Today's wildfire is brought to you by Gamespot and Eidos. It's been quite a day trying to follow this story and all of the "he said, she said" quality of the updates. Here's what I know for sure. Jeff Gerstmann no longer works at Gamespot after ripping Kane and Lynch a new ass with a 6.0 review. Did Eidos demand his head on a stick for the review? I don't know. Did Gamespot turn over his head on a stick for the review? I don't now. I've read the text version of the review and watched the video review and all I can say is that given the context of other reviews of the game that rate it around 6 or 7 out of 10, I don't feel that Gerstmann was out of place.
The speculation continues with a great many unnamed sources and second-hand information.
What I can tell you is that I have personal experience with a game company becoming so infuriated with my commentary that they have indeed called up their PR/Advertising agency and demanded that all current ad buys on this website be pulled immediately and no further ad buys be made with this website for any of their current and future titles.
Said game company, when asked what would be necessary to reverse that decision, demanded my head on a stick. Yes Virginia, game companies can behave like petty little bitches with thin skin.
My Editor and the CEO of the company I work for refused to acquiesce to their request and backed my writing 100%. Eventually, it was smoothed over and the ads were turned back on, but all it would take for Gerstmann to be out on his ass because of Eidos asking for his termination would be a spineless monkey at CNET to be in a position of authority. With that in mind, look around your office. I'm willing to bet that you can spot at least one or two spineless monkeys. Me? I don't have that problem. Don't get me wrong, the fact that my bosses have iron fists just means that if I'm the one at fault, I'm the one getting crushed.
The flip side to the story is that Jeff Gerstmann was a loose cannon who wasn't performing his reviews up to snuff, and had been taking a "tone" that management didn't like. This lends itself to him being fired as an example of what not to become for the other staff members. But that would have to mean that his reviews were either completely off or unnecessarily positive or negative. I don't see any of that.
As far as I can tell looking from the outside in, Jeff Gerstmann shouldn't be ashamed of those reviews. He spoke in a fair and honest manner about a game that clearly deserves a mediocre rating. And no one will ever go on record saying whether it was the review that caused Eidos to pull ads that caused the firing, or just demanded the firing outright.
To be honest, I've always thought that all of Gamespot's editorial was for sale anyway.
And since one of my readers likes pictures of "hawt chixors", here's a link to the Kane and Lynch contest where they try to find a vapid young beauty to represent the game.
