Bethesda changes their review policy

[WYP]

Bethesda has changed their review policy, deciding to only send media "review samples" one day before a game releases.



Read more on Bethesda's new review policy.

What are you opinions on Bethesda's new review policy?

 

[AlienALX]

Another one bites the dust.

 

[Kushiro]

Uhh... Good going Bethesda..

 

[Monty Python]

Good for them

If you're familiar with Gamergate, you'll understand why - when Dan Golding announced that gamers were dead, a lot of journalists fell in line with this view and attacked their audience (not helped by a certain feminist going after the gaming industry as a whole).

Bethesda have just decided that gaming journalism is dead, and that by not giving pre-release access it'll cost these journalists money because traffic won't go their sites.

Simple solution is, don't pre-order - it didn't hurt sales of Doom.

 

[Doomslayer]

IMO it's still not going to hurt sales.

 

[ImprovizoR]

If you're familiar with Gamergate, you'll understand why - when Dan Golding announced that gamers were dead, a lot of journalists fell in line with this view and attacked their audience (not helped by a certain feminist going after the gaming industry as a whole).

Bethesda have just decided that gaming journalism is dead, and that by not giving pre-release access it'll cost these journalists money because traffic won't go their sites.

Nice mental gymnastics. But this doesn't have a thing to do with Gamergate. If that's what they wanted they would simply not supply review copies to websites that they don't consider worthy. This is simply Bethesda doing something anti-consumer because they know that they can get away with it. They're not the first company to do an anti-consumer thing and they won't be the last. And you're trying to make them look like the good guys doing something ethical. Jesus Christ, you're naive.

This is fine though. I can get away with not buying their games for full price even if they're the most awesome games ever made. Just to make a point. It's not like I don't have other forms of entertainment to keep me occupied in free time.

 

[Monty Python]

Nice mental gymnastics. But this doesn't have a thing to do with Gamergate. If that's what they wanted they would simply not supply review copies to websites that they don't consider worthy. This is simply Bethesda doing something anti-consumer because they know that they can get away with it. They're not the first company to do an anti-consumer thing and they won't be the last. And you're trying to make them look like the good guys doing something ethical. Jesus Christ, you're naive.

This is fine though. I can get away with not buying their games for full price even if they're the most awesome games ever made. Just to make a point. It's not like I don't have other forms of entertainment to keep me occupied in free time.

How can this be "anti-consumer"? As a consumer your freedom to buy the game hasn't changed, has it?

 

[ImprovizoR]

How can this be "anti-consumer"? As a consumer your freedom to buy the game hasn't changed, has it?

If you don't understand that then I don't see how I can help you.

 

[AlienALX]

I loved Bethesda back in the ESO and FO3 days. They were yet to be completely consumed by a corporation and their egos. But man, Todd Howard's ego has grown to epic proportions over the past few years. You would need an ego as big as his to actually convince people that Fallout 4 was more than a wet stain on the mattress, an afterthought.

And now no reviews and they're choking modding on the consoles. Congratulations Bethesda (and Zenimax), you've made it ! you are now every bit as despicable as EA and Activision etc

 

[SeekaX]

Gaming journalism has been dead to me for years, it's not like any of those people are any more qualified to review games than the average joe anyways and they certainly don't know what i value in a game. On top of that their opinions weren't trustworthy because they had to make sure to pander to the developers in fear of not receiving any early samples anymore. I don't preorder and i can find more reliable sources to get an idea whether a game is any good or not and with Steam's refunding policy making a bad call once in a while isn't big of a deal either.

 

[AlienALX]

Gaming journalism has been dead to me for years, it's not like any of those people are any more qualified to review games than the average joe anyways and they certainly don't know what i value in a game. On top of that their opinions weren't trustworthy because they had to make sure to pander to the developers in fear of not receiving any early samples anymore. I don't preorder and i can find more reliable sources to get an idea whether a game is any good or not and with Steam's refunding policy making a bad call once in a while isn't big of a deal either.

I don't read reviews I will admit. People who have played through a game or watched a movie don't usually care about ruining it for any one else. I usually shut my eyes, then skip to the score/conclusion.

Not having any reviews though? I will now avoid. I trusted Bethesda to deliver with FO4 but it seems their attention was elsewhere. It's not an awful game, but even the reviews were too positive IMO. It's more like a DLC with slightly better graphics.

I don't mind having spent £99 on the Pip Boy edition though, as I know I'd have regretted not getting it.

 

[SeekaX]

I don't read reviews I will admit. People who have played through a game or watched a movie don't usually care about ruining it for any one else. I usually shut my eyes, then skip to the score/conclusion.

Not having any reviews though? I will now avoid. I trusted Bethesda to deliver with FO4 but it seems their attention was elsewhere. It's not an awful game, but even the reviews were too positive IMO. It's more like a DLC with slightly better graphics.

I don't mind having spent £99 on the Pip Boy edition though, as I know I'd have regretted not getting it.

Well there are still plenty of reviews out there, all you have to do is not pick up the game on day one, after 24h there are usually plenty of user reviews.
Isn't the pip boy edition just that plastic thingy with the cardboard display? Seemed a bit low effort.

 

[Kilbane]

In my opinion, game journalism has changed, people are more interested now about how the game works and how well or badly optimised the engine is over reading whether or not the game contains a good story or scares/twists/plot lines and avoiding potential spoilers.

More and more people are relying on game scores from sources such as steam to find out if the majority of users have enjoyed the experience.

So with this in mind, by releasing games as close to the release date as possible, game publishers can ensure an experience that is as optimised as possible and 99.9% of the time will show the performance of the day 1 experience.

 

[NeverBackDown]

In my opinion, game journalism has changed, people are more interested now about how the game works and how well or badly optimised the engine is over reading whether or not the game contains a good story or scares/twists/plot lines and avoiding potential spoilers.

More and more people are relying on game scores from sources such as steam to find out if the majority of users have enjoyed the experience.

So with this in mind, by releasing games as close to the release date as possible, game publishers can ensure an experience that is as optimised as possible and 99.9% of the time will show the performance of the day 1 experience.

The builds that the public gets on day 1 are not builds they get finished the day before. They've probably been done for a week at least. Anything after that is being updated for bug fixes/etc/etc. So if people find bugs in reviews, they will be there on release day. So that won't change anything from a performance standpoint. Day 1 patch would be the fix you'd get.

Imo, if companies are going to all start turning into heartless corporations(not blaming employees here) then they sure as **** better start making time for the devs to get demo builds out. Don't know why they ever stopped that.

 

[SeekaX]

The builds that the public gets on day 1 are not builds they get finished the day before. They've probably been done for a week at least. Anything after that is being updated for bug fixes/etc/etc. So if people find bugs in reviews, they will be there on release day. So that won't change anything from a performance standpoint. Day 1 patch would be the fix you'd get.

Imo, if companies are going to all start turning into heartless corporations(not blaming employees here) then they sure as **** better start making time for the devs to get demo builds out. Don't know why they ever stopped that.

Day 1 patches aren't unusual and pushing a new build a day before release isn't uncommon either.
They stopped making demos because they need to put time into making one. Since you can just buy the game and then refund it within two hours you don't really need a demo.
What do you mean 'start to turn into heartless corporations', any triple A title is already produced with profit ranking first second and third on the priority list, it has been like that for nearly a decade now, that's just the way it is when lots of money is invested and the companies grow to a certain point. The only thing which bothers me about that is that the quality of the product is more often than not sub par, but i blame that on the consumers being too caught up in hype and fancy graphics to care.