Funny Email From a Publisher re. Reviews

[Ghostwind]

Steve, I have to admit I suspected the same. Your review of my book Heroes of High Favor: Dwarves ended with much the same admonition-- don't buy the book unless you find it discounted.

I felt at the time that was a bit over the top, but I just chalked it up as your own particular style of review. Certainly I can concede that some of your readers may appreciate that kind of advice.

Of course I still disagree with your review on its merits.

Wulf, I still maintain Dwarves could have been much better , but at least you had the integrity to personally contact me and discuss our differences over the review and the book. Those conversations made me re-evaluate the score in the long run. And it made me respect you all the more because you approached things from an intelligent and sensible perspective. And so far, from what I've read of Half-Orcs, you took some of those criticisms under consideration and made a better product. This is the mark of a good publisher in my book. He listens, learns, and speaks up in a polite manner when errors are made by the reviewer and he uses the feedback he receives (whether it be positive or negative) as a way of tempering future products.

(Besides, your legions of fans who loved the book also let me know exactly what they thought of the review and where I should put it... )

 

[Corinth]

Now I have something of consequence to relay to all of my gamer friends when I make the rounds later this week. This is a story that ought to spread faster than a wildfire in a bone-dry grassy plain.

 

[JoeGKushner]

So What NOw?

Alright, I guess the real question is what now? When I contacted Avalanche they completely blew me off and claimed that they wanted nothing to do with EN World due to the poor review. I believe I sent Morrus a copy of that e-mail a while ago and asked him what to do about it.

I'm not hunting down 72 dpi (200 * 260) images for Avalance. If they want to send them, that's fine. If they want to send the product blurbs I asked for that's fine. I'm not going out of my way.

My gut tells me that Avalanche didn't expect the response they got and now have to do a quick retraction due to a 'mistake'.

I'm up for whatever the boss of the site wants though.

 

[AaronLoeb]

Aaron,

I have been reading your stuff for a long time, and I appreciate that you are trying to be fair on this matter.

The thing is, I think you are just wrong in this instance.
The two statements seem to indicate that reviewers in general are constrained due to the fact that the item is free.

If true, this is absolutely unacceptable.

Yeah, I tend to agree with you. I was trying my hand at the old "benefit of the doubt" game. The prevailing mood seems to be that the two statements have nothing to do with each other -- letter number 1 appears to say 'you can't be negative if you get it for free,' whicle letter number 2 appears to say 'that was a misunderstanding; I was being critical of a reviewer saying not to buy a book or to buy it cheap or used.' I was trying to reconcile those two statements.

At the end of the day, though, a reviewer's only duty (and folks who aren't getting paid to do it don't even really have a duty, unless they want to) is to her readers. If her readers are consumers (and they always are), the first question that they will have is "should I spend money on this?" To say that it's dirty pool to tell people not to spend money on it, the instruction that is the hallmark of consumer criticism, does seem to be missing the boat entirely.

That said, this is not the first time I've heard that complaint. Many publishers of entertainment products feel like reviewers should constrain their comments only to the product and its merits or faults, as though it's in a hermetically sealed universe. I've been complained at countless times simply for comparing two products (ala "well, Bonker Jerks is a good FPS, but Doom III just came out and it's better in ever way, so why would you buy Bonker Jerks?"). Many publishers feel that's unfair -- their product should be judged solely on its own merits, as if that's even possible in a world with competition.

So, I agree with you Steel; I was just trying to point out that perhaps the original comment really wasn't quite as bad as many people (including me) originally felt it to be. Then again, maybe it is!

Aaron

 

[tleilaxu]

I have always found message board communities have the tendancy toward hysterics, though this impression is no doubt do to large amounts of people expressing the same sentiments.

 

[Buttercup]

Re: So What NOw?

My gut tells me that Avalanche didn't expect the response they got and now have to do a quick retraction due to a 'mistake'.

I think you've hit the nail on the head, Joe. However, I suppose the grown-up thing to do is to just go on as though this whole unsavory incident never happened. Let them rise or fall on the quality of their products (including their tarted up covers.)

 

[Ashtal]

Would people be as upset if it were a guy? I dunno ... I highly doubt that if it were a guy, he would be depicted as sexualized as a Playgirl cover model. He'd probably look aggressive, powerful, and lethal, not sexy. Very rarely are men ever depicted as sexy in gaming art.

