I'm going to have to call bullshit on IGN here. If they don't see what could possibly be wrong and, at the very least, perceptibly shady about getting an exclusive REVIEW (especially one that gives the game a full 10), then they truly deserve the reputation they've received as of late.

I think Bo Derek may be too obscure for most Kotaku posters.

@Michael:

I'll comment about the story later. I just wanted to point out that the stories picture's file name says "10.jpg" but the alt text of the image says "7.9". Are you trying to say something?

That is not a gracious response.

@Flippy_D: Hillary is not a gracious person... in fact, he's a dick and he's often wrong and loud as well. Still, I don't think he's unethical; he's just foolish at times.

@riffleraffle: Not my concern! :)

@okenny :): Oh, just referencing a well known IGN review. Perhaps I should've gone with 9.9?

If IGN snagged an exclusive more power to them. I think the whole thing is nonsense. There is bigger fish to fry in the industry news.

@Michael McWhertor: A ten is fine... I'm just digging for worms :)

@riffleraffle:
Considering she hasn't had a decent job in years? =P

Okay so from reading the interview it is mentioned that the deal was for them to have first dibs and ign wouldn't give a very harsh review along with frontpage advertising. Now, Goldstein questions how it can be ethically concerning about a deal like that?

@Guitaratomik:
I kind of have to agree. I didn't want to, but that was a very evasive response by Hilary.

@okenny :): Hillary's a...man? Explains a lot somehow.

No, it *is* ethically troubling. And if the industry wasn't populated with people who didn't notice/care about these things, this kinds of practice would get more scrutiny.

@KirbyMorph: Zing! Wait... is that you sis?

The main point that I took from Ben Fritz's article was that you don't see this "exclusive review" foolishness for movies, TV shows or music, so why should it exist for video games? Whether or not this is ethically troubling, I'm not sure. But it does concern me because I want video games to be mainstream, and having to deal with agencies like IGN who aggressively try to get exclusives is an obstacle that some mainstream outlets may not want to deal with.

This is also IGN we're talking about... any chance I have to brand them as contemptuous is one I'm going to take.

How freaky. I was just randomly browsing Peter Sellers trivia on IMDB and ran into 10. Then I hopp over into Kotaku-land, AND SHE FOLLOWED ME.

@Mikintosh: agreed, has everyone forgotten the old kotaku article (appolgies if it was from another source) from a formor rockstar employee (or was it a leak I can't remember) about their marketing practices in getting reviews?

I personally don't see IGN thinking twice at all about journalistic integrity in any case if at all and that is definatly reflected in that statement.

The real problem here is that the game is great so great. That reguardless from the perfect score very few people were going to think twice about the extra day or two IGN got. Which I see as a very sad thing.

IGN has never been worth my time. The only time I have EVER spent any time on IGN is IGN dreamcast. F this ho.

Payola is payola. If IGN wants to keep its seat at the big kids table they will have to play along.

The problem is not that this is happening. It happens with movies all the time. The problem is that the most trusted reviewers (by the general public) are the ones taking the money.

A trailer for a shitty movie will have quotes from unknown reviewers, and the studios try everything to keep you from knowing it--swooshing quotes by in an effort to give the absolute minimum disclosure required by law. If the best quote you can find is from Jim Ferguson from WBAI Radio, the public knows that is shit. They know the major papers and reviewers, and those reviewers are mostly above the studios' influence. But in gaming, where are our Eberts, our New York Times? They are buried in obscurity, because almost no one has risen to the level of prestige that the game companies have to deal with that reviewer on his or her own terms.

This will happen once outlets like the Times starts devoting real resources to video games, but the game companies will do everything they can to delay this.

Haha, props on the 7.9 alt text.

@KirbyMorph: Hillary is the fat dude from Vice City. XD

what is the name of the girl in the pic?

@Grimmjow Jeagerjaques:
You're joking, right?

Hilary's a moron. Variety is a film and television industry trade magazine - a trade magazine - that's been around for decades and is still morning reading for every single film and television executive in the country. My office has Daily Varieties lying all over the lobby and in every office you walk into.

IGN is a 10 year old web site populated by 20 year old kids with no real journalistic experience whatsoever. For Hilary Goldstein to suggest Variety wrote this out of jealousy frankly just shows his immaturity as both a critic and as a person. He honestly thinks Variety wrote this because they couldn't get a copy of the game?

