Rumor: GameSpot Editorial Director fired for Kane & Lynch review

by Richard Mitchell { Nov 30th 2007 at 10:25AM }

It seems as we slept last night, big things were happening over at GameSpot. Rumors are flying (flying we say) that GameSpot's Editorial Director Jeff Gerstmann was fired thanks to a negative text review and a very negative video review of Kane & Lynch: Dead Men. As you can see from the above image, Eidos is obviously sending a lot of advertising money GameSpot's way, leading many to think that publisher pressure had something to do with the firing. Adding fuel to the fire, the Kane & Lynch skin at GameSpot seen above has since been removed, within hours of the story breaking. It's all still hearsay at this point -- the only confirmation is currently coming from anonymous sources -- but if it's true, it's likely to rock the game industry. The news is already exploding on GameSpot's forums, while the resulting posts on the Eidos forums have apparently been purged. There's a lot to go over with more likely to break. Hit the links below to read Joystiq's coverage from early this morning. Check out Gerstmann's video review of Kane & Lynch after the break.

Read - Rumor: GameSpot Editorial Director fired over Kane & Lynch review
Read - Eidos and GameSpot forums exploding over Gerstmann incident

Tags: business, eidos, gamespot, kane-and-lynch, rumors, scandal

Reader Comments (Page 1 of 2)

Jonah Falcon @ Nov 30th 2007 10:29AM

Correlation is not causality.

Corleone @ Nov 30th 2007 10:34AM

That guy was annoying anyway....LOL

xenocidic @ Nov 30th 2007 10:35AM

Penny Arcade says it all ~

http://www.penny-arcade.com/comic/2007/11/29

thisguyrighthere @ Nov 30th 2007 10:36AM

Let Gamespot do it. The guy will get another job and Gamespot will be known as an unreliable spin machine that sells good reviews to whoever will buy them.

That's the free market. Gamespot wants to ruin themselves let them go right ahead and do it.

Jonah Falcon @ Nov 30th 2007 10:38AM

Correlation is not causality.

xenocidic @ Nov 30th 2007 10:41AM

Repetition does not make your point any more salient.

Jonah Falcon @ Nov 30th 2007 11:43AM

Apparently not, since no one gets it.

James @ Nov 30th 2007 12:43PM

This is the media. Nobody is looking for causality, they're looking for "appearance of impropriety", and that's been found in spades.

Mike @ Nov 30th 2007 10:40AM

Anyone else been to gamespot this morning? No more Kane and Lynch ads... and I don't believe in coincidence.

It's an upsetting story, especially when you take into account the fact that gamespot is owned by cnet - one of the most *reputable* tech websites around.

xenocidic @ Nov 30th 2007 10:47AM

Yea, Eidos really shot themselves in the foot with this one. They probably blame Gamespot for fumbling the spin on it.

Games should be reviewed on their merits, not on how much the game publisher has contributed to the advertising revenues of the reviewing publication.

I don't mean to keep swinging off Penny Arcade's balls but I really respect that they will slam a game when it deserves slamming, even if it means their advertisers complain or withdraw support - http://www.penny-arcade.com/2007/11/14#1195073220 .

Knight Marquise @ Nov 30th 2007 10:42AM

If this is true, it will be one of the few times I hope this editor gets legal council.

Secondly, it will put all reviews in the light they truly are: paid advertisements by companies.

This game never even remotely interested me, and I had no intenetion of picking it up, the gamespot review was kinder then my own opinion of this game, simply story wise & game play mechanic wise.

Sorry, IO Interactive, stick with the Hitman series.

AnOffday @ Nov 30th 2007 10:42AM

I always hated Gamespot. Now I just hate them even more. FAKE reviews.

Jonah Falcon @ Nov 30th 2007 11:43AM

That makes no sense at all. The entire flack is over an HONEST review, not a fake one. (rolling eyes)

AnOffday @ Nov 30th 2007 1:07PM

I wasn't referring to the honest review. One reviewer who doesn't even get to keep his job for doing an honest review doesn't represent Gamestop as a whole; hence the word "FAKE reviewS" being plural. Learn to read.

Josh @ Nov 30th 2007 10:55AM

i was always at least "okay" with gamespot. this is going to be hard to recover from, methinks..

they've lost a lot of credibility with the gaming community on this one

JimyD @ Nov 30th 2007 10:57AM

After reading the review and watching the video review, Gerstmann was being generous with a "Fair" score of 6. Nice going GameSchlop.

I Dex I @ Nov 30th 2007 11:14AM

Jeff Gerstmann fired from Gamespot for giving Kayne and Lynch a bad review. Sign the petition. This kind of behavior on Cnet's part cannot be ignored!!!

http://www.petitiononline.com/GAMEJEFF/petition.html

Jeff is an honest and nice guy. I watched On The Spot every week for the past two years. Although I did prefer Rich Gallup as the host. Never the less, those guys were a family over there and now Cnet has busted that up. This cannot and will not be swept under the carpet. Jeff needs all the support he can gather. I hope all of you guys will let your voice be heard in this matter.

