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Duke Maddox
Ms.Taylor
ENGL 1106 9:05am
2/3/2020
Formal Proposal
The gaming industry is constantly evolving. It is an industry that always has ambitious new companies looking to push the bounds and create innovate. The industry is very lucrative, and this makes many companies huge. Like all industries some companies are liked more than others, but in gamming, a company’s public opinion is very important. In the gaming industry how liked a company is affects its sales much more than other markets.
The question I want to answer is why some companies are liked more than others. More specifically, what steps did the gaming companies Bethesda and EA take to gain such a negative light in the last few years. I want to look at the choices in their games, their marketing, their response, and public statements that gave them this reputation.
Some of the Specific events I will be looking at is EA’s recent loot box scandal and Bethesda’s fall in public opinion due to recent marketing decisions and releases. I picked these events due to their relevance. Both events started a movement of mass backlash of unpopular business practices. Not only are these events the most relevant, but they are also the most documented due to the massive backlash that came with it. All forms of media where reporting the PR nightmare that these choices caused.
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I believe this research will provide a good outlook on what companies can avoid going down the same path these two have. It will be a look into the effect on being out of touch with your audience, and what that effects in terms of public opinion. It can also contribute to the argument that things that save a company money on paper, might not always be smart to implement due to public reaction not being accounted for. This can lose the company more money than they would be saving. It will help show the how the line between the marketing team and players is something that needs to be watched carefully. This can be valuable information for marketers, seeing where the line needs to be drawn between profit and public reception.
The research I will mostly be using is textual analysis from past media and public relations to the major public relation disasters these companies have committed. I feel like this will show me the closet look to the cause and effect relationship between what is considered “going to far by the customers.”
I also would like to conduct a survey. I know that a lot of the reports on the events may be bias. This is since news is sold by controversy, and media companies can exaggerate things to fuel that. I think conducting my own research on the issue will be beneficial. The main way I will do this is by having those who are familiar with their games give their thoughts on the companies. If they are not familiar with the games, then they will not be interviewed. If they are and provide a response, I will ask what decision influenced their opinion the most. I believe that this will give me a good insight on what decisions make a company unpopular to the average person that plays their games.
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To make sense of this data I will use a rule of majority. If it seems that majority of the audience disliked a company’s action, I will consider it as something that lead to this company
not being well liked by the public. I believe that when dealing with research that is subject to varying opinions, the only important thing is how the general audience perceives them. This way I will be able to look at what alienates most audiences in the gaming community, and eventually pinpoint what general actions lead to Bethesda and EA’s Public Reception being so low.
As with all research studies there are some obstacles with this question. The biggest one is the fact that a lot of the data is based on people’s opinions, which are fluid and cannot be comply and fully be represented by numbers. This issue comes up the most in the survey. I can’t record how much one person dislikes a company compared to another accurately. This is why I will just stick to numerical data, such as if they like the company or not and why. I believe If the server and online research is compiled well enough, it can give a pretty accurate set of data into the leading cause of unpopular decisions made by these companies.
Duke Maddox 