Please note I only mostly believe what I'm going to say.

The incredibly antagonistic attitude they have had to deal with is crazy. At a certain point having a good relationship with a publisher diminishes. Giving Giant Bomb access to the game one hour before other sites break embargo is functionally no difference to not receiving it early at all.

Jeff Green is the coolest but, honestly what is EA driving that this site NEEDS?

It would be incredibly unprofessional but a reflection of the publishers handling to give it a 60 second review. What ever impression you get after one minute is what you score the game on.

It's always a bad idea to burn bridges, but right now this looks like a shitty bridge and it'd be as useful as fire wood.

I know it's a bad idea but seems like the only thing they care about is Meta Critic scores.

I'm very interested in finding out what Giant Bomb thinks of Battlefield 3. Its about the game. Not everything surrounding it.

or ... ignore any political bullshit, don't start feeling entitled to special treatment in the first place, get the game and review it to the best of your abilities.

I assume it's 4/5 which could be considered tanking it as far as those uncharted people may be concerned :P

Jeff thinks its great and deserves a five star review, then that's what he should give it. There's no sense in using the game as a punching bag just to be a dick to EA. That's ridiculous.

@drag said:

or ... ignore any political bullshit, don't start feeling entitled to special treatment in the first place, get the game and review it to the best of your abilities.

This.

what 
 
What's the story here? 
 
What does it matter if the review isn't out before the game? 

EA is the second largest publisher in the industry, burning a bridge with them would have numerous detrimental knock on effects with future game releases, events and press coverage.

That would be unprofessional, rude and missinformative. not only to EA, but to the readers of this site. and Jeff would definitely not get preview builds after that.

Just because they won't have the review up at the time the embargo ends doesn't change anything.

Giant Bomb have always taken their time with reviews, this will be no different if they choose to do one. Just because the embargo ends at a certain time doesn't mean they have to be up around that time.

My take is this game should go the way of red dead redemption.  I think that action speaks more than tanking a review.  Look at how GB had coverage up day and date for LA Noire.

It's not like Giant Bomb always has early copies to play or reviews up the day of release. There's been a number of times that they went and bought a game to do a review, Bayonetta and Darksiders I remember being the same week. It's not even as if it matters for the site traffic, because Giant Bomb is based on returning community subscribers, not click throughs on reviews linked from metacritic.

There's also the part where Jeff's integrity is about reviewing the game and not the business around it. If he punishes the game for business decisions, wouldn't that also stand to reason that he would promote games for treating him well? He'd be no different than the Dutch press who give games high scores if they get free booze at events that was discussed on the latest Jar Time. I think he has more integrity than you'd like.

In a year when a lot people are catching up on some games and some people (like me) have built their new PCs and come back to check out reviews, nobody will care how bad the launch was screwed up, they just want to know if the game is good or not.

@BlaineBlaine said:

Jeff Green

wat

Jeff Green is the coolest.

Leave Jeff Green out of this!

I wouldn't feel like I could trust the site's reviews if they pulled stupid sensationalist shit like that. Leave it to the amateur hour blogs like Kotaku or Dtoid.

@NickLott said:

In a year when a lot people are catching up on some games and some people (like me) have built their new PCs and come back to check out reviews, nobody will care how bad the launch was screwed up, they just want to know if the game is good or not.

On the other hand, if a launch is sufficiently screwed up, particularly for a multiplayer-focused game, it could have detrimental effects on the wider perception of the game's quality.

I like your sentiment, however, it's not feasible for GB to retain any journalistic integrity. Whatever, EA was a dick on this one.

I would like to think the GB community interest is in more innovative and fun gaming ventures than Army FPS-2011 part 1 of duex.

@Hailinel said:

@NickLott said:

In a year when a lot people are catching up on some games and some people (like me) have built their new PCs and come back to check out reviews, nobody will care how bad the launch was screwed up, they just want to know if the game is good or not.

On the other hand, if a launch is sufficiently screwed up, particularly for a multiplayer-focused game, it could have detrimental effects on the wider perception of the game's quality.

What I was referring to was more the publisher's mishandling of review copies and marketing. Obviously a technically broken game would be evident in the review.

i dont see why a person would purposefully rate a game poorly based on what happened while acquiring it.

that would be like me saying starcraft 2 sucks because i had to wait 2 hours in line to get it

You're reviewing the game. Not the publisher, developer or marketing team. But yeah, it seems like EA fucked them around a lot. I'm more interested to see how they rate this game honestly. I'm not sure if the single player and co-op will be as glossed over by GB as it has been with all the other reviews.

