PC Gamer takes a crap on Penny Arcade

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CreganTur

Gawd
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Jan 15, 2004
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If you don't read Scott Kurtz's news posts on PVP, or haven't heard this somewhere else yet, then you need to know that PC Gamer just crapped all over Penny Arcade.

http://www.pvponline.com/blog/3359/no-respect

Apparently the editor over at PC Gamer invited the PA crew over and created the 5 different PA inspired cover art mags just so the issue would flop. He wants it to crap out to show a buddy that PA isn't all it's cracked up to be.:mad:

This really pisses me off because either way (if the mag flops on sales or flies off the shelves) the jerk editor wins. If the sales plummet (because people aren't buying in protest to the a-hole) he wins because he can say "PA isn't that popular" or if the issues fly off the shelves (because gamers buy them in protest to support PA) then he can claim to his bosses that it was a brialliant tactical decision that caused such great sales.

*indignant snort*

This really irks me because PC Gamer has become a big disappointment in my opinion. They used to be the source for unbiased game info. A game could buy up half the mag in advertising, and they'd still shread it if it was crappy.

Those days are long gone.:( Now they give good reviews to mediocre games that advertise heavily. Their journalistic credentials, at least in my opinion, are tarnished, and have been for the past few years.

I think a lot of angry fanmail will be filtering through the PC Gamer mailroom very soon.
 
Vede is having a hard time being relavent these days. Gotta say, he's a nice enough guy in person, but this is a dick move and the only thing he's going to do is piss off a lot of his customers by making a statement like the one he did here. PA has a HUGE fanbase, probably larger than the subscriber base of PC Gamer.

i'd also be VERY interested to hear Tycho and Gabe's take on this.
 
That's a douche move on the Vede's part in my opinion. Makes me glad I dropped my PCG subscription when I did. The last couple of years haven't been quality for PCG or Maximum PC as far as I'm concerned. It's sad really.
 
Wow i had alot of respect for The Vede when he was on hardstuff but since he took over editor i have no desire to even read PC Gamer and now he pull off a move like this wow.
 
I had a PCG subscription back in the day, I used to love to read it, but since Vede took over I have had little to no interest in reading PCG any more. PCG sold out, and now they are picking a fight with PA, I think they are just trying to sell issues, this is another Rose Vs. Trump fight, all about ratings.
 
The Vede needs to go back to the Hard Stuff. I'm still not used to him as EiC.

Anyone else miss Rob Smith? Even Morris and Whitta were good EiC's.
 
Meh, PC Gamer started to suck years ago when they decided to cut down on number of pages but inserted more and more ads.
 
I stopped caring about PCG when it wasn't worth subscribing to on the whole, and when it did catch my eye in the store, the $12 dollar price tag was an instant WTF, followed by a frown.

Sometimes you just need something to read at work, but that something isn't going to be PC Gamer I guess.
 
PC Gamer is still around?

I always thought his judgment was questionable at best. He used to recommend spending more on a sound card than a graphics card on budget systems. Sure the the game would look bad and be choppy but at least the bullets hitting your corpse sounded better with that high end card. Well at least it would have if you would've also gotten high end speakers.:rolleyes:
 
BladeVenom said:
PC Gamer is still around?

I always thought his judgment was questionable at best. He used to recommend spending more on a sound card than a graphics card on budget systems. Sure the the game would look bad and be choppy but at least the bullets hitting your corpse sounded better with that high end card. Well at least it would have if you would've also gotten high end speakers.:rolleyes:
Click to expand...
He must've been in Creative Labs' pocket :eek: Someone needs to give him a kick in the teeth.
 
Hmm, I buy every issue of PC Gamer but I skipped the Penny Arcade one because frankly I never heard of it, it didn't interest me and on top of that there were no good games out or being reviewed in that issue.

Maybe I'll pick it up today and take a look.
 
Similar boat... not realy a fan of Penny Arcade... I dont hate them or anything, theyre just relegated to the pile of irrelevance in my book... just another reason not to buy the PCG issue, if I hadnt had enough of them already... I just stick to WIRED and National Geographic and I'm set...
 
I think people need to grow up and stop taking everything so goddamned seriously....
 
magazines...meh.

I dont understand why anyone would buy this sort of thing in the first place, when it's all free online. Except for maybe if they need something read when on the loo.
 
Frosteh said:
magazines...meh.

