Duke Nukem PR People Publicly Threaten Those Who Give Bad Reviews
from the total-fail dept
You may have heard that Duke Nukem Forever finally came out after a decade plus of being vaporware. It's no secret that the original team behind the game was somewhat obsessive-compulsive about not releasing a bad game -- so much so that they never released any game, and kept restarting the project entirely. After 3D Realms finally went under, someone else took control and put together a game... but the initial reviews have been scathing, and suggest that the game should have stayed vaporware.In response, in a moment of pure PR failure, the PR firm repping the game, the Redner Group, publicly threatened to stop giving preview games to those who gave Duke Nukem Forever a bad review.
"Too many went too far with their reviews... we r reviewing who gets games next time and who doesn't based on today's venom."That's a huge no-no in the business, because it suggests the whole review business is a tit-for-tat setup, where you only get product if you give good reviews. Jim Redner, the guy behind the tweet removed the tweet, and admitted that he got caught up in the emotion:
It is not my intention to bully anyone. I over reacted. I just voiced an opinion. I have poured my heart into this project and I just want it to succeed.That's all pretty unfortunate. Of course, this is the nature of the game, if you do this kind of thing. It's also one of the reasons we've tended to stay away from ever dealing with PR people. We don't do product reviews like that, and in part it's because we didn't want to have to deal with this kind of thing. Still, in the end, such a reaction tends to reflect even worse on the game because it calls into question any positive reviews.
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Filed Under: duke nukem, failure, pr, reviews, threats
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2K fires PR firm
Link
In the end, Newton's third Law will come into effect. For every action, there will be an equal but opposite reaction.
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Re: 2K fires PR firm
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Re: Old news is old.
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Review
Why was the Redner Group upset about the reviews? They were just the PR group, not the people who had been working on it for 15 years.
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George Broussard and Scott Miller, for all their self congratulatory bullshit, have finally been exposed as the money grubbing frauds they are. I'll be surprised if they aren't sued somewhere down the line.
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SUCKS!!!!!!!!!!
Sue me fawkers, then maybe I can get you to fix your bugged crap!
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Stupid move is Stupid
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Even if the statement were made publicly doesn't change the fact it's still going on and most assuredly affecting reviews.
I won't name names, but I've got it on good authority one review site has to "throw a bone" on a title, regardless if it sucks, because to do so otherwise means the review site has nothing to review.
This is another game being played by developers, and it's pretty sickening, especially when gamers are the first to object to the $60+ price tag of incomplete/buggy games.
I'm not sure why this gaming industry has gone this route, but all they've done is to ensure I'll wait for Gamestop's $9.99 price point before I buy a title anymore.
And that's a shame, because I know there are great games out there. I'm just not willing to risk my money to find them.
Perhaps this be a wake-up call to the industry, any industry, playing this blacklist game.
What's next: prevent gamers from playing if they tweet a bad review?
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http://www.escapistmagazine.com/videos/view/zero-punctuation
I check his reviews every Wed, damn funny dude if you like vitriol/sarcasm/merciless commentary.
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The million dollar question
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Its not just the gaming companies, and its nothing new. Movie studios do the same thing to critics. Music labels do the same to DJs and radio stations. Computer hardware companies, same.
It is a direct result of treating your customers as passive consumers who will buy what you sell them, instead of really connecting with them to see what they want and working with them to provide it.
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Only one day I figured out that the reviews weren't much good for determining which games where worthy of spending money on and which games where the turkeys to avoid. Wasn't much reason to spend money on reviews that were cheerleading for all the games with no games being rated as duds, unfinished, or just plain bad.
What came out over a long period of time was that when gamer reviews come out bad, they don't get the next game ahead of the market to write the next review. It pretty well killed gamer review mags. They are worthless for determining if a game is worth the money. The reviews have to play ball to get the next game to review. I quit buying the review mags and the games too. There were just too many turkeys out there being billed as the next must have. Some were rushed to market, depending on internet connections to finish the game by upgrade.
In today's world it is better to ignore the gamer review. Most are not worth the effort to read the words.
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Confirmation of what everyone already knew
This particular game I haven't played yet so I can't speak as to how good or bad it is. But, because of this situation in the industry I took to never buying games at full price at launch anymore and waiting several months for them to go on sale before buying. This is regardless of reviews etc. It's sad, but its what we as gamers have to do to protect ourselves from getting burned all of the time. Aside from that, I would recommend going off user reviews rather that editorial reviews of games, you'll get a more accurate representation there I believe.
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DNF reviews
Can I just say... a bunch of the reviews are all XBox and PS3 related reviews. I can guarantee you that the majority of those people never played DN3d and don't have any clue.
From the looks of it, expectations were set too high and the reviews were just totally uncalled for.
