I am specifically referring to this article by recode.net.

To begin with, this isn't news. If you were actually paying attention, he never gave any game a real review score. In fact he goes out of his way to specifically make nonsensical and arbitrary fake review scores to point out that he is not giving review scores. This is a hint that they're paid spots. I realize even if they weren't paid spots he'd probably still do this for the comedic effect, but it also means he can't be accused of taking money to give a game a good score because he's not technically giving a game any score at all. He also was looking at a lot of games before they came out. That's a pretty obvious tell that the spots were paid for. It's unlikely a company would give him an early copy of the game in the hopes that he might maybe make a bit out of it. But if they're paying him for an ad spot, they can be certain he'll make a bit out of their pre-release game. And finally, he has literally stated in interviews that they were paid spots. As has been added to the end of the article in an edit, Conan specifically mentioned it in the interview with Anderson Cooper. And at the time I watched this interview, I already felt like it wasn't news. I thought it was because Conan had mentioned it in another interview, but maybe it's just because it felt so obvious to me.

So in addition to this not really being news, there's also the aspect that this doesn't matter. Conan has never presented these bits as real reviews, and even a cursory glance makes it obvious they're not real reviews. If it wasn't obvious from just watching the video, he lampshades it at the end by giving them fake, nonsensical scores. As they are not real reviews, but comedy bits, it's not relevant whether or not they are paid to play the game or not. Just from watching the bits, you can tell that anyone actually interested in video games would be unlikely to base any purchasing decisions based on Conan's "reviews."

There is no conflict of interest, and there is no attempt to actually hide that some of them are paid spots. You can tell from the article that, when asked, they just straight up said some were paid spots. Also, the requirement to identify sponsorship only applies to actual endorsements or reviews, not paid comedy bits that use the video review format as a source of material. Conan makes fun of products on his show all the time. I have no doubt that some of those bits are based around paid advertising, but they don't disclose which ones are paid in the credits for those bits, either. Because they don't have to because a comedy sketch featuring a product is not the same as a review or endorsement.

The entire framing of the Recode.net article just seems ridiculous to me. They seem to be implying that something secret and insidious is going on. But to me, anyone who isn't already aware of this kind of advertising in modern TV shows is just ignorant. Just because Conan happened upon a format for it that's super popular doesn't make it any different than lazy close up shots of cell phones in the show Heroes. It'd be one thing if the article was just informing people who might not be so savvy or aware, but to bring up possible FCC violations is just ridiculous and ignorant of the law. This article is clearly just click bait trying to stir up shit by creating controversy over something popular with gamers, where no controversy need exist.