Bethesda has officially announced that it won’t be shipping out games in advance to reviewers any more because it wants everyone ‘to experience’ its offerings at the same time. So from now on, media outlets will only be able to try their hands at a new title a day before its launch.
That’s frankly an inadequate amount of time to form an opinion about the quality of a game and Bethesda knows this. It’s not the only company to pull such a move though. 2K, Blizzard and Warner Bros. Interactive Entertainment among others are similarly hostile to advance reviews too.
Many are painting this move as anti-consumer, though gamers do have the choice to wait for trusted reviewers to tell them whether or not a title is worth their time and money. Bethesda has noted that the media won’t be getting early access to Skyrim Special Edition and Dishonored 2.
The only problem is, streamers and ‘influencers’ who are no doubt thrilled to receive some special attention, appear to have received copies of the upcoming Skyrim offering. How does Bethesda expect us to believe that it doesn’t just want to control how the game is marketed to potential customers?
Of course, Bethesda tried to explain its decision in its blog post. Basically what it said was – Doom enjoyed critical acclaim even though there was doubts about its quality pre-release because the media only got to review it one day in advance. Bit of twisted logic there, don’t you think?
Here's one for starters: https://t.co/f0cDf0kgVs
— Beth Elderkin (@BethElderkin) October 25, 2016
The long and short of it is, publishers like Bethesda are counting on grateful ‘influencers’ and an eager public to sell their games before reviewers have a chance to try them and give their take on them. So it’s probably best not to pre-order a title until you’re sure it’s worth spending over.