OPM Dodges Arkham Asylum Embargo With A 9

Still playing “spot the corruption”? There’s still time, as the general embargo hasn’t lifted yet. Ding!

Ding!

Ding ding ding!

Scans of the entire thing here.

By the way, if cunts keep posting numerous anonymous comments as if they’re from several different people, we’re going to start publishing IP addresses. Especially the ones associated with Eidos.

Arkham Asylum: We Have A Winner

Have you been playing “spot the corruption”?

Excitingly, the embargo hasn’t lifted yet. Ding!

Ding!

Ding ding ding!

“With regards an article posted on RamRaider alleging that Eidos has fixed review scores for Batman: Arkham Asylum, we want to state that no discussions have been held about review scores with any magazines. In short there is simply not one shred of truth in this article, except for the title of the game.”

Jon Brooke, Eidos UK marketing manager


Scans of the full review here, if you can somehow heroically endure it.

ONM’s Rushed Wii Sports Resort Review

This has probably been the worst attempt at closing down a blog in the history of everything, ever. Seeing as we’ve already broken silence (erm, twice), we’re going to offload a few posts that we were saving up for a one-off later in the year. And then we’ll fuck off again. Probably.

“Just thought I'd bring the Official Nintendo Magazine’s review of Wii Sports Resort to your attention (flagged up by the GRcade forums). The review is atrociously bad on practically every single level. I’d wager the word “well” & variations of “works really well” have never appeared together so often ever before. Bear in mind this is one review...

When describing the Frisbee... “The controls work really well”

Wakeboarding... “The controls work well”

Table Tennis... “Actually works really well”

Power Cruising... “Actually works really well”

Table Tennis again... “In fact it actually works really well”

Archery... “But I have to admit this one worked really, really well”

Cycling... “Works well”

Archery for a second time... “Works very well”

Couple in typos ("you have get to the front of the course over the whole competition") & their review must have been cobbled together in record time. Shameful.

Anonymous Knight”

Eidos Seek 90% Score & Cover For Arkham Asylum In Exchange For Early Review

UPDATE: We Have A Winner

Unlike our no-longer-regularly-updated blog, corruption in the games industry has so far failed to go into hibernation. In the week that Eidos has breathed its last, they’ve decided to go out with a bang by brazenly attempting to artificially hype up their forthcoming Arkham Asylum release.

Several mags have their review code already, but have to sit on their reviews until a hateful embargo expires at the end of the month. But Eidos, ever the helpful fellows that they are, have been offering a way around this embargo. If you dedicate the cover of your mag to Arkham Asylum and guarantee a score of at least 90%, Eidos will allow you to run the review early.

We know that one editor has already valiantly told Eidos to fuck off, but we can’t tell you which to protect our Anonymous Dark Knight. We also asked the usually chatty UK Officially Corrupt Xbox 360 Magazine editor Jon Hicks about it, who tellingly clammed up tighter than a nun’s cunt at the mere mention.

But what of the others? Well, there’s an exciting way to find out in the form of a game that you can play at home over the next month called “Spot The Corrupt Arkham Asylum Review”. You see, Arkham Asylum is a decentish release that’s not quite up to par when it comes to variety and depth. This means even the most charitable outlets should settle at no more than the 80s in their verdicts, but don’t be surprised if you see a few 7s from the pseuds.

This means that if you see a mag turn up within the next few weeks (ding!) that features Arkham Asylum on its cover (ding!) and gives it at least 90% (ding ding ding!), you have a winner.

Exciting…

UPDATE: We Have A Winner

Eidos: Paying For Review Scores

You wouldn’t believe the shit publishers pull in their quest to salvage good review scores out of games that are clearly underperforming. Publishers such as Eidos, with workmanlike shit that’s not worth your money like Tomb Raider: Underworld.

The fun started when Eidos began laying down arbitrary conditions on reviewers before they could be assigned review code.

“They insisted that whoever was reviewing Tomb Raider for each of the Future Bath mags attend a one hour demo in Wimbledon before they were allowed to take away review code. I make that over £600 in train fares and nearly 30 hours of work time wasted to be told how to play a fucking game that’s been around since the dawn of time, or to show off some new sodding mo-cap gymnastics. Ramsay’s stench is all over this.”

Reviewing is politically hard enough when you’ve got the twin spectres of PR and publishers dropping turds on your head, but it becomes even more so when Future Publishing itself joins in. So-called site takeovers are the latest in the marketing man’s armoury in his quest to make editorial sites appear more like a shop front for whatever piece of low grade shit they’re trying to hawk on that particular week.

So the world shouldn’t have really been surprised when Future’s Games Radar changed its name for the day to Tomb Radar, as the risk of shattering the impartial veneer they try to con their readers into thinking exists is easily worth weathering in return for the substantial cash amount deposited into their coffers.

Here’s what James Binns, senior money launderer at Future, had to say in the press release issued by Future as part of the bargain:

“Tomb Raider: Underworld is a great game, well worth the 9/10 scores it is picking up across gaming websites and magazines. Getting the message out there on launch day is essential in the games market and this takeover gives Eidos unprecedented cut through.”

It’s always nice to have Future’s publishing goals confirmed as putting advertising over the truth. But eagle-eyed Pat Garratt of the excellent news site Videogaming247 spotted a slight miscalculation on the part of Binns – the “9/10 scores it is picking up across websites and magazines” don’t exist.

