As you may know, WatchMojo is one of the most popular channels on YouTube. Covering everything from TV and films to video games, their videos are usually your standard top ten lists about various subjects. Like the top ten worst selling consoles or the top ten most expensive sci-fi movies.
You know, the typical stuff you find on Buzzfeed like clickbait factories. Poorly researched, minimal effort attention grabbers that often retread the same ground as legions of others beforehand.
But in itself, that’s not a bad thing. After all, top ten lists aren’t a crime against humanity. And hey, everyone does need to just switch off and watch something a bit more mindless every now and again, right?
Well, I guess so. Except there’s just one problem.
Namely, the info in the videos is stolen from other YouTube creators.
Yep, I’m not kidding. All the facts are straight from other people’s work with no credit given.
How do we know this?
Because Guru Larry has seen his whole video ripped off and reused as a WatchMojo list. Yep, they took one of his Fact Hunt videos, noted down the entries there and remade the entire thing as a video on their channel.
Normally, that wouldn’t be too noticeable. Unfortunately for WatchMojo though, Guru Larry was prepared.
That’s because Guru Larry (like many map makers and dictionary writers of old) is known to sneak ‘copyright traps’ into his work. These traps are very minor ‘mistakes’ that can then be used to prove someone stole your data and reused it in their own work. They’re quite common on maps, with ‘trap streets’ often used to prove a mapmaker copied one of their rivals.
And since WatchMojo clearly didn’t do any other research on the topic, they copied the fake information without checking. Good job guys! How lovely of you to tell us where you get your information from now!
Here’s Larry’s tweet about the subject going into a bit more:
As well as Top Hat Gaming Man’s great video about the controversy:
So either way, the cat was out of the bag and Twitter was talking about it. So what did WatchMojo do?
Did they apologise for their actions like mature people would? Take down the video to stop people being fooled by fake information?
Well, not quite. They took down the video sure, but actually admitting they stole someone’s research never factored into it. Instead they sent Guru Larry the following, rather hilarious letter:
As you can see, it’s filled with examples of questionable journalism ethics. For example, why don’t the organisation credit people for their findings?
Because they don’t know said people are the original finders. Yes really. They outright say they won’t credit anyone because they don’t know said people are the ones they should be crediting.
That’s just… wow. Can you imagine if someone did that in school or college?
Like, if they handed in an essay with no citations because they ‘didn’t know’ the researcher was the original discoverer? Or told the lecturer they didn’t credit anyone because they didn’t know whether their sources were the original ones?
They’d probably get thrown off the course. That’s an obvious example of plagiarism, no matter how you cut it.
Yet that’s not all the letter implies.Oh no, it also implies they’re rather terrible at research.
Why?
Well, isn’t the job of a journalist about verifying the information they’re posting about? Aren’t journalists supposed to hunt down the source of a piece of information before writing about it?
Yeah, I think they are. But thanks to the fact WatchMojo clearly isn’t finding the original source, it implies the channel’s ‘researchers’ don’t actually do much research at all. That they find whatever a few other YouTubers or writers have said about a topic, copy down the information and merely assume it’s accurate. Verifying stuff? Who has the time for that, right?
Additionally, they also seem to imply they don’t really check their videos for originality all that well either. That’s because their letter goes and says ‘their tool didn’t pick up the similarities to your video’, implying the only thing they do is put the information through an automated plagiarism checker and hope nothing comes up as a match.
That’s again pretty bad for a channel like this. It’s basically admitting that people can send in anything and they’ll post it so long as it doesn’t ‘look’ enough like the source it’s paraphrasing. It feels like one of those cases where someone assumes Copyscape or Turnitin is good enough on its own.
And when you add this to the clear mistakes the channel makes in their videos (Top Hat Gaming Man references the terrible ‘Jaguar sales data’ in his response), you’ve got a lazy, uninspired YouTube channel trying to cash in on other people’s work for their own gain. Which is a trend that’s all too common now. Giant clickbait channels spamming low effort videos based on other people’s work for quick views.
So don’t support these guys. They clearly don’t put a lot of work into their videos, they steal from other people and their journalistic integrity is virtually nil. Treat them like you would Brash Games or other thieves. Organisations you refuse to support for their complete lack of morals and sheer laziness.
Because WatchMojo doesn’t deserve your patronage. And nor do any other such channels who refuse to credit people for their work.
Yesterday, Sonic Mania was leaked online. That’s because various shops broke the game’s street date and sold it early, leaving lucky buyers a way to post everything about the game online.
Fortunately, Sega found a way to move attention away from that leak. Why? Because to ‘compete’ with it, they just posted the game’s opening video online! Here it is if you haven’t seen it already:
As you can tell, it looks fantastic. You’ve got bright and colourful character designs for the entire cast. There’s fluid animation throughout.
