BioWare Employee Busted in Dragon Age 2 Review Scandal - UPDATED

[rsvp42]

Dear Bioware,
Just stop. Seriously, just stop. Stop trying to defend the game. Stop trying to act like you know what we like better than we do. Just stop with the douchebaggery in general. In the span of about a week (if not less), my opinion of you guys have gone from a respectable and talented development company, to that of just sheer douchebaggy. Just stop, please.

Sincerly,
Sean Strife

PS: Now go stand in the corner and think about what you've done.

Doesn't help that the Escapist has been skewing all the stories in a negative light. Calling this a scandal? Blowing the whole accidental game lockout thing out of proportion? It's easy to spin this kind of thing the wrong way and users here are quick to jump on the highest horse they can find.

I think BioWare has made some missteps, sure, but to look at a couple problems surrounding one game and conclude that a company has fundamentally failed is taking it a little far.

 

[Zom-B]

Not too young, but probably young enough to be considered young, so you have that on me. I'm an engineer, and admittedly, my conflicts of interest center more or less around supporting the project, and not publicly dismissing the suppliers or client. If I wanted people to see that there are those out there who would support the project, given an arbitrary review score, I would say that I am not above fluffing said score, without acknowledging my position on it. Yes, it has a lobbyist feel to it, but being a bit underhanded without being the most estimable in one's PR still gets the name out there. Should it come to light that I was the one who fluffed the review to draw attention, then I would admit as much--but would say that it was for the purposes of drawing more attention, which in today's climate, is how you get more people to try it and form their own opinion. It might be in that ethically gray area, but ethically gray is where most people sit. They're willing to see an underhanded trick, as long as it doesn't hurt them. That's how I feel on the matter, anyway.

So you want to have your cake, and eat it too?

In all seriousness though, you don't see the problem with your approach? If it comes out that an employee or team member is anonymously shilling for a product that they helped create, it all of a sudden casts doubt on all review material. Suddenly, consumers and/or industry peers don't know what or who to trust. Which are "real" reviews, by professional critics and end users and which are basically advertisements, submitted by the producers? It might not seem important, especially if the producer is genuine in their praise for the product, but many consumers look to reviews by "unbiased" (in quotations because generally we all have some sort of bias one way or the other) critics to help them make purchases. When the reviews seem untrustworthy, eventually your brand becomes tainted.

And you must certainly see the conflict of interest that arises when you actively work to boost your own product (and possibly your own bottom line) in a user's forum, posing as a user, when in fact you are creator or producer?

Sure, self advertising and being proud of your product is great- when you identify yourself as creator. When you take that "ethically gray" road, your customer base becomes suspicious and often, as this case demonstrates, vindictive.

 

[FieryTrainwreck]

This is getting to be stupid. You've got dozens of people defending Bioware and DA2 to the death in this thread when it should be glaringly obvious by now

The phrase "glaringly obvious" is rarely used by anyone who isn't trying to prop up their opinion.

You're attacking stylistic tendencies over content. I refuse to adapt the reductive language of 1984. If that's a dealbreaker, I can't say I'm going to miss you.

that DA2 did not meet expectations

Whose expectations?

The expectations of a large number of people who supported the first game? Was that hard to figure out?

This backlash is what happens when you decide to slap an existing IP onto a drastically different (and arguably inferior) game in an attempt to cash-in on an existing fanbase. And I'm glad it's happening, because publishers/devs need to realize the potential for negative consequences when decisions are made purely for the sake or profit.

and Bioware is badly screwing the pooch with regard to PR. Seriously, do you people have blinders on? You like the game? Happy for you. TONS OF PEOPLE DON'T, and they're just as entitled to express their opinions as anyone else.

Oh, you meant the expectations of people who were expecting a reheated DAO.

You're using the form of an argument (rehashes are bad, yo!) without understanding the context. In a vaccuum, a rehash sequel is obviously lame. In the context of the industry as a whole? That depends on what you're rehashing, doesn't it? What if you're making only subtle, evolutionary improvements to a vanishing genre -- "rehashing" practically the only party-based RPG from last year? Isn't that preferrable to "innovating" the series when the result is something so much more like everything else? DA2 has taken the franchise in a new direction for the series, but it's the same direction as most every other series in gaming. That's not progress.

By subset of RPG players, do you mean RPG players?

See, you're making your opinion out to be a majority one again.

The fact that it's become this enormous divisive issue pretty clearly indicates that I'm not part of some nutjob minority. Stop dismissing me as such, because you're starting to look worse. At best, Bioware fans are a subset of the RPG fanbase. It's not the other way around. And if it is the other way around, that actually proves my point.

