Games companies refuse to support EGM magazine

Author: Joe Martin
Published: 9th January 2008

First Gamespot, now this - EGM is claiming pressure from publishers for positive reviews.

The relationship between games journalists and games advertisers and publishers is a strange one and has come under scrutiny lately after a string of potential and actual scandals. Now there's more fuel for the fire.

Just after the whole Gamespot editorial scandal and the revelation that the editor of IGN is married to the VP of Nintendo's PR firm, Electronic Gaming Monthly has revealed that they too are under pressure from advertisers.

Editor-in-Chief Dan Hsu has written a column in the latest issue of Electronic Gaming Monthly that names three publishers who have pulled support for the magazine after several bad reviews. Midway's Mortal Kombat development team, Sony's sports game division and the whole of Ubisoft have each apparently banned EGM from further coverage of their games according to Hsu.

Hsu has promised that the companies have not and will not be treated any differently to other publishers despite the ban.

So far the companies in question haven't issued an official statement about the ban, nor confirmed that it even exists. It does seem perfectly plausible though, if not a tiny bit evil.

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