Reasons Why the Gaming Industry Is Still Ripe for Ridicule

If you've read SuperPhillip Central in the past, you know our opinion of the gaming industry. It deserves all of the ridicule it receives by those on the outside and also those of us on the inside, like gamers, bloggers, journalists, etc. We're a young industry, and we haven't yet completed our growing pains. Take a look at a message board or comment section on a site. Part of the problem presents itself then and there. This opinion piece suggests three ways (there are more, but we don't want to overload you) that we think the gaming industry deserves to be made fun of.

Game journalism is still an absolute joke.

One time we posted a very popular article on the video game news aggregate site N4G, and when it was getting ready to leave the front page's top headlines, it was removed by an administrator. Why it was done then instead of after it gave us thousands of page views is beyond us. The reason? "Only industry professionals can post blogs."

What does an "industry professional" even mean? Does that mean SuperPhillip Central's staff should act like typical game journalists and constantly provide articles for the sole purpose of clickbaiting? Should we get into Twitter battles with indie developers that make someone leave the industry because we feel entitled to an answer or sound byte? Should we give games like Call of Duty: Ghosts high scores so Activision will continue putting ads on our site to give us revenue? Should we shamelessly get invited to all-expenses paid EA-sponsored parties on the other side of the world to pimp up games like Battlefield 4? Should we throw softball questions to the companies that we like best and incinerate the companies we don't with hardball questions? Should we hype up a game with a partnership between us, Doritos and Mountain Dew? Should we just write tabloid-esque articles like Kotaku?

Because that's all we think of when we think of most game journalists, and it sucks because there's many in the industry who do their jobs well. They do hard-hitting investigative journalism, do fair and balanced reviews and give us intriguing interviews without the self-indulging "how awesome is your game?" bullshit.

An industry professional is just another word for someone on a big site like IGN or Gamespot who gets free review copies, trips to fancy parties and events for free and then bitches about their audience being the entitled ones. It certainly couldn't be the folks on this and many other independent gaming sites that don't let the industry's bull pass by us. It couldn't be the folks who generally have to buy their own games and not just get them handed to them with promises of good scores for more ad revenue. It couldn't be the folks who don't have to worry about pissing off a big developer so they don't invite us to their swanky parties or give us free gaming systems that we lick on camera anymore.

And no, we're not saying all game journalists and sites are like that, so please don't get us wrong. We're just sad that this is how our opinion of most game journalists has been shaped because of their actions in the past by places like IGN, Gamespot, Game Informer and Gametrailers.

Gamers still seem to enjoy failure in the industry.

We'll use the Wii U for this one, because it's a system that is down on its luck severely and has been kicked while it's down more times than... uh... something that has been kicked a lot while it's down. Somebody out there give us a better analogy, please!

Anyway, there seems to be a fair amount of people enjoying the failure of the Wii U. This is the exact kind of console zealot behavior that isn't doing anyone any favors. The thing is, when someone is loving a console not doing well, it sort of tells us that they don't respect the video game industry. A platform failing helps no one. No doubt jobs would be lost. Significant amounts of money would be lost. Only a sociopath would enjoy such a thing, and it sadly seems like many gamers fit that title perfectly.

When gamers don't even respect the industry, why in the world should anyone else? Wanting a console or developer to fail because you have some irrational hatred for it or them is not good for the industry. There are honest to goodness people who are loving that these platforms are failing, especially the Wii U. It's like all of the pent up frustration that the Wii beat our their favorite consoles' for five years has finally come to a head.

The Wii U failing is not good. It doesn't make the industry a better place. It's a major platform that is suffering, so instead of saying something absolutely stupid like "Nintendo is getting what it deserves, mwahaha", we should actually want the system to do better. It makes the entire industry a better, more successful place. It gives Nintendo the opportunity to pull off more risks, make money to invest in better games, perhaps make bigger budget games and maybe not rely on their usual franchises as much. Isn't that something we, as gamers who are supposed to love our hobby and want our industry to do well, should want? We aren't too hip right now on the Xbox One, but that doesn't mean we want it to fail. It's just not for us. How hard is it to instead of trolling every Xbox One article or message board topic we find to simply keep it to ourselves or speak of our disinterest in a productive way?

The best discussion forum we have is NeoGAF.

