I'll touch on the ice cream sandwich soon enough.
Most of us would probably agree that game journalism in general is not quite where it should be. Some might even say it's mostly bad. I know I would. But if we more or less agree on the problem, could we come together on a solution?
If I were to abridge my suggestion to improve the culture surrounding video game writing as much as possible, it would sound something like this: "Read before you write".
Too many times I've seen articles go completely unchallenged or ignored altogether. If a person replies, that person will quite often reply to elements of the text, or maybe just the title or the first paragraph, and care very little about examining or trying to understand the arguments of the text.
In no instance is this more apparent than when you encounter a title phrased as a question on N4G. To make use of a rather dull example, say you decided to browse the comments section of an article titled "Do videogames make us violent?". I'd be willing to be the first comments are something like:
"No." (which of course, earns the author of the comment a "well said")
"Most boring question ever. Move on already."
"I play video games and I turned out just fine."
Granted, it is a tired old question, but let's do a thought experiment. Say that this article was based on some breakthrough research showing a distinct link between violent behaviour and violent video games. Wouldn't that at least be worth discussing in greater detail?
I really think critical enquiries and well-researched opinion pieces would be more common in game journalism if writers and readers alike spent less time writing/commenting and more time reading. In many cases, the article will make the person who comments's point for him/her, and in other cases the article will tackle that exact point.
However, if the article really is just the same tired old story, or if it can be proven false, then no comment carries greater weight than the one that deals with the article on factual basis.
Imagine a world in which you wrote a piece called "How game X copied game Y", and you weren't just met with angry comments and arguments that you've already tackled in your article, but actual responses that prove your arguments and reasoning to be flawed. You look at them, politely phrased as they are, and have to admit that this time around you really should have done your research better.
Ignorant and angry comments, on the other hand, are likely to make you feel like you have a point. Sure, you'll be annoyed, but that's because you feel like you're not getting your message through to the public. Further down the page there's a completely valid criticism of your article, but who reads through 23 comments of hatred and stupidity to get to that one? No, you go on to writing another article like you wrote the first one.
I think, and I don't have much more than personal experience to back this up with, that polite, precise and well-informed feedback is the best antidote to bad writing. A collective display of hate might upset the writer, it MIGHT even scare the writer away, but most likely it'll only harden him/her, and make him/her care less about feedback in the future.
Qualitative reading furthers qualitative writing. Not just in the case of well-informed feedback repelling ill-informed writing, but in the case of a well-read writer being a writer with more to write about.
So why don't we read? Are we all uneducated barbarians?
Well, no. Not entirely.
The Internet as a format carries quite a lot of the blame. If you have everything competing for your attention at the click of a button, surely there are better things to do than read an article about video games?
Also, anyone can be a writer on the Internet. And with the power of N4G they can even be given a fairly loud voice. Some of the articles racking up 100s or 1000s of degrees on this site are written by people who apparently do not have any knowledge of what it means to be a journalist. They give (false) information without sources, or even worse, provide no information to back up their claims at all. Also, the grammar and spelling is often anything but inviting (This is a blog, so that's my excuse for not proofreading).
I won't encourage you to criticise the crap out of these people. Some of them don't have english as their native language, some are twelve-year-olds aspiring to be writers. Let's not scare these people away from writing for eternity, but: In business, there's this thing called a "compliment sandwich" (illustrated well by Family Guy: http://www.youtube.com/watc... it's a little sleazy and obnoxious, but I find it often gets the job done. I suggest we make more of these sandwiches.
Here's the recipe:
Read the article. Acknowledge what's wrong and what's good (in some cases I'll even resort to "I appreciate the article"), pack it in nicely, and you've got a piece of delicious constructive criticism ready to post.
As a writer, and a human being in general, I find it much more easy to take criticism from someone who adresses you in a nice way and who can prove that they've at least read the article. Being wrong can be painful, and many (completely grown-up people, as well) will find it extremely difficult to admit that they're wrong to someone with no tact or no. It is, however, not as painful to be wrong if you also did something right. Yeah, you thought Sonic Heroes came out in 2012, but a least your language was good. So you keep the good and trash the bad.
The problem with my proposal: It's a bottom-up plan. It demands that people read this, which in itself is quite ironic, and that they absorb the message - agree to it, and decide to spread the word. What are the odds that this sparks any real change? Slim. But I thought it was a message worth putting on paper.
Be patient - read carefully, and if you don't have the time to read - don't take the time to comment.
Black Ops 6 is rumored to release on PS4 and Xbox One consoles, which will be a huge set back for the upcoming Call of Duty title.
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Play Planet Zoo: Console Edition on Xbox Series X|S or PlayStation 5? You get treated to a couple of gems in the Aquatic & the Twilight pack
It's no secret that the best way to agrees and bubbles is to post the first or one of the first comments, keep it as short and undetailed as possible so everyone will read it, and align with the likely opinion of the vast majority. The article in question being an easy target helps a lot.
But if you post first and the comment is controversial, or you write more text to detail your point, the less likely you are to get anything out of it.
I assume that accounts for a lot of what you're describing. The whole system is unconstructive and cowardly. It's less about how constructive your contributions are, and more about how much you can pander to tl;dr on a one-sided issue.
I doubt there will be any changes, the community loves to fight and argue.They don't need to read to do that.I think articles should have a user rating are something though, something to allow N4G users to let others know if a article is good are not.There is no way to tell if a article is good are not before you read it are the comments(comments if your lucky anymore).I agree people need to read before they comment but they should also know if what there going to read is quality are not.
Edit:An no more 5 pages with one paragraph per page that annoys me and is just for hits.
So many times I go in to articles with sensational headlines and then I actually read the article. It gives me a better understanding of what the title is talking about. But then I read the comments and it just baffles the hell out of me that others didn't take the time to do the same as they leave the wrong comments throughout the page.
I came across this twice just last week:
what-respawn-and-titanfall-ca n-teach-the-industry-about-next -gen-development
and
major-nelson-it-took-years-fo r-360-to-mature-same-long-game- planned-for-xbox-one
Both times the first poster made a wrong comment based on the title alone. I think the problem are people racing to be the first to comment and leaving posts that will get the most attention and therefore a "well said" and an extra bubble. Another problem with this site are posters playing to the majority of the communities views and leaving comments that are guaranteed to get them an extra bubble.
In my honest opinion the admins should flag this as an off topic immediately. I understand that they are volunteers and they have a life outside too, but if you want to take on that responsibility of an admin/mod then you have to do more than just look for the obvious N4G perps and keywords used to break the rules.
Sensationalist headlines are a problem. If you entitle an article "Why The Last of Us is Overrated" you should expect some angry reaction. But within the article the author never really meant that, then what is the purpose of the flaming title?
I wish you would have picked something better than "Video Games are Violent" because that was my graduate thesis. Violent Media does not cause violent individuals. This has been proven through peer reviewed, refereed research (that was alliterative). I am, quite honestly, done with the intellectual dishonesty of these articles, so when the first poster writes "No" that is an automatic bubble from me.
Good, thought provoking blog! Keep it up. One day gaming journalism just might get better.
'People demand freedom of speech as a compensation for the freedom of thought which they seldom use.'