Topic: Gerstmann fired?

[gpw11]

That gamespot guy may or may not have been fired:

http://kotaku.com/gaming/rumor/gamespot-editor-fired-over-kane--lynch-review-328244.php

It's from one of those fake news site blogs, but that's the story.

If true, I can't say I agree with the reason, but I'm not sad about the action.  That guy sucked at his very simple job.  It's like he's there to appeal to this weird type of 'gamer' that is basically the anti-thesis of most people.  Morons...that's the market segment he represents.

[Pugnate]

Those can't be the reasons... can they?

[wizall]

That'd be a shame.  I've always liked the guy.

[Pugnate]

http://www.gamespot.com/pages/forums/show_msgs.php?topic_id=26072485

Apparently they are locking topics left and right...

Also if the reasons behind his firing are true, they won't just be a 'shame'. They'd play into the worst fears of gamers.

[wizall]

I just meant it's a shame he may not be around any longer.  As far as the reasons being true, well that's a whole other tier of significance.

[Pugnate]

Yea.

Looks like they were locked because there was already a 46 page topic on the off topic board:

http://www.gamespot.com/pages/forums/show_msgs.php?topic_id=26072117



Well then. That just confirms my feelings about Penny Arcade. I hope they get sued into hell over that comic.

[wizall]

I assume the comic was in response to his firing...?

[Quemaqua]

I don't get why you're mad about the comic, Pug.

Anyway, I always hated him.  He was kind of a gasbag, and I didn't care for his sense of style or what he considered cool.  I often disagreed with his reviews.  Still, these circumstances would be troubling if true.  Somehow I doubt they are, though.

[sirean_syan]

Same boat as Que here. Not a fan, but if they're dropping people because of this, well... that's not good.

And yeah, why would that comic upset you so much Pug?

[Pugnate]

OK the guy was fired, fine. But where do they get off saying he was fired because of pressure from advertisers? They are just spreading rumors only to make themselves look more legit. Basically they take every opportunity to tell the world they are the only honest ones, and they are the only ones not swayed by pressure from the publishers.

There has been no confirmation that that was why he was let go. And in all probability that wasn't why he was let go. It would be suicide for gamespot to firm him for that reason.

Yet Penny Arcade have taken the opportunity to beat their own drum.

edit:

The Kane & Lynch forums, and the Eidos forums have started getting attacked. Every thread has pics of mutilation or porn heh. At first they were locking topics etc., but now have given up and just left

http://forums.eidosgames.com/forumdisplay.php?s=a2c0ed5ee33af79a7babffef74a279dc&f=72

http://forums.eidosgames.com/forumdisplay.php?f=220

edit 2:

Yea, that comic really bothers me. It is slander, and I honestly hope they get sued. You are basically questioning the journalistic integrity of an entire website, just so that you will look good by comparison.

[idolminds]

I thought it was just a funny comic poking fun at the situation.

[sirean_syan]

Yeah, I think that's just looking into it a bit too much. Penny Arcade does comics. Often they're blunt or crass. This fits their mold pretty well. It's far from the worst thing they've done.

[Quemaqua]

Yeah Pug, I think that's overreacting a bit.  These guys create comics, generally comics that make fun of stuff.  I don't think they're at all purporting the situation to be true, but the situation arose, so true or not they're going to make something out of it for the fun of making something out of it.  I laughed... so mission accomplished.  Honestly, I have a lot of respect for the PA guys.  I didn't used to like them much, but I think they've done some interesting and cool things in their time, including generous donations to several charities.  I don't always agree with them, but still, I don't think this comic was spreading rumors or trying to do anything to their own image.  This is just what they do.

[wizall]

Wow, the whole situation is an absolute shitshow. 

Anyway, I don't know if we'll ever find out why he was canned.  I can't imagine GS doing that for an unfavorable review of even their biggest advertiser.   

[Cobra951]

I'd like to see him tell the story of what happened.  It would probably be ass-covering bullshit, but that's easy to spot.  There's a chance he could come out and point fingers.