Because DA2 only seems to appeal to Bioware RPG players - or as a lot of people

How nice it must be to have these large, faceless masses agreeing with you.

I know! We're so few and far between that the game's own employees have had to step up with hilariously biased reviews in order to "balance" the equation!

see them, fans of extremely linear action games with a small handful of RPG elements masquerading as full-fledged RPGs.

And now you're veering pretty close to insulting the people who *did* like the game.

I've got zero problem with people who enjoy the game. I've enjoyed it to an extent. But it's definitely a giant step in the wrong direction for this series in the eyes of many fans, and I'll gladly rip anyone who can't empathize with that frustration simply because he or she doesn't share it.

And the reason so many of these "mouth-breathers" have enough free time to slame sites with bad reviews? There aren't a lot of fucking games for them to play anymore.

Read a book.

You have to be a troll. There's no way you can deride me for possibly insulting a group of people after calling CRPG fans mouth-breathers.

And telling the CRPG fans to read books? I'm not sure if you're implying that a) we need to read more books, which seems comical given my opinion that we probably read more than our fair share, or b) we only seem interested in reading books because we're somehow nerdier, which seems even more comical when you consider that Bioware's "streamlined" approach to RPGs is a lot more like a passive narrative than an active role-playing experience.

That's probably why they're so up in arms about all of the changes in DA2.

Why don't they just go outside?

And have sex with girls, right! /highfive!

What would you do if your preferred genre/style of gaming was rapidly vanishing on account of larger market forces seemingly beyond your control?

I'd turn off the console and read a book.

So you're not really all that interested in what happens to this hobby because you don't consider it a legitimate or primary hobby? Honestly, why even make that sort of comment? If you're looking to mock people for taking a hobby seriously, you probably shouldn't do it on a forum dedicated to discussing that hobby.

You'd probably make a bit of a stink in the hopes that maybe devs would realize you are part of a passionate and increasingly untapped market.

"A bit of a stink", he says. You're using emotional language to paint yourselves as an embattled minority.

Weird. I didn't feel too emotional when I wrote that.

We are an embattled minority in the same way that every fan of a specific media experience is an embattled minority. Moneyed interests (aka publishers) are always going to push for media to be as inclusive as possible in order to generate the most revenue. This movement frequently acts in direct opposition to the quality of said media. If causing a ruckus on forums and review sites shows that there is some degree of push-back against this inevitable march towards "the perfect game", I welcome the whining.

Oh, and all the meta-convos about what defines an opinion and whether or not the guy even did anything wrong? Sorry, that stuff has been decided already.

Yet I somehow missed the Supreme Court ruling.

So you want to stand firmly in the camp that sees nothing wrong with a wholly compromised source anonymously producing a similarly compromised assessment for public consumption? That's really where you want to be when Jesus comes back? Because I'm pretty sure even he will call you an idiot.

If you were part of a production, authoring a publicly-available assessment of your own work without disclosing your relationship to the product is completely unethical. Period. There's no debating this point, and anyone trying to do so has no grasp of the situation whatsoever.

In other words, everyone who disagrees with you is wrong, and you're not willing to argue the point, ever. Glad that's sorted.

If you think it's okay for someone who worked on a game to submit a review of his own work without acknowleding his connection to the product, you're wrong. Absolutely wrong. Sure as up is up and down is down. Doesn't stop people from trying to create a world where that sort of behavior is fine and dandy, but their existence doesn't necessitate a debate. We could have one, but we could also debate 1+1=2. If you're interested in doing so simply to prove some ridiculous point about how "everything is relative/debatable/magic", you won't find an adversary here. I'll just point, laugh, and go about my day.

 

[rsvp42]

So you want to have your cake, and eat it too?

In all seriousness though, you don't see the problem with your approach? If it comes out that an employee or team member is anonymously shilling for a product that they helped create, it all of a sudden casts doubt on all review material. Suddenly, consumers and/or industry peers don't know what or who to trust. Which are "real" reviews, by professional critics and end users and which are basically advertisements, submitted by the producers? It might not seem important, especially if the producer is genuine in their praise for the product, but many consumers look to reviews by "unbiased" (in quotations because generally we all have some sort of bias one way or the other) critics to help them make purchases. When the reviews seem untrustworthy, eventually your brand becomes tainted.

And you must certainly see the conflict of interest that arises when you actively work to boost your own product (and possibly your own bottom line) in a user's forum, posing as a user, when in fact you are creator or producer?

