video game marketing can be a
fascinating and wonderful thing or a
total disaster
welcome to watchmojo.com and today we’re
counting down our picks for the top 10
video game PR fails before we begin we
publish new videos every day so be sure
to subscribe for more great content for
this list we’re taking a look at those
moments in the video game industry where
marketing and public relations managed
to botch the situation and leave
everyone reeling our focus is
specifically on events that hurt the
brand as a whole and not merely a single
product by bringing gaming to life I’m
bringing life to gaming story character
real emotion then we had to do number 10
ocean marketing the Avenger and as we
manufacture in control introduces it it
is supposedly the ultimate gaming
advantage well that’s certainly one way
to wreck your credibility and upset your
customers to handle customer and media
relations for their Avenger ps3
controller attachments and control
decided to employ the PR firm ocean
marketing unfortunately for any control
ocean marketing employee Paul
Christopher o chose to berate a customer
looking for information on an order
leading to a heated back-and-forth with
Penny Arcade co-founder Mike crowling
once the whole affair was made public
ocean marketing was quickly dropped by
in control but the damage was already
done quite a shame to see a potentially
interesting product time to such an
unpleasant strain event yeah yeah I’m
gonna sell your controllers on eBay
go ahead tell the Better Business Bureau
they all owe me five million dollars
because I dumped on him in heel number
nine skyrim paid mod it says the game
studios is known for creating open
living worlds with seemingly limitless
gameplay content but what if there was
another way to experience even more let
it never be said that valve isn’t bold
on a number of its endeavors so in this
case it didn’t exactly pan out in their
favor in April 2015 the valve
corporation unveiled a new paid mods
feature in its digital game marketplace
team with Bethesda’s the elderscrolls v
skyrim being the first game to test said
feature the following weeks were rife
not only with unrest and objections
amongst gamers but also problems
stemming from a lack of oversight on
Valve’s part once reports of overpriced
mods and copyright violating content
began to roll in the writing was
definitely on the wall hopefully
Bethesda’s creation Club doesn’t make
the same
although we’re not holding our breath
including the very best community
creators these outside creators work
hand in hand with such as decane studios
number eight Redner and Duke Nukem
Forever
hail to the king baby when the
long-awaited Duke Nukem Forever finally
released in June 2011 it was met with an
avalanche of negative reviews and
widespread disappointment certainly not
a good sign for the game or the Duke
roopam series but the situation was made
one extra bit worse by the interference
of marketing representative Jim Redner
in an infamous Twitter outburst Redner
stated his intention to limit review
copies of future games he represented by
blacklisting any vocal critics of duke
nukem forever even after 2k games
formally cut ties with Redner sperm
that’s probably the implications of his
statement still lingered number 7 shadow
of Mordor forced branch deals rogue
legend or da fortune seemed to favor
certain YouTube personalities when
Warner Brothers Interactive
Entertainment offered them pre-release
copies of Middle Earth shadow of Mordor
however the offer came with a caveat the
youtubers would have to sign a contract
that required them to withhold in Vova
warner bros directly sponsoring their
videos on the game but some reason we
got nothing back outside of one PR
company that wanted to do a brand deal
and said well yeah we can give it to you
early but only if you sign this brand
deal which was a paid promotional video
based after a leaked copy of the
contract began to make the rounds Warner
Brothers would find itself investigated
and exposed in full by the US Federal
Trade Commission we’re of the frame of
mind that it’s probably not a good look
using popular internet stars to sell won
games on false pretences gotta be
upfront about that stuff
number six PSP white
[Music]
it’s hard to know sometimes if someone
was intentionally aiming to be
insensitive or if they were just making
a terrible decision Sony faced such an
issue when in 2006 the company was met
with substantial backlash from an ad in
the Netherlands promoting the white
variant of their PSP handheld system the
adverts in question portrayed a white
woman violently grasping a black woman
by the jaw with the tagline PlayStation
Portable white is coming giving the
world the impression that Sony was kind