Pug, parody is specifically protected free speech.  Lawsuits would go nowhere.

[Pugnate]

Well we'll see.

But check this out:

http://www.gamespot.com/pages/forums/show_msgs.php?topic_id=26072117

It has spawned over 50 pages of hate.

Pug, parody is specifically protected free speech.  Lawsuits would go nowhere.

I wish we had free speech here. Currently speaking against the president means you are 3 years in jail.

But isn't slander not protected under free speech? I guess it is how you look at this.

[Quemaqua]

Try 287 pages.

Also, dude, that isn't slander.  It's a comic.  It doesn't need to be true or claim to be true or false.  It's a joke.  It is what it is, and truth has nothing to do with it.

[Cobra951]

I wish we had free speech here. Currently speaking against the president means you are 3 years in jail.

But isn't slander not protected under free speech? I guess it is how you look at this.

Parody is untouchable, even if the target is the president.  Slander does not enter the picture.  I'm sorry your freedoms are so curtailed there.

[gpw11]

The whole scenario seems a bit unrealistic.  First, it would require someone in charge of firing Gerstmann actually saying that they were firing him for that reason, possibly opening them up to a wrongful dismissal lawsuit since the reason he was fired most likely would be in contradiction with his job description as well as the goal of the business in general.  All that aside, it just wouldn't be good PR, and as such no one would make it known that that was why he was let go.  For the average employee there are a dozen reasons you can make up to let them go....for this guy there are like 3 dozen. 

Chances are someone heard a rumor that he's been fired, went to gamespot, saw the ads, and 'put two and two together'.  That's my take on it anyways.  That said, his review of Gears of War for the PC was total bullshit and I'd have no problem if he was fired over how he handled that. I watched it and knew nothing about the game after except for the fact that 'it has an extra chapter but that doesn't really fit in". Ok, thanks.  Maybe I'm watching this because I don't already fucking own the xbox version and I'd like to know if this would be a good investment.  No, it's cool...I'll just go and check out one of the dozens of other sites out there.

Speaking of which, it's not like the guy provided any sort of invaluable commodity.  I'm sure by the time the next guy comes up that can pull an arbitrary number from 6-10 out of a hat people will forget about this. 

But sometimes you have to stir the pot.  Sadly, I'm too tired to be witty.

[Quemaqua]

Well said.  And nice post on GameFAQs.  It amused me.  I hope it continues to as people respond (doubtless).

[Cobra951]

I didn't know you 2 posted over there.  I've been a member for a while, though I seldom post.  Yes, that was funny.

[gpw11]

I don't really.  It's a good place to have an account to ask questions about specific games you may be having problems with or whatever, but I"d estimate I might make 5-10 posts there a year.  I do usually browse the forums before buying games and such though.  The best part is that it's as much of an intellectual cesspool as ign used to be.

[Pugnate]

I agree with you GPW, well said.

Right Cobra, parody. But I don't think Freedom of Speech protects slander. You can mock the president all you want for having sex with an internet, because he did. You can mock the president for not finding weapons of mass destruction, because he didn't.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Defamation

Liability.

In law, defamation is the communication of a statement that makes a false claim, expressly stated or implied to be factual, that may harm the reputation of an individual, business, product, group, government or nation. Most jurisdictions allow legal actions, civil and/or criminal, to deter various kinds of defamation and retaliate against groundless criticism.

The common law origins of defamation lie in the torts of slander (harmful statement in a transitory form, especially speech) and libel (harmful statement in a fixed medium, especially writing but also a picture, sign, or electronic broadcast), each of which gives a common law right of action.

Again, I am not knowledgeable on the subject. But to me, it appears that the comic implies corruption.

I know you guys are thinking that I am overreacting, which I probably am.

I didn't know you 2 posted over there.  I've been a member for a while, though I seldom post.  Yes, that was funny.

I think they are going to ban me.