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Game
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Re: Old Fool
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Re: 2K fires PR firm
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Constructive Criticism
Anyways, there IS a difference between, Damn, this was dissapointing and sucked, here's why : backtracking, crude offensive jokes (That the reviewer has no tolerance for),short playthrough, outdated graphics,and the game feels 15 yrs old. But hey, it run well, and what do you expect for an abandoned game that was picked out of bit bucket and polished a little. Don't buy it expecting a great game, it is for seriously nostolgic fans that will overlook all of it's flaws only.
That versus, This game makes you feel dirty, it is offensive that your a horrible person if you find it funny and must be a simple minded teenager at that, the gameplay is terrible and makes you insane like looking upon Cthulu himself, it should never have been released, insult,insult,insult. Don't buy it they are monsters for making the game.
If you are being crappy, offensive, and insulting about the game being reviewed which is also offensive,crappy, and insulting, why should the reviewer expect to get treated any different when judged on his work?
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Re: Stupid move is Stupid
The fact is, people can and should write whatever they want about the game. If a pub doesn't want to do a thorough analysis and instead wants to mock a bunch of superficial aspects, there's no grand rule that says they can't. Reviewers are free to "miss the point" either intentionally or unintentionally.
Basically, the game is out there and it has to stand by itself. Getting mad at people for criticizing it is pointless and makes it sound like they know it sucks. If they were confident that it was an amazing game, they would keep their mouths shut and let it succeed on its own merits.
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And it's rather ironic for them to get mad about vitriol and vulgarity when those are the distinguishing marks of the Duke Nukem franchise.
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Re: 2K fires PR firm
Sorry >_>;
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Re: DNF reviews
In other words, the game can't stand on its own. That's a condemnation of it right there.
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Re: The million dollar question
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Not everyone in the world keeps their finger on the pulse.
Whatever pulse that is, I have no idea, but the message is still the same..
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Re: The million dollar question
....nothing....
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Re: DNF reviews
People have been waiting for this game for a decade. When the new developer took over, they knew damn well they were going to have to live up to some of the highest expectations that have ever existed in the industry. It's no excuse at all.
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Re: Constructive Criticism
But this PR guy's threat that reviewers would be shut out of that process in the future - based on their expressed opinions - was totally out of line. He could've taken issue with some of the nastier reviews and left the threat out entirely and there could've been a nice little flamewar for 5-10 minutes and his co. would still have a contract.
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Re: Re: Constructive Criticism
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That will probably soon be a term in the Apple TOS.
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Re: Stupid move is Stupid
Here is the relevant section:
". . . You see, the women in the alien craft are being forcibly impregnated by the aliens, and during your journey, you hear a mixture of screams and sexual noises. After I accidentally blew up a few of these female victims in a firefight, Duke made a joke about abortion.
"This is what passes for humor in the game. It's not racy, it's not funny, and it makes you feel dirty. Every time I put the controller down, I felt the need to rub my hands on my jeans as if the game were making me physically dirty. It's like watching your uncle tell racist jokes at Thanksgiving and praying someone has the guts to tell him to cut it out, but this time it's interactive—and you're the uncle."
I consider this to be good writing. It gives specific examples of what happens in the game, and then the reviewer describes his personal reaction to that content.
The full review can be found at:
http://arstechnica.com/gaming/reviews/2011/06/duke-nukem-forever-review-barely-playable-unfun ny-and-rampantly-offensive.ars
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Re: Re: DNF reviews
Isn't that how all games are now? It's extremely rare to find a squeal that can stand on it's own. Even Final Fantasy is getting into the realm where if you don't play the previous ones, the new ones kinda suck.
And yeah, sniperdoc is right. The reviewers probably never did play Duke3d and were probably expecting something just bloody and violent (Like GOW3) instead of raunchy, vulgar, and insulting. In that respect, Duke lived up to his name.
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Re: Re: Re: Constructive Criticism
That alone would have earned the PR group their next contract.
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Re: Re: Stupid move is Stupid
If good writing is "don't fully understand what I'm writing about," then yeah.
Also, what did the reviewer expect when playing this game? It was equally as crass for its time way back when.
Users are generally more favorable with the game, from what I've seen. It's not a $50-$60 game, but it certainly isn't deserving of the vitriol it is getting.
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Re: Re: Re: Stupid move is Stupid
I think you are probably right about "what did the reviewer expect?" aspect - but I don't think that small detail you are criticizing him over changes anything about the point he is trying to make. And, incidentally, the quoted article also includes an update the reviewer added after commenters there pointed out the same thing to him.
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That doesn't mean he shouldn't point that out.
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This is not news, just bad PR marketing.
Just look at what Sony did to Park Place Productions.
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