Shrapnel to Take on Wargamer.com?

[Annette]

Hi, Jim,

I sincerely welcome you to our forums and am pleased that you have taken the time to voice your opinions, particularly on such an unpleasant topic which seems to be turning more unpleasant by the moment. Please allow me to openly address some of the points you’ve made.

I appreciate your invitation to send early review code for hot titles. Our policy is to ship review copies only after shipment of all pre-orders have been made.. We feel strongly about this commitment to our customers who have demonstrated faith in our games and made a purchase having never read a review.

I’m not sure I understand your conclusion that my comments here demonstrate a belief that all reviews published by The Wargamer are biased or there’s a “conspiracy” on the part of The Wargamer against Shrapnel Games. Surely if I were to make such claims for the general public to read, I would back them up with more documentation than excerpts from two game reviews. My intent was to demonstrate, as War_Oberst says, a review is ultimately the writer’s opinion. It is up to the editors to ensure the review is helpful to the reader. I think he has every right to expect a high set of standards from all sources of news and reviews and that sites such as The Wargamer and TGN should be held to even higher scrutiny as they both could easily be perceived as biased. I think The Wargamer’s editorial policy and peer review process fell apart on the Raging Tiger review.

I disagree with Tim on the relevance of your reference to Dominions II. I’d like to thank you for quoting the Documentation portion of that review. I believe it further illustrates my point. With all due respect, however, it was not the last of our titles reviewed by The Wargamer prior to Raging Tiger. Mario Kroll reviewed StarFury on Feb 19, 2004, and Jim Cobb reviewed Dragoon: The Prussian War Machine in December ’04 (which was also given The Wargamer Award for Excellence). In these three reviews (under general sub-headings such as “Documentation and Installation”), the reader is given an in-depth explanation of why the writer draws his overall conclusion of the documentation. This explanation is clearly lacking in the Raging Tiger review. You say yourself that “criticism of a manual usually isn’t limited to its length but rather its quality and, more importantly, the need for it.” In the Raging Tiger review, the writer admits the manual is “crammed full of essential detail” but later concludes the game,"...is incredibly detailed, yes, and the potential for play is vast, once the player gets past the flunky controls, poor graphics, and big manual.” I think your readers are left to wonder if the detail in the manual is essential, why is it something they must “get past”?

I’m not asking that you alter your writers’ opinions or only publish favorable reviews. I’m asking that you hold your writers’ to the standards The Wargamer has set for itself. Mr. McKenna quite clearly did not like the game. That’s okay. Cheap shots like saying in his footnote bio he needed new eye glasses after playing the game are not. In your most recent post you indicate that such comments are intended to be “witty.” It seems War_Oberst’s advise to me, “…a sense of humor like that may just make you seem less objectiv,” may be helpful to us both.

I’m sure I would be able to search The Wargamer site and find many, many examples of objectivity, balance and fairness. I’m sure I would also find other examples of bias. What I know I would not find is any disclosure that The Wargamer is owned by David Heath who also owns Matrix Games. Only long-time readers would understand the implication of the merger between MilitaryGamer and The Wargamer mentioned it's "Site History" section. For the rest of us, it’s pretty much a secret.

[Jim_Zabek]

Thanks for the feedback Annette. It's well taken and I'll do my best to ensure that any such witty comments are reigned in, especially with regard to Shrapnel's titles. Aaron's comments about a 100 page manual putting the fear of God into you were intended to be humorous: many wargamers have seen lengthy manuals before and often relish the thought. Clearly the humor was lost in the context of the negative review.

And I appreciate you correcting me on the other games we recently reviewed; we have indeed reviewed several other of Shrapnel's games. I would hope you will see the fact that those others didn't immediately spring to mind helps illustrate the point that we (and I in particular) don't mentally categorize our reviews by publisher in our heads. They are written at face value.

I can understand your policy regarding not releasing code early. Send us what you can when you can. And don't forget to keep sending the free stuff - I'd still love to publish an AAR for Raging Tiger, or any other title. Just because we write a review on something doesn't make that the final word. An AAR would let readers have an even better look at the gameplay involved and help them make their own minds up.

[JDC]

For the record, Matrix has never interfered with any Wargammer reviews and has strenuously taken a "Caesar's wife" approach. I have a problem with Aaron McKenna's work but that's two very different approaches to our hobby/industry and writing in general. I doubt that I'll agree with him on "Raging Tigers" but, who knows, Patrick may have slipped up. I will be as stringent with him as I am with anybody else.

Frankly, I find this thread unseeemly and counterproductive. I really don't think two of the best publishers/ sites should go after each other. I may started this with my post on McKenna's review but that was between two authors, not companies.