MetaCritic, which has the game down as a painfully average 76% at the time of writing, reveals that the only editorial outlet to have given the game 9/10 is Console Monster (anyone?). Interestingly enough, the 9/10 stuck onto the end of Games Radar’s (sorry - Tomb Radar’s) review is actually in place of the less PR-friendly 86% score it was given in the mag that was the source of the review, PC Gamer.

You might think a disinformation campaign would be more than enough to save an ailing franchise that dreams of being half as good as (ironically) Uncharted: Drake’s Fortune, but you’d be wrong. As again noticed by VG247, it was revealed by Gamespot journo Guy Cocker on his Twitter page that Eidos were asking review outlets to hold back any reviews that scored the recycled crappy-camera-angled shit-fest at less than 80% until Monday. That way, all of those saps who pay their wages have several days to go out and buy it before being warned by reviewers that it’s not worth the money.

“Call from Eidos – if you’re planning on reviewing Tomb Raider Underworld at less than an 8.0, we need you to hold your review till Monday.”

Then, a miracle occurred. The PR firm representing Eidos broke with an ancient tradition held since time immemorial – they told the truth.

“We’re trying to get the Metacritic rating to be high, and the brand manager in the US that’s handling all of Tomb Raider has asked that we just manage the scores before the game is out, really, just to ensure that we don’t put people off buying the game, basically.”

After realising the earth-shattering blow they’d dealt to the turgid name of PR by telling the truth, BHPR quickly retracted the statement and tried to pretend that all of the above was nothing more than a vivid hallucination.

So what’s the moral of all this? Don’t be silly – publishers, marketers, PR husks and editorial shills don’t have any.

More On The PC Zone Walkout

Original story

Considering how long we’ve sat on this story, we’ve been surprised at how few people actually knew about it. So, here are some more details for you.

First of all, if your life’s ambition is to edit an ailing mag that’s being ground down to sawdust, you’re in luck as Future hasn’t found a replacement for Porter. Considering he’s leaving on October 17th, this could potentially be quite awkward for them. Well, we say awkward, but we really mean lucrative, as considering key staffers aren’t being replaced (including Ed Zitron due to centralisation), it’s not a huge stretch to envisage the mag being swallowed whole by the Future corporate whore machine.

The one and only new guy brought in to replace the four writers that have left is a chap called David Brown who’ll be getting whipped for peanuts alongside the only remaining writer, Steve Hogarty. Curiously, Hogarty doesn’t seem particularly upset about the walkout.

In summary, Zitron, Sefton and the Art Editor have gone, and Porter and Blyth depart October 17th. They’re having a party. Wouldn’t you?

By the way, while you’re reading this story on certain other sites, you’ll have to add the “Source: RAM Raider” part yourself, as not all of them can be arsed to include it.

Walkout At PC Zone

Five of PC Zone’s staff, including its editor and art guy, have finally tired of Future’s bullshit. Disc Editor Ed Zitron and Chief-Editor-In-Chief-Editor-In-Chief Jamie Sefton have already walked (Zitron responded to a job offer in New York, and Sefton's contract was up), and Editor Will Porter and Best Games Journalist This Country Has Jon Blyth are following. The reason? Take your pick:

The page count and budget have both been slashed. Again. This means the staff writers are going to have to take on more work for the same money, and won’t be able to assign as much out to freelancers. Is this saving being passed onto the readers? Is it fuck – the lower page count means they’re getting less for their money.

The publication frequency is going up to 14 issues a year. Again, this equates to more work for the team, but they’ll still be getting the same money. It also means the regular readers will have to pay for one extra issue a year to get the same amount of content.

The hardware section is written by the same guy who does PC Format’s and PC Gamer’s bit. Once upon a time, PC Zone used to have a reputation as the daring wild child with strong opinions that had no truck with Gamer’s wishy-washy sixth form philosophising. This has naturally been diluted beyond belief since the mag was bought out by Future, but now that chunks of the mag are going to be written by someone from Gamer, any personality it once had is now warmly dribbling down its inside thigh.

Disc Editor Ed Zitron isn’t being replaced because the cover disc is going to be handled in the same way as hardware – so one guy will be dealing with the coasters for several mags. Again, an opportunity could have been taken here to ditch the disc (which died the day everyone got broadband) and lower the price of the mag. It’s no secret that they cost barely pennies, and are only there to justify the fucking silly prices Future charge.

We’ve been predicting PC Zone’s demise for some time now, but now know that it’s due to keep on running for a while yet. But despite having a special soft spot for the former cool kid, we really wish it had already gone under instead of being centralised, cut-back, sanitised and cheapened by the Future Publishing corporate bland-o-thiser. At least it would have cashed its chips whilst on a relative high, instead of rolling on with none of its talent left, fleecing its three readers month after month until it inevitably slips into the not so great shithouse in the sky.

We wish our best to the dearly departed, and salute them for fucking off away from Future's dick of doom before it rogers them into obscurity.

Dennis Publishing’s legacy is well and truly dead. Does that make you sad?

(Big thanks to our Anonymous Knights)

EDIT: Update posted

Officially Corrupt “World Exclusive” GTA IV “Review” From The Officially Corrupt Xbox 360 Magazine

If you’re sick of that embargo-busting dogshit review we posted last week of Grand Theft Auto 4, you’ll be jumping up and down with apathy at the news that a good citizen has scanned in the Officially Corrupt “World Exclusive” GTA IV “review” from the Officially Corrupt Xbox 360 Magazine. Y’know, the one they’ve been banging on about in full-page ads for the last three months.

