So do you work for a game company?

DukenukemX

Supreme [H]ardness
Joined
Jan 30, 2005
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Penny-Arcade.com brought up something I've been wondering myself for some time about the forums. The comic I'm talking about is "On Botany".

So do any of you wonder about people who infiltrate forums to sway public opinion? I mean I've seen people make some pretty strange claims about games and hardware in this forum. <.< Looks left. >.> Looks right.

I know you people are out there. Come clean and nobody will get flamed. Puts tin foil hat on.
 
This is something that Bill Hicks got right...

If you are in marketing or advertising, KILL YOURSELF! Seriously.
 
Tetrahedron said:
This is something that Bill Hicks got right...

If you are in marketing or advertising, KILL YOURSELF! Seriously.


In fuedal Japan blind men who could only earn a living through gambling and giving people massage's were considered prostitutes. (Yeah, I stole this from the series Zatoichi...) Same with advertising. We might be considered ad whore's or whatever but it's a living. There are people that do far worse in this country and they often have the most power. That's how the US was formed after all; trying to shape and form the publics opinion... It's what keep the US comfy and happy with life.

Idealism is great and everything, but reality is far more difficult to manage and comprehend.
 
Well it is about the gaming market, which we do discuss a good bit.

I think its an interesting question.

However I will tell you the admin and mod staff around here are very good at spotting, and quickly banning "drive by spammers", people who make accounts simply to plug a product, site etc. The offender's posting ability is removed, and often the spam url is added to our filters, so you don't have to worry about it showing up again.

So around here, unless we have a user like Torgo for example who did game development, you won't see this type of pimpage on our forums.

I will also add I have never seen any longtime or respected user like Torgo pimp "You should really go buy AOE, its the greatest game EVAR!!" in an attempt to sell a product he has worked on. Most of our users are very respectful and let their products stand on their own merits and faults.

Hope that covers it all for you. ;)
 
But I think the real problem is the people who don't admit they work for a game company. Going around and claiming that this is great and that is great and you should put up a mortgage on your home for all these things.

I mean you'll never know. These are people who are paid to sway public opinion and as we know the American public don't have a mind of their own. This is going to be a real big problem until people evolve with the ability to think on their own.

The bigger the forum the more probable that someone posts here for a living. Imagine that right before the Xbox 360 was released that a number of people were hired to go to www.hardforum.com only to sway public opinion to buy it.

It's a scary thought.
 
Tetrahedron said:
This is something that Bill Hicks got right...

If you are in marketing or advertising, KILL YOURSELF! Seriously.

I work for a marketing company that pulls over a billion dollars a year net. I love my life and my job.

Bill Hicks got it wrong.
 
dude im not in the gaming industry... have you heard of Perfect Dark for Xbox 360? its basically the greatest game ever go buy it. now.
 
Molingrad said:
dude im not in the gaming industry... have you heard of Perfect Dark for Xbox 360? its basically the greatest game ever go buy it. now.

LOL :D

I don't work in the gaming Industry, I'm a part of a software development team that uses a game engine to power the product. Does that count for anything?
 
DukenukemX said:
But I think the real problem is the people who don't admit they work for a game company. Going around and claiming that this is great and that is great and you should put up a mortgage on your home for all these things.

I mean you'll never know. These are people who are paid to sway public opinion and as we know the American public don't have a mind of their own. This is going to be a real big problem until people evolve with the ability to think on their own.

The bigger the forum the more probable that someone posts here for a living. Imagine that right before the Xbox 360 was released that a number of people were hired to go to www.hardforum.com only to sway public opinion to buy it.

It's a scary thought.

I do agree that you may not know for sure, but in our case any new account that is even suspected of such behavior is watched closely, if not banned immediately.

I can only speak about my personal experiences here, as I don't frequent other forums, but I really feel in our case, our readers are intelligent enough to base their own conclusions off of the data presented. If 20 people say game x blows, and you have one person saying it is greater than sliced bread, you can imagine which way our users would go. ;)

The same thing goes for our article content, we give you OUR opinion of it from our extensive testing, to try to help you make a better choice with your buying dollars.
 
STOP CALLING ME AT DINNER DAMMIT!!!!


