In light of recent events by Avalanche Press (Company bashing not desired)

[Fred Delles]

I don't think opinions about the covers will terribly effect a review. A good (as in sufficient not as in pro) review should go into detail about what is in the product and the reviewers likes and dislikes. If they give a product a certain rating the text of their review should say why they are giving it. Any review that would say the content was ok, but the cover was blatently just selling sex so I am giving it a 1 rating would quickly be given a 24 hour warning by Psion or whatever mod saw it. Reviews need to have more to them than that.

That being said, personally I will not buy a product by ANY publisher that shows scantily clad women in a sexual pose on the cover.

Of course, based on the critical thinkers around the D&D community (generally, they are smarter than your local Joe or Jane Average), I think that Avalanche is shooting themselves in the foot for the cover art. Exactly what does the chick on the cover do for the content, especially if it is completely unrelated? NOTHING.

Just as a movie reviewer would give a lower standard for something that is classified as "pornography", many reviewers would give lower standards for something that uses something so cheap and tawdry like above, regardless of its actual quality (which, in spite of reading one of AP's D20 books, is just average). Books, movies, and the like which display such unrelated sexuality may not be bad, but few people will take it seriously enough for an unbiased opinion.

Bondetamp: Thanks. (Though my example shows the ridiculousness to Avalanche in comparison. Ticket costs mean nothing compared to the millions movies make.) BTW, does anyone remember the time when Sony created fake reviewers to make their movies look good?


Oh yeah, one more point. From the above (for example, because of the cover, a 3.5 might become a 3 instead of a 4, if I reviewed), if Avalanche is angry about that sort of "bias", will they PLEASE STOP putting scantily-clad women on the cover? They don't do anything for the product or its content, and they sure don't do very much for sales.

 

[poilbrun]

Ah, so if you think a particular reviewer has a special thing against you, and that he doesn't give you a fair shake, you should continue to send free products to him, encouraging him to give you more bad press? That's illogical.

Has it occurred to anyone that, form Avalanche's point of view, it may seem that EN World reviewers are unfair? I mean, look at all the flack we give them for their covers. Might we here not look... less than neutral to them? Hm?

The problem I see is not that they decided not to send books for review anymore because they had received bad reviews in the past. The problem is that they seem to think that because they send free books, they are entitled to receive a good review even though they may not deserve it , which means that they send free books to reviewers hoping that it will fool us into buying their book. Now that I know, I will most certainly never buy anything from them. That won't change much from before, since I was VERY disappointed by the books about Norse mythology and had decided that I wouldn't buy anything from them blindly. But now that I won't be able to see a review of their new books, I won't be able to see that their latest book is really THE book I've been looking for...

 

[Fast Learner]

It isn't an uncommon policy by the way. How about the novels you buy with all those glowing reviews on them? Yes, same exact policy for all sci-fi publishers. Giving out free copies of your product is a public relations activity, not an act of fostering free speech.

I don't know where you get your information, but you are quite simply wrong. I've reviewed (and edited a magazine full of reviews) science fiction and fantasy for years. We received big boxes of books from publishers every month. Some of our reviews were positive and some were negative. We never felt the least bit of concern about writing negative reviews, and never received one single word from the publishers about our negative reviews. One large-name sf&f company in particular was publishing a lot of crap for several years and received almost exclusively negative reviews from me and my staff, yet the flow of books never slowed because negative reviews are better than no reviews.

That is most certainly not policy for sci-fi publishers.

That said, are there reviewers who are free-copy and goody whores, who will write positive reviews about anything they get for free? Of course there are. Are those reviewers respected in general, and do they ever get reviewing jobs/requests from respected publishers? No, never. The system is self-policing.'

If a company routinely receives negative reviews from a particular reviewer or publication and they'd rather have no reviews at all rather than negative reviews, they can simply stop sending review copies. That is completely ethical.

It is entirely unethical to believe or insist that the reviews you receive be positive because you're sending out review copies (or providing free tickets, or whatever).

As far as the poll goes, though, I can't vote because there's no option that says "I won't buy their products ever again unless they apologize and take back their policy."

For those of you that are happy to buy their products anyway as long as you like them, does the ethics of the company that makes the product not play into your decisions at all? For some more extreme examples, would you purchase a company's products if they were known for ripping off their authors, or were known for plagarizing other people's ideas? If not, why do you consider tampering with the review process -- and more importantly indicating that they exepct all of their reviewers to act unethically -- acceptable?

 

[The Lemon Merchant]

I voiced an I don't care vote, but there is more to it than that. I've been planning on purchasing some of their material but I have come to rely on reviews before making a purchase as there is definately some good and bad d20 material out there. My only source of reviews is EN World and I don't see that changing any time soon. As a result of this new policy by Avalanche I won't be seeing reviews by folks whose opinon I've come to respect and trust thus I am now much less likely to make an Avalanche purchase. I'm not basing my decision on their actions but as a result of their actions they will probably not be seeing any money from me (like they'd notice).

