As the height of summer wanes, hundreds of video games journalists breath a melancholic sigh, preparing to dig up the next pointless thing they can turn into a scandal and/or event. Just weeks after the the Nier Automata “secret level” bonanza, many in the gaming press are finding it harder and harder to scrape the barrel of things that can be turned into major events which will draw in the crowds.
Were this any other period of the year, there would be new game announcements, there would be new game releases, there would be people in the industry who are currently on vacation saying and doing stupid things. But there isn’t any of that right now, and there won’t be for another month or so. This prolonged period of drought in gaming announcements and no other scandals that don’t involve Ubisoft and Activision being run by rapists (allegedly), of which people are already tired of hearing, has caused much difficulty.
And while the Nier Automata event can be seen as a success, turning a meaningless prank for a game that people forgot about years ago into an event, it has had a very limited success. None remember it now. None link back to it. It generates no new revenue. The elders of the gaming press fear that this is a sign of things to come. As more people are funneled to Youtube, or worse, TikTok, they will need to focus on increasingly more esoteric and niche subjects that will have a guaranteed audience, but one that will not linger.
According to some writers, even the cornucopia that is “just write an article about how Ocarnia of Time had this thing that no one noticed” has been spent. At best, they can craft new articles about “this one texture you didn’t see before, because it’s 2×2 pixels and not actually used in the game”, but that road will lead only to ruin at this point.
Some think fondly back to a time, years ago, when in a similar period no news they managed to craft an event so large, so click-baity, so polarizing and profitable, that it bled over into the real world and left deep scars in society that can be felt even now. But they fear to unleash such a monster again, at least until it’s time to move to a job in the gaming industry itself or somewhere else, and then it’d be OK if everything burns behind them.
One writer for a prominent gaming news site, who wished to remained anonymous, had this this to say on the subject:
So until interesting things happen, or can be manufactured, expect listicles, articles about “who is X character” and… hold on! Nexus Mods did what!? CACHING$$$
Dollar signs then formed in his eyes and he was rushed to a hospital.