Oh, wait you said forum marketing whores not telemarketers.....

Same thing IMO.
 
For someone to infiltrate, it'd be easy to spot... that n00bie tag; the 3 posts to your name all on the same subject; the three sentence review. I think that our forum audience is way smarter than the average bear. I mean, that's why I love coming here. It seems like when there's a new game that you have to talk about, it's mostly done in a lengthy intelligent way. I've seen it here plenty of times and it's also got some negative comments in there as well.

For instance, I saw someone recommend Gothic II to the forum recently. This happened to be a title that I haven't picked up yet because I'm absolutely swamped at the moment. However, I trusted the review because: 1) it compared it to other titles, 2) explained the plotline and positive elements in a detailed (for me at least) manner, and 3) I knew the user had been here for a while.

It really pays to know your community. Sometimes I wish I could tag certain people so their messages would glow flourescent because I know they'll have something interesting to say even if I don't agree with that person.

It's an interesting point, but I don't think you need to worry about covert agents. We've got enough smartasses, wisecrackers and chutzpah in this forum to smoke 'em out. I mean, seriously, this is one hell of a forum.
 
Torgo said:
It's an interesting point, but I don't think you need to worry about covert agents. We've got enough smartasses, wisecrackers and chutzpah in this forum to smoke 'em out. I mean, seriously, this is one hell of a forum.

Perfectly put.

Once again, in our forum. Here in gaming for example all the regulars know each other. Like Torgo said above if some person with a n00bie tag and no posts comes in touting some piece of crap my inbox is going to be flooded with Report Bad Post emails and we're going to ban the yahoo.

They want to pay some people come to our forums and spam? They can feel free, the admins mods and users, as Torgo said, will be on them quicker than flies on shit, and they'll be headed to bansville.

We as a staff are very committed to keeping this a clean environment. Of course, most forums aren't nearly as well moderated by us and the community as this one. Which is why I don't read them. ;)

Knowing your community is a big deal.
 
for instance this thread got reported as off topic
why Im not really sure, as it is a viable question for this forum

there are forum spammers and then there are forum marketers
the first class are obvious, the later extend all they way up to official reps
and some "marketers" arent as easily spotted as one might imagine
the real acid test is often what contribution they make
same criteria as applied to everyone else

of course if they are pimping a dog product
they are going to get called on it by the membership
if its a hot product they are going to be hard to seperate from a fanbase if they are clever
but then why would they need to be pimping it in the first place :p

of course they say it takes one to know one
unfortunately for them Ive been a professional spin doctor for some 22 years now :eek:
 
Torgo said:
For someone to infiltrate, it'd be easy to spot... that n00bie tag; the 3 posts to your name all on the same subject; the three sentence review. I think that our forum audience is way smarter than the average bear. I mean, that's why I love coming here. It seems like when there's a new game that you have to talk about, it's mostly done in a lengthy intelligent way. I've seen it here plenty of times and it's also got some negative comments in there as well.

For instance, I saw someone recommend Gothic II to the forum recently. This happened to be a title that I haven't picked up yet because I'm absolutely swamped at the moment. However, I trusted the review because: 1) it compared it to other titles, 2) explained the plotline and positive elements in a detailed (for me at least) manner, and 3) I knew the user had been here for a while.

It really pays to know your community. Sometimes I wish I could tag certain people so their messages would glow flourescent because I know they'll have something interesting to say even if I don't agree with that person.

It's an interesting point, but I don't think you need to worry about covert agents. We've got enough smartasses, wisecrackers and chutzpah in this forum to smoke 'em out. I mean, seriously, this is one hell of a forum.

I wholeheartedly agree, hanging out here is always entertaining and there's no way anybody could pull off anything like that. I've only been coming here regularly for a few months but I already have a sense of who the major posters are. Whenever you do actually see a spam thread in any [H] forum, there's always at least 15 replies identifying it as such, and the op ends up banned (in fact, part of me enjoys it when somebody starts a spam thread because the replies are always amusing :) ).
 
I should add that while we do tend to have a group of curmudgeons of users in big easy chairs, wearing smoking jackets, pipes in hand by a crackling fire who think they know everything (I happen to also wear a fez), don't let that put you noobies off. We'll test you for sure when you make a stupid comment, but show some spine and we'll save you a seat by the fire and give you some fuzzy slippers and make you feel welcome in our gaming forum.