[TheOtherBelmont]

Pug, the Penny Arcade comic is probably in response to all of the rumors that have been going on and shouldn't be viewed as seriously as you are looking at it.  They have done several comics like this where they have gone along with rumors in gaming news and exaggerated them to poke fun at the fanboys and the situation itself sometimes. Usually in their newspost for the comics(the newspost for this comic hasn't been posted yet) they elaborate their true feelings.  I pretty much agree with GPW on the whole situation of Gerstmann getting fired though.

[gpw11]

http://www.gametrailers.com/player/usermovies/137943.html

There's the review there.  It doesn't show it, but he gives it a 6.0.  Honestly, if that's the quality of all his work (the only other one I can specifically think of is the GoW one), then good.  The guy spends 5 min. bashing the game.  He literally doesn't say anything good about it except "The multiplayer is a good idea....but it's ruined by the fact that the game fucking sucks".  And then he picks the number of 6.0 to attach to it? I understand that it's just an abstract number summing up how one person feels about something, but you can't go off for 5 mni. on bad qualities, not give any good qualities, and then say the game is closer to perfect than perfectly awful. 

[Pugnate]

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Eidos_Interactive

Kane & Lynch Controversy

On November 29, 2007, a Penny-Arcade comic accused website GameSpot of firing long-time employee and editor-in-chief Jeff Gerstmann from the staff. CNET, the parent company, is believed responsible, under pressure from Eidos due to their advertising campaign on the site. Jeff's video review has already been pulled from the site, and a mass departure of members, moderators, and administrators is already underway.

Gaming sites Neogaf and Kotaku have both broken the story, and a large industry backlash is believed to be underway.

That didn't take long at all now.

[scottws]

Even if advertiser pressure wasn't the reason he was fired, it doesn't change the fact that big advertisers attempt to and most likely succeed in "buying" favorable reviews.  It's not really different in any other industry supported by advertising.  I'd say, even if there isn't a whole lot of direct evidence, that idea is well known, and just makes business sense.

[Pugnate]

Why the heck haven't Gamespot released an official statement yet? They are insane to let this cook.

Edit:

Some guy named Tim Tracy has resigned from his position at Cnet apparently:

http://www.gamespot.com/users/TimT/show_blog_entry.php?topic_id=m-100-25233420&page=1

[MysterD]

So, when will this game hit Bargain Bin so I can see if Gertsmann is spot-on or not??

Yes, he namely punched the game in the face for basically nasty AI issues (which iare not a good idea for a squad based game), inaccurate shooting issues when firing, duck and cover tactics don't work too well in a game based around it, and the game having some half-baked ideas.

The reviews for Kane and Lynch, in general, have been all over the place -- period.

At least when Gertsmann reviewed Kane & Lynch, he complained about the game and scored it to what he feels it is according to its numerous issues he cited. It's surely not say like Kasavin's Doom 3 review, when he bitched about the game majorly and really said nothing too good about it -- yet, I was still baffled that he somehow found a way to score it in the mid-8's.

Yes, I do prefer Kasavin as a reviewer over Gertsmann most of the time, but that one time, Kas really dropped the ball on the D3 Review.

If G-Spot dropped Gerts because of this review not confirming w/ Eidos' ads on their G-Spot page and not w/ a score Eidos was looking for, that is the absolutely pathetic.

Regardless, I think Kane and Lynch might sell better, since everyone might see what the fuss is all about -- just to see if they agree w/ Gertsman.

[Pugnate]

Anyway looks like there was truth to the comic, and it wasn't speculation or whatever:

http://forums.penny-arcade.com/showthread.php?t=42776

Check out posts #18 and #28. So it looks like they had some inside scoop. I'll take that foot out of my mouth right about now.

What the hell does this mean for the industry? Now that I know they had some inside info on the matter, I feel far worse.