The game predictably receives 10/10 which, by the Officially Corrupt Xbox 360 Magazine’s standards, makes it just as good as Perfect Dark Zero. For us, the stand-out quote from the review is this:

“Rockstar was still making the final tweaks as I played, so I can’t say whether my minor grumbles – the cover system stumbling in box-filled environments, slightly over-enthusiastic target lock-on, the occasional pop-up – will be present in the box you buy in two weeks’ time.”

Now hang on – surely you’re not saying you reviewed unfinished code? Surely you’re not admitting that this 9-page Rockstar love-in is actually a preview, what with it not being based on finished code?

We’re curious whether Jon Hicks (who’s a decent fellow, so we’re not giving him any shit) would have still awarded a score of 10/10 if the finished game was riddled with pop-up and had an unreliable cover and combat mechanism.

Whilst we’re asking him, you can read the (p)review here so you don’t have to do anything silly like buying a magazine that’s not satisfied with being merely corrupt, but is no less than Officially Corrupt. Go, Team Future!

[EDIT] Jon Hicks very politely declined to comment specifically when we asked him if he would have given the game a 10 if the unfinished code was sold in that state, and he also passed up the opportunity to settle the big question on everybody's lips: is GTA 4 better than Perfect Dark Zero? He did point out that he stands by his review, though. Thanks, Jon Hicks!

Top 5 Misconceptions About Games Reviewers

Having a chat with an Anonymous Knight the other day, we smiled wistfully as he said he wouldn’t make a good games reviewer as he didn’t read many magazines. After we’d finished weeping face down into the rug we like to roll around naked on at remembering days when we were that innocent and naïve, it dawned on us that the comment reminded us about something we started on a while ago but never finished – the Top 5 Misconceptions About Games Reviewers. If it educates just one reader or wannabe reviewer, that’s good enough for us.


1 – Games Reviewers Can Write

Games reviewers being a form of journalist, and journalists being a form of writer, it wouldn’t be massively unreasonable to assume they could string together a sentence without fucking something up. It would also be massively wrong. Like all the misconceptions listed here, we’re not saying that it applies to every working games journalist out there. Just a surprisingly large proportion of them.

Most of the time when you read a review, it’s been tidied up by a sub-ed. It’s their job to take the mangled, ridiculous musings of half-cut lunatics and turn them into something readable. One way of cutting through who can write and who can’t is by reading their blogs or forum posts. They’re not edited, so you know that the authors of the decent ones are worthy of their job title. The rest aren’t just being lazy or ironic – they really are shit at writing.

Yes, they can put ideas and comments about games into a paragraph. No, they have no grasp of how to communicate them grammatically correctly or even colloquially.

(Quick note to the person who’ll spend hours trawling the blog for a typo before posting it in the comments box – well done, ten points to you)


2 – Games Reviewers Know About Games

It used to be said by reviews editors that finding an employable games reviewer is incredibly difficult as plenty of people know about games and plenty of people know how to write, but very few people can boast about possessing both accolades. As Misconception 1 decrees, we already know most of them can’t write without letting their dicks get in the way. Not knowing about games, though – isn’t that slightly disappointing?

Most get away with it with their saviour Google, but it’s the over reliance on press releases and PR trips that poses the biggest danger. Walk through a mag office, and you’ll see mountains of games still in their shrinkwrap. Have a conversation with a reviewer about games, and we mean the big releases, and a look of fear darts into their eyes as they realise one wrong move could expose them for the idle, blagging charlatans they often are.

Some of the funniest (in the unintentional sense) days and evenings we’ve had have been with the staff of mags discussing those little compilations of games they like so much, like group tests or top 100 games lists. Major games come up, and three-quarters of the room are shaking their heads having not even heard of them, never mind played them.

In conversation away from the safety of the old boys’ networks, the biggest giveaways are “I haven’t had chance to play that one yet,” or, if you’re a reader, they’ll always pull the “I can’t talk about that yet because of the NDA” cracker (an NDA being a non-disclosure agreement, which reviewers have to sometimes sign when they’ve played unfinished code and the review they’ve cobbled together off the back of it can’t be published until a date commanded by the publisher or PR).

Mag style guides (the instructions telling reviewers the house rules of the mag) invariably instruct reviewers to lie about gaps in their gaming knowledge so you’ll never find out about it. Yep, the mags tell their reviewers to lie – bet you never saw that one coming.


3 – Games Are Given To Reviewers Based On Their Specialist Knowledge

Another promise the mags are printing every month in the header page of their reviews section is the empty pledge that games are matched up to reviewers who are specialists in certain genres. Bollocks.

Most mags have something like a little white board with all their reviewers’ names written on them, and next to the names go the games they’ve been assigned to review. The big games (6-8 pages) will usually go to the staff writer regardless of the genre, because freelancers get paid by the word and will get assigned whatever small time shit that’s left over randomly, and that includes pickings for staffers from mags completely unrelated to gaming as an old boy favour. As well as avoiding a payout, this also sidesteps the problem of sending the reviewer to the PR/publisher’s office for a day or two to play it, as only freelancers who have their dicks very firmly wedged up an editor’s arse (i.e. ex-staffers) will get an expenses-bonanza like that.