of tone-deaf and ignorant
this marketing campaign was naturally
later pulled and Sony released a
statement acknowledging people’s
concerns number 5 fake bomb for
watchdogs the saying goes among certain
gaming pundits Oh
Ubisoft the Australian news site 9 MSN
received quite a shock when a safe was
sent to one of their reporters along
with a note saying to check their
voicemail when they tried to open the
safe it started beeping so they called a
bomb disposal unit to disarm it except
turns out the whole thing was a hoax
inside the bomb was a copy of Ubisoft
2014 game watchdogs accompanied with
some assorted promotional items Ubisoft
had apparently not anticipated that the
safe or the cryptic instructions for
opening it could be misconstrued and
they had no malicious intent
yikes
number four Nintendo versus let players
some days it’s great to be the fun
traditionally rooted game maker in the
industry but this is not one of those
days Nintendo’s struggles to adapt to
the nature of let’s play video content
began in 2013 when the company declared
its intent to claim the ad revenue of
anyone doing videos on Nintendo games
public outcry would lead Nintendo to
discontinue this practice though it
didn’t stop them from establishing the
creator’s program about two years later
this affiliate program which ensures
Nintendo earns some of the ad profits on
Let’s Plays less many players wondering
if Nintendo was simply incapable of
changing with the time and led to many
youtubers just deciding not to cover
Nintendo games number three revealing
the Xbox one this system is built to
amaze on day one and continuously
improve over the generation ahead the
early days in a consoles promotion are
vital with success requiring a light
touch careful wording and an
establishment of goodwill between the
manufacturer and its customers Microsoft
decision to press conference one months
before e3 2013 in order to generate
interest in their then upcoming Xbox one
console most definitely did not achieve
such a balance not only did the event
focus more on the ones streaming and
social media features than on you know
gaming it also revealed a myriad of
potential problems for the console
ranging from the always online status to
the questionable price point nearly
every aspect of the Xbox one as
advertised had to be walked back and
reversed after significant criticism
today you’ve seen how we’re transforming
TV experiences we’ve shared the magic
and science behind our system and you’ve
tasted a new generation of games powered
by Xbox one number two the PSN security
breach of 2011 buckled only more second
equals I wonder stuff
when your customers personal information
is on the line it might not be wise to
withhold important information on April
20 of 2011 Sony shut down various
services on their PlayStation Network on
the grounds that it was conducting
maintenance it would be another six days
before Sony revealed the truth of the
situation the PlayStation Network had
been hacked with the personal
information of 77 million
users potentially compromised
understandably this led various
government officials and security
experts to criticize Sony for waiting as
long as they did to explain the true
reasons behind their shutdown the real
problem is that now people can email you
and do phishing attacks and try to get
other information from you directly yeah
an identity theft is also a concern here
absolutely before we get to our topic
here a few dishonorable mentions another
exciting aspect is the ability for
consumers to make micro transactions 599
u.s. dollars and we’ve been digging
deeper and discovering what kind of
muscle this machine really has
[Music]
number one Konami just Konami yeah
those present at e3 2010 may have felt
that Konami’s bizarre somewhat tone-deaf
presentation was the pinnacle of
misguided public relations efforts to
which Konami definitely said hold my
beer I got this
in 2015 the company presented us with
the depths of their self-destructive
tendencies beginning with rumors that
the company had driven a claim to
developer Hideo Kojima to leave the
company this was followed by a conga
line of terrible moments such as leaks
pointing to a hostile work culture and
the company decided to turn their
beloved franchises into pachinko
machines add to this their refusal to
allow kojima to appear at the game
awards and the announcement of Metal
Gear survived and it becomes clear that
Konami
as a friend is seemingly beyond
redemption yo Commission which okay sure
Metal Gear Solid WA yes a cognitivist
Amazon base no Houston do you agree with
our picks check out these other great
clips from WatchMojo and subscribe for
new videos every day
