Interview with Star Trek Gamers' Victor

Brother None

Brother None

This ghoul has seen it all
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I know, I know, no peripheral subjects, but we at NMA decided that the topic of Bethesda's blacklisting and general treatment of the STG website was a bit too interesing a topic to pass up.

For one thing, we want to show sympathy to STG's plight. Secondly, we want to remind people that the RPGCodex is also a critical and blacklisted site, allegedly for inappropriate content, but that story is thinning by the second. Thirdly, it offers a possible look at the future for us, if Bethesda makes the wrong choices we could end up in the same position.

So we cornered Star Trek Gamers' webmaster Victor to hear him out. A snip from the interview:<blockquote>Now, people who know me know what I am like. I speak my mind. If I dont like something I say it right on the front page of the site, screw the consequences. It got to the stage where Bethesda Softworks' silence was getting beyond a joke, and that's when The Argus Array, the STG's Star Trek Gaming podcast (which gets about 100,000 listeners) went on the record and listed the flaws of the game in a constructive manner. Argus 13, 14 and 15 all discussed what was wrong with the game and then Lindsay Muller (some kind of artist in Bethesda) came on the official Bethesda boards and said that the Argus Array must follow Bethesda Forum policies...basically Bethesda was now trying to dictate what i should put on my own podcast which I pay the hosting for.

...needless to say I wasn't happy. They didn't want criticism, but I gave it to them full bore. I told them exactly what I thought of Legacy. All the while another particular "fansite" remained silent. It got to the stage where official "volunteer" moderators in the Bethesda boards were allowing any topic made by me to be flamed, but at the same time they banned any of my staff in the forum for the slightest misdemeanor.</blockquote>Link: Interview with Star Trek Gamers' Victor on NMA
 
Originally it was met with open arms. This was the first game in 3 years and the fan sites were all over it, STG being the one that got the most interviews with the makers of all 3 games (there was Tactical Assault and Encounters being made as well). It was directly leading up to the release in December when things started to turn sour. It started to become obvious that a lot of the features which were hinted at being in the game weren't going to be there, which is the usual case in Trek games. I for one thought it was a bad omen and then when the PC version of the game was released at the end of December we all saw it for what it was...a cheap port of a console game.
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Scary stuff

Bethesda didn't help matters when they apparently didn't bother to lift a finger when I informed them that one of their OWN "volunteer" moderators and possibly a developer from inside MadDoc was helping to run or at least send info about STG and it's staff to the hate blog that was (and still is) giving out personal info about myself and the staff who run the STG. Bethesda Softworks didn't even bother to contact me with regards to any info I had as to who was running that public hate blog against my site, they just let it, and the moderator/developer responsible for running the blog continue to this day.

It is also now starting to appear that Bethesda's own board's are becoming pro STGU and anti STG due to the questionable actions of some of the STGU supporting moderators of that official board whom Bethsoft themselves invited to moderate, knowing full well the 4 year ongoing history between STG and STGU. At this point in time I would like to point out that not one of the STG affiliates or STG staff have been asked to moderate in the official boards, only STGU people since Bethesda deem STGU a "safe site" which falls under Bethesda's own rules...basically Bethesda is trying to control the fansites,
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Really scary stuff :shock:

they never guessed on one thing though...that STG has outlasted the 4 previous publishers...possibly contributed to the downfall of Activision as publisher and STG will still be around when CBS eventually decide to not renew the contract with Bethesda...making them the 5th publisher STG as a site has outlasted.
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Very interesting, hmmmm...
 
A lesson in Rambo marketing, treachery and franchise rape.
Obviously Bethesda is unable to handle criticism and sees fans as a free slave resource for Pete&Co. :seriouslyno:
If I look at the very strange intrigues and tricks to play off fansites against each other I think they must have a clone of Macchiavelli in their PR team - divide et impera?
And the quality of the delivered game ... oh, oh. :roll:
Apparently the word 'quality' is misplaced in this context.
(ratings : ign 59% - gamespy 40%)


It's really not a good omen.
 
Very interesting.

Even though it is Star Trek I feel it is extremely relevant to what will probably happen to the Fallout situation regarding Bethesda's totalitarian approach to everything, wich there is no denying as is obvious by the things presented here and in the past.

Thanks for keeping up to date on this subject as otherwise I don't think I would have ever noticed it for a while as I don't frequent the Star Trek site to much.

@ Victor if he see's this
excellent job, no one no matter if it is Bethesda or whoever should censor factual reports on their products regardless of if it is hurtful to them or not (unless its national security or the like wich this is certainly not). If they don't like it then perhaps they should fix it so they would get better results.
 
Only 17 people? Well, no wonder Bethesda doesn't want to make a game for 17 guys. There is definitely no money in that.
 
Heh, this should get some exposure, and it'll probably hurt Bethesda quite a bit. I'd like to see their internal communication around now.
 
King of Creation said:
This interview made it up on Bluesnews. Cool beans.
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Excellent. I mailed it to them in the vague hope they'd post it under etc. or elsewhere, but didn't expect them to.

Though they seem to have just used it as an oppertunity to point out STG's plagiarism (of a Blue's News' newspost?), which is fair. Still, exposure, good.
 
BAH, i keep telling them over at the STG site forums not to copy and paste whole news posts without credit....grrrrr...

Anyway, i'd like to thank Kharn for the chance of the interview. Only time will tell on what the effects of it are. I can tell ya now though, i'm not on Bethesda's 2007 christmas card list. LOL
 
Constructive criticism should always be welcome. I like companies that will patch a game to change some aspect because most people don't like it or to add a major feature. Bethesda needs to stop with the Gestapo crap, is my vote.
 
Victor1st said:
BAH, i keep telling them over at the STG site forums not to copy and paste whole news posts without credit....grrrrr...
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Heh. Be sure to send an apology to Blue's News, they're good people.

Raising awareness on this is pretty high priority. The ES forum might be pretty insulated against any doubleplusungood unthinking coming on the forum, but others should know.
 
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