5 ms·

A ton of other people hated it though. Is there a reason people hate Kotaku so much? It's always seemed like a pretty normal game site to me except for the fact

A ton of other people hated it though. Is there a reason people hate Kotaku so much? It's always seemed like a pretty normal game site to me except for the fact it leans a little more liberal on social issues.

FactolSarin 8y ago
Conservatives hate it because of the Gamergate nonsense
PhasmaFelis 8y ago
"Liberal on social issues" is all it takes for a vocal chunk of gamers to obsessively hate them and everything they write.
dankusmcmeme 8y ago
Far left nonsense
billfruit 8y ago
Kotaku is very partisan in its Nintendo fanboyism. In their view Nintendo can't do anything wrong, where as the slightest hint of a mistake from Valve or Sega or others, they pounce upon with extreme outrage. Also they kind of patronizingly fetishize Japanese gaming culture, over others. They'll have pages and pages of articles about even the most obscure Pokemon game releases, while they give lesser coverage of a Total War game. Note to mention the click-bait and hyperbole laden writing style.
- billfruit 8y ago
  And Kotaku has a weird focus on things like "cosplay", which as I perceive isn't really a part of gaming culture, for example I don't see any other gaming press making that conflation.
livueta 8y ago
Social issues definitely seem like part of it now, but Kotaku was disliked in hardcore communities well before Gamergate or any of that other nonsense. My recollections of late-2000s Kotaku are similar to how I feel today about a lot of tech publications where personal expertise in their subject area makes it painfully obvious that they don't really know what they're talking about. When you spend hundreds to thousands of hours mastering a game and immersing yourself in the culture surrounding it, an article on "your" game, unless it's written by someone as keyed-in to the meta as you are, is likely to come off as a series of poorly informed hot takes. In other words, generalist journalists frequently have a hard time developing the level of experience in a particular area necessary to write about it in such a way that's not laughable to the "experts". This effect is particularly bad in video games, where the amount of rabbit holes you can pour yourself into is practically uncountable. Everyone's an expert on something, and it only takes one crappy article on your pet game to destroy your confidence in anything that outlet produces, even if you lack the experience to see the lie in each and every piece.
- JohnBooty 8y ago
  I'm torn here. On one hand, I understand what you're saying. For example, I'm a big fan of Evangelion, and there's a decent amount of meta context to be aware about when going into that series. On the other hand, I think we need fresh (and even naive) looks at these older works. Shenmue, Evangelion, etc -- they should be continually reevaluated and challenged. That's the difference between a living fandom and an echo chamber of folks smelling their own farts.
  - livueta 8y ago
    Oh, sure, I didn't mean to critique this article in particular. I thought it was actually somewhat interesting and went off on some fun mental tangents around how the form of the creative medium can influence the message, the obvious example being the interplay of mechanical difficulty and narrative in Fromsoft games. Stuff like this definitely benefits from a fresh perspective. Nobody needs another self-referential addition to the homoerotic subtexts in Madoka fandom wiki page. Where I and others have had problems in the past tends to be around content that's less interpretive, like this, and more factual, like "a window into competitive play in ___ MMO", where, if you're a competitive player of ___ MMO, the gaps in understanding are on display front and center.
    - rainonmoon 8y ago
      Isn't the framing of that hypothetical piece as "a window into..." fairly heavily implying that it's not intended to be the entire picture?
- thrownblown 8y ago
  their media group was purchased in 2016 for $136 million and was sold recently for less than $50 million. in 2017 they generated $80 million in revenue at only a $20 million dollar loss. https://www.niemanlab.org/2019/04/gizmodo-media-group-is-sold-to-a-private-equity-firm-and-univision-is-out-of-the-english-language-website-business/ https://www.niemanlab.org/2019/04/gizmodo-media-group-is-sol...
- smacktoward 8y ago
bitwize 8y ago
The standard narrative is that Goobergrape tarnished Kotaku's reputation through organized hate campaigns because they are literal womanhating fascists or whatever. The truth is a bit more complex. * Game journalists are often shit-tier journalists who cover games as part of paying their dues and building their portfolio so they can advance one step closer to their dream: covering Hollywood, or writing for The New Yorker or something * Game journalists are often shit-tier gamers; if so, it's usually because they have little interest in the medium for its own merits. As a result, their writing tends to focus less on a game's merits as a game, and more on either needless politicking or fitting the game into a Procrustean bed of contemporary art. A great way to impress Kotaku, for instance, is to make a Duchampean un-game whose goals undermine the goals we normally associate with games in the name of making a Statement (remember, art is anti-kitsch). It will be unfun for the player, and will probably not sell well, but the likes of Kotaku will eat it up. We've seen this in the game journalist who couldn't cear the tutorial level of Cuphead, and the recent outcry from game journalists to add an easy mode to Sekiro to allow them to "experience" the game when for a From Software game, the difficulty IS the game experience. * Game journalism sites are incestuously tied to game publishers. This is "access journalism". In exchange for the concession of early access to the latest games and other products, these news outlets agree to provide positive coverage only. A similar arrangement exists for Hollywood journalism. These outlets will tend to praise the studios that give them access and punish the studios that cater to actual gamers rather than gaming journalism. There's probably more to it than this, but one thing I know: Gamergate wasn't responsible for Univision's decision to sell off Kotaku and the other Gawker/Gizmodo properties into private equity at a considerable loss.
- scott_s 8y ago
  > Game journalists are often shit-tier gamers ... We've seen this in the game journalist who couldn't cear the tutorial level of Cuphead, The notion that a 26 minute clip of someone playing a demo of a game at a tradeshow is emblematic of any large-scale trend should be dispelled by mundane explanation from that person: https://venturebeat.com/2017/09/08/the-deanbeat-our-cuphead-runneth-over/ https://venturebeat.com/2017/09/08/the-deanbeat-our-cuphead-...
  - 8y ago