I've got news for him: if Variety wanted this game, they could have had it sometime around 1993, before Rockstar or IGN even existed. Yes, they're so powerful and well-established, they can bend space-time.

Variety, like all other respectable publications, does not do "exclusive reviews". And good for them.

@Grimmjow Jeagerjaques: That's Bo Derek, as she appeared in the 1979 film "10". You see what McWhertor did there? Oh, yeah. He's saying that IGN is behind the times by a factor of 29 years!

Screw you, Occam's Razor!

@Minister of Fun: There's a TV personality/"movie critic" in Sacramento who has lots of those positive blurbs on otherwise mediocre to bad movies.

[www.sacbee.com]

I'm sure that video games have their Eberts and NY Times, but the reviewer that fits into those categories may be different for different gamers. My approach to reviewers is

1.) Does the reviewer have a somewhat similar taste in games as me? If so, what they like and dislike about gameplay, stories, etc., will jive with my tastes.

2.) Does the reviewer have a complete 180 difference from me. Same kind of (but opposite) deal as #1.

3.) If there is a score, does the text of the review fully reflect the final score (be it numerical or letter) of the game? Does that site have a general guideline of what their particular scoring system represents.

I don't have much (if any) control over the politics behind some game journalism, but I do have control over what I read and what I choose to do with that information.

Aw crud, I meant to also say kudos to the picture selection. The Bo Derek reference is awesome and I have absolutely adored the panda usage as well!!

Sorry for the double scoop.

This seems like a non-issue, because most people weren't going to need a review to tell them they wanted GTA and most games that people might hesitate to buy pending a review probably wouldn't have anybody bothering to get an exclusive. Let IGN waste their money.

My issue with the IGN review is they gave the game a 10. They stated that a game did not need to be perfect but rather a 10 signified the game was pushing bounderies. Okay. Look at the breakdown. A 10 for graphics. Really? What are the bounderies? Unreal 3 and Crysis just to name two. Am I honestly expected to bite into that? GTA IV is pushing past that?

I have logged a few hours so far and sevreal areas clearly fail to push the bounderies set by games from LAST YEAR.

Design flaws are more than 1 or 2. For a sand box game simple things like removing the GPS when not in the designated mission car are ridiculous. That just scratches the surface. There are some (several) AI moments in the game that are below the level of Crackdown.

I think the game offers a vast enjoyable environment but it hardly pushes the bounderies across every single area of consideration.

IGN just keeps going lower and lower in my opinion. What I once thought of as one of the few respectable new media journalism sites had revealed itself over the years to be just a bunch of wannabe-writer immature idiots.

I think that Penny Arcade podcast (the one where they insulted their own fans' comments and opinions on Assassins Creed and got into a hissy-fit whinefest about a Penny Aracde that wasn't about them in the first place) was their lowest point.

They're kind of entertaining at this point, but I can't think of them as professional in the least.

@exaggeration17a: YEAH, I totally see what McWhertor did. good one.

I agree, I don't think IGN should have an exclusive review. I read what they had to say, all seven pages of it. After playing for the last three days I don't agree with much they said. Hell, I don't think the game is revolutionary in any way. Portal was revolutionary. Echocrome is revolutionary. Another GTA with better graphics, more to do, and basically a next gen sequal isn't revolutionary.

Don't get me wrong, I like the game, but in order to call something revolutionary, it much be a new concept, new gameplay, something we've never seen before, and must blow us away. GTA IV does all except isn't a new concept, open gameplay has been around and we've seen it with GTA III, Crackdown, Saints Row... the list goes on. All GTA IV brings is better storyline, a good name, and some next gen graphics, otherwise... blah

Ethics 101:for game reviewers
Do not accept gifts from someone you have a business relationship with.

So, whey TT sends a goodie bag full of GTA merchandise, it is unethical for you to accept it.

We do have a few Eberts... Gabe & Tycho and Yahtzee being a few of them. It's just that the stupids want a review score that isn't "5 Stars" or "Two Thumbs Up"

"Goldstein theorizes that "if Variety didn't get the game early then you're looking at somebody, I don't know, who had a grudge on his shoulder because he didn't even have the game yet and we'd already put out the review."

