Tuesday, April 20, 2010
Brand Protection
Something I've been noticing and want to throw open to discussion... Does the franchise a game belongs to affect the way we treat it. Many games get portrayed as near perfect by fans and the press and in some cases, This isn't true, But we overlook the flaws or the press won't speak of them because the game belongs to a well known franchise. I feel Halo 3 and Splinter Cell: Conviction are examples here. I'm not saying these are bad, Or even good games, Merely that their title seems to provide them protection from criticism. So my question to you... Do you believe this to be true? And do you believe this should be the case? Please, Regardless of your opinion, Leave a comment letting me know what you think.
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I think brands do offer a lot of protection to certain games. I mean I love the Halo series...Not just the games, the books and such but I also accept that the games have flaws and such. And also brand protection is a little iffy some times. Because when games from unknown companies come out (mostly they can get over looked) but sometimes they get those awesome reviews and people are like whao! Shit is awesome. So they don't really have brand protection on that, but still get awesome reviews etc. Oh well it's just a thought.
ReplyDeleteI think in most cases franchise branding may have something to do with the opinions and rating it receives from its reviewers and critics but i think that most of what we read nowdays along the lines of criticism is based merely upon bias people, and many if not all reviews do not show nearly enough of what the REAL people think or say. If someone was to look down upon Halo and openly say so then do you really think that that kind of review will be taken over someone who has openly discussed their like/love for the game and mentioned some small minor things they were'nt happy with. Branding and franchising may have something to do with the amount of bias a game gets but it also has to do with smart selling to the consumer. If the brand wants to make money from the game they are not going to list the review as i previously mentioned by the person who has openly displayed his/her dislike thoroughly for the game/title/series/brand/label etc. Freedom of speech gets hammered by critics who want to sell their title and brand. It's not always that games do not get critically tor to shreds but more along the lines about what will and will not sell their particular brand and franchise that creates bias opinions and flawless reviews.
ReplyDelete-Devilking2100-
I'm not really talking about the companies releasing the games though... More the fans and reviewers. It seems that they are more (for lack of a better term) ignorant towards flaws in games that belong to a larger franchise. Reviewers will give a game almost perfect scores and disregard flaws in a game thinking, Oh, But the other games were awesome. Is it really OK for press to bump up scores on major releases because they don't want to admit the game could have been better?
ReplyDeletei think you have to look at it from a franchises selling point of view though...regardless of whether the game has been released, is going to be released, or in production. The object of any company is to market their product and sell it accordingly, and for a gamers market it comes mainly down to brand familiarity, title, and reviews. You have to think that only selected reviews of a game get officially released as to hype the title and franchise, right? It's not to say that there were reviews that showed specifically the flaws of the game because there are. It all has to do, penultimately, with the selling point and the reflection of the reviews are going to specifically target that, therefore creating a need for positive rather than negative feedback and reviewing. An immoral marketing strategy? Yes, of course, as bias comes back into play here but its a strategy that has been successful and i'm sure that it isn't going to change any time soon.
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