I sent this message to Sirean a few weeks ago:

What do you think of the reviews and stuff for these games? I don't know, I find something extremely odd, yet I can't put my finger on it. I know how this is going to sound, but when I find the review positive, I find the praise too high. On the flip side when the review is negative, I find myself thinking it is a bit too critical.

Meh.. its probably nothing.

He replied with:

I was actually thinking of starting a topic on this earlier today. Pretty much all reviews out there have been suspect lately. I sort think that most reviews out there have always been pretty lousy, but we don't have anyone great to fall back or trust in right now. Of course, I'm talking specifically about Kasavin. Even when he wasn't reviewing something, it felt like he had a part in nearly everything publish by Gamespot because the drop in quality has been pretty noticeable since he left.

I feel like he sorta did the industry a disservice by going for his dream and, the way I've seen it, himself too. He had way more influence on how gaming was growing at Gamespot than he'll ever have as a designer. Even if he becomes the head of a AAA studio, the way gaming works he'll never add much to the industry as a whole. As chief editor at GS, he was shaping how games were see on the whole and no one out there in the gaming journalism is anywhere near his level... well, it's his dream. Who am I to knock him for pursing it.

There just needs to be some sort of leadership again in the whole gaming journalism. I don't know where they'll come from, but I feel like something's brewing with all the cynicism brewing within boards and even some of the bigger names out there (see Zero Punctuation for an example). We're just stuck in this annoying period of in between stuff.

Anyway... I guess whatever was brewing boiled over.

This is quite insane, isn't it.

No D, it won't sell better. They've shut down the Eidos and Kane & Lynch forums, because of a massive attack. Go around the net for a little while.

edit:

Watched the video review on YT:

I didn't mind the review, though like GPW said, the score doesn't fit the negatives. I guess he had only 4 minutes so he ran out of time for the positives.

[Quemaqua]

I've been talking about my complete lack of faith in gaming journalism for a while now.  Most people probably wished I'd shut up about it, even.  If this is true, then apparently everything I'd feared is actually coming to pass and this is what we've really become.  I suppose that I shouldn't entirely be surprised, but even with my cynicism I was hoping that it was just a phase and somehow we'd get beyond it.  I guess not.  Welcome to commercial hell, everybody.

[Pugnate]

They updated the main page.

http://www.penny-arcade.com/

Can't say that I find that 100% convincing, but the damage has been done.

[Xessive]

Hmm, I guess this could have been the result of making someone who's not into the genre review something he'd hate even if it was decent.

I've noticed that Gerstmann's RPG and strategy reviews were more intuitive than any of his action game reviews. His action reviews all seem way more subjective than objective (whether he likes the game or not). They should have just let Van Ord review K&L hehe

[Pugnate]

Bob Colayco, who left Gspot in 2006 to join Blizzard, posted some strong words on his Gspot Blog!

http://www.gamespot.com/users/BobC/show_blog_entry.php?topic_id=m-100-25233563&page=1#post_comment

Unbelievable.

This is what happens when inmates run the asylum.

I'm disgusted and broken-hearted all at the same time. For whatever it's worth, much love to my old comrades, the rank and file at GS. Drinks are on me, next time I see any of you.

edit:

It isn't like Gamespot have put their integrity on the line before. I remember this:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/GameSpot

the original review for Shenmue was taken down from the site after GameSpot received many user complaints about the low score, and was re-scored, though the text review remained the same

Edit:

Some of you might find this interesting:

http://boards.1up.com/zd/board/message?board.id=games&message.id=488045

Jeff's been overseeing GameSpot's reviews for over a decade, and publisher complaints (of which there have been many -- I would know, I worked there years ago) never affected policy.

October 27th, the guy who launched such fine publications as Stuff and Maxim takes over GameSpot.

You figure it out.

Also some guy on the gamespot forums said the following, that makes sense:

What, exactly, did Edios do? Can you or someone else explain specifically what the did wrong? Based on what I understand from the information we have at this point, it's just common sense for Eidos or any other company to pull ads on sites that gave their game a low review score. Having an add here probably wasn't going to be worth the cost of admission as the ads would probably have been rendered ineffective at getting more people to buy the game, since the review was so damming. Why waste hundreds of thousands of dollars on banner ads that will yield little fruit?