For lesser games, you’ll find that shit which nobody else wants like the flight sims and the hardcore strategy dross does sometimes go to the peculiar specimen in the freelance pool who really does like those kinds of game. The trouble there though is they almost always overrate games from their specialist genre. Got a hardcore racing sim that nobody who plays games for fun will enjoy? Then it'll get 85%, because they like hardcore racing sims that nobody who plays games for fun will enjoy.

We’re tempted to launch into our argument about why more than one reviewer should play every game reviewed here, but that’s for another post.


4 – Games Reviewers Always Complete Their Games

This one is excusable for several reasons. First up, it’s rarely necessary to complete a game to get a decent write up from it. A day or two, or a few respectably sized evening sessions, gives you everything you need to know about whether the code is worth spending money on.

Second up, when a reviewer has only spent an hour or two on a game, it isn’t always their fault. It may be so unfinished that it’s barely playable. It may have a high reliance on multiplayer action, which means there’s artificiality to playing against beta testers or against other mag staff over a LAN. They may be sat in a developer/publisher/PR’s office with a husk on their shoulder telling them what to do and where to go before showing them the door. There may be a stupidly unrealistic deadline of less than 24 hours. The review might be only taking up a quarter or an eighth of a page, in which case other stuff has to take priority, or a freelancer’s only getting £20 for it so can’t be arsed.

Despite the rain of shit flying in reviewers’ faces when it comes to playing decent chunks of games, they’re still often not spending enough time with them. Look at something like Teletext’s GameCentral – when two reviewers are producing reviews daily along with news and letters, how much time are they actually getting to play the things?

If you’re familiar with a game that’s been reviewed you can play a game of “spot the screenshots from the first level”, but the beta code we get to review often comes with codes to skip to later parts of the game, for shame.


5 – Games Reviewers Read Games Magazines

And that’s what takes us back to the comment that re-inspired us to write this post. Most of them don’t even read the mags they write for, although that’s as much to do with cunts like Future being too tight to bother sending copies to their own contributors as it is with laziness.


We could have made this a top 10, but there’s already enough on here about games reviewing being a job that stopped being good many moons ago, and being too commercialised now, and the old boys’ network who still hilariously deny they exist, and the shit pay, and review scores being adjusted in exchange for advertising/covers, and the frequent fuck ups stemming from all of this which you can find out about by sidling up to a reviewer and mentioning Headhunter: Redemption, DRIV3R, Unreal 2 or Doom 3.

The most depressing thing about this list is, really, all 5 of the misconceptions should be standard industry practice. Of course reviewers should be able to string together sentences without getting lost up their own sphincters and ejaculating along the way. Of course they should know about the games industry without having to crib from Metacritic.

Are these unreasonable expectations to have of the people who review games in exchange for your money?

Sadly, yes.

Q&A (Guest Starring… Kieron Gillen!)

On our second Birthday, we made a promise to answer your questions. Actually, we promised to answer your questions if they arrived within an hour of posting with the obvious intention that nobody would notice until it was too late. Several of you asked questions, but missed the deadline. We’ll answer some of them anyway. However, one person managed to squeeze in an email full of questions within the hour, meaning we have to answer them. That man was Gillen.


KG: What's the purpose of your blog?

RR: There isn’t really any one purpose when it comes to what goes up on here now. When I first started over two years ago, I was pissed off. Pissed off with the games industry. Pissed off with how it all works. Pissed off that the mags lie to their readers and treat them with contempt. Pissed off that I would get bollocked if I made anything vaguely resembling a humorous or true comment that wasn’t in step with the company line (which means the advertisers’ line too). Just pissed off that the games industry has become this ridiculous joke constantly begging anyone who’ll listen to be taken seriously whilst carrying on like a corrupt, amateurish sixth-form project. Money money money.

KG: Why do you do it?

RR: That fateful night I started the blog, I thought there was very little chance that I could make a difference. I just wanted to get it out there how the magazines are put together, how we’re told to lie, how we get less than 24 hours to turn around preview code and call it a review, and how we get censored unless we’re rewriting press releases. I thought I might get a handful of readers, maybe 50 or so, who read the games mags and would be interested to hear what really goes on behind the scenes.

I never really thought I could make a difference until word got out and I started getting four-figure daily hits. Then I thought maybe I could. The weird thing is, despite blogging about the lies and bullshit, the majority of mag readers don’t know the blog exists because my main audience is games journos and industry workers who know it all anyway. Even the only place that’s had the guts to print my rants as the RAM Raider is the industry’s trade mag, MCV. I did get a mention in PC Zone though, in a roundabout way...

KG: What drives you?

RR: The purpose is just to have fun. If I want to slag something or someone off and Future Publishing (or even smalltime Nazis like the RLLMUK mods) won’t let me because they’re so fucking pathetic about censorship, I can just bung it on here and people get to read it if they want. The purpose now is just to talk about the games industry, get views from the people inside and outside of it, and to let the mags know that they can’t expect to lie without people finding out about it.

KG: What do you hope to accomplish with it?

