From the Vault — originally published December 3, 2007. Some links, videos or prices may be out of date.
By now you most likely heard of the rumors behind the firing of Jeff Gerstmann from gamespot. Word on the street is that he was fired for publishing a very unfavorable review of the video game Kane & Lynch for the Xbox 360. Gerstmann seemed to have been well liked among his peers and we even posted a few segments he did on this blog a week or two ago. One was a Team Fortress 2 Tournament and the other detailed what Mass Effect was all about.
The whole fiasco on whether its a fact that the Gamespot muckety mucks canned him because he published a unfavorable review of a product from a sponsor/advertiser raised a bunch of red flags with fellow Journalists and Gamers alike. My gut tells me that something fishy was going on at Gamespot. I started to get weary of Gamespot’s practices with reviews of games Advertised on their sites when Alien Syndrome came out for Wii earlier this year. It was so odd to me that even days after the game was released no review was posted on Gamespot. Not only that but at that same time there was ads for the game everywhere on Gamespot. The background of the Gamespot site was an ad for the damn game and no review was anywhere to be found. At that time I realized that the game was shit and that the review was held back because they publishers or ad reps were spending dollars with Gamespot.
Oddly enough the suspicion from not seeing any reviews and tons of ads everywhere prevented me from buying the game and I am glad I did’nt buy Alien Syndrome because I ended up renting it and it was complete shit. These big sites and publishers need to realize that you cant hide the fact that a game is crap. Embargoes on Journalists and shady ad buys will not help or prevent the rulings of the court of public opinion. There are way too many forums out there including good old word of mouth even. The juice on these types of shady actions is not worth the squeeze. If you want great reviews make good games. Period. Even people in the store game sections at Target or Walmart that work there are quick to tell you if a game is crap. They do not work on commission. All this fiasco shows is why smaller video game blogs and forum sites like this (shameless plug) are important to keep that honest communication out there about whats hot and wack in the video game world. Bigger isn’t always better.
It will be interesting to see how the rest of this issue with Jeff Gerstmann pans out although I am sure he will be fine if not better than ever, if anything some one should snatch his ass up asap at least he seems to be honest and he’s getting alot of publicity from this and rightfully so. Gamespot is in the middle of a PR nightmare right now.
