Negative DNF Reviews Lead to PR Blacklist?

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What's the best way for a PR firm to lose a huge client like 2K and piss everyone else off in the process? Hmmm, how about using Twitter to announce you are blacklisting sites that give Duke Nukem Forever a negative review. :eek:

A third-party public relations firm tweeted last night that they would be "reviewing who gets games next time and who doesn't" based on the bad reviews pouring in about Duke Nukem Forever. "Too many went too far with their reviews... we r reviewing who gets games next time and who doesn't based on today's venom." Jim Redner, of The Redner Group, tweeted out.
 
It wasn't a great game, for sure. But I don't think it was worthy of 3/10 or 4/10 reviews. A solid 5 or 6 IMO. Didn't someone give it an 80/100? Not worthy that rating either. :cool:
 
Jim Redner is a textbook definition of a fanboy.
 
LOL On metacritic DNF got:
1 good review on XB360 (long load times probably affected that)
4 good reviews on PS3
4 good reviews on PC

and 28 negative reviews so far between the 3 platforms.

The PR firm would have been busy.
 
It wasn't a great game, for sure. But I don't think it was worthy of 3/10 or 4/10 reviews. A solid 5 or 6 IMO. Didn't someone give it an 80/100? Not worthy that rating either. :cool:

A solid 6.5 in my book. I am enjoying the game though as its refreshing to have something different then all the rehased BS that has been coming out as of late.
 
Redner has already written out to journalists to apologize for that Tweet:

Hello,

I would like a quick moment of your time to humbly ask for your forgiveness. I made a major error in judgment. I acted out of pure emotion without any thought to what I was saying. It is with a sad heart that I come to you now asking that you forgive me. I posted a Tweet this evening saying that I was reviewing The Redner Group's policy for future reviews of video games based on today's Duke Nukem Forever scores. I must state for the record I was acting on my behalf. 2K and all other clients had nothing to do with my comment. I want to be very clear that this came through me and was in no way affiliated with any of my clients especially my former client 2K.

Though I didn't name names, I did say that I thought some reviews had gone too far in tone. Meaning, that the tone of some of the reviews was poor. I respect the scores, it had to deal with the tone. I was unable to properly convey that in 140 characters. But that it beside the point. We are all entitled to our opinions regardless of score, tone or meaning. My response was a juvenile act on my part. I know better and my emotion got the best of me. I have worked very hard on this project. I want it to succeed. I just got upset and acted out.

I believe we are all allowed to voice our opinions and that opinions by their very nature are correct. Many of you quickly pointed out my error in judgment. For that I thank you and apologize.

I truly respect what you do. You have helped me achieve a little bit of success in this industry. I depend upon you. Your coverage is of the utmost importance to me. You have helped me secure coverage for all of the projects that I have touched. I have tried to treat you all with respect, dignity and honesty. Tonight I threw that all away, and I am extremely sorry.

The video game industry is an industry that I love. I have tried to dedicate myself to this industry. Tonight I failed the industry.

With much respect, I hope that when we meet again you will be able greet me with a smile and without malice. I will gladly do the same.

I am truly sorry for what I did. I know better than that. If I have caused you any issues, now or in the past, I apologize.

Best of luck,

Jim Redner
 
People were (ignorantly) expecting a game that seriously would take 12 years to make.

How many months (not years) do you really think they put into making it?

When that first delay hit, I canceled my pre-order.

Seems like a decent game... but I just knew there'd be a fan backlash over it not being "An Ass Kicking Tribute".
 
I honestly think that a lot of the reviewers were waiting to destroy this game regardless of whether it was fun or not. I've played a good amount of the game, I've read the reviews, and I can't agree with the ones that are giving it 1,2,3, 4 out of 10. The game is very playable, entertaining, and there is absolutely nothing gamebreaking about it or unplayable about it that would make it deserving of such lambasting as I've seen.
 
How much did they actually change to the core game? Didn't they simply tie everything together and fix bugs? I don't believe they remade it from the bottom up, they didnt have time :D the negative reviews wouldnt bother me too much hell the game still probably got them a nice profit.
 
Honestly with the hot, steaming piles of crap out there that never get below a 5-6, what DNF got was just a piling on the bandwagon of, "Let's be cool and flame DNF."
 
I honestly think that a lot of the reviewers were waiting to destroy this game regardless of whether it was fun or not.
Most of the critic reviews were mediocre, not bad. But there are far more negative reviews than positive reviews.

I played the demo and my only opinion was that I'll buy it when it hits the bargain bin. $50 or $60 for it? lol, no way.
 
When I read reviews like "This game has poor voice acting" I immediately stop paying attention. It has poor voice acting on purpose because it's not expected to be taken serious. This is not supposed to compete with MW, BF, or any other FPS.

I completely understand why Joe Schmoe off the street would give this game a poor review. The game wasn't made for him, it was made for people who love Duke and how everything around him over glorifies how awesome he is compared to the rest of the world. Everyone else in this game is drawn out to be puny compared to Duke.
 
