1Up's Sam Kennedy: GameSpot's Sad State of Affairs

Sam Kennedy, an editor at 1Up.com has written an opinion piece trying to make sense out of the recent problems at Gamespot and the reliability of game reviews from major news organizations.

And how about GameSpot? Will it be able to rebound from Gerstmann-gate? As a business, it'll be just fine (the dirty little secret of sites like GameSpot is that traffic is largely made up of stuff like cheat codes and forum posts anyway). In fact, the controversy surrounding Gerstmann was said to have actually boosted traffic to the site. But the question is, for those people who used to rely on GameSpot for its reviews -- and there were a great many people out there who did -- will they still, knowing that they might not be getting the same honesty as they used to? Whether or not GameSpot management realizes this, but every single review for the foreseeable future is going to be viewed with a certain air of caution. It could take years for Gerstmann-gate to leave peoples' minds (GameSpot of all publications should know this -- it took years for Sega fans to forgive the site for its 6.8 score of Shenmue). Potentially toned down reviews? I don't think gamers are going to stand for that. Not when they're shelling out $60 a pop for these things. And going forward, believe me, every advertisement in proximity of editorial will be closely scrutinized (did a publisher pay for this review?).

It's a very long and provocative article. Be sure to read it. It's an eye opener into the "biz" of game reviews.