EGM Names Coverage-restricting Game Publishers
The specific publishers mentioned were Ubisoft, Midway, and Sony Computer Entertainment. According to Hsu, Midway is disallowing coverage of its Mortal Kombat games and Sony its sports games to EGM.
Particular divisions or segments within Ubisoft were not mentioned, although the magazine recently scored Ubisoft Montreal's Assassin's Creed with scores of 4.5, 6, and 7 (each out of 10), generally lower than the overall press average. (Shacknews' own Nick Breckon was similarly unenthused with the game in ShackCast 20.)
Hsu insisted that the publisher restrictions will not affect EGM's judgments on the relevant products or companies.
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According to Hsu, Midway’s Mortal Kombat development team, Sony’s sports game division, and Ubisoft have all allegedly banned EGM from further coverage of their products.
1. Sony sports titles? What are those?
2. The biggest question is to what degree are they saying they have been banned? Have these publishers said they are not allowed to view games behind closed doors? Are they not sending EGM preview builds? Banned sounds pretty harsh, but I would love to know more specifics.
Bottom line: bad news for publishers, whether it is true or not.-
1. Sports titles developed by Sony, such as NBA and MLB The Show.
2. They're probably just not cooperating with EGM. If EGM is at some event and games are there, there isn't much a publisher can do, but it's easy for the publisher to not invite EGM to their own press events or send them preview builds.