While I don’t have an issue with your argument – I think that E3 awards, while in practice mean very little, have a huge impact on the perceived popularity and success of a game far before it’s release, one that reaches across all demographics and interests gamers and non-gamers alike – I do have an issue with the “facts” you use to defend your argument.
Youtube views are not a good metric to judge popularity; I could find you plenty of lesser-known music videos with more.
200,000 stories for “Titanfall Best of E3” is not a lot; with the huge volume of gaming news sites, blogs, and accredited news sites out there, you’ll be hard-pressed to find any press release-related subject that doesn’t have that many hits. Hell, my own personal blog probably shows up in that search and nobody reads that. (Also, why did you bother adding “Kotaku” to the search string? Did that help narrow your parameters? Because it makes it look like you have some selection bias going on.)
Finally, Google trends doesn’t prove anything. Titanfall was completely unknown up until E3; of course it has a jump in search popularity around that time. When everyone interested in the gaming industry is on their phones/laptops/desktops/tablets/Amiga/walkman/pedometer/et cetera looking for info about E3, you are bound to end up with an increase in searches for anything that was announced there. Besides, going from 0 to 1 is a 100% jump if you have no other frame of reference. Things have fallen down to 39% or below since E3, which is perhaps a better metric, but still – using trends to track the popularity of a brand-new subject? Not exactly damning evidence.
Like I said: I agree with your argument. E3 awards are important to the industry, so gamers pay attention. Maybe us intelligentsia realize that the merit they hold is slim to none on the actual content of the game but that does not mean that the “general populace” has had that same revelation; all they see is “Best of E3” and they will immediately think, “This game is amazing, I have to have it!”
Just… Pick better cases to argue your point?
stusser
3569
E3 is smoke and mirrors, the games aren’t finished so they’re based upon tightly controlled demos and marketing materials. That’s why E3 awards aren’t meaningful. Critical response based upon playing the finished product possess real value.
Edit: Dangit, I replied to the previous page and didn’t notice that a dozen people posted essentially the same thing on this one. I will let it stand as a monument to my shame.
Teiman
3570
This must be a religious thing.
I remember working as webdesigner in a company, and one of our websites received two or three awards. It was not our best website (it was average), or the best website around. We where pretty sure our boss paid money for these awards. The dude was pretty excited, but I think we trough the whole idea was ridiculous and sad, and a waste of money. I think theres two type of people, people that think these awards are meaningful, and the people that think are a waste of pixels on the screen.
My opinion, and everyone I know about these awards is total derision and activelly not paying attention. Do you know the brain learn to ignore images in webpages of a particular shape and size (banners)?, our brain is wired to not see these crappy medals and logos, because we classify them as visual spam.
I disagree that they aren’t meaningful but agree that reviews carry more weight. To sketch this out more simply:
If a game gets significant recognition at E3 of course that’s meaningful for a number of reasons - it means that when your game was presented to the most jaded of audiences, it still shined brightly. It means that if you get recognition from multiple websites, there will be a force multiplier effect when it comes to buzz. It means that from a marketing perspective, you get a chit that you likely will use to promote your product.
But I agree with stusser that reviews carry more weight.
In essence, the former (recognition at E3) is about the potential, the promise of the game. The latter (actual reviews) are about when promise meets reality.
My position has never been that awards matter the most. It’s simply that they matter. Others here have called them “meaningless” or that only “non gamers” or “gaming moms” care about these things. Or that they simply reflect a “cottage industry of self promotion.” Nope. I disagree.
stusser
3573
Kinda, but it’s so controlled that it’s really more about competing marketing.
You seem hung up on the “meaningless” claim.
Sure, E3 awards correlate to best-sellers, but that has as much to do with the intersection between “the kind of games that win multiple E3 awards” and “the kind of games with a huge marketing budget” being almost 100%.
The awards themselves don’t measure anything useful.
That was someone else’s claim, not mine. You’re right that I’m focused on it, because I think it’s wrong. Plus I found this amusing. Truly.
But at this point, that horse is a pulp. Folks can judge for themselves if they think these awards are “meaningless” or simply for “gaming moms” or just a byproduct of a “cottage industry” patting itself on the back.
Teiman
3576
Did anyone think any of the XBONE cloud features would work without a subscription?
Aleck
3578
I’ll bet money you played Black and White, though, didn’t you? DIDN’T YOU?!?
EDIT: GODDAMNIT, YOU STUPID MONKEY, STOP EATING MY VILLAGERS!
Aleck knows well that I did since I borrowed his copy!
God I loved that game.
For exactly one week. And then I never wanted to play it again. Same with all my friends.
The weird part is, I still cherish that week, and think the amount of joy I got out of seeing my creature learn all kinds of weird funky stuff was such a blast, that I felt like it was money well spent. Whereas my friends were all bitter at having played full price for a game that they eventually lost interest in. I still think it’s a shame that the rest of the game didn’t live up to that first fascinating week of watching your creature learn new things, and always leaving your computer on and seeing what your creature had learned while you were away. But at the same time, I still think of Black & White as one of the boldest, coolest games I’ve played because of that first week.
Canuck
3581
All this talk about marketing sounds like a great topic for a new thread.
My history with the game was somewhat similar.
Hey this creature is kind of cool,I can’t wait to see where they go with this!
What, they aren’t doing anything worth a fan with creatures more than I saw in the first hour and there is nothing else to the game? Fuuuuu!
Needless to say, my opinion of the game in the end is not the same and it is one of the games that helped to create my extremely negative opinion of any sort of pre-release hype machine.
Nevermind Black and White, just look at Spore for a recent example of a game winning a zillion E3 awards and ultimately being a bit underwhelming.
A bit underwhelming is a huge understatement. The game was a horrible letdown.
Games like that are responsible for gamers wanting to wait as long as possible to buy games, because they are scared if being outright lied to and screwed over.
I didn´t. But maybe if said subscription system wins a bunch of awards, I won´t care!
stusser
3586
I fully expect everything online to be tied to xbox live gold except purchasing DLC and media.
Canuck
3587
I didn’t expect game streaming or anything that used cloud but you can’t even use the glorified TV guide without a gold subscription? WTF.
I find this news pretty disappointing. I definitely don’t plan to re-subscribe when my Gold runs out in April, and now one of the cool features won’t work anymore?
Despite what Telefrog posted, there was precedent to expect the reverse in this situation. One of the coolest things you’ve been able to do on Xbox Live since the beginning as a SILVER member is download replays in racing games from the leaderboards, and see how the top players and your friends raced a particular track or race. That was one of those defining moments where Xbox Live changed single player gaming for the good. It was a huge change, it was a GREAT feature, and it was always available for free for Silver members. So yes, I did expect replays to be available for Silver members too.