 

[Squirrel Nutkin]

In fact, with very rare exception (like Consumer Reports), that is the standard in MOST industries. I'm sorry you guys find that shocking, or unethical. But that is how free products sent out for reviews usually works, and I think you guys are hypocritical if you stop buying avalanche press books simply because of their new free-copy policy, but you don't take the same action when it comes to sci-fi books, fantasy books, most computer and electronics products, and most movies and TV shows even.

Sorry Misty, but that ain't how it works in the electronic gaming industry. During my tenure as Happy Puppy's assistant editor in the late 90's, I reviewed at least 100 titles myself, and edited well over 500 reviews written by the staff and our freelancers. I got sent to quite a few launch parties and conventions too, and if any journalist had ever suggested that bad reviews would keep the publishers from sending us more titles -- or that we were expected to write good ones just 'cause we got free goodies -- I think the rest of us would have laughed ourselves silly.

 

[Eosin the Red]

I cannot believe the level of hypocracy, or naïveté, exressed in this thread.

I think you don't get it.

It is not that they won't send anything to ENworld reviewers, if I felt that I was not getting a fair shake somewhere I would not send free stuff either. It is that they believe they have a right to good reviews for free copies. They want to purchase good reviews and insinuate that they have done so at Gameingreport.com & games unplugged. I and others like to know what a reviewer thinks, not how cheaply they can be bought off.

I like Avalanch - the poll does not have my choice. This will impact how I buy but not if I will buy. Borderline purchases will now be much easier for me.

 

[Morrus]

Take down any single sci-fi or fantasy novel on your shelf. EVERY SINGLE ONE YOU TAKE DOWN WAS SENT FOR FREE TO A REVIEWER WHO WAS KNOWN TO GIVE GOOD REVIEWS TO THAT AUTHORS PRODUCTS. When a reviewer gave a bad review to one of those authors products, they were taken off the "free copy" list.

Maybe you didn't know that before (though it is not a hidden fact). But you do now.

Irrelevant. On the whole, reviews in the d20 industry do not suffer from this problem. I am aware of plenty of publishers who accept bad reviews with good grace.

If it happened with all of them, maybe it would be different. But the fact is, the occasional publisher who doesn't handle it well (as in this case) is competing for customer dollars with the others. In this case, I feel it's my responsibility to make people aware of differing standards.

The bottom line is - I'm here to tell people about d20 stuff. I tell it how it is, so that they can make whatever judgement they wish on where to spend their money. The fact is, Avalanche reviews, on the face of it, seem to be written under different conditions to the majority of the rest of the industry (and they have had plenty of opportunity to refute or clarify this, before the news item was posted). Being involved heavily in the review process in this industry (possibly more so than anyone else in the d20 industry), I can assure you that that is the case.

If I were to hear that another publisher thought the same way, I'd tell you about them too. Whoever they were, and no matter how much I liked them.

I don't care if it happens with movies, books or anything else. It's wrong, and it ain't happening here. Everyone who visits EN World is going to hear it as it is. That's what the site is for.

 

[Mistwell]

Sorry Misty, but that ain't how it works in the electronic gaming industry. During my tenure as Happy Puppy's assistant editor in the late 90's, I reviewed at least 100 titles myself, and edited well over 500 reviews written by the staff and our freelancers. I got sent to quite a few launch parties and conventions too, and if any journalist had ever suggested that bad reviews would keep the publishers from sending us more titles, I think the rest of us would have laughed ourselves silly.

I personally know of two game (software) companies, one of which is a major company, that does not send free copies to reviewers who have slammed them in the past, or who are unlikely to give a good review. So, while that may not have been your experience, it does happen even in that industry.

Also, note I never listed electronic gaming industry in my list of industries that follow that policy (even though I know of at least two who do).

 

[Trine]

Well, at least Avalanche doesn't plan on suing people who give them bad reviews. Don't think it's possible? A company has filed a $15M lawsuit against a person for giving a negative review of their company on a mailing list. Want more information? Click here. It could be a lot worse.

 

[Mistwell]

I don't care if it happens with movies, books or anything else. It's wrong...

It's wrong, and yet you will continue to buy those other products that are doing this thing you think is wrong, but you imply you won't buy products in this industry if they do it. That is a double standard.

Mind you, I agree that it is news, and that people should know about it. Nobody said you shouldn't be reporting it, or telling everyone about it.

I just dispute that it is okay to take a moral stand on this kind of product, and not other kinds of products that do the same exact thing (once you are aware of it).