230°

The Year’s Worst Bullshots, aka, Screenshots That Lied To You

Kotaku - It was back in 2005 that Penny Arcade first coined the term "bullshot", giving a definition to the practice of doctoring video game screenshots to make them look better than the game actually is.

You'd think the intervening seven years, the rise of the video trailer and a growing awareness of the practice would have seen bullshots go away, but no. They're still around, and still as bullshotty as ever.

CaptainCamper4158d ago

King of the bullshot: The War Z

victoryscreeeeeech4157d ago

I dont know about that game, why is it a bullshot?

nveenio4157d ago

I'm going to play devil's advocate here:

Bullshots are in all marketing. The reason is in order to more closely mimic what our eyes see when we look at these things in real-time. Let me give you an example. I am developing software for a group of hotels in a city near where I live. They keep handing me photos of their rooms, and all of the photos are terrible. So I go to take a photo. When I'm taking the photo, the room looks great. But when I get it back to my computer, what I see is wrinkled sheets, messed up dust ruffles, crooked pillows, marks on the walls, etc. The same happens with their restaurant. They have great looking desserts. But when I take a photo, I see that the strawberry isn't centered. The whipped cream is leaning to the right. Rhubarb is an ugly color.

So I have to go out of my way to doctor the photos in a way that those problems aren't the focus of the image. Is it dishonest? It would be if I doctored them the same way McDonald's doctors photos of the Big Mac. But I just try to remove the things that are distracting that wouldn't be noticed in person anyway.

And that's what they do with these game shots. When playing the game, you won't notice that the explosion is a little low-poly. You won't notice that the texture on so-and-so's belt buckle is low-res. So they remove these issues from the screenshot in the interest of presenting the game so that it matches the experience we'll have during play.

No one complains about Rockstar not showing gameplay of the GTA games before release. All we get to see are doctored and prepared photos and cut scenes. When we buy GTA at midnight launch, we have no idea what we're getting. But we buy it anyway, because it's not the pretty screenshots that sell us. It's the game.

Just as you wouldn't date a girl from Match.com based on a single, weird-angled bathroom mirror photo, you shouldn't buy a game based on screenshots.

-Mezzo-4158d ago

This practice needs to Stop.

ScubbaSteve4157d ago

Yea! Kotaku really needs to stop writing articles it's getting pretty ridiculous. Also, the deceptive marketing screenshots are pretty bad too.

Welshy4157d ago

I suggest we make a "The years worst Kotaku articles, AKA, the most sensationalist, knee jerk written bullshit".

All Kotaku are good at are leaking things and prying peoples business. The community is just plain terrible too, just read just about every comment section for any article.

mttrackmaster384157d ago

N4g's community isn't too good either honestly.

iamnsuperman4157d ago

I agree it irritates me when these people release "screenshots" but they are not screenshots. I thought releasing CGI trailers was bad but at least on them they put at the bottom "Not actual game footage".

Megaton4157d ago

Epic is the king of the bullshot. They always make the newest Gears game look a generation ahead. I think UE3 lends itself very well to bullshotting.

Awesome_Gamer4157d ago

Exactly, It's kinda funny how 360 fanboys use those bullshots to claim Gears of War looks better than Uncharted, lol.

WeskerChildReborned4157d ago

The devs need to give an actual presentation for how the game looks like on each console.

MariaHelFutura4157d ago

I don't know why anyone would disagree w/ that.

Beastforlifenoob4157d ago

@maria
Maybe the clicked the wrong button? Not even kidding happend to me about 3 times

jetpacksheep4157d ago

With the exception of Halo 4 in the screens gallery all the other screenshots are just ultra settings PC screens. Companies use this to show off their game as best as they can, its common marketing sense.

UnwanteDreamz4157d ago

It's misleading, being a popular practice doesn't make it right.

sheep

porkChop4157d ago

They're just showing off the best version of their game. That's not misleading at all. I mean even when devs show gameplay they almost always specify whether it's console or PC footage. If anyone was actually mislead by any of those PC screens they're both blind and naive.

Norrison4157d ago

Don't know why people disagree, it's true.

Show all comments (27)
50°

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EKWB reportedly plagued with financial disarray many gaming pc's left without parts

EK Cooling allegedly has slipped itself into a hot soup of seemingly endless financial woes, where it has not paid its staff, suppliers, and contractors for many months as the company is facing liquidity problems and a surplus of inventory left unsold, stuck in the warehouse for a more extended period. Gamers Nexus investigated these claims made by former and current personnel, where he found trails of unpaid bills lasting as long as three to four months and unpaid raises that accumulated for almost a year.

EK Water Blocks has two entities—a Slovenian-based headquarters and a US-based subsidiary, EK Cooling Solutions. Steve narrated the series of events in detail, stating that the company was reportedly irresponsible and negligent regarding payment. Consequently, partners and employees are forced to share the burden of alleged mismanagement. It all begins with its extensive range of products, leading to a surplus of goods. EK has over 230 water blocks, 40 liquid cooling kits, 85 reservoirs, 40 pumps, 73 radiators, and 212 miscellaneous accessories.

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just_looken3d ago (Edited 3d ago )

Yes this is not about video games directly but indirectly this will impact the pc gaming/workstation space hard.

This company is massive one of two in the water cool space so if it goes poof then thousands out there have no spare parts or half built computers.

SO yeah i know not about a video game but think of it as amd leaving the pc space but this is ekwb that could be leaving water cooling in the pc space

Jayz2cents a supporter of there products also has issues
https://www.youtube.com/wat...

Giblet_Head1d 11h ago (Edited 1d 11h ago )

As someone that has built a watercooling rig. EK is big, but there's so many numerous watercooling part companies out there. EK's stuff isn't exactly amazing quality for the price compared to others either, it's just ok. Much like Corsair. The impact would be negligible long term. For perspective the majority of my parts are XSPC, at most I use EK for my gpu waterblocks and fittings. Both easily replaceable.