Heaven knows that no one wants to hear me blather on all the time. We do need fresh voices.
 
Let "em come in.....most of the time "they" are found out......I enjoy it when it happens.

I agree this is a very well run forum....I enjoy hanging out here, and occassionally I have something intellegent to say.
 
as it has already been stated, if your product is good, you don't need to "pimp it" (god I hate that phrase), everyone will do that for you cause they think your product is great.

stuff like that (most advertising for me actually) sends a signal to me that screams

"PLEASE, look at me, please please please, I am ever so good for you, please"

to which I just can't help but think of this girl I knew back in high school (BMX)

but it can be pretty entertaining watching shills defend their shite, its like watching politics, reason has no place, only blind devotion. Always amusing.
 
gameforum0ng.jpg


I'm just not wearing my fez in this picture.
 
You guys would be surprised at how often people try this stuff here. Our mods and admins can tell you that we see them all...the...time.

Not so much in the games forum but we have people every week try this stuff...the good thing is, as Torgo has pointed out, you guys catch em' quick and report them. Our crack admins and mods show them the door so fast their heads spin and we maintain trouble free (well...) forums.

So, if you enjoy the fact that we do not see much of that garbage, you can credit yourselves and our mods / admins.
 
IIf there is anyone here who is gung ho about a game, then he is just a fanbo y. Just like the guys who are so protective of their precious "rigs" when someone starts a thread about consoles. There are no insiders. Torgo used to work for Ensemble (sp?) but to my knowledge, that is about all.
 
I work for Xbox Live and I've been involved in discussions on these forums about the pros and cons of PS3 vs. Xbox360, but I've done so as a private person. Microsoft has no knowledge or responsibility for what I say here. I agree that if someone is being paid to post, that's just wrong. However just because I work for Xbox Live shouldn't in-of-itself preclude me from being able to talk about the console, or the service, even if I am trying to sway your opinion to be more like mine, because my opinions are genuinely my own. I obviously support the product I helped to create. Yes that makes me biased, but does that really exclude me from the discussion?
 
People who whore stuff suck. I really hate marketing... viral marketing... all those terms!! GAH!! This thread has pissed me off...

Sony does things that make me go "WTF!??!", but it's a job so... at least I am not spray-painting my opinions/products on someones wall trying to be cool...
 
btf1980 said:
Steviep has to work for Nintendo, he just has to. :p

Alright, that's enough now :p I don't work for the damn company!
If that were the case, Tiny and ZX6 would work for Microsoft, and Terpfen and Nullomodo would be in Sony's pocket. But despite our leanings, we can all still be objective and purchase games that we think are good. I have no ill feelings toward any of them, or most of the people in this awesome community, simply because we enjoy discussing things, even if they get heated sometimes. And truth be told, I have no hard feelings against any type of gaming system. (Otherwise I wouldn't have put my hard-earned cash a couple years back into a PS2). I just prefer one company's gaming philosiphy over another's...

That said, if Nintendo of Canada was hiring programmers, technicians, or any similar type job of which I am qualified for, and they offered good money... I think even the most hardcore fan-boy would take that job :D

This community, for the most part, is too smart to allow moles in the forum. We do have some members that work in the gaming community, and that's fine. But I don't think I've ever seen them unfairly post spam. In fact, for the most part they participate like any other regular joe on this forum... and that's what makes it great. Long live the [H] :cool:
 
Hell, I don't work for a game company. I am a game company.

Oh, and I hear that Lomby Zombie is the best boardgame ever. It's way better than Monopoly and puts the XBox 360 to shame in terms of fun and replay value.
 
Slartibartfast said:
Is it better than Twilight Creation's "Zombies!!!" ?

I thought the benchmark was Cheapass' "Give Me The Brain." Even if it is a card game.
 
AreEss said:
I thought the benchmark was Cheapass' "Give Me The Brain." Even if it is a card game.

I haven't played that one yet. Actually, I'm not even that big a fan of Zombies!!! It's a cool idea, but it's just not particularly fun.
 
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