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Schreier: “There are maybe only two dozen people with full-time jobs in the video game press right now, and they're all overworked and underpaid”

viveks86

Member
I’m a huge proponent of the free market, but this is a pretty unique situation. Google almost anything gaming related, and most of not all of the results of the first few pages will all be AI-generated garbage, likely built from scraping one another, with whoever the original source was being buried beneath pages of instantly generated “articles”.

There was a job with an “AI writing manager” I saw last year. They claimed the “managers needed to produce several thousand “articles” Per. Fucking. WEEK!

We can’t treat this as “business as usual”, because were quickly entering a total hellscape where nothing you see will have been touched by human hands.

And yeah, people want to poke fun at it because it’s affecting media outlets that are pushing agendas, but we’ve already started seeing official digital marketplaces being inundated with AI-generated “games”. The only realistic solution IS to have real gaming journalists and reviewers we can rely on — but if those people don’t exist, then you won’t be able to sort the good from the bad. And then only the biggest publishers WILL be able to be discovered, because they can just buy exposure.

Things have been bad with gaming journalists pushing real world agendas, which has only exacerbated the issue by alienating their audience further. But I think it’s still a role that frankly NEEDS to exist.

That is, if we actually want there to be more games than just COD and other “safe” franchises devoid of any personality.
Human greed will always find a way to maximize profits, so even if the industry was doing well, the problem of fake AI content was going to emerge.

There certainly is a need for reviewers, but that need is already being fulfilled by alternative media such as YouTubers, streamers and the like. The only form that is dying is the written form. Other than reviews and circulation of PR, games “journalism” is as pointless as Hollywood celebrity tabloids anyway. And actual industry issues like workplace harassment, crunch and layoffs can all become segments covered by people doing this part time, or by regular, real journalists. There is no reason for dedicated full time employees for an entertainment industry. Jason complaining about this is understandable, since it is what pays his bills. But more decentralized forms are already successful and growing.
 
Good. Video game journalists aren't real journalists. The more underpaid they are the better. Hope the entire industry goes under, and I hope Ryan McCaffery is the first to go. The North remembers.

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Woww.. I played that for the first time last year and thought it was amazing. Granted people can have differing opinions.. but I'm going to go check out this "review" to see what the hell he had to say.
 

Aenima

Member
And they only have themselves to blame. Alot of gaming journalists nowadays, hate gamers, are activist bloggers using a gaming website as a pltform to spread they personal agendas. And some devs are the same.

With the rise of youtubers receiving review copies, i dont thing the traditional gaming journalism has any future cuz players started ignoring them a long time ago.

It kinda sucks cuz i miss the proper gaming journalist that sided with the gamers and made devs answer the hard questions. Those times are gone. Now all its left is buddies for access jounalism, that put the blame on gamers.
 
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Arachnid

Member
Woww.. I played that for the first time last year and thought it was amazing. Granted people can have differing opinions.. but I'm going to go check out this "review" to see what the hell he had to say.
It's an infamous review because he was playing wrong lol. Dude died 300 times because he didn't know the motion sensor was alerting the Alien. I don't think I died 100 times across 5 playthroughs. He shouldn't actually lose his job over it, but it's fun to carry the hate torch. :messenger_tears_of_joy:

I meant what I said about gaming journos though.
 
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Good. Video game journalists aren't real journalists. The more underpaid they are the better. Hope the entire industry goes under, and I hope Ryan McCaffery is the first to go. The North remembers.
It's kind of a vicious cycle, the more underpaid they are, they less actually qualified and talented people will want to work there, and you end up with people who only accept the low pay because they are more interested in pushing certain agendas.

This is how you got into this mess to begin with, same thing happened in the comics industry, they were so lowballing the writers that mostly activists who were more interested in pushing leftist ideology than pay ended up writing comic books.
 
It's an infamous review because he was playing wrong lol. Dude died 300 times because he didn't know the motion sensor was alerting the Alien. I don't think I died 100 times across 5 playthroughs. He shouldn't actually lose his job over it, but it's fun to carry the hate torch. :messenger_tears_of_joy:

I meant what I said about gaming journos though.
Why is every gaming journalist so awful at actual playing of games? Is this some unspoken requirement?
 

Zacfoldor

Member
Let's name them.

