So I started noticing how close Niche Gamer article titles and Siliconera article titles are...
I don’t wanna go all ham and cheese on this yet, but I’m noticing some uncomfortable overlap between some of the articles, and it’s starting to become plagiarism.
For example, we have these two articles on Naruto: Ultimate Ninja Storm 4.
http://www.siliconera.com/2015/07/13/kaguya-can-use-her-transportation-technique-in-naruto-shippuden-ultimate-ninja-storm-4/
http://nichegamer.com/2015/07/kaguya-can-utilize-her-transportation-technique-in-ultimate-ninja-storm-4/
Both not only have similar titles, but also the fact that UNS4 will feature environmental hazards, something not mentioned in the title.
Looking at something less shocking, we have these articles between the fact that Harvest Moon: More Friends of Mineral Town are coming to the Wii U E-Shop.
http://www.siliconera.com/2015/07/10/more-friends-of-mineral-town-coming-to-wii-u-virtual-console/
http://nichegamer.com/2015/07/harvest-moon-more-friends-of-mineral-town-coming-to-wii-u-virtual-console/
Not only the Niche Gamer one came a day later, but both mention that the new Harvest Moon game (or shall I say the continued bastardization and rape of the Harvest Moon brand; fuck you Natsume) Seeds of Memories is coming out.
However, the Siliconera article does mention more info, such as that More Friends of Mineral Town was the 3rd Harvest Moon game to have a female protagonist, so it’s not complete plagiarism.
Finally, let’s see these two articles between the game Shin Megami Tensei x Fire Emblem.
http://www.siliconera.com/2015/07/07/shin-megami-tensei-x-fire-emblems-main-story-will-be-around-30-hours/
http://nichegamer.com/2015/07/shin-megami-tensei-x-fire-emblems-core-story-will-take-roughly-30-hours-to-complete/
Both mention that the characters come from the first and thirteenth Fire Emblem games, and get this, and were selected from character polls!
This is an issue that needs fixing. Now. The worst part is that it’s ALL FUCKING BRANDON ORSELI’S FAULT.
Full disclosure: I’m not a fan of Orseli, so perhaps I’m biased.
I know this because here’s an example of two similar articles that aren’t fucking copypasta of each other.
http://www.siliconera.com/2015/07/06/the-original-1992-romancing-saga-has-been-translated-into-english-at-long-last/
http://nichegamer.com/2015/07/the-original-romancing-saga-on-snes-has-finally-been-translated-into-english/
Full disclosure: Carl is my favorite writer in Niche Gamer. Definite bias there.
It’s an easy fix! Of course, it’s not as easy as cut/replace some key words, but it just requires some more effort!
When #GamerGate started, one of the mottos was that we need to support better games journalism sites, and tear down the old corrupt ones. If this is the result, then I think we need a reality check on our *new* better journalism sites.
Of course, I could be wrong, and it’s a load of nothing. Still, I wanna squash this before it gets out of hand.