FactolSarin 8y ago

Conservatives hate it because of the Gamergate nonsense

PhasmaFelis 8y ago

"Liberal on social issues" is all it takes for a vocal chunk of gamers to obsessively hate them and everything they write.

dankusmcmeme 8y ago

Far left nonsense

billfruit 8y ago

Kotaku is very partisan in its Nintendo fanboyism. In their view Nintendo can't do anything wrong, where as the slightest hint of a mistake from Valve or Sega or others, they pounce upon with extreme outrage. Also they kind of patronizingly fetishize Japanese gaming culture, over others. They'll have pages and pages of articles about even the most obscure Pokemon game releases, while they give lesser coverage of a Total War game. Note to mention the click-bait and hyperbole laden writing style.

billfruit 8y ago
And Kotaku has a weird focus on things like "cosplay", which as I perceive isn't really a part of gaming culture, for example I don't see any other gaming press making that conflation.

livueta 8y ago

Social issues definitely seem like part of it now, but Kotaku was disliked in hardcore communities well before Gamergate or any of that other nonsense. My recollections of late-2000s Kotaku are similar to how I feel today about a lot of tech publications where personal expertise in their subject area makes it painfully obvious that they don't really know what they're talking about. When you spend hundreds to thousands of hours mastering a game and immersing yourself in the culture surrounding it, an article on "your" game, unless it's written by someone as keyed-in to the meta as you are, is likely to come off as a series of poorly informed hot takes. In other words, generalist journalists frequently have a hard time developing the level of experience in a particular area necessary to write about it in such a way that's not laughable to the "experts". This effect is particularly bad in video games, where the amount of rabbit holes you can pour yourself into is practically uncountable. Everyone's an expert on something, and it only takes one crappy article on your pet game to destroy your confidence in anything that outlet produces, even if you lack the experience to see the lie in each and every piece.

JohnBooty 8y ago
I'm torn here. On one hand, I understand what you're saying. For example, I'm a big fan of Evangelion, and there's a decent amount of meta context to be aware about when going into that series. On the other hand, I think we need fresh (and even naive) looks at these older works. Shenmue, Evangelion, etc -- they should be continually reevaluated and challenged. That's the difference between a living fandom and an echo chamber of folks smelling their own farts.
- livueta 8y ago
  Oh, sure, I didn't mean to critique this article in particular. I thought it was actually somewhat interesting and went off on some fun mental tangents around how the form of the creative medium can influence the message, the obvious example being the interplay of mechanical difficulty and narrative in Fromsoft games. Stuff like this definitely benefits from a fresh perspective. Nobody needs another self-referential addition to the homoerotic subtexts in Madoka fandom wiki page. Where I and others have had problems in the past tends to be around content that's less interpretive, like this, and more factual, like "a window into competitive play in ___ MMO", where, if you're a competitive player of ___ MMO, the gaps in understanding are on display front and center.
  - rainonmoon 8y ago
    Isn't the framing of that hypothetical piece as "a window into..." fairly heavily implying that it's not intended to be the entire picture?
thrownblown 8y ago
their media group was purchased in 2016 for $136 million and was sold recently for less than $50 million. in 2017 they generated $80 million in revenue at only a $20 million dollar loss. https://www.niemanlab.org/2019/04/gizmodo-media-group-is-sold-to-a-private-equity-firm-and-univision-is-out-of-the-english-language-website-business/ https://www.niemanlab.org/2019/04/gizmodo-media-group-is-sol...
smacktoward 8y ago

bitwize 8y ago

The standard narrative is that Goobergrape tarnished Kotaku's reputation through organized hate campaigns because they are literal womanhating fascists or whatever. The truth is a bit more complex. * Game journalists are often shit-tier journalists who cover games as part of paying their dues and building their portfolio so they can advance one step closer to their dream: covering Hollywood, or writing for The New Yorker or something * Game journalists are often shit-tier gamers; if so, it's usually because they have little interest in the medium for its own merits. As a result, their writing tends to focus less on a game's merits as a game, and more on either needless politicking or fitting the game into a Procrustean bed of contemporary art. A great way to impress Kotaku, for instance, is to make a Duchampean un-game whose goals undermine the goals we normally associate with games in the name of making a Statement (remember, art is anti-kitsch). It will be unfun for the player, and will probably not sell well, but the likes of Kotaku will eat it up. We've seen this in the game journalist who couldn't cear the tutorial level of Cuphead, and the recent outcry from game journalists to add an easy mode to Sekiro to allow them to "experience" the game when for a From Software game, the difficulty IS the game experience. * Game journalism sites are incestuously tied to game publishers. This is "access journalism". In exchange for the concession of early access to the latest games and other products, these news outlets agree to provide positive coverage only. A similar arrangement exists for Hollywood journalism. These outlets will tend to praise the studios that give them access and punish the studios that cater to actual gamers rather than gaming journalism. There's probably more to it than this, but one thing I know: Gamergate wasn't responsible for Univision's decision to sell off Kotaku and the other Gawker/Gizmodo properties into private equity at a considerable loss.

scott_s 8y ago
> Game journalists are often shit-tier gamers ... We've seen this in the game journalist who couldn't cear the tutorial level of Cuphead, The notion that a 26 minute clip of someone playing a demo of a game at a tradeshow is emblematic of any large-scale trend should be dispelled by mundane explanation from that person: https://venturebeat.com/2017/09/08/the-deanbeat-our-cuphead-runneth-over/ https://venturebeat.com/2017/09/08/the-deanbeat-our-cuphead-...
- 8y ago