Sure, self advertising and being proud of your product is great- when you identify yourself as creator. When you take that "ethically gray" road, your customer base becomes suspicious and often, as this case demonstrates, vindictive.

But user reviews are inherently untrustworthy. I'm not saying this was a good idea, but as others have mentioned, there are many reviews from people who either didn't play the game or never went in with the intention of reviewing it fairly. The game's score has already been crapped on by disgruntled "fans" so a single employee that may or may not have been involved with the game posting a good review doesn't really change the landscape at all. And honestly, his review likely reflects the opinions of plenty of players. Obviously not all of them, but there's nothing scandalous about this. It's just an issue of questionable judgment and people that use this as an excuse to hate BioWare or try to prop this up as an example of corruption or something ridiculous are just being spiteful and probably were looking for a reason to rant anyway.

It seems like everyone in this issue has an axe to grind.

 

[Arnoxthe1]

Actually, I don't think this is such a big deal as everyone says it is.

What I really am disappointed with is just DA2 itself. Hopefully Bioware can make it out of this hole. They've made so many classics, it's insane. Eh, I forgive 'em as long as they get back to churning out some good games.

 

[rsvp42]

You have to be a troll. There's no way you can deride me for possibly insulting a group of people after calling CRPG fans mouth-breathers.

That was me actually. And I was only referring to the ones that would make crap reviews for a game because it didn't conform to their expectations. DA2 is a standalone game and as such is shouldn't be reviewed solely on how similar or dissimilar it is to its predecessor.

 

[TheTinyMan]

Why is this an issue? Of COURSE he thinks the game is awesome. When he sees it, he sees the fruit of his labors; the result of his blood, sweat, and tears. Every review on every site includes the biases of the reviewer. If we exclude employees, we'd also have to exclude disgruntled former employees, people who've been turned off on the series from previous games, people who love the company as a whole, people who hate the company as a whole...

You can't remove bias, and you can't deny someone the chance to submit a USER review just because of their biases.

Now, if we had evidence that Bioware had a full-time employee creating new usernames and writing reviews, or if we had evidence that they were paying journalists to inflate their review scores...THAT would be fraud. This is one person's biased opinion. If it's wrong, it'll be an outlier, and no one will care. Otherwise, it'll be part of the majority, and no one will care.

 

[ovrebekk]

So what??
It's a user review, and how many users are really that objective?
His 10/10 rate should offset all the whiners giving the game 1/10 for being a bit disappointing.

Personally I was deeply disappointed by the game as well, but i still think its worth at least 5/10 for the things the game do well.

Now, if Bioware rigged one of the official reviews referenced on metacritics, that would be something to write about.
If a Bethesda employee gave it 1/10, would that be such a big deal?

 

[Spendrik]

Bioware will be vindicated, if they move more copies of DA2, compared to DA:O.

As an incidental observation, some RPG 'fans' are the most opinionated, dyed-in-the-wool and resistant-to-change folks.

 

[Tryforlive]

I am the only one of my friends who ignored the reviews and bought the damn thing and i love the game, i find nothing really wrong it is better then the first it has a lot of parts where i truly felt like a RPG couldn't get better im gonna give it 10/10 cause i thought it was epic but a lot of people are hating and i wonder why....

 

[Narcogen]

UPDATE: Electronic Arts has apparently decided to balls it out with a statement to Kotaku [http://kotaku.com/#!5782097/dragon-age-ii-dev-rates-his-own-game-on-metacritic-ea-bets-obama-voted-for-himself-too] that actually defends the review as no big deal. "Of course the people who make the game vote for their own game," a senior PR manager said. "That's how it works in the Oscars, that's how it works in the Grammy's and why I'm betting that Barack Obama voted for himself in the last election."

The problem is that these situations are not analogous, which makes EA's response specious at best.

The US presidential election, as well as the Grammy and Oscar ballots, have checks and balances in place (in theory, anyway) that restrict voting to certain approved populations, and limit each participant to one vote each.

In practice, Metacritic has no such controls. All that is necessary to submit a user review is an account linked to a unique email address. All that is necessary to generate any number required for a given purpose is time and commitment. Since those whose employment is related to a game's reception and performance, those individuals have greater incentive to spend that time, which skews a system designed to give a statistically valid rating of a game's reception by the general gaming public, whether it is skewed by a greater proportion of a game's reviews being submitted by individual employees one at a time, or by multiple reviews submitted by the same employee over several accounts-- or both.

