The blog NZGamer wouldn't publish

Author's Note: This blog was originally submitted to NZGamer.com nearly a month ago and was denied publication. For several weeks I negotiated with NZG admins Aaron Scott and Shaun Hunter over their problems with the blog and conceeded many changes to the original text. This eventually proved fruitless when requests for changes became increasingly vague and the blog was finally deleted by NZGamer with no explanation given.

It is NZG's adamancy not to let its readership view this blog that suggests to me how important it is that they do. Even if it affects little change.

-Dannyboy

That’s Not Journalism.

If you travel to right parts of the internet you’ll see the term ‘video game journalism’ in heavy dispute. For some, the phrase is a veritable oxymoron. For others, it’s a new specialist press that deserves just as much respect as film, sport, or music writing.

Whether writing product reviews constitutes journalism I don’t know. But what I do know is that copying and pasting press releases isn’t.

Anyone who has gone through the painful process of reading the news feed on NZG knows that ‘news’ consists of one of either two items: A) The announcement of competition winners, or B) a video game press release that has been copied and pasted.

Here are a couple of recent examples: Persona 4 Arrives Next Month, New GodFather 2 Date Announced, EA Announces G.I. Joe.

These stories and the majority of all NZG news stories are ripped directly from press releases that are sent out by publicists for the video game industry. For a long time NZG has used GamesPress, one of the largest video game PR wires. Many video game websites use these PR wires or are even sent emails directly from local PR contacts (eg. Nintendo Australia). Most websites choose a couple and rewrite them, NZG has for a long time favoured the direct copy and paste approach.

In newsrooms this isn’t called journalism, they call it churnalism. And it’s time NZG stopped it now.

I am not blaming or trying to single out Morgan Bates – who writes the majority of the news stories these days - because this is not his fault. NZG has been doing this for a long time and no staff member in the history of the website has ever enjoyed this practice. Back when I wrote for NZG we actually had staff competitions involving news quotas to provide an incentive to perform this unrewarding and repetitive task.

What are the problems with copying and pasting press releases I hear NZG’s editorial team ask? They’re numerous.

Firstly, most of these stories aren’t written for NZ readers. Despite Aaron Scott’s claims that NZG strives to offer a “kiwi perspective”, you’re not doing your readers any service by not converting money from pounds, insistently leaving in the ‘Inc’s, ‘Ltd’s, and ‘Corp’ abbreviations after every mention of a company name, or casually referring to towns like ‘Durham’ and ‘Cardiff’ as if they’re in our backyard.

Second, and most disturbingly, these press releases are just that: Press. Releases. They’re advertisements for video game producers and distributors and pretending they’re actual content drains NZG’s credibility as an objective news outlet. Every story I’ve ever read on NZG about video game piracy is essentially unfettered propaganda from ELSPA – an organisation of British video game publishers which is the equivalent of the record industry organisations that whine so frequently about illegal downloads.

Worse still, how many times on NZG have you had to read over a gushing synopsis of a mediocre or untested game? The article on Godfather 2’s release date tells us the game “delivers the ultimate organized crime experience”. Really, guys? Do you really believe that? Another article about an Atari game called FUEL informs me that it will “revolutionise open world multi-terrain racing when it launches this May”. Who needs a review when I’ve already got the verdict?

What’s the difference between content and advertising? Where do those giant banner ads that take up half my browser’s space stop and NZG’s content begin?

This gets troublesome when there is actual gaming news to report in NZ. During February Wellington hosted a quirky art exhibit called 99DS in Civic Square. The exhibit was put together by two guys from Weta and based around sketches they drew on their Nintendo DS systems.

The story made the rounds on several of Wellington’s free regional papers, yet try searching for ‘99DS’ on NZGamer and you will find no mention of it. The majority of NZG’s staff is based in Wellington and there is no good reason why there is not a single news article about the exhibit on their website. This means NZG got scooped in its own region in the one area it is supposed to specialise in.

But it doesn’t have to be this way.

There are plenty of interesting stories out there in New Zealand about games, gamers, and the local industry. Reporting on them is not only relevant to us, the readers, (as opposed to piracy stories in Cardiff) but it enriches the NZ gaming community.

The key problem is that no one on the NZG staff has any idea of how to gather news. Indeed, few video game websites do. The majority are staffed by young writers who have no formal journalism training and mostly take their cues by imitating the template set down by the big websites like GameSpot and IGN. Far too many rely solely on rewriting or copying press releases because it’s easy, cheap, and they don’t know any better.

I write all this because I think NZG has a unique opportunity to not only do something no one in the NZ video game circuit is doing (as far as I’m aware Gameplanet.co.nz also missed the 99DS story) but few video game writers ANYWHERE are doing. And that’s report some actual news.

NZG’s profits aren’t gargantuan but it does produce advertising revenue, enough to reinvest in a small news writing team. I would suggest one or two reporters (preferably one Wellington based, one Auckland based). Give them a small salary for a couple of stories a week and, for the love of God, do not pay them in games - it’s hard to ask Microsoft the hard questions when you’re stroking a fresh copy of Halo Wars.

The job involves talking to people; talking to gamers, talking to retailers, talking to local developers and distributors, and occasionally asking some tough questions. NZG does this every now and then but not often enough. There are stories out there: Why is it that Nintendo’s Wii is doing so poorly in NZ? Who is buying them and who isn’t? Attend LANs and report on small local gaming culture. There’s a recession going on - is this changing what locals are buying or is the game industry immune? A month ago the Dominion Post reported about an American expert in game theory and Alternate Reality Games who was giving a presentation in Wellington – who was there from NZG to attend and write about it? What were the video game sales like last month – who is leading the console wars in NZ anyway? There are media studies lecturers at Victoria University who are specifically interested in new media and video games, talk to them and see what they’re researching. Report. Report. Report.

It doesn’t mean you can’t use press releases. They are one of the primary means we are alerted to release dates and new game announcements – but you have to edit them so they’re neutral, shorter, and intended for an NZ readership when possible.

If NZG is serious about being a voice for NZ and for legitimising ‘video game journalism’ as a specialist press then this is the way to do it. I won’t pretend the web hits will skyrocket overnight but I can say that over time NZGamer will develop a devoted base of readers who will return again and again to read relevant, interesting stories they can’t read anywhere else. If NZG wants to be a better website than GamePlanet it won’t be through giving the new Grand Theft Auto a 9.9 over a 9.7 or having a nicer website, it will be by doing some actual journalism.

In a discussion about the state of video game journalism a prominent game columnist and blogger named David Thomas fretted that he and his colleagues functioned not as journalists but rather to "create a marketing echo chamber that amplifies whatever the industry happens to want us to say." On cloudy days it worries me that this is all that video game websites like NZG represent; a powerful marketing arm for the video game industry under the guise of objectivity and information-sharing.

There’s an opportunity here to be something more than that, and if NZG is willing to make the leap it can set a new standard. If it cares more about its readers than its profit margins it can turn video game writing into video game journalism.