I had made a comment how 1UP.com, the web entity of the Ziff Davis Game Group, seemed like “the inmates are running the prison”. After making 1UP a daily read, especially in the past week, I can now say for certain that my comment is correct.

I initially gave 1UP too much credit (no pun intended). I said its gonzo style of journalism had some merit for being different than its competitors. Apparently they walk the fine line between hard-hitting journalism and sophomoric unprofessionalism equipped with a press badge. Since when were strikethroughs allowed in news print, web or otherwise? Probably since enthusiast sites Kotaku and Joystiq were recognized as legitimate news sources. It’s also about the same time news editors started interjecting their stories with editorial and conversational writing style.

Luke Smith is from that same school of journalism, literally, having spent time at Kotaku prior to becoming News Editor at 1UP. He seems to be an intelligent guy, and must feel the need to prove it by littering his content with words that would normally be edited out of a New York Times article. It’s okay, Luke, I know what “fulcrum” and “modus operandi” mean, but you lost me at your frequent slang (“sup”, “y’all”) and devilish conscience which likes to materialize itself through needless comments, represented by said formatting. What really gets me, though, is his written tantrums against the very industry he represents, such as his “revealing” article on PR embargoes. That rant was nothing more than an immature 25 year-old who thought he was more important than he really was. In any other organization which views itself as respectable and professional, he would have been shown the door as fast as he hit the “submit” button.

James Mielke is another 1UP staffer who thinks his value is based on how important he thinks he is to his employer, not his actual financial worth to the bottom line. Yeah, Mielke, we get that you are a DJ and into techno and club music. And we get that you seem to be able to write your own ticket whenever you get the urge to go to Japan to “cover” game news. But it’s obvious you pick and create boutique projects that probably aren’t even worth the time it took to think them up, let alone spend the money to execute them. Your “Q Entertainment Cover Week” article was all style and no substance, and appeared as if it was just an excuse to let you scratch your personal itches rather than do something that would attract actual readers to the site. At least you have that DJ skill to fall back on once 1UP gets sold to someone who is interested in making a profit, because writing like the following excerpt of yours won’t get you any opportunities:

“My interviews I conducted this past week were fucking awesome. Can’t wait to put the stuff up. Be about 9 days ’til we start rolling this shit out.”

Recently Andrew Pfister’s mock announcement regarding Gears of War was an embarrassment, only because a release date for a high-profile title is news. This is the biggest release since Halo 2 – why is this any different than Halo Tuesday? Apparently because Andrew says so. Even senior member Jeff Green seems to be regressing in the 1UP day care, making this comment after the Games for Windows announcement:

“Microsoft has NO say over our editorial content, and, in fact, it’s part of the legally binding contract that they not interfere…And when they fuck up, we’re gonna be right there, calling them on it.  I promise.”

That last sentence was quoted in the actual news article. It was subsequently, and wisely, removed after it originally appeared, but remains engraved in the 1UP forums. And before anyone defends such comments by saying they were mostly blog posts, I say anything written within the 1UP pages are representative of that organization – including but not exclusive to news, features and blogs. Anyone at any other professional organization would never be allowed to write anything that may have negative impact without repercussion. If I decided to write a comment like the ones above on my company’s intranet site, I would probably be reprimanded if not outright fired. But like I said above, the inmates make the rules.

If the videogame industry consistently longs to be recognized as an acceptable form of entertainment for all ages, it needs equally mature representation by its media. Part of the problem is it doesn’t have the same level of journalists as other industries. There is no 60 Minutes, there is no Peter Jennings. There is 1UP, calling attention to itself like a hyperactive child in the supermarket whose mother just can’t settle it down. Its peers try to look away and ignore it, but can’t – partly out of embarrassment, partly out of sympathy for its parent; but mostly because it desperately tries to disassociate itself from 1UP, to avoid carrying the same negative connotation and cursing the industry it is trying to project as positive.

The 1UP management team should be ashamed they allow their employees to conduct business they way they do. But all is not doom and gloom – it appears as if they might not be granted such a long leash in the foreseeable future. Gamasutra reported the Ziff Davis Game Group was unprofitable in Q2 2006 with a loss of $1.5 million. It also stated, “the company noted that it has retained financial advisors for a possible sale of some or all of its groups – possibly including the Game Group.”

I would pay to see Meilke’s meeting with the “Bobs” as he tries to justify using company expenses to pay for his frequent personal vacations. Luke would have to explain why Ziff Davis has been paying a staff of bloggers the wages of a proffesional journalist. And then someone would have to answer to why the quarterly loss was blamed on “development costs within the online business” when the website is barely navigable on a good day.

Perhaps I would be remiss if I didn’t mention Gamespot as game journalism done right. Previously I had been too hard on Gamespot, because I had mistaken its objective delivery as rather boring. Now I know it is anything but deadpan – it is professionalism.