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When video games journalism eats itself, we all lose out | Keith Stuart
As industry giants trade beloved brands like commodities and AI offers easy content, independent games outlets are rising up. Here’s why they’re sorely neededLast week was a bad one for video games journalism. Two key contributors to the veteran site Giant Bomb, Jeff Grubb and Mike Minotti, have announced their departure after a recent podcast was taken down. The 888th episode of the Giant Bombcast reportedly featured a section lampooning new brand guidelines issued to staff and is no longer available online. Later this week, it was announced that major US site Polygon was being sold to Valnet, owner of the ScreenRant and GameRant brands, resulting in a swathe of job losses. This follows ReedPop’s sale, in 2024, of four high-profile UK-based sites – Eurogamer, GamesIndustry.biz, Rock Paper Shotgun and VG247 – to IGN Entertainment, owned by Ziff Davis, which also resulted in redundancies.It’s sad how these long-standing sites, each with vast audiences and sturdy reputations, have been traded and chopped up like commodities. On selling Polygon, Vox CEO Jim Bankoff said in a statement: “This transaction will enable us to focus our energies and investment resources in other priority areas of growth across our portfolio.” It felt gross, to be honest, to see this decade-old bastion of progressive video games writing being reduced to an asset ripe for off-loading. Of its purchase Valnet said: “Polygon is poised to reach new editorial heights through focused investment and innovation.” Quite how it will do that with a significantly reduced staff is anyone’s guess. Continue reading...
As industry giants trade beloved brands like commodities and AI offers easy content, independent games outlets are rising up. Here’s why they’re sorely needed
Last week was a bad one for video games journalism. Two key contributors to the veteran site Giant Bomb, Jeff Grubb and Mike Minotti, have announced their departure after a recent podcast was taken down. The 888th episode of the Giant Bombcast reportedly featured a section lampooning new brand guidelines issued to staff and is no longer available online. Later this week, it was announced that major US site Polygon was being sold to Valnet, owner of the ScreenRant and GameRant brands, resulting in a swathe of job losses. This follows ReedPop’s sale, in 2024, of four high-profile UK-based sites – Eurogamer, GamesIndustry.biz, Rock Paper Shotgun and VG247 – to IGN Entertainment, owned by Ziff Davis, which also resulted in redundancies.
It’s sad how these long-standing sites, each with vast audiences and sturdy reputations, have been traded and chopped up like commodities. On selling Polygon, Vox CEO Jim Bankoff said in a statement: “This transaction will enable us to focus our energies and investment resources in other priority areas of growth across our portfolio.” It felt gross, to be honest, to see this decade-old bastion of progressive video games writing being reduced to an asset ripe for off-loading. Of its purchase Valnet said: “Polygon is poised to reach new editorial heights through focused investment and innovation.” Quite how it will do that with a significantly reduced staff is anyone’s guess. Continue reading...