The wonderful Sun-God cover on Dragon recently being a beautiful exception ... and check out the letters from men that they received about it ... rather telling, IMO.

To me, the covers boil down to this: If you had an historical book solely about Motel T-cars, it would look damn silly to have a 2003 Jaguar on the cover. It would be laughed at. Why? It's out of place; it doesn't jive.

The fact that they are putting fantasy skin-shots up there (which I have no problem with - they really aught to put out a collection as a calender or art book or something) on their historical books says to me this is their primary means of advertizing. Nothing wrong with liking the skin, but if they think this is the only way to promote their materials ... well, it too is rather telling, IMO.

 

[JoeBlank]

New here is a funny coincidence. I said earlier, about my recent research before my buying spree:

On the boards, one publisher (Wulf of BadAxe) directed my attention to reviews here and elsewhere. One of his products has received a 3/5 from two different reviewers (neither of them ENWorld staff reviewers). However, he had taken the time to respond to the reviews (the comments are a handy feature), and one of them had even been increased from a 2 to a 3, thanks in part to his explanations. Of course, his products both average a 4 or better. Still, he was not afraid to point me to a source where I would read negative comments, and he took the time to address those comments. That is the right way to handle negative reviews.

The review that was modified after Wulf's interaction with the reviewer was Ghostwind's review of HOHF: Dwarves.

Also funny to point out that, while I had never considered buying Black Flag, after reading the reprinted review by Ghostwind I would actually consider it. A fair review, and mostly favorable. Taking the cost of a product into account when reaching a conclusion in a review makes a lot of sense, similar to a movie reviewer suggesting that you wait for the video release or the discount theaters. I have seen plenty of reviews that say "Well worth the price," so it is only natural for some reviews to say "Not worth the cover price, but still worth some money."

For what it is worth, I agree with those who are still not certain about buying AP products now. My reasons are not to punish them for their actions. Like others have said, either here or in the GD thread, there are some artists who are jerks and yet they do good work, and create a good product. However, as I said before, I rely heavily on reviews and comments on this messageboard when I am deciding how to spend my money. If I feel, even just a little, like I can't trust the reviews, then it is all the more difficult to make the decision to buy a product. At this point, I still feal like I can't entirely trust reviews of AP products. Maybe that will change over time.

 

[Dagda]

At the end of the day, though, a reviewer's only duty (and folks who aren't getting paid to do it don't even really have a duty, unless they want to) is to her readers. If her readers are consumers (and they always are), the first question that they will have is "should I spend money on this?" To say that it's dirty pool to tell people not to spend money on it, the instruction that is the hallmark of consumer criticism, does seem to be missing the boat entirely.

A review shouldn't ignore cost of the item. Wether a consumer is happy with a purchase is often based upon what they paid for it and if they feel it was a good value at that price.

Here's an interesting off topic story to illistrate: A year or so ago my wife and I were in the market for a new washing machine and checked into the front load type. Well, Maytag sold one that was significantly more expensive than the competitors. All the review and comments we found on it were either "this is the best purchase I ever made" or "this is the worst purchase I ever made". Nothing in between. I theorize that after spending top dollar, you want to justify it. So you need to really love the product. Or, if the product has not lived up to that, then you feel totally ripped off. Consumer reports rated it as good, but not as good a value as the competition (if I remember correctly).

So if a review ignored price and just said "this is a good product to have" it misses the point of what the customer is giving up.

I was just looking at reviews of Gaming Frontiers, and none of the ones I saw mentioned the price! They said it was a good read. At the time I felt, well, they got the magazine for free, of course they enjoy it. But would they still enjoy it after paying $20? That's a question that cannot be ignored.

I'd think if someone getting all their review products for free, they'd risk falling into a trap of forgetting that the readers will be paying and that the price aspect can't be ignored.

At the same time, whether or not a review would buy something isn't an indication that the reader wouldn't want it. So saying "Dont' buy this" could be unfair. But saying "I wouldn't buy it at full price." seems part of what a reader wants from a review.

 

[JacktheRabbit]

Actually it is. The company with that email pretty well came out and said that their free copies to reviewers are in fact bribes given to get good reviews. If you don't give good reviews then they stop giving out the bribes (ie new products).

While I don't particularly like their position, it is not indicative of duplicity.