Also, yes, Jeff Green is the coolest.

Game reviews should be about the games merits, not its publishers. If the Giantbomb Crew were to write a story about their experience, that would be better then tanking a review, in terms of furthering the original posters goals, at least. I would definitely like to know more about these goings on, but don't hurt the developer to get to the publisher when there is really no need to.

I don't think that EA would be upset if Jeff threw a Red Dead esque tantrum and didn't bother with a review, they could probably do without another 80 (or lower) metacritic score pulling down the average.

No, Giant Bomb needs to review this game. Cut through this bs and share your opinions.

They may simply not get around to reviewing it, that in a practical sense, the reviewing cycle is over. I think I may have seen that occur before, for any unstated reason. It's an odd situation, because that is what the publisher may in effect want, but it may not be what a reciepiant review site may feel compelled to do. Especially if it is scheduled work load. In that case, it may be wise to be known for reviewer maturity at least, and not a sensationalist site that hands out spetacular, if not pleasing, usually low scores

It sucks to be on the end of a political stick. I think GB partially gets that for it's almost abituary numerical review system, but I'm not saying anything more than that here. Also the reviewers here are honest. And they have one eye on the reviews, Uncharted 3 did well here, these guys arn't abituary time-proven self promoting assholes. But of course a publisher is concerned with most of all keeping it's own skirts clean with high scores. Games that are not of video nature then are going to happen.....

I personally think Battlefield 3 can be reviewed. They do have time. It might be a smart move on Ea's part also because the patching for clipping and such will be corrected i would think quickly, and I think there will be a reviewer tilt on how important the SP is. Or not. Hey, honesty is more important, especially internally, than the external concerns of the publisher in the long run. But what should not be is that there is any attitude of a 'check' mark put next to the game for reprisal or such. Though in this I think I am only sussing their work approach, anyways.

@morrelloman said:

I like your sentiment, however, it's not feasible for GB to retain any journalistic integrity. Whatever, EA was a dick on this one.

I would like to think the GB community interest is in more innovative and fun gaming ventures than Army FPS-2011 part 1 of duex.

How is BF3 not more innovative than most games out there? Few games offer the scale and depth of a Battlefield experience. Of course you wouldn't know, just superficially judging books by their cover like the gaming hipster you seem to be.

As hard as it's going to be I think whoever reviews it (Jeff presumably) has to ignore everything around the game, the bullshit with early copies and it's close rival MW3, and just focus on the quality of the game itself. These guys have been around for a while and they probably have a pretty good idea of how to deal with this sort of stuff, I imagine it has happened before, so have confidence and trust in these guys and they'll deliver a solid and informative review.

Man, anyone else remember how great the CGW/GFW podcasts were?

@Hailinel said:

Jeff thinks its great and deserves a five star review, then that's what he should give it. There's no sense in using the game as a punching bag just to be a dick to EA. That's ridiculous.

Well said. I agree.

Is anybody else confused about which Jeff this thread is about?

Yeah, they should anger and make bad relations with one of the biggest publishers in the industry! That sounds great.

I'm very interested in finding out what Giant Bomb thinks of Battlefield 3. Its about the game. Not everything surrounding it.

@drag said:

or ... ignore any political bullshit, don't start feeling entitled to special treatment in the first place, get the game and review it to the best of your abilities.

I don't think that EA would be upset if Jeff threw a Red Dead esque tantrum and didn't bother with a review, they could probably do without another 80 (or lower) metacritic score pulling down the average.

@Pr1mus said:

For how bored Jeff can seem and sometimes outright hostile towards a game or publisher during quicklooks or the bombcast and whatnot i have never seen him be a dick or purposefully blast a game in a review just to give the finger to a company. He's not perfect but when it comes to reviews he's always professional. You know tanking his review of BF3 would be giving the giant bomb members the finger, not EA.

Yeah, one of the best examples of Jeff's professionalism towards reviewing games was when he was discussing his review of Marvel vs Capcom 3 on an ep of the Bombcast. He didn't much care for the game personally, but could obviously see the enjoyable and well made parts of it which made him seriously contemplate and take extra care in the review to give a fair assessment to it to the prospective buyer other than using tired cliches.

