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IGN shows us how NOT to inform
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Well-known gaming site IGN is one of those places that makes me glad I'm not very successful. Like Sony and Microsoft, people are quick to point out their mistakes because they are big, evil corporations who need to be knocked down a peg.
Unfortunately for IGN, they are actually one of the companies on my poop list, and I take pleasure in mocking them. Don't feel bad for them, though -- they've done more than enough shady things to deserve it. Lest we forget this blogger's rage...
More to the point now, IGN recently ran an article detailing the amount of money independent game developers could possibly make, in which they cited 2D Boy and their successful game World of Goo. At least, that's what the article was supposed to be about.
The main problem I found was that the article actually made no mention of the sales or profits made from the game. I mean, the opening of the article was as follows:
Ever wonder what the profit margin is for a successful independent game? At the Game Developers Conference 2009, 2D Boy's Rob Carmel, who co-created the hit World of Goo, shed some light on the upstart's game development costs and profits.
Yes, as a matter of fact I do wonder what the profit margins are for independent games, and thanks to this laughably incomplete article, I will continue to wonder. Why do you specifically mention 'profits' multiple times but never even bring those statistics up? Oh, I see -- you were just advertising for your download service, Direct2Drive.
Direct2Drive was one of the avenues through which you could possibly purchase World of Goo, the others being Steam, WiiWare, and the developer's website. IGN breaks down which service was the most successful, which was WiiWare, and also manages to not link to anybody but themselves. They link 'Direct2Drive' twice and 'World of Goo' links to the game's page on IGN. Typical...
So while IGN is doing nothing here but using World of Goo's "sales figures" as another chance to advertise the fact that you could download it from them, as hard as they are pushing Direct2Drive, you'd at least think they could spell it correctly (which took them 2 days to correct after being pointed out by some commenters, one of which may or may not have been me).
I also want to mention that IGN, even if not given the exact numbers (should anyone want to use that as an excuse for IGN not posting them), they know what the percentages were for the different services. One would assume they know what the sales numbers were from their own service, so it shouldn't be that hard to estimate what each service sold based on the percentage split. If this is information they weren't able to provide, they should have changed the title and opening paragraph.
As it stands now, the article is somewhat of a bait and switch. The sales figures and potential profits of an independent game is an article that I actually wanted to read. What I got instead was not that but instead an advertisement to download crap on Direct2Drive and a reminder why IGN can lick my balls.
[Wardrox, please notice how I linked everyone except IGN in this article. You're welcome. Also, just to be clear, I don't have anything personal against the individual writers of IGN, just the corporate greed that affects how the site is run.]
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