I dont understand why anyone would buy this sort of thing in the first place, when it's all free online. Except for maybe if they need something read when on the loo.
Click to expand...

You must not leave home much. :p

Magazines have their place:
On the crapper
On the train / subway.
On a plane (because those in-flight moves are soooo good.)
Dr's office
Waiting at the DMV
In jail (umm, scratch that one. . .)
 
CGW was always better than PCG. You want journalistic integrity? CGW used to refuse to do previews of games without a hands-on gameplay demo.
 
Yes, I read PA thrice weekly and am a PCG subscriber. I did in fact read this article on the can and merely chuckled at it. Wow, talk about overreacting. Vede doesn't say much negative about the comic or the game, hell he even gives props to their talent and what looks to be a good game. He merely comments on PA fanbois. I mourn for today's youth and their reading comprehension skills.
 
well i hate to say it but i agree with almost everything the vede said... Now that doesn't mean he should have raped them in his public letter but still:

- yes penny arcade is as popular as it is partially because it has no real competition
- most people don't find penny arcade funny, only relevant sometimes

I agree with both of these points as stated by the vede, and personally i never read penny arcade and the ones I've read i don't find funny in the least. In fact, sometimes they're maniacally stupid.....
 
I was going to send this email to him while I am work, but I should wait till I get home so
I can use my personal email address.

I have never purchased your magazine but I have flipped through a few issues at a friend’s
house before. Basically I would rather get my gaming information from the Internet and I hope
gaming magazines slowly die because I see no use for them.

I enjoy Penny Arcade, but I am not as fanatical about it as your friend. I am attending my
first PAX this year (I live in Baltimore) and I have bought one t-shirt from them so I could it
signed by both Mike and Jerry when they were on the east coast. I read their comic everyday
and I think their infrequent podcasts are basically the best audio recordings ever. I listen to
them all the time while at work, kind of like some people listen to the radio.

Basically I am writing this because you said some things that were not very nice. I am sorry
that your friend's love for Penny Arcade bothers you so much, but maybe you should try to
be happy for him. Be happy that something that makes you friend happy exists and makes
him feel good. When my friends get all crazy about the TV shows and/or other things that
they love, I do not try to kill their joy by proving that the object of their affection is not so great.

Is there nothing that you are fanatical about? Say for example that you love TV show Lost.
(I don't watch that show, but lots of people seem to like it.) What if a magazine editor put it on
the cover of their magazine and then wrote about how they hope the issue does not sell well
because Lost is stupid and Lost is not good enough to warrant the fanaticism of the masses.
Maybe those boobs that love Lost are all suffering from group-think or mass hysteria!

Yeah, there are people out there who like things because everyone else does. They may be
fooling themselves. Deep down they may hate Lost, but they are so messed up that they
don't even realize they hate it. I feel sorry for people like that, but I don't think that Lost is the
source of the problem. The problem is these people who either have low self-esteem or who
are insecure.

To close out this overlong email I want to talk about this paragraph I read in a forum about this
stuff:

"This really pisses me off because either way (if the mag flops on sales or flies off the shelves)
the jerk editor wins. If the sales plummet (because people aren't buying in protest to the a-hole)
he wins because he can say "PA isn't that popular" or if the issues fly off the shelves (because
gamers buy them in protest to support PA) then he can claim to his bosses that it was a
brilliant tactical decision that caused such great sales."

It is true. No matter what happens to sales of the magazine you will win. You win Greg! Hurray
Greg! Lets all have a party to celebrate Greg's victory!

I hope this victory tastes good, because soon your magazine will fail along with other gaming
magazines and you will be without a job. Then I hope you are forced to live with your Penny
Arcade obsessed friend, and I hope he shoves his love for Penny Arcade in your face for so
long that you decide to commit suicide.

I don't really hate you Greg, but I do think you are: a jerk, a douche, a killjoy and a sad loser.
 
Penny arcade seen to have trouble getting simple points over in just a sentance or so and ramble like there's no tomorrow, the comics are ok but rarely funny to me.

As for places to read a magazine, most of those places you can take a laptop :)

And no, I don't go out a lot :p
 
I agree with the article. While I do not agree that putting them as the cover is either a good way to show theyre not that popular or even a non-dickhead move, I agree with what the article says.

The guy even says "I find it entertaining." I too find the comic entertaining. However, it has SO MANY dumb fanboys it's mind-boggling. Not people who just enjoy it, people who are fanatically devoted to it. You might even find a few in this thread. There are those who are just sucked into it like its some kind of drawn Scientology.

