Some time ago, you may remember reports coming out on Bethesda's overhauled review policy. The publisher essentially stopped dishing out review code early to gaming sites like Push Square, effectively eliminating any reviews of its games before they released. By many, this was viewed as an anti-consumer act, since people looking for reviews wouldn't be able to find any until after the games had launched.
But over time, Bethesda has slowly but surely backtracked on its controversial stance, as Pete Hines explains to VG247. "We’re constantly iterating and reevaluating. It just didn’t make sense," Hines states. "We did it the first time because there was the whole thing about transparency and companies needing to be transparent."
Hines continues: "Then it ended up being the focal point and, honestly, we were tired of reading reviews where the first paragraph spent more time talking about our review policy than the game. So we decided we’re not going to keep drawing attention to it – we’ll send out copies and maybe people will start talking about the game instead of talking about policies. So we did."
To be frank, the policy seemed stupid to begin with and it seems even stupider in hindsight. Hines' words don't really give much away with regards to Bethesda's internal situation, but it's clear that the publisher soon realised that it had screwed up after implementing the policy.
Naturally, we're happy that Bethesda's backtracked on all this. We like to think that we provide high quality reviews that help you lot decide whether or not you want to buy a game, and if we're not getting review code early, then it's not really fair on our readers. Hopefully this is the last we hear of such a policy.
[source vg247.com]
Comments 15
Hopefully it helps them sell more of their awesome games day 1.
I think the truth is that they realised it was hurting more than it was helping. They've had some unbelievable hits come out since they implemented this policy, but the coverage online was non-existent because Bethesda actively held them back from us and prevented us from talking about them.
By the time we'd got codes for some of their big holiday games, we were forced to get the review done and move on, because there were other games that demanded our attention and the Bethesda stuff was "old news".
You missed an opportunity to say "Hinesight"
Bethesda are pretty notorious for failing to market anything that isn't Fallout and Elder Scrolls, I legit thought Doom would be bad due to la lack of reviews, and Evil Within 2 was shot behind the shed with its lack of coverage.
@SKC_Diamond Good one!
Good move Bethesda, I find early reviews very helpful. The sooner I buy the game, the sooner I can finish it and sell it on as new.
@NintendoFan4Lyf See I'm not convinced a 7/10 does spell doom. I know exactly what you're saying, but I think it's much better for a game to have 7/10s and LOTS of stories all over the web in the run up to release than a game to get 8/10s and a few articles a week after launch.
With stuff like Dishonored 2, there was just no coverage of it at all.
almost feel that they came out with this just to calm down the controvery about that guy that wanted to sell a game.
either way,good that they got rid of that policy.
Now if they can backtrack on stopping a guy selling their games and pretty much blackmailing Sony over cross play then I might consider buying their games new again.
@get2sammyb In the case of Dishonored 2 it is Crystal clear this was what happened. I've seen it happen among my friends too, who totally forgot about the game.
And I think 7/10's can be fine. The only time review scores really become important is when they are either extremely high or low. But most consumers don't mind scores that much, just look at review scores for Assassin's Creed and Call of Duty throughout the years. Those weren't always sky high, but the games performed well due to their coverage.
What about this is transparent? "You keep using that word, I do not think it means what you think it means." They obviously don't have a friendly reason, because that's not it, and they don't want to tell us the real reason. Now do I blame them for that? No, if I had a selfish (even if understandable) policy like this, I wouldn't share it either. I'm glad they revoked it though. .
Translation: Our plan to hyping gamers so they buy our game before reading reviews backfired, beside doom and skyrim, our game didn't sell because people actually waiting for reviews, lol.
I think they expected other publishers to follow suit but tbh, most other publishers don’t release as much single player games that need good reviews as Bethesda.
I still never gonna buy a Bethesda game day one only used or on a super cheap sale 😝
As a single player gamer I love Bethesda, but I always have to wait a few months before buying their games (patches, patches, patches...) so I can wait to read reviews too!
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