NeoGAF pounds its chest as a preeminent place for video game discussion, yet you take a look at a topic like this, and you see that full blown trolling is not only allowed it seems to be encouraged. And console wars? What topic is complete without a nice unhealthy helping of it? It's the same type of garbage you see on a site like GameFAQs. We're sorry. We just undeservedly insulted GameFAQs. At least GameFAQs has helpful FAQs and cheat codes. It is also sans the superiority complex.

The fact of the matter is if NeoGAF is the best place we have for video game discussion, this industry deserves to be made fun of. NeoGAF is elitist garbage with as many trolls, fanboys, console zealots and hypocrisy as all of the sites their members make fun of combined. It's trash. Plain and simple. Just look at these wonderful quotes full of kneejerk reactions, hyperbole and trolling from various members. These are examples of the types of reasons we have been talking about as to why the gaming industry is still ripe for ridicule.

THIS is the best we can do?! These posts could be transplanted to GameFAQs or a YouTube comments section and one would not be able to tell the difference. You need not think we're cherry picking either. Just enter any Wii U topic, even the ones with a positive message. Those eventually turn negative, too. Enter a Phil Fish topic where internet tough guys want to punch the man in the face. Enter a PS4 RAM topic. Enter an Xbox One 180 topic. Enter any next-gen discussion topic. Enter... etc. The fact of the matter is that NeoGAF is just another site with the types of gamers that embarrass us and our hobby. We need something better than this. When your industry's best site for gaming discussion is just console wars covered up with a superiority complex, then your industry has a severe problem.

And that's what makes being a fan of the industry so maddening. I want the industry to start being taken seriously by people other than gamers, and hell, even gamers don't seem to take it seriously. If things continue, we'll always be the target of ridicule by the masses. The constant infighting, console wars and trolling does little to help our cause. And if, somehow, after all of this you think the industry is perfect as it is, you really need to wake up and realize that you might be part of the problem. Sitting there doing nothing or even engaging in the types of behavior listed is not helping the industry. We need to collectively grow up, wish systems to do well so our industry does well, and have a more respectful discourse with one another about our console choices.

If We Want the Industry to Grow Up, We Need to Grow Up First

I always find it hard to talk about wanting the gaming industry to grow up because I'm not exactly a beacon of maturity myself. However, I have long since been over console wars, fanboy wars, and certain-man-part-waving contests on message boards and comment sections (for the most part, that is). It's a fact, however, that so many gamers have not gotten over this mindset. This is a young industry, and because of that, it is a very immature one. This piece is somewhat of a stream of consciousness. It's an oddity of opinion pieces here, but it's one that allows me to rant about how I think that before the industry can be taken seriously, the press, the gamers the press caters to, and industry insiders need to start acting with more maturity.

Allow me first to allude to Halo 4 and some outlying review scores for the game. I do not wish to talk about how NeoGAF got its collective feathers ruffled by a site's 7.0 review score and talk about how NeoGAF, the self-proclaimed "preeminent community for video game news and discussion", is no better than the sites they constantly make fun of. I've done the latter enough before to the point where regular readers of this site are bored by that by now. (And I am as well, no matter how easy it is to draw comparisons to other message boards.)

No, let's talk review scores in general. First of all, a 7 out of 10 is a good score. Perhaps it doesn't meet some people's thoughts of what a Halo 4 score should be. Perhaps many who complained about it should have waited to play the game. I'm sure that reviewer is very sorry for not allowing Halo 4 to be on top of the review aggregate sites' ranking lists of the best reviewed titles of all time. I know how important that is to some people. Even after the reviewer explained his position, people still (I'm not just talking NeoGAF, mind you) argued, bitched, and moaned. It is as if they couldn't understand that someone saw Halo 4 differently than them. We are in a young industry full of people who cannot stand it when someone has a different opinion than them. Don't believe me? Go on any gaming message board where it is especially bad. Yes, even the preeminent community NeoGAF.