You don't. Right? So what else did they do wrong?

This whole saga makes me realize something. God I love the internet.

[MysterD]

IT is worth noting, check out the discussion on Page 12 about David Smith (formerly of IGN) scoring Deus Ex for the PS2 low -- in which this DX PS2 game was published by Eidos.

And yep -- not too long after Smith's DX PS2 review was up, his PS2 review was pulled by IGN, he was fired, and then Cory Lewis's review was thrown up by IGN.

Hmmmmm....

[scottws]

Well maybe if Eidos didn't release crappy games they wouldn't be getting low reviews to bitch about.  I mean seriously, other than the original Deus Ex, have they ever released a game that is any good?

[Cobra951]

They updated the main page.

http://www.penny-arcade.com/

Can't say that I find that 100% convincing, but the damage has been done.

Huh?  That's not a retraction.  That's a full-fledged broadside assault.  If anything, they've cemented the journalistic horror story with further anecdotal evidence (which unreliable though it may be, looks pretty damning to me).  More damage has been willingly inflicted.

Edit:  In all seriousness, after Kasavin's departure, the recent lack of review reliability, and now this, does anyone here still trust Gamespot at all?

[MysterD]

Well maybe if Eidos didn't release crappy games they wouldn't be getting low reviews to bitch about.  I mean seriously, other than the original Deus Ex, have they ever released a game that is any good?

For one, Thief: Dark Project.

[wizall]

Edit:  In all seriousness, after Kasavin's departure, the recent lack of review reliability, and now this, does anyone here still trust Gamespot at all?

It's not that I don't trust them anymore; it's that I now consider them just another review site.  Before that, with Kasavin (and yes, I liked Gerstmann), they seemed more professional somehow.  That appears to be no longer the case.  It's when they changed their scoring scheme, however, that I lost most of my respect.

[gpw11]

Well, it certainly seems I was wrong about that.  It seems evidence is adding up that perhaps he was fired for the reasons people claim.  Yet, when it's all said and done I can confidently say I don't give a shit.  At all.

I'm of the opinion that the guy sucked.  Yes, I'm basing this off of two reviews of his and that might be a bit unfair, but it should be noted that when I think of the reviews of his I've read or watched, these two are the only ones that I remember or stand out.  I'm sure I've read or watched others of his before, but didn't check the name or whatever, I'm not about to go and check.  It's a non-issue. 

I seriously think people are making a much bigger deal out of this then it actually needs to be.  This isn't some conspiracy, this isn't some big scandal.  Worst case scenario: a guy reviews games for a living, and his reviews were threatening to hurt the bottom line of the company he works for.  He got canned. Can't trust gamespot anymore?  There are thousands of other people just dying to tell you their subjective opinions about games and they can even provide arbitrary numbers as well. 

It's not like this guy, or anyone else who does this professionally, is any more qualified to analyze a game then any other jackass. You could even argue that they'd be less qualified because of the chances they'd get so jaded.  Yes, it's shitty that gamespot is aparently now owned by the guy who runs Maxim and Stuff, but it's not like it was some beacon of journalistic integrity before.  It was an entertainment website.  That's fucking it. 

The problem is that this bullshit gamer culture puts these people and their completely subjective opinions on pedestals when in reality it makes little sense to do so.   I'd argue that the entire professional review system is no less flawed now that I'm aware that people can be fired for not 'toeing the party line' then it was 3 weeks ago.  I wouldn't go so far as to say the entire profession is a joke: we need people to do research on games, conduct interviews, and let us know how they're coming along.  Big sites and 'professionals' provide that.  It's also good to have people play these games before us and tell us roughly how they turned out, but you're a moron if you think that some guy at gamespot is any more qualified to do that then any of the 10,000 other idiots that are dying to tell you how they feel about something.