It's alright, but it's not the best thing evar.
 
I guess I'm not aware of the "rabid penny-arcade fanboy" issue as it were. I mean, I've read the comic since it was created, and I'm definitely a fan, but I understand that humor is always subjective based on the person.

So while I'm a fan, I would never try to 'argue something funny' to somebody. I still think that while the editors note is an opinion piece, it's still a prick move to call out your issue moving cover story, and I bet it's never been done before.

The letter is ok, until the end where he talks about hoping it "doesn't move copies to prove a point"
 
i'm not sure how many of you read the actual Editorial, but it really doesn't seem to crap on PA that badly... sure it's not exactly good publishing, but he doesn't come out and say that he wants it to fail like everyone is claiming.

i haven't read PC Gamer in over 5 years, so don't think that I give a rats @$$ about Vede.
 
Uh, "gaming" magazines have been irrelevant to me for like 10 years now. I do like penny arcade, though, and read their comic/frontpage on mondays wednesdays and fridays. They have somewhat different tastes in video games than I do so their comics are hit and miss. I do agree on their opinions of Halo 1 & 2 and the people who love them, though :p (a couple of their recent comics)

I do visit pvp once in a while, also, but the most I get out of that is an extremely mild chuckle.
 
I read it, and I'll agree he doesn't necessarily 'slam' the PA guys, but he goes to great lengths to compare them to something he personally finds extremely lame.

"Oh, I'm not saying you guys suck, you just remind of this one thing does suck, you remind me of it a lot"

It's really not all that thinly veiled.
 
PC Gamer is a poorly written magazine and is almost impossible to read. The jokes they come up with are lame as hell. They give false information. I wish they would die already.
 
I remember Vede. I used to subscribe to PCGamer... for a year. It was a good year, full of frequent demo's that I'd never download from a poor free dialup connection (curse you Juno!). I loved reading it.
Fortunately, I've now graduated to the internet on the broadband stream of life. The only reason I remember Vederman is because the way his name showed up... "The Vede". Honestly I didn't even care about the hardware articles. Bleh. I haven't even paid attention to it for these last few years, but I could tell the quality was diminishing at the end of my subscription. Soon it will be gone.

On the other hand, I read Penny-Arcade every day. I don't find all the jokes funny, though most are mildly amusing at least (today's HaloClix comic, for instance). I'd go to PAX... if I could. I donate to Child's Play... when I can. But overall, I'm not a fanboy, I'm just another passing face. Perhaps someday PA will go the way of PCG. But not anytime soon.

Regardless of all that, this situation sucks. What was I saying again?
 
Five covers, nine positive pages inside the magazine but let us focus on the EICs attempt at humor. It is funny that he does not get the PA cult and cult gets angry. I am more annoyed at the dumb "did his mother" joke.
 
What exactly is wrong with what Vede said? He's suddenly a dickhole for admitting that he doesn't find Penny Arcade to be the rip-roaring laughfest so many internet addicts believe it to be? When is PCGamer going to do a VGCats theme?

I don't know, but I think the whole uproar about this proves his point. It's just a comic, and often a comic that tries too hard to be deep, or bitingly sarcastic, and fails from time to time. When someone has to say "Admit this is funny", they're on thin ice themselves. That's called a fan-boy.

Frankly, if such a popular comic that is so great can't take some open criticism (mild criticism, at that!) then I think they realize their actual mediocrity. Grow up, boys.
 
This really pisses me off. I bought the issue because I never bothered reading the editor's message before purchasing it, but now I'm stuck in a situation in which I'm happy because buying it helps support Penny Arcade and prove "the Vede" wrong, but I'm not happy because I paid hard-earned cash just to fund some asshole who trashes the cover story even after the guys are nice enough to give details about the game and everything in between.

I don't think I'll be buying PCG for a while, or at least until they get a new Editor in Chief, because this is just ridiculous and about as unprofessional as you can get.
 
Actually, it was Scott Kurtz that was pissed off.

He thinks the tactics of the whole situation suck. The whole 'uproar' is in response to his opinion on the subject. As far as PA is concerned, it seems that they could give two shits... I remember seeing it mentioned, and didn't know what they were talking about at the time. The only reference to the editorial article was made back on May 25th, and was surmised in two lines in the post at the bottom.


Not really an uproar at all... mild shrug maybe?
 
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