fascinating and wonderful thing or a
total disaster
welcome to watchmojo.com and today we’re
counting down our picks for the top 10
video game PR fails before we begin we
publish new videos every day so be sure
to subscribe for more great content for
this list we’re taking a look at those
moments in the video game industry where
marketing and public relations managed
to botch the situation and leave
everyone reeling our focus is
specifically on events that hurt the
brand as a whole and not merely a single
product by bringing gaming to life I’m
bringing life to gaming story character
real emotion then we had to do number 10
ocean marketing the Avenger and as we
manufacture in control introduces it it
is supposedly the ultimate gaming
advantage well that’s certainly one way
to wreck your credibility and upset your
customers to handle customer and media
relations for their Avenger ps3
controller attachments and control
decided to employ the PR firm ocean
marketing unfortunately for any control
ocean marketing employee Paul
Christopher o chose to berate a customer
looking for information on an order
leading to a heated back-and-forth with
Penny Arcade co-founder Mike crowling
once the whole affair was made public
ocean marketing was quickly dropped by
in control but the damage was already
done quite a shame to see a potentially
interesting product time to such an
unpleasant strain event yeah yeah I’m
gonna sell your controllers on eBay
go ahead tell the Better Business Bureau
they all owe me five million dollars
because I dumped on him in heel number
nine skyrim paid mod it says the game
studios is known for creating open
living worlds with seemingly limitless
gameplay content but what if there was
another way to experience even more let
it never be said that valve isn’t bold
on a number of its endeavors so in this
case it didn’t exactly pan out in their
favor in April 2015 the valve
corporation unveiled a new paid mods
feature in its digital game marketplace
team with Bethesda’s the elderscrolls v
skyrim being the first game to test said
feature the following weeks were rife
not only with unrest and objections
amongst gamers but also problems
stemming from a lack of oversight on
Valve’s part once reports of overpriced
mods and copyright violating content
began to roll in the writing was
definitely on the wall hopefully
Bethesda’s creation Club doesn’t make
the same
although we’re not holding our breath
including the very best community
creators these outside creators work
hand in hand with such as decane studios
number eight Redner and Duke Nukem
Forever
hail to the king baby when the
long-awaited Duke Nukem Forever finally
released in June 2011 it was met with an
avalanche of negative reviews and
widespread disappointment certainly not
a good sign for the game or the Duke
roopam series but the situation was made
one extra bit worse by the interference
of marketing representative Jim Redner
in an infamous Twitter outburst Redner
stated his intention to limit review
copies of future games he represented by
blacklisting any vocal critics of duke
nukem forever even after 2k games
formally cut ties with Redner sperm
that’s probably the implications of his
statement still lingered number 7 shadow
of Mordor forced branch deals rogue
legend or da fortune seemed to favor
certain YouTube personalities when
Warner Brothers Interactive
Entertainment offered them pre-release
copies of Middle Earth shadow of Mordor
however the offer came with a caveat the
youtubers would have to sign a contract
that required them to withhold in Vova
warner bros directly sponsoring their
videos on the game but some reason we
got nothing back outside of one PR
company that wanted to do a brand deal
and said well yeah we can give it to you
early but only if you sign this brand
deal which was a paid promotional video
based after a leaked copy of the
contract began to make the rounds Warner
Brothers would find itself investigated
and exposed in full by the US Federal
Trade Commission we’re of the frame of
mind that it’s probably not a good look
using popular internet stars to sell won
games on false pretences gotta be
upfront about that stuff
number six PSP white
[Music]
it’s hard to know sometimes if someone
was intentionally aiming to be
insensitive or if they were just making
a terrible decision Sony faced such an
issue when in 2006 the company was met
with substantial backlash from an ad in
the Netherlands promoting the white
variant of their PSP handheld system the
adverts in question portrayed a white
woman violently grasping a black woman
by the jaw with the tagline PlayStation
Portable white is coming giving the
world the impression that Sony was kind
of tone-deaf and ignorant