(I'm not alleging either has happened here, just that the possibility exists, and this underscores the wiseness of a policy that says that employees shouldn't submit reviews-- or, at the very least, if they do, they should self-identify as employees when submitting.)

The Academy of Motion Pictures Arts and Sciences is a membership organization. Only industry members are eligible, and their awards, voted by members, reflect the industry's opinion of itself. That includes those who work on the products they vote on, but as those in the industry are the only ones voting at all, and the Academy has 6000+ members, such individual irregularities arguably don't alter the results, nor should any such influence be deemed improper. Just as Barack Obama, as a citizen and a candidate, is entitled to vote for himself once-- as each other candidate is also entitled-- every Academy member who worked on a film up for an award is entitled to cast their one vote in each relevant categories, and unlike Obama, may have worked on more than one film, and even perhaps in more than one film competing for the same award.

By contrast, Dragon Age 2 at Metacritic at this time has a mere 1,083 user ratings-- ratings that are intended, at least, to represent the section of the gaming populace that has played the game. It's a much smaller sample, and it is not intended to mirror the opinion of the community who made this game, or who make games in general, but the opinion of average consumers. One, two, or even a dozen "reviews" by employees, regardless of their specialty, without identifying the author as an employee, have a much greater chance of skewing the accuracy of the aggregate user rating in this smaller population.

 

[Zom-B]

So you want to have your cake, and eat it too?

In all seriousness though, you don't see the problem with your approach? If it comes out that an employee or team member is anonymously shilling for a product that they helped create, it all of a sudden casts doubt on all review material. Suddenly, consumers and/or industry peers don't know what or who to trust. Which are "real" reviews, by professional critics and end users and which are basically advertisements, submitted by the producers? It might not seem important, especially if the producer is genuine in their praise for the product, but many consumers look to reviews by "unbiased" (in quotations because generally we all have some sort of bias one way or the other) critics to help them make purchases. When the reviews seem untrustworthy, eventually your brand becomes tainted.

And you must certainly see the conflict of interest that arises when you actively work to boost your own product (and possibly your own bottom line) in a user's forum, posing as a user, when in fact you are creator or producer?

Sure, self advertising and being proud of your product is great- when you identify yourself as creator. When you take that "ethically gray" road, your customer base becomes suspicious and often, as this case demonstrates, vindictive.

But user reviews are inherently untrustworthy. I'm not saying this was a good idea, but as others have mentioned, there are many reviews from people who either didn't play the game or never went in with the intention of reviewing it fairly. The game's score has already been crapped on by disgruntled "fans" so a single employee that may or may not have been involved with the game posting a good review doesn't really change the landscape at all. And honestly, his review likely reflects the opinions of plenty of players. Obviously not all of them, but there's nothing scandalous about this. It's just an issue of questionable judgment and people that use this as an excuse to hate BioWare or try to prop this up as an example of corruption or something ridiculous are just being spiteful and probably were looking for a reason to rant anyway.

It seems like everyone in this issue has an axe to grind.

I agree that this is not a scandal and one or two "fake" reviews don't make much of a difference. In the larger picture, however, situations like this and the employee review have a cumulative effect.

Look at it this way: Simply because Greg Tito gave the game a glowing review, the initial assumption is that EA paid him for the review. Regardless of whether this is true or not, all of a sudden all of Greg's past and future reviews are in doubt for some people. I think we'd agree that accepting payment for a good review lacks journalistic integrity. But let's enter your "ethical gray" area and suppose that a reviewer loved a game and was going to give it a good review but still accepted payment? Immediately we can give no credence to his review because it's a sponsored position whether it's genuine or not.

The same applies to user reviews. And while many think that user reviews are useless or untrustworthy, they aren't necessarily. Professional critics often have different criteria for reviewing than the regular public. And often, when we take an aggregate score like those used on Metacritic or the ratings for books on Amazon we get a fairly accurate gauge of the overall public reaction to a product. Sure, it doesn't work when people work to game this system, but user reviews do have a place and employees posting reviews without revealing their affiliation is, at the very least, disingenuous.

 

[Horben]

Good on Bioware for sticking up for its employees.

 

[OutforEC]

It's a differant type of fantasy, and has me oftentimes going "WTF".

So you're saying your idea of fantasy is more realistic? You realize just how that sounds, right?

