Bethesda has changed their policy on media review copies

[Demose]

They will now only be giving out copies the day before release.
https://bethesda.net/en/article/42QH1pT ... me-reviews

I don't like what this suggests.

[ezze]

What does it suggest?

[Demose]

What does it suggest?

It suggests that Bethesda Publishing will be pushing out games before Bethesda Softworks is done with them and using the small amount of time before release to prevent journalists from informing the public of the current state of the game thus protecting early sales at the expense of both companies reputations.

[ezze]

I guess this suggest even more that my approach of waiting at least one year before buying a game is a good idea. Honestly I never understand why people seems to love to ride the hype.

[Chris]

It suggests that Bethesda Publishing will be pushing out games before Bethesda Softworks is done with them

Bethesda Softworks is the publishing arm or the Zenimax family. This doesn't change game development in any way, it simply means reviewers won't get copies early to make their reviews in time for the game's release (the game "goes gold", i.e. is finalized with no further changes until post-release patches, much earlier than it's released, so the devs wouldn't be forced to stop earlier, and reviewers would get the same 1.0 version that consumers do).

It is a bad thing though, because that means most reviews will happen some time after release, reducing the amount of information people can get by release, leading to more people making uninformed purchases, increasing the likelihood of people buying games they end up not liking (and would've known they wouldn't like if they had been able to read reviews). This of course nets more money for the publisher, but it means some people are effectively duped into dumping $60+ into something they don't like; that's not exactly a cheap investment for recreation, so the more bad purchases you can avoid, the better.

Ideally, people wouldn't preorder and would wait for reviews regardless of how long it takes. But that's not how things work for the majority of video game consumers, and publishers know that. The only information people will get ahead of release is from the publisher, who is of course going to put it in the best light possible to attract as many preorders and early sales as possible, versus third-party reviewers who are more likely to either find flaws that make a game not good, or at least recognize when a good game might not appeal to certain types of people who otherwise like what the publisher has shown. So the earlier reviews can be made and released ahead of the game's release, the better it is for consumers to have the chance of getting informed before making a day-one purchase.