RR: One of the things that makes me snigger when I’m being lambasted for being cowardly, and hiding behind my cloak of anonymity and all that bollocks is that the journos who are doing it aren’t criticising me for telling the truth. They’re criticising me because I’m talking about them and their buddies, and they don’t like it. They like criticising games (as long as the publisher hasn’t paid for advertising in the mag, natch) perched up in their magazines and on their little websites, and so they should. As games journalists, it’s our right and our duty to criticise bad games. I know for a fact that you feel no guilt when you’re really sticking it to a bad game, and rightly so.

What the games journos really hate though is the thought that someone’s criticising them. The reviewers are being reviewed. When I’m being called a hypocrite for working in an industry I’ve come to hate as much as I love over the years, that makes me laugh hard. So there’s the purpose: it keeps the mags on their toes, it keeps the readers of the mags informed about what goes on, and it entertains me as well as my Anonymous Knights.

KG: *Is* there anything you can accomplish with it?

RR: When it comes to accomplishments, I think I’ve achieved everything I set out to do and then some. Anything else is a bonus. As long as people enjoy reading the blog and the right questions are there to be asked, I’ll carry on popping up from time to time to ask them. And you’ve got to admit – that Top 10 Least Hideous Games Journos thing was a genius idea…


That’s enough for you, Gillen. And for the record, I don’t dislike you or your work. I just dislike some of your work, and the way it’s treated like lost sections of the Bible by certain people. Now, other questions from other readers:

lips said...
Happy Birthday Rammy! My question - why bother?

RR: Kinda answered that above. Thought I could make a difference, but now I’m just pleased to have a conduit to comment without corporate interests taking precedent.


Neil said...
When did you first see corruption in the games industry?

RR: Very good question. A lot of the very early stuff is well documented already, but the first time I personally felt the baseball bat of corruption was when I had an entire article plagiarised from an Amiga mag by a freelance guy like I wouldn’t fucking notice. I won’t name the guy who did it because I don’t know what he does now, and it was a long time ago. And yes, I do regret not suing.


Bonjela said...
Happy Birthday Ram. Answer this please: there are only two magazines for PC games players, so which is better. Pc Zone or Pc Gamer?

RR: PC Gamer, without a shadow of a doubt. I’ve swung between the two a lot over the years. PC Gamer lost my vote when they redesigned a few years back and got all wanky, but then PC Zone was bought out by Future, and was transformed from an edgy adult games mag into a more sterile version of The Beano, and PC Gamer have reeled in their wankiness a bit. Both mags have their faults. PC Zone’s days are numbered the way its ABC’s are going, but they have some genuinely good writers on board which means it’s a shame. Jon Blyth is superb, and weird Irish kid also has his moments when he’s not hung over, but the combination of Future’s dictatorship and the worst editorial partnership in the mag’s history (Sefton/Porter) has sealed its fate. PC Gamer has a more consistent bunch of writers when it comes to quality, with Gillen (when he’s not being silly) and Walker (when he’s not being wrong) standing out. They’ve also got a good solid editor with Ross Atherton, although he needs to reel in the World Of Warcraft features, and stop Tim Chubby Edwards from being so smug.


Anonymous Knight said...
how long have you been in the games business

RR: I won’t give an exact date, but my first published games mag appearance was in the 80’s.


Richard said...
why don't you actually post anything about people taking bribes and that anymore. More rumours of PR intervention, please!

RR: Two answers to this, really. First, despite how much Future and its bitches made out they didn’t care about the blog, they got in an enormous flap. Hatches were battened down, rumours flew, and management wanted to track down their little leak. The problem is, and I hate to admit this, it kinda worked. The way this info works its way around the office means that when stuff does reach me, it would narrow down the field too much if I revealed it. About 10 people know for certain who I am (not including the ones who have guessed) and that's the way I want to keep it for now. The second reason is that it really, genuinely upsets people when I talk about them, so I hold back unless there’s something I really want to get off my chest. Anonymous Knights even write to me with info, but ask me not to reveal it for what I guess are the same reasons, which I always respect. Surreal, but true.


Anonymous Knight said...
How many games industry staff were in the PS3 get-a-free-TV line?

RR: It was quicker to count the genuine customers, and that was after they had to be bribed to appear in the publicity shots.


That’s it folks – the RAM Raider salutes you.

Why The Mail On Sunday Got It Right

It’s not unusual for the non-specialist press to get it completely wrong when it comes to games, but nobody cares. Anyone who’s a proper gamer knows it’s all bollocks, and bad press almost always means better game sales. Last Sunday, the Mail On Sunday led with a front headline of “Slaughtered”, and featured pictures taken from Official PlayStation Magazine’s giddy-schoolboy account of a pathetic press event for God Of War 2. Whilst it was embarrassing enough that what’s viewed as a “leading” games publication was getting all excited at naked breasts, what had really offended the sensibilities of The Mail was the decapitated slaughtered goat from which offal was being offered to the motley collection of journalists.

As soon as Sony found out one of its pathetic “look at me” press events had been given the front page of, as much as everyone likes to criticise it, one of the country’s best-selling newspapers, it immediately back-pedalled by issuing an apology and launching an enquiry. As soon as Future Publishing found out its magazine had made the front page, the brass acted just as steadfastly by… pulling the entire print run of their excuse for a magazine and are now busily ripping out the pages.

It’s so easy to sit back and criticise newspapers for their games coverage, as they always get it hopelessly wrong. Whether games are being linked to knife attacks or GTA is being blamed for the world’s evils, we, as gamers, know it’s just misinformed shit which heretic non-gamers, who nobody cares about anyway, will tut at and everybody else will laugh at. In this instance though, the Mail On Sunday got it right.

