Keighley launches premium Portal 2 iPad feature

Information doesn’t want to be free.

Or available to the majority of the population.

Keighley sounds a bit of a dick anyway. Some journos are particularly unimpressed by his sneering attitude to ‘the rest’ of Games Journalism in this app. And frankly, ‘the executive producer of the Spike TV Video Game Awards’ marks him out as a super nuclear douche of the highest proportions.

WTF Valve. Where is Raising the Bar 2?

I’d love a Raising the Bar 2 but I expect it won’t happen this side of HL3/EP 3.

I’ve seen comments about his sneering of other jurno’s in the app, what does he actually say?

Say what you want about Geoff Keighley but he knows how to write stuff like this. His Behind-The-Games features for Gamespot back in the day were nothing short of stunning.

I was just amused that on the apps site, you know, around all the pictures of himself letting everyone know he is much better looking that everyone else, his reasoning for charging for the content was that it cost money to make the app. So like, wouldn’t it have been easier to just… you know, not make the app?

I guess it is kinda pricey for a single feature, but it looks to me like a smart way of making some money off a piece, without having to pay all the middlemen.

I’m not familiar with him, so I have no idea whether he really is a douche. I tend to like the journos that get peoples panties in a twist. Even if they act out and slam stuff every now and then just to prove their meddle, at least they aren’t the same as all the lapdogs, who wouldn’t dare to write what they really think if their lives depended on it.

Guys like Tom Chick take a lot of shit for that, but personally I think he’s one of the few people that actually does his job as an independent writer.

@6 He probably wants to tell the story though, he just doesn’t want to give it away. Which makes sense to most people in pretty much any craft. At least the ones that aren’t hippies.

I guess on the flipside, that’s certainly not the cheapest looking website I’ve seen for such a small app

A magazine with half the word count of this would have cost twice as much to buy.

Remember those days, people?

Why didn’t Valve just pay Keighley? Or maybe they did. Seems strange. I mean, is the game “that” big? It’s not exactly a mega-release, is it.

It’s a 4-hour puzzle-game. Albeit a very good one.

I dunno, it just seems to be over-hyping the game, elevating it to some kind of iconic status that doesn’t seem befitting.

Fair play to Geoff for wanting to make money, but if Valve didn’t already give him a fat wad of cash in the first place then he needs a better agent.

I dunno, maybe if it was Halo 4, I’d be interested, but although Portal 2 is awesome, it’s just not that interesting to know what went on, imo.

It’s one of the most played games on Steam, which probably makes it one of the most played games on the PC, so I reckon it’s pretty mega.

meh

@9/Mike: http://www.rockpapershotgun.com/2011/04/20/portal-2-in-4-hours-the-steam-timer-is-a-lie/

Considering how worked up people get over Valve games and the fact that it has a 95 Metacritic rating, i’d say its sort of a mega-release.

I dunno, if Keighley was with Miyamoto making the first true 3D HD Mario World game and was behind the scenes as a new Nintendo console was being made, I might consider paying a premium to read about it. Because that’s fucking huge.

But Portal 2?! Great game. I doubt, however, it’ll sell close to any of the major hitters. Now that doesn’t mean it isn’t good/great etc., but it does mean that imo, it isn’t really deserving of an INSIDE SCOOP! OMG.

Again, opinions/arseholes etc.

#12 I know people who have completed it in under that. In RT too, not just Steam time.

Most people get more than 4 hours out of it, regardless. You don’t use a speedrun of Super Mario Brothers to determine the time it takes, either.

If you only spend 4 hours then you’re probably missing most of the easter eggs and tiny details that are essentially what makes the game stand out. And it seems to me like a pretty convenient way of creating a negative narrative, while avoiding to actually form an opinion of what’s in the game, which should really be the important thing.

Portal 2 is selling extremely well currently, so unless it drops off, I don’t see how it would become less than succesful. It’s gotten massive publicity and stellar ratings, plus it was already a very popular IP. I don’t see how it could possibly be considered an underdog.

I also fail to see why people shouldn’t run stories on whatever they want. Even if they needed to qualify a story like that, the fact that it’s a Valve game pretty much means it’s going to be more than relevant for a metric fuckton of gamers.

Not that they all should buy it or burn in hell, but there’s no discounting the basic merits of the story from a reporters perspective.

It wasn’t a speed-run. it was a first playthrough. And they absolutely fucking loved it.

I think the whole thing was basically set up to promote the game and to generate even more interest about it using a paygate as a teaser: DON’T MISS OUT ON THE AWESOME BEHIND THE SCENES INFO!!! *yawn*

Dev makes game – and it’s a very good one.

Still, as I said, I’m not knocking Geoff or Valve for trying to make as much money as possible. I just don’t think the subject-matter is a worthy first-step to what could become a new angle in games journalism.

Not very many editors would agree with that, I’m pretty sure they’d love the story. It’s not as if reporting hasn’t come with a paygate for centuries now.

It’s certainly impressive by your friend. That would put him in a rare percentile.

It seems to me more like we have a cycle of bullshit where subject X says something on a forum and five people who haven’t even played the game end up repeating it, and agreeing with other people who also haven’t played it.

If it was actual criticism, rather than random chatter about length, then they might be on to something, but there seems to be infinitely little of that in this case.

it wasn’t a criticism of the game, though. I thought I made that abundantly clear.

Ah, I must’ve misunderstood.

I’m just pretty puzzled by the fact that so many people seem to be substituting real criticism, with a weird fixation on how long the game is.

I’m pretty sure 99% of games writers would jump at the opportunity to visit Valve though. It’s not exactly a minor player. Really, why would you ever turn down that kind of access as a games writer?

To his credit, the piece he did on Metal Gear Solid 2 (which you can read on the MGS2 Making of disc if it’s not online) was brilliant. But other than that, I’m not his biggest fan as such (even though I did have a passing interest in this a couple of hours before it was revealed what it actually was – that, and he was in Utah last week for the Bethesda event for GTTV).

@20: The article’s validity isn’t really under question. It’s whether the story itself is so interesting that it’s worth paying to read.

Also, consider this, what IF Valve were arseholes and the company run like a shambles? Would Keighley have written that? He’s gotten never-before-seen exclusive access to a major dev house. One that’s been contrived by PR to promote and hype the game and I’m sure they get a cut of revenue.

Tbh., reading about how Portal 2 started out life as a prequel just isn’t interesting. I mean, the Halo franchise starting out life on a Mac and as an RTS is pretty interesting as there’s loads of political ramifications of MS buying Bungie and then the game becomes a shooter. Still, the info was for free on the internet. I didn’t need to pay some bloke who’s renowned for his sycophantic platitudes and self-promotion £3.

I wouldn’t pay money for ANY behind the scenes story of ANY current game… Unless it involved pictures of Jade Redmond & Hideo Kojima acting out some kinky Snake/Raiden cosplay…
But its all down to individual taste I guess o_O

@22 Aaaah, misunderstood again I guess. I get what you’re saying with that.

But there is such a thing as fan service. That’s really a pretty huge part of what any magazine does, especially with this kind of access. I’m awfully fond of Portal 2 after the first playthrough, and if I had an iPhone or an iPad, then this would be something I’d seriously look at.

Neither of us have read the feature though. I don’t know if it’s crap or not, but there’s more to an article than simply the title. Maybe the guy makes it come alive, maybe there’s some insight in there that’ll thrill the fans simply because it lets them in on the considerations of the creators. Or maybe it’s just useless promotional reporting made to order.

I’m not familiar with the guy to begin with, so I have no clue, but I see no reason to dismiss it, though.