And well, in general the hand drawn cartoon opening looks a million times more interesting than the CGI deals found in most games. Indeed, some might say it looks good enough to have a TV series styled after it. One that’s a bit more… official art like than the actual Sonic the Hedgehog cartoons out there at the moment.
So good job guys. You’ve made a fantastic intro for Sonic Mania, and one that brings back the personality so many games are missing nowadays.
Let’s hope other titles do something like this in the future!
Yesterday, Nintendo released an update for the Legend of Zelda Breath of the Wild. This update made various changes to the game, with the most major being a new feature that let you get items in game by reading news articles about the title in a Nintendo Switch app.
However, it also fixed a few bugs. Like the annoying Kilton one that stopped him giving you those medals for killing overworld bosses.
But there was a downside too. Namely, it also fixed the world reset glitch.
Yep, the one that let you get infinite Korok seeds and items is now fixed. Gone. Kaput. Doesn’t work anymore, regardless of what you do.
And that’s pretty bad for completionists. It means Korok seed collecting is now back to taking hundreds of hours, items like the Champion Weapons are limited in number again and we have to actually buy or find all those arrows we want.
It’s pretty annoying to be honest.
But it’s understandable none the less. After all, it is a glitch that breaks much of the game. So in that sense, Nintendo was perfectly right to fix it.
And hey, they did avoid fixing other bugs that didn’t have such major effects too. Like horse clipping or bomb clipping. So it’s not a complete write off on the glitch front.
Just one that’ll annoy Zelda speedrunners and glitch fans.
Still, what do you think?
Are you disappointed they fixed this useful trick? Or are you just happy they’re focusing their efforts on fixing issues with the game none the less?
Post your thoughts on this here or at the Gaming Latest forums today!
Well, this came from nowhere! Apparently, ARMS is actually getting a new update next week, with balance patches and possible new content!
Here’s the tweet confirming it from the official Japanese account for the game:
As well as a quick translation telling you what the tweet says in English:
News flash!
The ARMS League has announced an update for the game. This update will include balance fixes for the game, and will be available next week.
More information is coming soon, so please wait for our next report.
But what does this all mean?
Well, let’s be realistic here. It probably doesn’t mean a huge amount of content changes in the most fan pleasing sense possible. So if your ideas for the update include lots of new characters, stages and modes… You’ll probably end up disappointed here.
Yet at the same time, it also seems like there’s something more than just balance fixes. That’s because the tweet itself hints that there’s more than meets the eye, with comments about extra information coming soon.
And that doesn’t make sense if it’s just bug fixes and game balance tweaks. Because they’d just say ‘a balance fix update’ is coming soon.
So it seems like new content is a possibility here. This goes well with a monthly update schedule, and means that either a new character, stage or extra ARMS will be made available for the title.
Which makes perfect sense considering the situation. Remember, ARMS has lost a lot of hype recently. It’s in a situation where it’s doing okay, but Splatoon 2 has taken its spotlight.
And that’s because even the DLC stuff like Max Brass is old news now. People are used to it. It’s just not exciting any more.
So to keep the excitement going, a new content update seems to be the most likely option here. It’s free press for Nintendo and this game.
But still, what do you think? Could the new ARMS update bring extra content in addition to balance changes and bug fixes?
Or is it really just going to be a simple balance patch and nothing else?
Post your thoughts on the matter here or on the Gaming Latest forums today!
Source:
ARMS Cobutter Update on Twitter
Back in 2012, Capcom released Resident Evil Revelations for the Nintendo 3DS. The game was a hit, getting good reviews and selling well for the series, and ended up being one of the best titles for selling the system’s 3D capabilities.
For the first time since Resident Evil 4, Nintendo fans got to play a main series Resident game on a system they owned.
Which was more than you could say about the sequel. Why?
Because unlike the original title, that never did come to Nintendo systems. It was released on every other console under the sun sure (including PlayStation Vita), but neither the Wii U or 3DS was a platform it was made available for.
But now it seems Capcom is making up for that a bit here! Why?
Because they’ve just announced that Resident Evil Revelations 1 and 2 will be coming to the Nintendo Switch! Yep, both games will be available for the system in late 2017 and will be sold for the low price of $19.99 each. Complete with a special compilation set including one game on cartridge and one game as a digital download.
It’s a pretty neat deal, especially given how the Xbox One and PS4 only seem to be getting one of the games remastered. Here’s a trailer showing the first game’s remastered version in action:
As you can see, it looks fantastic so far, regardless of the system the games are on.
So yeah, it’s good news all around really. Makes up for the second game not seeing a Wii U release anyway…
But what do you think about it all?
Are you happy that Resident Evil Revelations 2 is finally on a Nintendo system? Is the idea of getting to play remastered versions of the games on Switch an exciting one?
Or do you wish Capcom had done this much earlier on?
Post your thoughts on the matter here or on social media today!
Source:
Resident Evil Revelations Comes to PS4 and Xbox One, Both Games Come to Nintendo Switch (Capcom Unity Blog)