My wifd got me DNF for an erly father's day present on pc of course (only one that got it on pc at the eb games at one of the largets malls in NC). If I wasn't a DN fan I would give it a good 5.5 or 6. Since I am a DN fan it's a good 7.5 to 8 out of 10. Been playing the shit out of multiplayer. Its just like old duke 3d, fun mindles death matches. Havn't really played the single player mode much yet. But I'm really enjoying the game and I'll be playing the shit out of it for a long time.
 
Redner has already written out to journalists to apologize for that Tweet:

Well written apology but something tells me he was threatened of being fired if he didn't make one, because it made everyone involved look back.
 
He wasn't pissed at low scores. He was pissed at the absolute trashing and flaming of the game that was completely uncalled for and was way beyond a fair, unbiased review.

I agree with his initial twitter post. If I owned a PR firm though, I wouldn't be saying those things...because...well it's bad PR.
 
I betchya 5 bucks they were probably referring to the review that Ben put up on ArsTechnica.

He tore DNF at least 3 new anuses.
 
They are no longer doing PR for 2K games as of today....idiots

Games is shit except for DNF fanbois and 14 year old teenage boys.
 
I completely understand why Joe Schmoe off the street would give this game a poor review. The game wasn't made for him, it was made for people who love Duke and how everything around him over glorifies how awesome he is compared to the rest of the world. Everyone else in this game is drawn out to be puny compared to Duke.
I haven't played the game yet, but I remember playing DN3D and thought it was great. If it's basically a repeat of that game then I don't see what the problem is other than it being a shoddy port. Definitely going to wait for this one to go under $10 before I consider buying it.
 
Honestly with the hot, steaming piles of crap out there that never get below a 5-6, what DNF got was just a piling on the bandwagon of, "Let's be cool and flame DNF."

This has been my belief as well. DNF did not deserve the kind of "me too" gangraping that it got. I have read some of these, and it is my opinion that some of these reviewers went way overboard. I am also starting to wonder whether some of these people don't even understand what Duke Nukem was all about, considering that their balls hadn't even dropped when DN3D came out. They were still sucking their momma's tits back when we were playing one of the best games ever released. Many of these people never even played the original DN or the 2nd one.
 
Some of the reviews have been way, way too hard on Duke. It's not a very good game, but it's not as terrible as some would have you believe. To be honest I've had more fun playing it than any Call of Duty lately.

Some reviewers (who need to get over themselves) just seem to have taken it upon themselves to take the game down a peg or two because they have this fake moral indignation about the game's "disgusting" attitute to women etc. Others just want to join the queue of people putting the boot in... it all seems very personal and biased.
 
Some of the reviews have been way, way too hard on Duke. It's not a very good game, but it's not as terrible as some would have you believe. To be honest I've had more fun playing it than any Call of Duty lately.

Some reviewers (who need to get over themselves) just seem to have taken it upon themselves to take the game down a peg or two because they have this fake moral indignation about the game's "disgusting" attitute to women etc (and I bet most of these people are complete hypocrites).

Others just want to join the queue of people putting the boot in... it all seems very personal and biased.
 
It wasn't a great game, for sure. But I don't think it was worthy of 3/10 or 4/10 reviews. A solid 5 or 6 IMO. Didn't someone give it an 80/100? Not worthy that rating either. :cool:

Exactly how I feel about it.
 
I played it for 3 hours yesterday, was utterly pissed off, and stopped playing. I was hoping that I would jump back on it today and it would be different, but it was more of the same, so let me explain, without any spoilers, what the game is like..

-- enter scene

You are in a decrepit construction area with very oddly placed "things." This affects my eoverall experience on a sub-conscience negative level.

There are very few things. There was a bent pipe sticking out of the ground, 3 freight train cargo holds. I just kinda looked around at the very boring scene as I did my quick circle around the are to find out (much like in every other part of the game) that you are walled in with a "puzzle" to solve.

Following puzzle is a bit of a spoiler, but very easy to figure out, so hate me if you like. I doubt you'd need a walkthrough for this.

You must climb a triple stack of girders, which like everything else, prove to be there for one reason: You to proceed. You climb these, and look to see one of the 3 freight cargos are filled with explosives. You shoot them, and it blows some doors off. You then wander around, wondering what to do until you see the only other things in the environment (literally).

3 barrels. There is no way for you to know this, but since everything in the environment looks so static, I assumed nothing to be involved with the barrels. I quickly grabbed one and then walked in the cargo to see that it had a teeter totter thing going on. Gotcha. Throw barrels in cargo and then *all too obviously* the way will be open.

Ok... skip ahead. Next construction site. Instead of barrels, there is a truck. You kill 2 ridiculous aliens with jetpacks who are about as tough to kill as anything else in the game. WAY too easy.

After this, you see a crane. You go in to find the controls dead. Oh my - not another "must give it juice somehow task." Yup.

Well, like I said before, everything is extremely linear, so since i'm not going to have to go back the way I came, I only have one option - climb the crane. Yes - this idiotic logic becomes ingrained in your head.

Climb crane, jump over to more buildings in progress, that are just metal girders. Climb some wooden planks, and oh wow... There's a battery. As soon as I saw it, I thought "Ok... what's going to spawn as soon as I get this?"