Which might make you wonder why I even have review scores. I simply followed Game Informer's scale as I grew up on that and became comfortable with it. Nonetheless and thankfully so, those who read my reviews and regularly comment are smart and don't generally care about the score. I've seldom ever gotten sass or meltdowns in the comments section for writing a negative review or giving a low score to a hyped game (though I have for writing a controversial opinion one, two, or twenty times in the past). Perhaps that's because no one cares what some random college student with "Super" in front of his name has to say about their most anticipated games. I don't deny that that's a distinct possibility. Regardless, my readers care more about what is said rather than what is scored. I don't know how I developed that kind of community with the kind of crap I write. It's a mystery that will baffle even the most seasoned Professor Layton player.

Let's shift gears to the press that actually covers the industry? We should all know about the Wainwright, Doritos, Mountain Dew, Geoff Keighly nonsense by now. If you don't (don't worry, it's only another black eye on games journalism), just use a search engine and you'll find your answers.

In my opinion, gamers get the press they deserve. I watched over the weekend a segment on Gametrailers.com called "Bonus Round." It was essentially a roundtable with three guests and the host. It was an end-of-the-year type deal. Yes, an end-of-the-year type deal in early November. Screw the most important part of the gaming year, the holiday season, let's rush this sucker out because we have no shame. They hilariously talked about Nintendo -- y'know, the company that is kicking off the next gen with a new console in less than two weeks and were actually grading them before the system even came out. The sheer amount of willful ignorance displayed by the supposed experts Gametrailers assembled was astounding. One statement by a panelist wanted Nintendo to license their IPs out to developers working with mobile platforms. That certainly wouldn't cheapen the brands at all and cost Nintendo long-term at all! Way to go, panelist! In all honesty, if you wanted a better panel, you could have selected any three random GameFAQs members. No wonder Nintendo doesn't care about bending over backwards for the Western press anymore-- the press cannot even bother to look up simple things that it's their job to know.

It's the stupidity of the press that perfectly matches the stupidity of most gamers. Okay. I will admit this: I do not like a majority of gamers (I will now simply be referring to "most gamers" as "gamers"). I find them obnoxious, indecisive, immature entitled, selfish, and insatiable. The current press that we have that gives 9s and 10s to really hyped games, accepts swag so shamelessly, and appeals to the lowest common denominator is worthy of gamers. These are the types of gamers that go on sites like N4G, GameFAQs, NeoGAF, YouTube comment sections, and Twitter just to troll other fans and faceless companies. These are the types that hate Sony yet "like them" on Facebook just so they can troll every news story the company posts. Then there are the ones that so feverishly defend every little thing their favorite developer or console manufacturer does. How about those that happily applaud when a game or system bombs? Who cares if that game that bombed cost hundreds their jobs when we can laugh at some faceless company because we don't like their business practices?

Or how about the freaking hyperbole and overreactions that spread in myriad threads and topics? It's seemingly everywhere. Or news stories that aren't just news but are overly editorialized? I don't care if you think Nintendo Land sucks and looks stupid. Just tell me when the game is coming out, how much it costs, what it consists of, and be on your merry way. I also don't need news stories about fanboyism on GameFAQs or NeoGAF. That's not news. That's "no shit, Sherlock" territory, and a good reason why this industry is so laughable (whether you take that reason being those aforementioned news stories or fanboyism in the industry from gamers and the people that make the games that we play).

I bet some find it ironic that an opinion piece saying that everyone in the industry needs to grow up before the actual industry can grow up is basically a rant any 13-year-old could make. I don't blame you for finding the irony in that. I see it, too. Regardless, I don't want you to think that I believe every gamer or every press member is holding the industry back and keeping us into the realm of immaturity. Look at sites like Nintendo World Report or Digitally Downloaded. I don't mention both of these because I have ties to them. 1) I wouldn't have ties to them if I didn't like what they were doing, and 2) They are great examples of the positives of the press. (The gaming press CAN be good, people!) They are great examples because they are alternative gaming sites with little influence from gamers or publishers. They write what they want to write, they review and give games scores they want to review. They seldom, if ever, create controversy just for cheap hits like so many sites do. You will never see a review for Assassin's Creed III surrounded by three Assassin's Creed III ads, making you wonder if the ad money from Ubisoft somehow factored into that site giving the game a favorable review. How dirty are some sectors of the press?