Taul Passi
Jason Schreier
Gerst
Geoff
Grubb
Destin

oh and

Vara Dark
Asmongold
Smash JT
Colt Eastwood
Colin
Jaffe

That's over 10 who are making money!
 
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Novaex

Member
The only power this joke profession still has is the ability to influence metacritic scores which (unfortunately) still play a role for many devs and publishers, especially for single player games. Nothing of vaue would be lost if gaming "journalism" died out.
 
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hemo memo

You can't die before your death
Here's a crazy idea. What if gaming journalists and media outlets purchased their own copies of the games they review? This way, they could maintain complete editorial independence and avoid any pressure or influence from publishers.
 

Raven117

Member
The only power this joke profession still has is the ability to influence metacritic scores which (unfortunately) still play a role for many devs and publishers, especially for single player games. Nothing of vaue would be lost if gaming "journalism" died out
This. Truly it’s this. It’s a big part of why the industry is in the state it’s in.
 

bundylove

Member
You mean a made up proffession that noone asked for is going away for good? Good.
We dont need your leftist agenda fuck off . You destroyed gaming for a long time with your ideologies, push for woke shit and push to influence games and the direction they should take.
Your opinions which really is just opinions have no place in the gaming world.

Fuck off forever
 

Hollywood Hitman

Gold Member
'they're all overworked and underpaid'...

compared to what? i mean, if there really are only 2 dozen of them in existence, how can you tell? not to mention, if they're so badly mistreated, why in the hell are they 'just trying to hold onto their jobs' 2 paragraphs later?...
 

StreetsofBeige

Gold Member
'they're all overworked and underpaid'...

compared to what? i mean, if there really are only 2 dozen of them in existence, how can you tell? not to mention, if they're so badly mistreated, why in the hell are they 'just trying to hold onto their jobs' 2 paragraphs later?...
Classic supply and demand theory is higher prices if there's good demand and low supply. Well, according to Jason S, there's low supply and still bad money so to goes to show even the companies hiring them think they are worthless. LOL
 

Lunarorbit

Member
The last 20 years saw a massive decline in journalistic standards starting with kotaku and ign. Jason's long given up any kind of investigative work and his podcast reflected that.

When triple click first went live it was like their other podcast- review some games, highlights in the industry, trends, blah blah blah. Then they pulled a bait and switch and changed the format partially cause I dont think Jason plays games anymore. He became the thing he hated- a drone at forbes that turned his back on the industry.

You helped contribute to the slanted bloated press that has nothing to say now cause you played yourself.
 

Lunarorbit

Member
Woww.. I played that for the first time last year and thought it was amazing. Granted people can have differing opinions.. but I'm going to go check out this "review" to see what the hell he had to say.
That game was famously fucked for years. Someone forgot to put a single letter in the original code and it broke the alien following you. 3 or so years ago someone figured it out
 

Ivan

Member
As much as I hate youtubers/influencers in general, I think this is their victory to be honest. And partially steam reviews...
Still not for me, but I'd rather have that instead of those fucking "journalists".
 
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Humdinger

Gold Member
It's part of a larger trend that has seen traditional journalism die off in large sectors, replaced by independent outlets. Multiple reasons for this. I have a journalist friend who is quite distressed to see her profession slowly collapse around her. It's been going on for many years. Many traditional outlets have closed, relatively few trad journalists remain (compared to the old days). Tons of people have gotten laid off. Entry salaries are low, so you can't find good people to work there - not for long, anyhow. So lots of job insecurity and working with noobs with low qualifications and few options (because who would want to go into the field, the way it is)**. The AI takeover is the most recent cause for alarm, but the problems are many, and they've been going on a looong time.

You still see "legacy media" hanging on in some spots, but by and large it is being usurped by the little guy, the independent voices, cranking out content on the internet and social media. The quality of those little guys vary, of course, but it's a welcome trend. It's a long overdue rebellion against the monopoly on "approved opinion" that the traditional media held for so long. What's happening with trad journalists in the gaming space is a subset of that overall trend.

Back when I was in my 20s, I thought for a while that I might become a journalist. I'm glad I didn't choose that route.