An alien warship that you just mindlessly shoot at with the RPG. After 12 shots it goes down and convieniently breaks down a wall making your trip back to the crane easier.

Insert battery.

Ok... so apparently, this is a wrecking ball! Yay! Destructions!!! So I knock down 4 beams of one of the girdered "buildings" and for some reason the other girders were invinsible. Please note the physics of this game are just horrendous and worse than any physics i've ever seen in a game. I just got done playing FEAR (the first one) and those physics were better. Not to mention the rag-doll effect in this game is basically non-existent. Its just really bad.

Yah ok - wrecking ball!!! FUN!! Wrong... you soon figure out that there is something shooting at the crane... oh... way over on the left side, there is a wall with some monsters - well.. I already used the wrecking ball on my right side - I guess i'll knock it into the left building with the monsters shooting me.

Duke promptly says "Taste my balls" while the monsters instantly die from the shockwave of the wrecking ball that hit about 10 feet below them and did very minimal concrete building damage.

You do this for about 5 rounds of aliens just re-spawning and coming to die and then...

I don't know what then. I stopped playing. I don't know if i'll play again.

Final thoughts - this game is not meant for your veteran FPS'er. It is almost like some kids were given a set of instructions, with a very easy SDK and went to work. If you have played Half-Life 2, or even half life 1, single player, all the way through, and were blown away... take a step back.

This game is worse. We're talking some sort of Quake, Heretic game with better graphics. Oh - don't forget the horrible one-liners that lack any sort of punch.

I rate Duke Dukem Forever a 43/100 and would never recommend this game to anyone. I've got a steam account with only duke nukem balls of steel (ugh) and the witcher 2 on. I haven't played more than 3 hours on either. Anyone want to buy it?
 
Just the term "Operation: Cockblock" gives it 7 out of 10. I laughed my ass off the first time I saw it.

I'll wait for the bargain bin, tho.
 
I am a Duke fanboy and was going to buy it regardless if it sucked. Then I played the demo.... Oh boy. Did it suck? No. But it was very uninspiring. I just hope everyone makes their money back and allows gearbox and duke devs still left over to make a total kick-ass re-imagining of the series with updated engines.

What do you guys think?
 
I haven't played the game yet, but I remember playing DN3D and thought it was great. If it's basically a repeat of that game then I don't see what the problem is other than it being a shoddy port. Definitely going to wait for this one to go under $10 before I consider buying it.
I'm currently enjoying the fuck out of the game.

It's not a repeat so much as it takes all the elements and brings them into this century. The only real clunky thing I've come across, so far, is the second or third level where you have to move the remote control car with WASD but you're viewing it from Duke's eyes instead of the POV of the driver's seat.
 
Been playing the game for a little while. It's pretty average, nothing special. If you played the original one back in the dat you'll like it. 6/10 score in my book.
 
Fuck DNF. I stopped giving a crap about it 10 years ago..

And if you don't like the negative review, write a decent game.
 
Consider 50 bux a donation to go towards the development of the next chapter in the Duke franchise. I'm happy to move on.
 
Honestly with the hot, steaming piles of crap out there that never get below a 5-6, what DNF got was just a piling on the bandwagon of, "Let's be cool and flame DNF."

Probably. I've seen bigger pieces of shit get awesome reviews. Far Cry 2 is a great example of that. Reviews are generally positive for it but that game sucks horse dicks and teabags elephants.
 
I'm starting to think the terrible reviews are based on Xbox 360 version. The PC version seems to be getting much better reviews. I'll wait for a sale on DNF to be around $30 before I give it a go.
 
Probably. I've seen bigger pieces of shit get awesome reviews. Far Cry 2 is a great example of that. Reviews are generally positive for it but that game sucks horse dicks and teabags elephants.

I found FC1 boring as fuck and from everything I've heard FC2 makes FC1 look like a party with hookers and blow.

So far, Duke is fun. Sure, the graphics aren't "OMGZORZ!!! TEH REALZ!!!" but... Who gives a fuck? I really feel like gameplay has been massively sacrificed for pretty graphics.

There's boobs and I'm ripping pig-cops heads off and kicking guys in the balls.

There's... wait for it... wait for it... ACTUAL GAMEPLAY!
 
Maybe reviewers are a little gun shy. They all gave Crysis 2 rave reviews (except for [H] of course) and the rest of the gaming world shit all over it. Maybe they're overcorrecting some.
 
and this is why many game developers dont do demos anymore. If it sucks ass in the demo, chances are it'll suck ass in the full version. Why cut off the suckers before they latch on to the teet?
 
Whatever happened to the damn demo? I thought it was supposed to come out yesterday, or was that just for pre-order people? I have to see for myself how horrible this turned out after reading this stuff. :D
 
This is one reason Apple gets such good reviews, they send out lots of free stuff to reviewers. Give the iPad 1 a bad review and you won't get an iPad 2 or any other Apple goodies.

This is why reporters don't ask the president tough questions, they don't want to lose but cut off from the White House.
 
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