Just a concerned Gamer....peace V

I Dex I @ Nov 30th 2007 11:19AM

...and Gals.

Tr3y MoNey @ Nov 30th 2007 11:14AM

That's why I buy from GameSTOP! And I never read/watch reviews from only 1 source.

Benjamin09 @ Nov 30th 2007 11:15AM

Well if I had a ton of money into advertisements with a company that gave me a bad review, I would pull my ads because...if I give you money I expect at least something in return. Like sales of my game!

Thats like still giving gifts to an exgirlfriend...why would I waste money when she isn't going to put out?!?

Mike @ Nov 30th 2007 11:21AM

when you pay money for ads, that's all you're paying for - ads. The fact that for the past couple of weeks you couldn't go to gamespot w/o seeing Kane and Lynch ads ALL OVER THE SITE is what the ad money paid for. Not the review. The content of the reviews is (or should be) objective opinion expressed by the writer. To sell a good review is to lose journalistic integrity. It's a disgusting practice for a journalistic outlet to take up, and frankly, I hope (if the rumors are true) that gamespot suffers losses over it.

I Dex I @ Nov 30th 2007 11:23AM

Benjamin09....I think EA might be looking for a guy with your type of attitude on the business world. Screw honesty and pride. The world would be a better place for all of us. The Machine FTW!!!

Knight Marquise @ Nov 30th 2007 12:03PM

Before I take you to task for your ignorant comment, please tell me you're a kid, not an adult with any form of business education.

Bmurph @ Nov 30th 2007 11:26AM

I think this hurts makes every site like this. Maybe IGN and others haven't done this too, but after seeing this practice how can we be sure the reviews weren't being affected by advertising money (I'm sure most on this site were already questioning that point). What do you guys think?

Tony @ Nov 30th 2007 11:27AM

Here's the thing, people are signing petitions and making tons of posts about this all over the place that are jumping to the conclusion that this is 100% fact and there's absolutely no real proof about it except the timing of a review.

There have been many times when Gamespot has given a shitty review to something heavily advertised on that site. By now they'd have fired almost every one across all of their networks.

I just find it hard to believe given the way the Internet works. Gamespot and CNet of all places would know this. They would know their credibility would be ruined, they would know that Gerstmann would be able to talk about this anywhere he wanted to once he left, they would know that people on the Internet are notorious for finding proof for a lot of this shit.

At this point it just seems like far more of a coincidence that people are linking together and creating a rumor for than anything else.

I Dex I @ Nov 30th 2007 12:22PM

...coincidence that Gamespot pulled the Kayne & Lynch reviews, the Ads and terminated Jeff all in one swift motion.

DVent360 @ Nov 30th 2007 11:28AM

I signed the petition just because the guy shouldn't lose his job because he did what he was being paid for, being honest about a bad game. If he is not hired back I am deleting Gamespot from my favorites.

Benjamin09 @ Nov 30th 2007 11:28AM

You guys are just not understanding me. I would pull my ads from anything that would give me a bad review. I wouldn't expect my ads to buy me a good review, just that if your going to bash my product, I'm going to take off my ads.

Hmmm Bad review > ads selling power. So why waste money on this?

Bmurph @ Nov 30th 2007 11:34AM

That makes it ok to fire him?

Mike @ Nov 30th 2007 11:34AM

that's the thing - you paid for the ads, and you got what you paid for - I can understand you (eidos) disagreeing w/ the review, but at the end of the day you got what you paid for. Don't like it? Don't advertise on a site that rates your product.

Benjamin09 @ Nov 30th 2007 11:46AM

I'm not saying anything about him getting fired. I just said I would pull my ads on a website bashing my product.

People are fired all the time. He will move on and find a better job. If he was fired for giving it a bad review, then people will not use gamespot or their other websites, causing them to lose more money and hopefully someone will take their spot that is true to their reviews

Benjamin09 @ Nov 30th 2007 11:31AM

Also, everybody is jumping to conclusions that he was fired because of this. Do we know his work habits? Maybe they caught him jerking off in his cubical.

Lets all use the "Jump to conclusion's mat" from Office Space!

burgerbat @ Nov 30th 2007 11:36AM

Has anybody been reading Gamespot lately? Like in the past twelve months? They hardly have any "news" that's not pilfered from various blogs like Joystiq. Their reviews are few and far between, and usually only for high-profile games. On average, a review will go up for a game a week after the game is released. This has been going on since a regime change over there, and the site has become laughably bad over the past year. Anyone looking for some serious VG reviews should never go to GS, and that's been true since way before this particular episode even happened. CNET ruined GS, and brought a bunch of tween trolls when it hooked up with Gamefaqs. Just look in the GS forums right now to verify.

Somebody needs to finally bust the lid off of videogame payola scandal. It undermines the truly great work of some developers.