Having a decapitated slaughtered goat at a press event and splashing it over the pages of a shit kiddy magazine was totally misjudged. Sony has admitted it was misjudged by grovelling when confronted, and Future has agreed that they fucked up too by withdrawing its OPSM bog roll. The MoS isn’t entirely right – their “review” of the game by “expert” Rob Waugh, whose usual remit is rewriting press releases to make them even more superficial, is woeful (Waugh-ful! Sorry…) However, the games industry has no right to criticise the MoS for running the story.

MCV has reported Tim Wapshott, described as a “veteran industry writer”, describing the story as “screaming”. They’ve also quoted Steve Boxer, hilariously and pathetically all at once described as a “senior games journalist”, whatever the fuck that is, slagging off the MoS with the usual “they always get it wrong” shit.

The industry has already been shamed by being tarred with Sony and Future’s brush of stupidity and gormlessness. Sony hasn’t exactly had the best PR record since the PSP and PS3 have dirtied shop shelves. Even before then, they’ve not precisely nailed the PR machine. We remember a friend who had been into hospital and had a head x-ray about 10 years ago. A week or two later, a mailing marked “urgent” arrived, and in it were plastic reproductions of head x-rays with a letter worded as though he had a serious illness. He realised as he read further down the letter that it was some bullshit Sony “game brain” crap, but not until he’d almost had a nervous breakdown at the thought of being notified to see his doctor urgently after having a head x-ray. Complaining to Sony, they just sent back a letter saying how they were being “fresh”. No Sony – you were being fucking arseholes, just like you are now.

Anyway, that’s what we think to Sony, and you all know what we think to Future. But MCV, who we respect, shouldn’t be wading in with comments from “senior” and “veteran” journalists, who obviously have no vested interest in sticking the knife in because it’s not like they write for competing papers like The Times, The Guardian and The Mirror, or anything, and presenting it as an industry view.

The industry is full of journalists. Many of them are shit, many (but a lot less) of them are great. When the industry as a whole has been humiliated by the stupidity of Sony and Future’s money-grabbing attention-seeking antics, it needs to be left to the specialist journalists – the good specialist journalists – to comment, and say, “yeah, Sony and Future fucked up, we think they’re stupid”. The opportunistic rival newspaper wankers can keep their opinions to their own rags.

Will this industry ever be free of vested interests?

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Our 2nd Birthday Q&A will be up soon.

Edge = Spineless Fucks

Reading Edge is wrong on so many levels, there literally isn’t room on the whole of the web to list them. The pretentious prick-fest that calls itself monthly journalism is getting a lot of attention at the moment because they’ve been even more spineless than usual. And that’s saying something.

Former Digitiser editor Paul Rose / Mr. Biffo usually writes the only page of the “mag” that’s even close to readable every month, and is always refreshingly free of penis-sucking platitudes and over-use of Word’s “Synonyms” option to pick the longest words. This month, Edge has seen fit to pull his monthly opinion page because he commits the unforgivable sin of telling an amusing story about how Sony husk Phil Harrison hijacked a Marillion concert by turning it into a corporate plug for the despicable PS3, contrary to Future Publishing Commandment “Though shalt not biteth the cocketh that fucketh our readers in the arseth for money. Eth.”

Recognising that reporting the truth about Sony cunts and their ridiculous antics is what proper journalists do, Paul has published the article on his excellent blog.

So now you can hate Sony and their nosediving sales figures and read the only readable page in Edge without having to buy it / hang around a newsagent / fish it out the office bin right now, for free. Future, in the meantime, are safe to carry on selling the varnished covers of not-very-popular-in-terms-of-reader-figures-despite-what-they-make-out Edge for another month.

Future Haemorrhages Credibility

We’ve already told you about Future’s loss of readers and money. Now we’re going to tell you why.

Future is desperate to put a positive spin on readers flocking away from their magazines along with their money. In last week’s omnipotent trade-weekly MCV (happy now, Lisa?), they summoned their mouthpiece James Ashton-Tyler to take a leaf out of Sony’s book of PR arrogance. In one fell swoop, he brushed aside a suggestion that hadn’t been made in the first place that websites are killing mags all whilst sidestepping the real reason Future is haemorrhaging readers and money.

The discussion about websites taking over from the mags has been limping along for years, but has never been convincing. Although websites provide up-to-the-second news and reviews for free, the writing itself has always been questionable. Even the websites championed as spearheading the online games-info revolution attract the dregs of the industry. The unreliable Eurogamer and IGN lead the way in posting up woefully bad copy that’s uninformed, overly-indulgent or both.

Magazines have always been the place to go to read the views of the industry’s leading critics. You have to pay a few quid for the privilege, and mag lead times mean that reviews might be published a bit later than the instant-update websites, but the money and wait has always been worth it for well-written, funny, honest views to help you spend your money.

Not any more.

Despite Ashton-Tyler’s snide comments in MCV, Future is running scared of its online competition. They’re so frightened, they’ll do anything to compete. They’ll publish official magazines for unreleased consoles that their journalists haven’t played with yet. They’ll set-up “world exclusive” reviews to give the illusion of being ahead of the websites. They’re so desperate, they’ll jump into bed with publishers and lie to their readers to keep the illusion running.

