadvertedly cause the firing of an 11 year veteran, how can we determine if any review is "credible"? What does credibility even mean at this point?

Of course, I know GS will just try to sweep this under the rug and pretend nothing happened, but I don't see a clear cut way to remedy this issue. And the only way I can see would render SW pretty much worthless.

The "We're on GameSpot so we should only use GameSpot scores" is, while valid in a sense, so ridiculously prone to tunnel vision that it's utterly ridiculous. And this is one big situation where that's presenting itself.

If GS was still to be considered credible, we'd have to remember that this is a site that involves the firing of an 11 year senior executive due to money hat issues. Jeff wasn't just some rookie writter (And I think this entire thing about "Unprofessional conduct" is a scapegoat ideology, especially when considering he should have been fired years ago if that wast the case). No the seeds of doubt have been firmly planted with GS, as now we have to wonder exactly how far this advertising influence really reaches. For all we know, Assassin's Creed could have been under a similar situation. We'll probably never know for certain, but this incident has made it seem like more of a reality than ever before, which is more than enough detrimental damage.

For those saying that "GS has to make their money somehow", you're missing the overstepped boundaries in this situation. Dan Hsu of EGM stated a similar altercation with a company, but there was no firing afterwards. If the heads would go this far, whether or not the true cause is a combination of factors, what GS reviews, past or present, shouldn't be called into question?

There's GR or MC, but again, these sites not only fluctate in what is considered "AAA" (One game can repeatedly dip between 90% and sub 90% levels, so what would you do about bets in that case?). And we have fansites with clear cut biases that do get counted towards the over all score (Read SMG's Strategy Informer review sometime, a review that was infamous for being rescored and having some inaccurate info, counted towards GR/MC's average).

What can you do besides combing through "credible" sites, knowing that there are other sites that might have been influenced by the same damn thing? If anything, this incident has caused seeds of doubt to be rooted throughout the entire concept of "Gaming Journalism", not just GS. I mean, look at NeoGAF. They issued a filter on all CNet related media due to this incident in protest, which is definitely going to have some far reaching effects when considering how many key developers and figures frequent that place.

What should we do? I would suggest just not using ANY review score at this point. But of course, not that many people, if at all, are ready, prepared, or what-have-you to move on beyond the crutch of reviews. But if a review means were used, I certainly would not recommend GS anymore.

there are sure alot of sh!t talking for a game that has not been reviewed by Gamespot...... alot and I mean alot of you folks better pray that this game doesn't get a 7.5 or 8.0......lolAfrikanxl

Actually, you'd better pray that GameSpot doesn't do that.

When considering that Lair has been getting 4's, 5's, and 6's, I guanrentee that GameSpot with be the laughing stock of the gaming community if they turn around and give it an 8.0 and above. Sure, you'll have your little SW bet won (Or skewed to AA at least), but it'll be a pretty hollow victory if its reputation goes even further under.

Honestly, do we even readreviews anymore, or do we just jump on the scores and nothing else?

As said many times in the past, the scores aren't leading people to debate over the quality of GS reviews, Wii conspiracy bias or not.

[QUOTE="AFBrat77"][QUOTE="XenogearsMaster"]

WarioWare is better than MP3...

Now that is an ultimate flop.

mmirza23

No chance, look at the scores of Warioware and Corruption on GameRankings, not even close.

GameRankings = Big Picture

Do keep that in mind when a game that you're anticipating flops on GameSpot due to lame or contradictory reasons. One would think there's a problem when more and more people are starting to use other sites as better references.