As I stated in the opening paragraph, we're a young industry. Is it because we're so young that we're so immature, or is there another deeper reason? Could it be that most of us really just grown men and women playing with expensive toys who take our hobby too seriously? Maybe we don't take it seriously enough. Is it as simple as that? The sooner we start evolving mentally and do away with console war mentalities and earn a press that we can be proud of, the sooner the video game industry will start getting mainstream recognition as something great instead of just the martyr and butt of Western culture.

Agree? Disagree? Want to know what the heck you just read? Let me know in the comments section. Regardless, I thank you for reading the rantings from this exasperated gamer.

One of My Biggest Problems With Gaming: Gamers Themselves

That's a provocative editorial title. You may also refer to this editorial as "Phil Complains About Gamers for the 766th Time." While gamers are nowhere near as burdensome as on-disc DLC, season passes, nickel and diming players for every little thing, developers releasing broken ports of their popular games to other platforms, and a profusion of other problems, they are a perpetually annoying part and necessary evil of this hobby. This article discusses how gamers just irritate me to no end and more importantly, why. Call this a rant, something I don't generally do that often on this site (I've been due for one for a while now). Now, don't get me wrong -- I don't mean to generalize, so if I say "gamers," I am talking about some or a lot of gamers, and not all gamers as a whole.

First, let's talk about Nintendo's new ad campaign (video here) meant for non-gamers/more casual players. Now, regardless of the fact that the casual boat has sailed for Nintendo as that group constantly moves onto the next new, shiny thing, the commercial shows Olympic gold medalist Gabrielle Douglas playing New Super Mario Bros. 2 and saying that she isn't a gamer, she's a coin-collecting champion. In any other hobby, the message would be clear, but as I argue all the time --  a lot of gamers are super defensive, insecure morons -- at least the ones that frequent online. They took the message as Nintendo saying that the company is distancing itself from gamers when the commercial does not say such a thing at all. 1) The commercial isn't intended for them, and 2) Even if the ad said "I'm not just a gamer; I'm a coin-collecting champion," I'm sure we'd still have people complaining. Apparently, game companies have to spell things out as gamers must be simpletons.

One of the two ads in question.

I've seen many people say the commercial is insulting to them and longtime Nintendo fans. Talk about missing the point, overreacting, and looking stupid in the process (all three are common with gamers). Exactly how the commercial is insulting is beyond me.The idea that this new ad campaign by Nintendo is meant to be insulting to gamers and giving the middle finger to all of their fans blows my mind in negative ways. That would be fine if that was the point. It is not the point, however, to anyone with half a brain and the ability to think for themselves, which admittedly is not your typical gamer. The point is to convey that the celebrity isn't just identifying herself as a gamer, but identifying herself as something related to the game she's playing. It'd be like if Sony had an ad that said, "I'm not a gamer, I'm a professional racer," for a game like Gran Tursimo. The person is saying she is deeply a part of the game. It's not meant to say "gamer" is a naughty word, so no, Nintendo did not insult anybody, indirectly or not. If you want an actual insult, here's one for you: *deep breath* Gamers are childish, inconsolable man-babies who bitch and moan about everything even when they have all the attention and have more games than they can possibly play.

This is essentially just a very vocal group of gamers making mountains of mole hills, creating conflict where there shouldn't be any, and intentionally keeping their heads up their collective asses. Saying something is an indirect insult. How is it possible to be this obtuse? I have no idea. It makes the majority of gamers look awful.

I don't understand why people in our hobby feel the need to brand themselves with the term "gamer", as if it is some badge of honor. I don't see enthusiasts of books calling themselves bookworms in a sense as a means to be better than someone else. Do most of these people feel so inadequate that they have to brand themselves to feel superior to other people (casuals)? No wonder people are so damned pathetically defensive over this ad campaign. And yes, there is still a social stigma to play video games, and deservedly so. It routinely presents itself as an incredibly immature hobby, and one of the reasons is how gamers conduct themselves.