Pretty much all publishers care about Metacritic, which continues to amaze me considering what a flawed system it is. Ubisoft Montreal upon speaking about the development of Assassins's Creed: Brotherhood and Revelations have stated that they target a 90% or more Metacritic score. I don't like it but that's the way the cookie crumbles.

As for Giantbomb, I'd lose respect for both Jeff and the site if he were stupid enough to use his review to hit back at EA. That's not how Jeff does things, he's a very respected games journalist for a good reason and it's something he would never do. I'm sure he'd love to go mad at EA, he sort of hints at his frustration with it on the Bombcast this week but burning a bridge between themselves and EA would be suicide to some degree. Plus, there not the only game site out there to get this treatment.

Jeff reviews with a pretty level head. He tends to save the jaded bullshit for everything else, as seen in any sort of coverage with this game (with a couple exceptions)

Not only would it be unprofessional to tank a review, but he would effectively cut off the site's access to any future EA content. Also, what kind of message would that send to other publishers? That would be the dumbest thing a reviewer could ever do because then they would completely lose all integrity.

I'm missing the background on this. Where did Jeff mention that he got his review copy late?

1) How can there be an embargo on the console version of Battlefield 3, when EA did not provide a playable version before launch day? Embargoes are an agreement where the publisher provides early copies of the game, and in exchange the reviewer agrees not to publish the review before the embargo date. No journalist should be agreeing to withhold reviews of the game when the publisher doesn't give them early access, and they can get their own copy from the store.

2) Why would Giant Bomb complain about just now getting their review copy, when it has been available at retail for more than 24 hours?

The single player looks pretty bad and the multiplayer is still great, but not much different, just simplified. I dont see anything in there that the game does better than BF2 did. Bad Company was a terrible turn for the games and bringing back more of that BF2 feel is good, but it is not revolutionary. It looks great but I think it will get a 4/5. I have the same feeling for MW3, unless the changes to the multiplayer are improvements and the single player feels different but just as good as the first MW single player.

@Hailinel said:

@NickLott said:

In a year when a lot people are catching up on some games and some people (like me) have built their new PCs and come back to check out reviews, nobody will care how bad the launch was screwed up, they just want to know if the game is good or not.

On the other hand, if a launch is sufficiently screwed up, particularly for a multiplayer-focused game, it could have detrimental effects on the wider perception of the game's quality.

It looks like EA and DICE screwed up a lot more than the launch. Most of the reviewers completely disregarded the campaign in their reviews. Even if you dont intend to play the campaign, that is a hefty chunk of the product that DICE should have at least built to be a competent campaign. Add that to some of the online issues people have reported and you cant help but wonder if the game should have had more time.

Giantbomb only reviews one game out of fifteen. They're a joke when it comes to actually work on well-timed reviews. Look at the review section and how it's lacking. I'm not saying that the content of their reviews are bad, but they're so slow and often late that their opinions don't really matter in the end. I just come here for quick-looks and forums. Brad has to be one of the worst gamers I've seen, and Ryan seems to bitch about everything he can.

@Electric_Zen said:

I'm missing the background on this. Where did Jeff mention that he got his review copy late?

1) How can there be an embargo on the console version of Battlefield 3, when EA did not provide a playable version before launch day? Embargoes are an agreement where the publisher provides early copies of the game, and in exchange the reviewer agrees not to publish the review before the embargo date. No journalist should be agreeing to withhold reviews of the game when the publisher doesn't give them early access, and they can get their own copy from the store.

2) Why would Giant Bomb complain about just now getting their review copy, when it has been available at retail for more than 24 hours?

I think what happened was they got a code for the PC version that unlocked at 12AM launch night (so basically just like buying the game digitally) and the reviews could start going up at 12:01AM. It's on this weeks bombcast, I forget where though.

@AhmadMetallic: You're surprised there are reviews of Battlefield 3? This game is an absolute status-quo in your opinion then?

@Klei: The goal of this site isn't to cover everything.

@Klei said:

Brad has to be one of the worst gamers I've seen, and Ryan seems to bitch about everything he can.

I like Brad. He seems like a nice guy. And Ryan is cool too. It's not like he's Arthur Gies on RebelFM or anything.

@Ravenlight said:

Is anybody else confused about which Jeff this thread is about?

is this about Jeff Green or Jeff Gerstman?

@AhmadMetallic: You're surprised there are reviews of Battlefield 3? This game is an absolute status-quo in your opinion then?

While I doubt they will do that I don't see this game getting higher then a 3/5.