Dapper Dan @ Nov 30th 2007 11:39AM

i really dont understand why everyone is up in arms about this. who cares, go to work and play the games you like. end of story. and yes i do feel bad because he lost his job, but seriously at the end of the day we all more important things to worry about. this not intended to be a selfish rant, but you all have to agree somewhat that this is being blown out of proportion. people lose their jobs everyday. why is this guy so special?

Benjamin09 @ Nov 30th 2007 11:40AM

Thank you!

Mike @ Nov 30th 2007 11:48AM

What do you do for a living? Scratch that - I don't really care. Let me tell you what I do - I'm a writer. Furthermore I'm a writer looking for steady work. Furthermore, I'd love to get hired at a large gaming site - you could even call it my long term career goal.

Hearing a story like this is scary on so many levels - when journalistic integrity is absent from a journalistic outlet, than no one's job is safe there. Let's take that a step further - gamespot is owned by cnet. Cnet is where many many people get advice on what tv / dvd player / cell phone to buy. So what if this is a common practice there too? Selling good reviews to the highest bidder hurts the readers more than anyone, and it would also cause the writers to fear giving a product an honest review.

If it doesn't bother you, stop reading and commenting about it. Clearly the shady business practices held by gamespot upset a lot of people. If you're not one of 'em, move along - nothing to see here.

Knight Marquise @ Nov 30th 2007 12:18PM

"who cares, go to work and play the games you like. end of story. and yes i do feel bad because he lost his job, but seriously at the end of the day we all more important things to worry about. this not intended to be a selfish rant"

If you truly didn't intend for your comment to come off as a selfish rant, you failed.

Dapper Dan @ Dec 1st 2007 11:14AM

for the career writer you are correct. that is a scary thought. look this doesnt bother me so bad i want to turn my head and look away, i am just merely asking why is this turning into such a huge ordeal. surely this has happened in the past.

Mitch @ Nov 30th 2007 11:44AM

I don't have any reason to care about Jeff Gerstmann's job, and I don't want to sound like a whiney fanboy (I'm not. More often than not I disagree with the guy) but this is some bulllllllshit.

Being fired for doing his job? Perfect. Absolutely brilliant GameSpot.

Jonah Falcon @ Nov 30th 2007 11:44AM

Yeah, because Joystiq always uses its own sources, and not user submissions. (rolling eyes)

burgerbat @ Nov 30th 2007 3:33PM

Johah Falcon, you really need to stop with the whiny-ass posts...I've read some of the links you've posted in other threads, and I've come to the conclusion you are a whiny bitch looking to drive up hits to your crappy video game website by instigating conflict with various successful video game websites. I'm against them ouright banning you, although that would be awesome in practice, because you have the right to spin whatever nonsense theory you wish...but I think enough is enough and you should probably rethink your strategy. It ain't working.

lord hobo @ Nov 30th 2007 12:04PM

When i saw this i was rather angry Jeff was the one of the reason's i went there, he made onthespot entertaining along with the hotspot, They seem to losing all there top people first Carrie then Greg to work in the industry and then rich moved down south to do what ever he did.

To the point i am boycotting Eidos and maybe cnet site's.

Benjamin09 @ Nov 30th 2007 12:14PM

http://blog.wired.com/games/2007/11/gamespot-inside.html

OH! None of their ads were pulled and they didnt have anything to do with his release from the company!

Mike @ Nov 30th 2007 12:29PM

to be fair, we don't have any sort of official response from anyone - Jeff, gamespot, or eidos. One "inside source" says he was fired for the review, and another "inside source" says he wasn't.

Oh, and "none of their ads got pulled"? Last night kane's face was on the left of gamespot's site, and lynches was on the right with a kane and lynch ad in the middle.... today it looks completely different.... I've said it before and I'll say it again, I don't believe in coincidence. Perhaps Jeff G wasn't fired over the review, but the overnight change in ads is related to this mess in some way.

pjh @ Nov 30th 2007 12:53PM

this might explain the 9.0 that assassin's creed got from gamespot. which, frankly, while pretty was a godawful gaming experience. a shame. if this turns out to be true, I'll never visit gamespot again.

Jon @ Nov 30th 2007 12:34PM

Actually, to me, that just confirms it even more. The article states he'd already been skating on thin ice for "unprofessional reviews and review practices." Sorry, I can't swallow that load of crap...

mark.j.smith @ Nov 30th 2007 12:41PM

...and this is why big webzine/magazine reviews are pretty much BS...it's all about ad dollars, or the 'gifts' that are sent (ex: $1000 in goodies that various sites received when they received their copy of H3).

ccc @ Nov 30th 2007 1:06PM

Well well sounds like corporate corruption with money at the root of the problem. The best thing to do about this is propbably just boycot GS all together, from the sounds of these post noone really liked the site anyways. But then again, if GS looses its appeal alltogether then the big bad coporations will turn to another to try and corrupt with the all powerful dollar.
A better word for it is Indoctrinate.....heh.