People will sit down and say that they didn't dumb the game down but rather "streamlined" it, but the bottom line is a lot of options are missing. Above and beyond arguements about what you could or couldn't customize in the first game, the problem gets down to core gameplay mechanics like picking your party. In "Dragon Age: Origins" I had a real choice of what companions I wanted to use, I could set them up in whatever way I chose to support my main character. I was not saddled by having to use characters I don't like due to a complete lack of options, or having to say "that's a cool character, I like the banter, but I just don't need that skill set". In Dragon Age 2, you have few if any options. There is ONE tank companion, so if your main character is not a tank that means that for a balanced party you have to bring along their sword and shield character. Sure, the friendship/rivalry system gives you some latitude, but at the same time if your playing a criminal or bad guy, it's absolutly ridiculous to be dragging the ultra-strict "captain of the guard" along as your tank. What's more you constantly have to listen to the nagging and disapproval. It just doesn't work. By the same token if your hero isn't a healer, you have exactly ONE healer companion you can use. He's a mage, and not just ANY mage but pretty much the most vocal pro-mage character in the game, AND even goes so far as to write manifestos in the game (seriously)... having this guy glued to your party if your deciding to play Hawke as a Templar and do a pro-templar walkthrough is an absolute joy to listen to. Like the bit with the guard above, the whole question as to WHY you'd be teaming up with him arises, the only answer is "I need a healer, and there isn't anyone else".

You're complaining about roleplaying reasons for keeping someone in the party due to your meta-gaming reasons for keeping them in the party. These two concerns are night-and-day, and require looking at a game with two entirely different mindsets.

It's not some small minority of contrarians attacking this game, it's a matter of the game being a HUGE disappointment compared to the first one for a lot of the players. Honestly I'd go so far as to say that I think the people who are experiencing "Dragon Age Rage" are the majority, it's just that a lot of them (like my father, who doesn't hang out on forums) are silent about it.

I'd honestly go so far as to say that I think a lot of gamers play the game, and either enjoy it or don't. The contrarians are just more vocal.

Truthfully, from what I've been seeing the professional, paid reviews have been positive. But that highlights a disturbing trend of how tainted by industry dollars they tend to be. Even before the current contreversy, the user ratings of for this game were pretty bloody low, and it's not surprising that you have Bioware sending staffers to try and pad it out, or try and counterbalance the word of mouth.

Unless you can prove Bioware is 'sending staffers to try to pad it out', you're just spreading unsubstantiated rumors. Plus, you give the 'average' person too much credit when it comes to critical reviewing capability. See a Michael Bay movie for an example of the tastes of the average person.

Let me be honest, people can argue about the streamlined mechanics themselves which is why so many people defending the game talk about that. You cannot however defend them recycling the same maps so much for quests, or the way they are having monsters just pop up, the wave attacks, and guys falling out of the sky (or jumping off rooftops) as they spawn or whatever. That's just horrendous and sloppy game design, and there is no excuse for it.

And if that's all the naysayers were complaining about, that would be ok. But the most widespread complaints; Streamlined mechanics, 'dumbing down' the game, not as 'hard' as the first one, etc.

(Snip...)

After reading the rest, it just seems like you're upset with Bioware in general, perhaps because you prefered the ME1 and DA1 experiences more than the sequels. That's perfectly fair, and although I disagree with ME1 > ME2, I can understand your points. But if you're dead-set on having the best *roleplaying* experience possible from your games, complaining about meta-game concerns and Bioware's lack of realism with their fantasy seem like strange things to fixate upon.

PS. I never made it though DA1, haven't played DA2, and don't really care about Bioware in general (other than the upcoming Old Republic), I just don't understand the vehemence directed at them. It's not like they FORCE anyone to buy or play their games...

 

[Tiswas]

Makes me re-consider the scores on a lot of other EA/Bioware games. Is EA the ones who did Kane and Lynch fiasco too? I don't remember.

 

[Aurgelmir]

UuuuUUUuuuhh... Looks like it could pay off to write perfect reviews using other peoples aliases...


Who to discredit who to discredit... Valve perhaps?

That was my thought as well.

I mean how many people don't share their online nick with a million others out there?

 

[Perfice]

PS. I never made it though DA1, haven't played DA2, and don't really care about Bioware in general (other than the upcoming Old Republic), I just don't understand the vehemence directed at them. It's not like they FORCE anyone to buy or play their games...

I was talking about that earlier as well. People are so angry about a game company making ITS game in way they don't prefer. It's like the company having fans of a game they don't agree with is them personally pissing in their cereal or something.

 

[Moktor]

Seriously, who cares? It was a user review. If they were caught paying off a publisher or something I could see it as an issue. Does anyone actually take user reviews seriously? Does anyone even take published reviews seriously? Do you think that opposing game companies would never think of doing the opposite? Ha!