The October issue of PC Gamer is in the shops on Thursday. Inside is an 8 page “world exclusive” review of Company of Heroes. Although it takes Tim Edwards a while to get going (“I could tell war stories all day, but you might want to know how CoH actually plays” says Edwards on the sixth page) but it’s an otherwise reasonable account of the game. From what we’ve played of CoH, it’s a very good game which will probably be worth its 94% when finished. The trouble is, there’s so much dishonesty and deceit around it all, they’re not even trying to hide it any more.

Page 44-45 has a two page advert for Company of Heroes featuring a quote and the score from the review which, remember, is in the same issue. The front cover is adorned with CoH worshipping. “BEST RTS SCORE EVER” lies the front cover, as later on the magazine cheerfully reminds the reader the 95% they awarded Rome: Total War in issue 141. The last time we checked, 95% is higher than 94%.

It screams dishonesty. They’re so desperate to beat the websites to a review, they’ll base the review of the game on unfinished pre-release code. The guy who reviews it will be flown around the white cliffs of Dover in a WWII plane to France, and wined and dined in a luxury hotel and casino. His fellow journalists will be sat in front of preview code to write previews whilst he’s given “world exclusive” unfinished "review" code. Future will give the advertisers the score and a quote from the review as part of the deal. A lie will be told on the front cover.

It’s been going on for years. The RAM Raider has written reviews for magazines from disks with “preview code” written on them. The RAM Raider has written reviews for magazines from code that’s less than 75% finished. It’s becoming more of an open secret now, and the readers are realising.

This is why magazines are dying. They’re dishonouring themselves by reviewing unfinished code and making advertising-for-coverage deals. They’re cheapening the quality of an excellent game by reviewing it through dishonesty.

That’s why Future is haemorrhaging readers. That’s why Future is haemorrhaging money. If its morals and honesty are haemorrhaged too, more readers will realise they’re being lied to.

Would you rather read a “world exclusive” review of unfinished code in conjunction with advertisers, or a later review of finished code that’s independent and uncensored?

Official Xbox360 Magazine Does “It” Again

We had it all planned out. We were going to post a huge critique of issue 2 of Official Xbox 360 Magazine. We were going to scream from the tops of our lungs about how painfully obvious it is that their “world exclusive review” of Perfect Dark Zero was written after playing unfinished code. We were going to crow about how the writer hasn’t even been identified, with a crap cartoon image and the name “Justin Thyme” being substituted for his real details because of the wrongdoing. We were even going to ask how Future can justify asking £6 for a magazine that still has a DVD full of video clips instead of playable demos hidden inside the ridiculous box.

But we’re not going to do that.

Instead, we’re going to ask the brilliantly talented team behind the magazine (Cutlack! He writes the funny bits of UK:R!) to please put a stop to this nonsense. Let’s have no more “exclusives” derived from unfinished code written by journalists unable to even put their name to them. Tell your bosses at your next meeting that you want honesty in your magazine.

Is that too much to ask?

Future issue 130 page press release for £6

…and it’s called Xbox360 The Official Xbox Magazine.

It’s only natural that in the wake of a new console, a skipload of new magazines are going to pop up to cover its launch. It’s also natural that the world-domineering Future Publishing has secured the official Xbox360 licence.

Being on the shelves in mid-September, nearly three months before the console is out, thousands of eager readers must have snapped up the first issue to read some decent journalistic coverage of the Xbox360 and its games. After all, surely the staff of the official magazine has access to Bill’s new console?

Future’s favourite trick of hiding a dodgy issue inside a sealed box has been wheeled out, and opening it up after shelling out six quid will tell you why. A thin and miserable varnished Microsoft advertorial with a DVD full of tech movies running off a PC is rattling around inside.

A regurgitation of the spec sheets makes up some of the mag, masquerading as journalism. We lost count of how many times the proclamation “The graphics rock!” was bolted onto the end of a nonsense-sentence about the tech specs. And would it really have been too much to ask for someone to check the totally wrong page numbers in the A-Z game index?

Even the mighty Cutlack (UK:Resistance, we salute you) fails to save the coverage of the games, which is a dismal selection of rewritten press information and glossy screenshots that we’d bet our tattered careers on baring no resemblance to the final products.

Yes, citizens, again you’re being sold a lie. Despite the promise of “exclusive playtests” in the mag, and the promise “we play the best console launch lineup ever seen” on the cover, at the time of writing the magazine the staff hadn’t gone near a finished console, but were still ordered by their paymasters to get a rewritten press release out onto the shelves.

For six fucking quid.

PC Zone transformation into PC Gamer complete

As the RAM Raider predicted, PC Zone has become PC Gamer. Months of sneering at PC Gamer’s irrelevant Extra Life section has given way to the birth of PC Zone’s Freeplay, which is an exact copy. You might almost think they’re being written by the same people.

The RAM Raider knows this isn’t true, but it might be happening sooner than you think. Recent ABC figures have shown massive drops in circulations that Future suits have desperately tried to justify with the excuse that summer has unexpectedly happened. Losing nearly ten thousand readers each, Future knows that the only way forward is to merge them.

We’re going to get a book running on who’s going to lose their jobs, and even worse, who’s going to be pushed off to the editorial Siberia that is the pathetic CVG.com website. Place your bets.