Hypothetically, let's say the ads were to distance Nintendo from gamers. Is it any wonder why someone would want to do that? Look at message boards, look at comments sections. Console zealotry is everywhere. It's common on GameFAQs, it's common on various gaming news sites like IGN, GameSpot, GameTrailers, etc, it's common on N4G, and it's even common on the site that pretends it's the greatest gift to gaming discussion when it's just as bad as the aforementioned sites, NeoGAF. All of these places have the same console and fanboy war debates, and the only thing that distinguishes them from one another is a different coat of paint. I constantly shake my head at posts and comments I read. We have Nintendo fans who feel betrayed by the ads, and we have the anti-Nintendo brigade using this as another attack point. The constant console wars are obnoxious -- it makes a plethora of people look bad, and it gives the industry's reputation a black eye. I would be ashamed to show the actions of many gamers to anyone outside of our hobby. I can see why (again, hypothetically) Nintendo would want to distance themselves from gamers if the commercials were intended to do that (which, again, they weren't). Hell, I don't want to be associated with gamers a lot of the time, and looking at what has transpired over the past month helps me with that ideology.

Let us not forget Bayonetta 2. Nintendo takes a game that was dead and in its grave, puts money into it to get it published, and now a lot of people are pissing their pants with rage about that. They'd rather the game be dead than have to shell out money for a Nintendo console. Seriously? The fanboyism by many gamers is that bad? Yes, it really is. Gamers are insatiable. They complain that Nintendo has no third-party support or exclusives worth buying, Nintendo gets a game that they would want, and now they're mad because of that! Nintendo is damned if they do and damned if they don't, but this isn't about that. This is about the severity of the reaction that happened after that. Nintendo and Platinum Games received a myriad of tweets, some even being death threats. Death threats. There are even petitions against the game now. Every time I say that gamers can't embarrass themselves more, they somehow pull through for me and make themselves look even worse.

Apologies for the foul language, but
that's the least of this pic's problems.

Then there is any time a game gets a review score that is lesser than what fans of the game or console it appears on expect. We saw this with Eurogamer's Uncharted 3 review ("oh, no, an 8/10! How dare you, Eurogamer! We were tight, but no longer!"), we saw this with The Legend of Zelda: Twilight Princess (8.8) -- one of the most embarrassing displays of hating on a great score ever, and we now see it with Resident Evil 6. We're in a young industry where many gamers just cannot handle someone else having a different opinion than them. By the way, how the %#% does anyone with an iota of professionalism make a post about the reaction of a bunch of fanboys and passes that off as news? Fanboys act irrationally -- faux news at 11. Someone who also proclaims himself to be a "gamer" writing several news pieces every time a fan group does something stupid and making that "news" is a good example of the childishness of this hobby. And these aforementioned message board gamers eat it right up. You get the content and journalistic reporting you deserve, and our industry's gamers certainly deserve what they get.

8.0 is still a great score, no?
Isn't the review text more important anyway?

You might be wondering why I wrote all of this. It's just that I've had my limit of this crap. I'm absolutely tired of making excuses as to why this hobby is so underdeveloped in maturity. Between people getting offended that they aren't being marketed to 100% of the time or purposefully misconstruing a message for their own agendas, people feeling threatened that casuals are entering THEIR hobby, people being overly defensive and sensitive about everything, people consistently entering console/fanboy wars with other like-minded individuals ("My faceless corporation is better than yours!"), game journalists also participating in such wars and/or adding fuel to the fire (you know who you are -- the 100+ of you), and the genuine obnoxiousness of this hobby and the gamers that it contains is all just maddening to me. I know many who no longer want to call themselves gamers because they feel humiliated to associate themselves with the select many that make the hobby appear so sophomoric. I can't help but empathize. Is there a reason that when I start a Google search for "Gamers are" I get results that say "Gamers are losers", "Gamers are entitled", "Gamers are embarrassing", "Gamers are idiots", among others? All of the search results shown are negative. Regardless, will gamers start acting their ages? Sadly, I don't see this happening any time soon when a score of 8.8 makes an entire fan group rage, when a developer receives death threats, and "the preeminent community for video game news and discussion" is just like every other gaming message board on the planet -- a haven for immaturity and console wars.

Thank you for reading my rant on gamers and the current state of affairs with this entertaining hobby. If you have your own thoughts on the matter, feel free to leave a comment. 

And you have to ask why gamers are made fun of all the time?

Yikes.

Welcome to NeoGAF, the preeminent video game industry discussion community.

So much for any message board being a place for serious video game discussion, fellow gamers. You don't even have to like the Wii to see how pathetic that was (nor the actual topic subject). And that's supposed to be the best board for taking about games! Yikes indeed!