Conduit Studio Accused of Amazonbombing Conduit Reviewer - UPDATED

[Puzzlenaut]

In fairness, having read the descriptions of the book, it does look like a load of bollocks that isn't worth anywhere near 5/5 stars.

Still, judging a book by its cover and all that...

 

[v3n0mat3]

Not his fault your game sucks (to him). Attacking his product because he didn't like yours is childish and stupid.

 

[Bags159]

I dunno, Valve got Metacritic bombed on Portal 2 by people over nothing. So it's not a bullet proof vest against all problems, sadly.

http://www.metacritic.com/game/pc/portal-2

Critics: 95
Users: 83

It looks fine now to me; metacritic seems to have deleted a lot of the, "hur it's a 0 and I didn't play it but valve are fgts" comments. It was only really low for the first few days; and low reviews on the first few days were not going to prevent VALVe fans from buying Portal 2 on day 1. Seriously, are you going to let a review that reads, "it's a 0 because it's really short and oh my god day 1 dlc" affect your judgment?

It's nothing compared to MW2's metacritic:
http://www.metacritic.com/game/pc/call-of-duty-modern-warfare-2

Critics: 86
Users: 37

Although I always take user review nubmers with a pinch of salt, and official review numbers with a handful of salt. I read a bunch of reasonable reviews and look for re-occurring themes.

I wasn't arguing the effect of the Metacritic bomb of Portal 2, (though it's user score is still unduly influenced by those 143 negatives that were based on inconsequential reasons) heck I don't even look to Metacritic, I just check with a few reviewers I trust . I doubt the silly book review thing will effect the reviewer who gave Conduit 2 much either. It'll probably make his seemingly unknown book more widely seen if anything.

You can argue that it didn't hurt Portal 2 much, and I'm sure the effects weren't great, my only point was that making a great game isn't a guarantee against all problems. There'll always be a few nutcases out there with a lot of time and pent up rage they want to unleash safety across the internet.

Not to mention all the gamers and reviewers who believe that a game is bad just because it doesn't meet their specific tastes. I've seen a lot of great games laid into and derided by professional games journalists even over arbitrary personal tastes.

Okay, let me rephrase that then. Making a great game is the best way to almost always avoid most problems developers seem to have lately.

 

[James Kortright]

To be fair, the positive reviews were probably all written by his mates, so it all equals out in the end

 

[jowo96]

I would imagine it is more likely that the negative reviews were written by High Voltage fans rather than High Voltage itself, It's not unreasonable to think that High Voltage may have atleast 4 fans.
However if it is true then High Voltage studio is petty and childish and this course of action would suggest that they probably don't have the qualities to make a good game.

 

[FieryTrainwreck]

Let's be honest here; what are the chances this book isn't completely awful?

 

[Woodsey]

Were they expecting The Conduit to receive amazing reviews, then?

 

[BrotherRool]

At least FencerOrigins has good taste in other books

 

[scyther250]

Haven't read the novel being trashed, but it's almost a sure thing that anything by Terry Pratchett is better anyway.

 

[SamElliot'sMustache]

The same reviewer also gave last year's Alpha Protocol a five-star score, however, calling it "an RPG masterpiece," so maybe he or she just has really bad taste.

Maybe calling it an 'RPG masterpiece' is a stretch, but Alpha Protocol was still miles ahead of some of the games that were nominated for Best of 2010 on this site. Just saying.

Meanwhile, Conduit 1 was utter trash, so I'm not surprised that there was a bad review for number 2. And considering the attempt at sub-3D Realms style of marketing they tried to pull with it, I also wouldn't be surprised that they stooped this low to get back at anyone who dared to trash their product. High Voltage certainly seems like it's staffed by flea-riddled monkeys who had been given meth and forced to watch a 24-hour marathon of Glenn Beck.

 

[Sunder845]

Funnily enough, I just went and checked and all but one of the negative reviews has disappeared.

 

[Snotnarok]

The 'amazon bombing' of those idiots who went on fox news and said Mass Effect made little boys think women are objects while never having played them, while also staying ignorant to the fact women are playable characters, they deserved it.

I'd say anyway, it's an idiot going on TV and publicly showing their ignorance in the subject, while insisting things should be done against it. But ...a reviewer dishing out a bad review? That's what you do that for? ...Grow up.

 

[mariofan1000]

Sounds like they were actually trying to thank him by suggesting they read his book, and everyone took it wrong way.

 

[Sunder845]

Sounds like they were actually trying to thank him by suggesting they read his book, and everyone took it wrong way.

You cant be serious.

 

[zombie711]

this article seems to blow things a little out of proportion.
the book only has 10 reviews. And anyone who thinks those low reviews were from fans, well perhapse some of those high reviews were from fans. Fandom works both ways. Its not even that big a deal, I mean were calling someone out, someone who gave conduit 2 and alpha protocal a good review just for giving a bad review for a book that was written by a guy who didnt like conduit 2. If that doesnt sound like a conspiracy theroy to you then I dont know what is. I mean has anyone read the book? Perhapse its horrible, perhapse its great, we dont know and to me this all seems like a coincidence. I mean just cause someone likes games that have mixed reviews doesnt mean that when they give a bad review to something, they become a raging fanboy.

 

[Andronicus]

Haven't read the novel being trashed, but it's almost a sure thing that anything by Terry Pratchett is better anyway.

QFT

Murdock: The Conduit 2 is not worth the time of day because it fails in nearly all of the most basic aspects of proper, cohesive game design.

High Voltage: OH YEAH?! Well... er...
YOUR FEET SMELL BAD!

 

[newwiseman]

Inflating the reviews on someones own products has been common practice ever since advertising began. Bombing someone else's product is just dirty, and underhanded. Bad form if they did do it, even if they didn't do it they now have a measure of guilt tied to their brand by the two reviews coinciding.

 

[Andronicus]

Sorry for the doublepost.

Internet crapped out on me

 

[SomethingUnrelated]

Impressive level of objectivity with which this article was written...

OT: It looks suspicious, but I suppose we should wait to see what High Voltage has to say in their defense.