Future looking for new mugs

After a spell of losing staff faster than their credibility, Future are advertising for “four experienced gamers” to join their London office as trainees. Promising opportunities to work on the woeful Official Xbox Magazine and PSW, the RAM Raider was especially interested in Future’s requirements.

- An exhaustive knowledge of videogames and a passion for playing them (well, it was only a matter of time before Future realised their writers need to actually be gamers)

- A creative mind itching to express itself in print in an entertaining and original way (so they’re not looking for writers for Edge then)

- A bright, outgoing personality who can get along with anyone (in other words, can bend over and take it up the arse from the PR people so they can exchange high scores for advertising)

- A desire to learn and succeed (presumably to succeed at being a low paid skivvy that writes shit about games they’ve barely played)

Better still is what they’re not interested in:

- The size, shape or colour of your academic record (we’ll give them that – you’re either a decent writer or you’re shit, so well done Future)

- Why “old games are better than new ones, actually” (so anyone that actually has experience of old games – yet again, Future fail to grasp the importance of being involved in the industry from the golden era)

- Post-Freudian rationalisation of the Mario/Wario relationship dynamic in Super-Famicom releases ’91 to ’94 (so they’re definitely not looking for writers for Edge)

Judging by the number of comments attached to the post, it looks like loads of naïve forumites are seriously considering applying. The RAM Raider implores you not to, for the sake of your own sanity and well being. Working at the stinking London office doing shitty menial tasks that nobody else wants for a disgustingly low wage is not what you want to do in life.

You might love gaming, but Future only love their wallets.

Pointless press release of the week goes to…

…Official PlayStation 2 Magazine, who have… (drum roll)… got some previews and reviews in their latest issue. Well fucking done guys. With OPS2 counting amongst the lamest of the dismal PS2 mags doing the rounds, the RAM Raider can see why Future need to push out a press release to announce the amazing fact that they've done their jobs for once.

It’s even accompanied by an official statement by editor Stephen “I hate my track suit wearing readers” Pierce:

"The force is strong with this issue, making it the best OPS2 ever (customary shit press release gag over with early – well done). We have the amazing Star Wars blow-out, which couldn't be better timed to build up excitement for the movie (can’t resist letting slip the real reason for securing those ‘exclusives’, can you Steve) – as well as loads more (yes – Reviews! Previews! Hearty congratulations). We have the biggest selection of first-look exclusives ever assembled in one magazine (we’re assuming you have the facts to back that up, Steve?), and have covered the titles gamers really want to get their hands on (good tactic – a lesser editor would just pick a load of shite that nobody gives a fuck about). With the essential covermounted DVD, this illustrates why OPS2 is by far the best videogame magazine you can buy."

Well, the RAM Raider's convinced.

PC Zone To Become The New PC Gamer?

The RAM Raider has heard a rumour that the reason Jamie Sefton has been installed as acting editor of PC Zone magazine over at Future Publishing’s London office is that editor Dave Woods is working fulltime on a total redesign of the magazine, presumably in an effort to halt its declining sales.

PC Zone still has a fearsomely loyal fanbase from its heyday, which is sadly long gone. For a long time now, it’s not so much been a magazine with attitude as a games comic, but will this be rectified?

Dave Woods has always been a vocal critic of PC Gamer’s stupid and largely pointless Extra Life section, but is ironically planning a section called “Freeplay” that’ll basically emulate Gamer’s pages of glorified look-at-me filling. Only time will tell whether the Zone team can prevent Freeplay from turning into yet another desperate source of irrelevant commentary – has nobody learnt anything from the NGJ debacle?

Deadlines & How Long Reviewers Spend Playing Games – The Truth

The RAM Raider spotted a discussion on a fansite writers' forum recently about deadlines. The comment “I think 2 days is a bit short notice” particularly caught my attention. After all, we’re talking about an unpaid writer coming up with shit about a game, for free, that nobody will read.

These people have no idea. As a professional games journalist, two days is a bloody luxury. The RAM Raider has often been landed with reviews from magazines with a day to turn around up to 1000 words, plus screenshots, plus captions, plus boxouts. The record has to be 22 hours from one of the major PC mags – that’s to play a game, and write up the review plus bullshit extras.

Remember the Headhunter: Redemption debacle, where that poor guy from Official Xbox Magazine had his name dragged through the mud by the game’s developers who revealed on the magazine’s forums (which were naturally deleted by Future, but there’s more here) that he’d simply regurgitated facts about the game from an old press release, revealing that he hadn’t played it properly? Despite Future’s desperate attempts to deny the accusations, the RAM Raider has learned from one his colleagues on the mag that he actually had barely played the game at all, as he was completely snowed under with a load of games and not enough time to review them.

How much time is spent playing a game for a review isn’t always down to the deadline though. As a general rule, the less space a review takes up, the less time the reviewer will spend on it. If it’s half a page in a magazine, the reviewer can expect £40-50 at the most, and less than half of that for a quarter of a page. For that kind of money, it’s just not worth spending hours on a game, so more often than not, a review will be knocked out after a couple hours of play at best.

So, the next time you’re reading a review section introduction with the lofty promise of a magazine’s reviewers playing games right through to the finish, you can now confidently think to yourself, “bollocks”. Yes, dear reader, quite often the review of a game you’ll be thinking of spending £40 on in a magazine that cost you a fiver will have been cobbled together by some poor/lazy guy who’s played it for a couple of hours.