this marketing campaign was naturally
later pulled and Sony released a
statement acknowledging people’s
concerns number 5 fake bomb for
watchdogs the saying goes among certain
gaming pundits Oh
Ubisoft the Australian news site 9 MSN
received quite a shock when a safe was
sent to one of their reporters along
with a note saying to check their
voicemail when they tried to open the
safe it started beeping so they called a
bomb disposal unit to disarm it except
turns out the whole thing was a hoax
inside the bomb was a copy of Ubisoft
2014 game watchdogs accompanied with
some assorted promotional items Ubisoft
had apparently not anticipated that the
safe or the cryptic instructions for
opening it could be misconstrued and
they had no malicious intent
yikes
number four Nintendo versus let players
some days it’s great to be the fun
traditionally rooted game maker in the
industry but this is not one of those
days Nintendo’s struggles to adapt to
the nature of let’s play video content
began in 2013 when the company declared
its intent to claim the ad revenue of
anyone doing videos on Nintendo games
public outcry would lead Nintendo to
discontinue this practice though it
didn’t stop them from establishing the
creator’s program about two years later
this affiliate program which ensures
Nintendo earns some of the ad profits on
Let’s Plays less many players wondering
if Nintendo was simply incapable of
changing with the time and led to many
youtubers just deciding not to cover
Nintendo games number three revealing
the Xbox one this system is built to
amaze on day one and continuously
improve over the generation ahead the
early days in a consoles promotion are
vital with success requiring a light
touch careful wording and an
establishment of goodwill between the
manufacturer and its customers Microsoft
decision to press conference one months
before e3 2013 in order to generate
interest in their then upcoming Xbox one
console most definitely did not achieve
such a balance not only did the event
focus more on the ones streaming and
social media features than on you know
gaming it also revealed a myriad of
potential problems for the console
ranging from the always online status to
the questionable price point nearly
every aspect of the Xbox one as
advertised had to be walked back and
reversed after significant criticism
today you’ve seen how we’re transforming
TV experiences we’ve shared the magic
and science behind our system and you’ve
tasted a new generation of games powered
by Xbox one number two the PSN security
breach of 2011 buckled only more second
equals I wonder stuff
when your customers personal information
is on the line it might not be wise to
withhold important information on April
20 of 2011 Sony shut down various
services on their PlayStation Network on
the grounds that it was conducting
maintenance it would be another six days
before Sony revealed the truth of the
situation the PlayStation Network had
been hacked with the personal
information of 77 million
users potentially compromised
understandably this led various
government officials and security
experts to criticize Sony for waiting as
long as they did to explain the true
reasons behind their shutdown the real
problem is that now people can email you
and do phishing attacks and try to get
other information from you directly yeah
an identity theft is also a concern here
absolutely before we get to our topic
here a few dishonorable mentions another
exciting aspect is the ability for
consumers to make micro transactions 599
u.s. dollars and we’ve been digging
deeper and discovering what kind of
muscle this machine really has
[Music]
number one Konami just Konami yeah
those present at e3 2010 may have felt
that Konami’s bizarre somewhat tone-deaf
presentation was the pinnacle of
misguided public relations efforts to
which Konami definitely said hold my
beer I got this
in 2015 the company presented us with
the depths of their self-destructive
tendencies beginning with rumors that
the company had driven a claim to
developer Hideo Kojima to leave the
company this was followed by a conga
line of terrible moments such as leaks
pointing to a hostile work culture and
the company decided to turn their
beloved franchises into pachinko
machines add to this their refusal to
allow kojima to appear at the game
awards and the announcement of Metal
Gear survived and it becomes clear that
Konami
as a friend is seemingly beyond
redemption yo Commission which okay sure
Metal Gear Solid WA yes a cognitivist
Amazon base no Houston do you agree with
our picks check out these other great
clips from WatchMojo and subscribe for
new videos every day
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