Great Ad Hominem there Goldstein. Staying classy, logical, and intelligent like the best of them.

Perhaps I'm a little bias, because I'm a fan of Hillary and the 360.IGN crew, except maybe Nate...=) But here's my response:

The issue here is not the 10/10 score. The score is no proof, because a quick trip to metacritic and you'll find many non-exclusive tens. I also find numbers useless when compared to words, so the point is moot for me. But back to that in a minute...

Fritz seems to be worried that when given an "exclusive" review, the publication becomes bias due to the "major boost in Web traffic or magazine sales." But where is the incentive in that to cook up a more positive review because of that? I would think that had GTA been a horrible game, for instance, and that IGN had then given GTA a 5.5/10, that would have brought even more traffic to their website because of all the hype behind the game.
"IGN's Exclusive GTA IV Review: Biggest Disappointment in Gaming History" Doesn't that sound like a more enticing title that would garner more traffic?

Back to the numbers. Unfortunately, Fritz is contradictory throughout his article in his issues with exclusive reviews. He says about Game informer's exclusive Mass Effect review:
"it's very possible that the Game Informer folks just disagreed with me and that's well within their rghts."
But then goes on for an entire paragraph, in perentheses, about how the text of the review doesn't seem to match the numerical score. Which insinuates that Game Informer's 9.75 was higher than it should have been due to the exclusivity of the review. Again, despite the fact that a quick trip to Metacritic and you'd find many non-exclusive tens.

He then went on to update his article with: "Mini-preview: I've been playing it a while and it's really good. But it's not 10/10 "best since 'Ocarina of Time'" good. It does have faults" Which is completely contradictory to everything else he said and further leads me to believe his problem is with the numerical score.

I find no issue with exclusivity, because all publications get it in some form or another at some point. And I fail to see any evidence that exclusivity affects reviews.

@Hatchetforce: Wait, doesn't the GPS work in any car? And in all fairness while the graphics aren't technically superior to many games the score does factor in art style, which fits the game beautifully. And in all fairness they did say the categories weren't flawless but that the few flaws they had were so outweighed by the negatives that they gave it a ten. I can see why you would disagree but they did at least defend their resoning

@WickedOrange: Calling GTA IV merely a production value/graphics update but referring to Portal as a revolution seems inaccurate as technically it's just the production value/graphics update to their former game Narbacular Drop: [en.wikipedia.org]

I think IGN more than justified their score in their seven page review.
You may not agree with it, but that's irrelevant, they gave a score and they explained why the gave it.
As for people being given exclusive access to material, it happens with movies and music as well, nonly in those cases it tends to be exclusive access to the artists involved.
the problem with games as opposed to media like music and movies is the timesacale involed in being able to accurately review the product.
So your competitor gets to see the movie before you, no biggie, it onl takes you two hours to catch up.

Games on the other hand, take a lot longer to play through in order to review.
IGN's exclusive review of GTA must have garnered them a fuckton of extra traffic, and that translates into cold cash.
Why did Rockstar decide to allow them this privelaged early review?
I find it hard to belive it was just one of those things.

I'm stumped as to how every review out their was able to play the game yet there seem to be so many load/freeze issues out there (esp PS3)...I just got the game tonight and yup...freezes right up like Bo's career.

While Goldstein is one of the better writers in any IGN channel (not saying much!), I think he completely dodges the real issue in that kind of response.

He simply diverts the argument to being about Variety and ethics, whatever that actually means in games journalism. Instead of addressing any point of contention towards his own words, he goes on the attack. defensive much? Did he review a retail copy of the game, or was it preview code authorized by Rockstar? Why was IGN favored with such a wonderous blessing?

We're to believe there was no incentive for Rockstar to trust IGN exclusively with the first critical press their game has ever recieved? Bullshit. I for one haven't read his review because I think all exclusive reviews are bullshit. It doesn't mean that I believe all exclusive reviews are bought and paid for, but damnit if the don't all feel that way.

Deadline pressure, fanboyism, whatever it is, I find most exclusive reviews to be noncommittal, and loaded with nice fluffy meaningless platitudes that read more like a really long preview than anything that amounts to thoughtful, intelligent criticism. Be it GTA or Mass Effect, and whether it's IGN or OXM or Gamespot, I just can't take any of them seriously. Niggling complaints get ignored, and many outlets review incomplete code (all too often) that isn't truly representative of what I'll be playing at home.