** That's part of what happened with gaming journalism, btw. Financial decline in the journalism industry generally -> poor compensation, job insecurity -> who's going to be willing to take entry level jobs? You ended up with a lot of "gaming journalists" who had no desire to be gaming journalists, who were stuck with that job because it's all they could get. They had graduated with bachelors degrees in fields like English, sociology, psychology, history, or gender studies. They had little life experience and few options for employment, so they had to take what they could get - in this case, writing about videogames. That wasn't what they wanted to be doing, really. They were poorly paid, disgruntled, working in a low-status role at something they didn't care that much about, and were probably unhappy with their life. And it showed.
 
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StreetsofBeige

Gold Member
It's part of a larger trend that has seen traditional journalism die off in large sectors, replaced by independent outlets. Multiple reasons for this. I have a journalist friend who is quite distressed to see her profession slowly collapse around her. It's been going on for many years. Many traditional outlets have closed, relatively few trad journalists remain (compared to the old days). Tons of people have gotten laid off. Entry salaries are low, so you can't find good people to work there - not for long, anyhow. So lots of job insecurity and working with noobs with low qualifications and few options (because who would want to go into the field, the way it is)**. The AI takeover is the most recent cause for alarm, but the problems are many, and they've been going on a looong time.

You still see "legacy media" hanging on in some spots, but by and large it is being usurped by the little guy, the independent voices, cranking out content on the internet and social media. The quality of those little guys vary, of course, but it's a welcome trend. It's a long overdue rebellion against the monopoly over "accepted/approved opinion" that the traditional media held over public discourse for so long. What's happening with trad journalists in the gaming space is a subset of that overall trajectory.

Back when I was in my 20s, I thought for a while that I might become a journalist. I'm glad I didn't choose that route.

** That's part of what happened with gaming journalism, btw. Financial decline in the journalism industry generally -> poor compensation, job insecurity -> who's going to be willing to take entry level jobs? You ended up with a lot of "gaming journalists" who had no desire to be gaming journalists, who were stuck with that job because it's all they could get. They had graduated with bachelors degrees in fields like English, sociology, psychology, history, or gender studies. They had little life experience and few options for employment, so they had to take what they could get - in this case, writing about videogames. That wasn't where they wanted to be in their career. They were disgruntled, poorly paid, and probably unhappy with their overall situation. It showed.
When it comes to news, I think the typical person just likes being informed and entertained.

And if that means some guys doing YT videos in his spare time, cranking out low budget clips in his basement, or is a sports guy who does tons of daily tweets about the LA Lakers can be successful it shows that highly paid, slick studios and highly paid news anchors at 6 pm or 11 pm news arent needed or too late. It's the traditional news way of doing news on radio and TV, but not now as people move on. If people would rather read an unverified tweet over ABC news doing a story about it, it shows people dont really give a shit. They just want something to read or listen to be entertained than 100% accuracy. If they are that involved, they'll look for accuracy later.

And going by how skewed all the big corporations are... left wing, right wing, TV ads, I think most people see through that. As for gaming, ya there's some awesomely clever journalism like how everyone has seen some kind of lengthy article about the rise and fall of Sega, or the history of Neo Geo etc... but those rare.
 

Humdinger

Gold Member
When it comes to news, I think the typical person just likes being informed and entertained.

And if that means some guys doing YT videos in his spare time, cranking out low budget clips in his basement, or is a sports guy who does tons of daily tweets about the LA Lakers can be successful it shows that highly paid, slick studios and highly paid news anchors at 6 pm or 11 pm news arent needed or too late. It's the traditional news way of doing news on radio and TV, but not now as people move on. If people would rather read an unverified tweet over ABC news doing a story about it, it shows people dont really give a shit. They just want something to read or listen to be entertained than 100% accuracy. If they are that involved, they'll look for accuracy later.

And going by how skewed all the big corporations are... left wing, right wing, TV ads, I think most people see through that. As for gaming, ya there's some awesomely clever journalism like how everyone has seen some kind of lengthy article about the rise and fall of Sega, or the history of Neo Geo etc... but those rare.

Yup. And a lot of this has to do with losing faith in the mainstream/legacy media generally. It's not just in gaming journalism, of course. The whole "fake news" thing has been a death knell for them. They earned that reputation themselves; there's no conspiracy here. They failed over and over at their basic journalistic responsibilities. I won't get into the litany, because it's political. Most of us know it by heart. Mainstream/legacy media has lost credibility across the board. Part of this has been the rise of these alternative voices. They aren't always right, but at least you hear a variety of perspectives, not just a univocal one.
 
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