In most areas of entertainment, the journalistic focus is on new products. In videogames, for some odd reason, it's on future products.

This is IMHO the Number #1 Uno Prime reason Videogame Journalism is so messed up.

Anticipation is not such a bad thing by itself, it's what sells product right? But it's just so accelerated, what's been on the shelf for days is already old news. The window for game sales is so small, if it isn't a blockbuster from the get-go, it's getting tossed into the discount bin pretty quickly.

There's no more room for sleeper hits. I honestly don't think The Sims, Rollercoaster Tycoon or Warcraft could have made it in today's game climate. Neither of those games were hyped much before release (The Sims barely got attention in a small corner of EA's '99 E3 booth, seriously).

The games industry has become addicted to anticipation.

• Beta and Alpha product is never fully indicative of the final game. Simple things like removing debuggers, compressing textures and patching visibility leaks are rarely done until last minute and make huge performance differences. Or a game with pretty pre-release screenshots can turn out to have horrible framerates.
• Journalists choose favourites based upon brand, designer and worse: the games they have pre-release access to. A stinker can get a lot of attention and a gem can be neglected.
• Journalists comment on what they think ~may~ be good features based how they expect a game will turn out, applying inaccurate assumptions.
• Gamers begin to predict success or failure (of games and consoles) and the pride of predicting correctly overshadows the actual enjoyment of the game.
• It's ethically unsound, because a game can be hyped by the press without actually reviewing it, creating conflicts of interest between advertisement and news.
• The 'scoop' becomes the 'exclusive first peek', which again, is ethically questionable as these become hand-selected by the publishers looking for pure promotion.

I could think of a whole lot more points, but you get the idea. The fascination with what's in development versus what's playable now is the root of so much evil.

Now, we're migrating into a situation that's compounding it: Bloggers the world around have decided that the established journalists are corrupt (there's plenty of good evidence for that) and are taking it upon themselves to replace the industry, which they're doing very effectively.

Except the Numero Uno problem is now just exasperated, because bloggers write what they damn well please and the fascination with beta and 'next-gen' is so over the top at this point.

I've seen a lot of bloggers comment that what they think is wrong with the established press is the lack of full disclosure over games before they get released. This is soooo messed up backwards to me, it's not thinking with their heads it's thinking with the pre-release hype. Correct the mistakes, don't repeat them.

We need more disclosure of completed products and less of what's in the works.

It's a damn good thing most game designers are passionate about the games they make, otherwise it would be all hype and no game. That's probably the only reason I see this as a journalistic problem, not one with the game developments themselves.

This is an old subject, but one that I'm finding myself revisiting time and time again. Call it a desire to pigeon-hole if you like, but what category of "news" does blogging fall under?

First, let's filter out all of the personal blogs, plus take out fiction and the pure aggregators. Oh and don't forget the spam and corporate promotion blogs, skip those too. Everything we're left with is trying to be newsworthy.

There's no simple umbrella for blogged news, but I think I've got it down to three basic categories: Journalists, Pundits, or Joe Schmo with an opinion.

• Journalism needs standards. That's my opinion, one I hope is shared by the general populace. Even basic op-ed reviews need standards, you wouldn't review a movie you haven't seen, or a game you haven't played, right?
• Pundits can be listened to once and then ignored. They tend to push a rigid and repetitive stance, that's why they're pundits.
• Joe Schmo, that's the tricky one. There are both educated and uneducated opinions. Once an opinion is decently educated on the topic at hand, the lines between Joe Schmo and Journalism begin to blur.

Despite some nasty setbacks in videogame journalism, a goal of integrity should be maintained. In fact, those setbacks will probably strengthen the field. They've also opened up a hole where the bloggers can compete with the establishment.

If you've got what you think is leaked information about a game, verify it. Everyone loves a good fresh leak, don't they? But if it's not true, it's causing damage. And respect the NDAs, even if you aren't the one that signed it. In fact, this is why NDAs have become so prevalent in our industry, so many hotshot wannabe reporters can't hold their tongues when they should.

What do you care, if your pagerank goes up you're happy right? If game blogs get mired in false information, a high pagerank won't be worth much with a disenfranchised audience. Make trust the default, don't post suspect information.

Honesty and integrity before pagerank, please.

Normally I like Tobold, but lately he's been posting opinions about monthly fees on new and upcoming games that I strongly disagree with. Specifically in his articles "WAR is expensive" and "Pirates of the Burning Sea is too expensive". I think he's making some overly simple assumptions about information he's just not privy to. I don't think these are fair claims to make in the face of the significant financial hurdles that face independent developers like Flying Lab Software.

To be fair, Tobold tempered his opinions recently with "Listen to me! Or rather not", which was refreshing.

Are blogs journalism?

It's the conundrum with blogs, isn't it? Are we just players with an opinion and some webspace? Are we journalists, do we follow the ethics of journalism? Do we skip those ethics, like much of the recent media does and just spout whatever is on our mind? Some of us have significant readership, with fans who could take our meandering thoughts as facts, so do we take responsibility for that?

Truth is, Tobold is just as human as I am.

Speaking for myself, I've been a videogame journalist (official, card carrying so-to-speak). I've got my credentials and I can stand up and say I know a thing or two after years inside the industry.

But this blog is hardly journalism.

I'm not a journalist anymore. Something snapped for me a little while ago, where I realized my passion for games was being watered down from the inside. Playing games again just as a player was so enjoyable. Dammit I love games. But I couldn't let go of stuff I knew and opinions that begged to be expressed. So I converted my personal blog to this. MMOROG as a name is meant to be tongue-in-cheek, I'm not all encompassing within MMORPGs by any stretch. I don't want to be a pundit and I hesitate to jump back into journalism.

Too many Pundits

I'm uncomfortable with Pundits, they stick their feet in like roots and twist information to suit them, branching off in tangents stacked on one assumption after another. More and more blogs seem to be falling into punditry. Meanwhile, the journalism side of the videogame industry has been stuck in its corrupt game reviews system for decades.

I want to read opinions from other players who're comfortable to post just as players. Or the rare journalist that manages to maintain that honest perspective that's not hinged on an advertising (or web traffic) agenda. Perhaps with the independence of bloggers we'll see more of this, but so far the likes of Kotaku, etc. haven't been encouraging.

So here I am, trying to keep myself in check and I guess it's natural for me to act a bit like a watchdog now and then toward others. I'm sure Tobold means well, but I've been around the block and sometimes I sniff something that smells funny to me. I'm jaded and I'd like to see more validity from anyone reporting on games, bloggers or otherwise. That includes myself.

If anyone has any other reading sources for MMORPGs that they trust and respect, I'd be happy for some new links. They don't have to be chalk full of information, just express an insight or two.