What's the incentive for the publishers anyway if they don't know in advance they're getting a favorable score? Am I going to more or less likely to buy GTA based on what Hilary Goldstein says because he said it first? Christ I hope nobody answers "yes" to that question!

I think the practice is bunk, and without there being an ulterior motive for developers and publishers to engage in the practice, I completely fail to see how an exclusive review benefits anyone other than the outlet who printed it. Maybe that's why Variety thinks it's shady... I know it's why I do.

@Bluecell: I agree. I also like the 360 guys too. If you follow them and listen to their podcasts and stuff, they're definitely not the type of guys who would just give a game a better score like that just because of an exclusive review. In fact, I think IGN had the exclusive review on Assassin's Creed and even if they didn't, they had at least a shitload of marketing content on the site and it gets a 7. Hilary also reviewed that. Also, it seems barely anyone here even read the interview. Those quotes are mostly taken out of context and in the interview, Hilary makes a lot of good points. Best one being that nobody contacted IGN or Hilary or anyone to ask about this or the review. Not Kotaku, not the guy who wrote the article. Best one was at the end: "And of course we gave it a 10. But so did everyone else. There's not a person out there, even in the complaints, nobody said "this game is awful and IGN's giving it a 10." Everybody said that this game is brilliant. So what? Instead of telling people, "get the game" we were telling them "really get the game." It's sort of nit picky."

@stranger: Read the actual article. It answers almost all of your questions. Even the last one. It's bold and blown up on the page I think that part. Also, this quote really isn't representative of the interview and article at all. He addresses most of everyone's concerns in the long interview and then at the end, the interviewer asks if he has any last thoughts he'd like to say and this is where he says that. C'mon people, at least read the linked article before you make lengthy responses attacking the guy.

Why on Earth is this article accompanied with a picture of Bo Derek? O_o

@badasscat: +1

It's not like they're the only ones to give it a 10.0 for some extra money or something. They had an early review, and it's the same review everyone gave it. Different story maybe, if the entire world scored it un-perfectly.

Played for three hours and no freezing here. Am I just lucky?

Hilary is such a fanboy.Wasn't he the one who gave SA a 9.9 too? He just slobbers over all the games he likes.

"Exclusive" reviews should always be suspect. On what condition did IGN get the exclusive? Some kind of favor has to be involved.

@badasscat: Spot-on.

"IGN is a 10 year old web site populated by 20 year old kids with no real journalistic experience whatsoever."

Oh snap!

@Samos42:
I'm not attacking Goldstein for HIS GTA review per se, but as someone who's been familiar with the guy's games writing for years now, I have a really good idea what to expect from his work.

I stated flat out that I don't waste my time reading exclusive reviews, because they are all inherently bunk as far as I'm concerned. I could be wrong about that, but I never said that the IGN GTA review was problematic for me in any way. My problem is with the very the practice of acquiring exclusive critical content, buy any entertainment media outlet, about any game, album, or movie.

To say trading marketing favors (like the promised free advertising in the form of preview articles that Goldstien himself admits to having done to secure the GTA review) for exclusive criticism rights doesn't create a moral quandry is simply naive.

Having read the article, I find it incredibly specious that Goldstien both finagled the review for IGN and then chose himself to write it. There is a tremendous ethical oversight right there on IGN at large he was allowed to do that much. All I was trying to indicate above was that it didn't surprise me that IGN would engage themselves in this way, my opinion of them already being so low...

Ok- according to Goldstien, who himself isn't really to be trusted to be publicly honest on this for obvious reasons, he didn't promise a specific score, he did promise them something. That to me creates a huge ethical conflict, regardless of score, writer, game, or anything else. Besides, do you really believe that Take Two PR thought for a second that IGN was going to have anything else to write about in March & April 08? What, other than GTA were they gonna feature on the front page? The entire videogame industry has given Rockstar a wide berth for GTA.

Let's just hope that Rockstar's response to this is that the never engage in exclusive review agreements for any game the ever release. Personally I'd like it very much if all publishers would do the same.

@trunk3h:
#personally don't see IGN thinking twice at all about journalistic integrity in any case if at all and that is definatly reflected in that statement."

Well said. And I fully agree.