Fucking bonkers. Between this an McD's changing their ToS to say using their app waives any right to non-arbitration dispute, something needs to be done about companies trying to effectively write new laws into their ToS. This shit is beyond egregious

No satire? Guess anything on the internet is out of the question then.

Engaging or providing subjective negative reviews

What do they think a review is?! If they wanted an advertisement, buy an ad spot on Google ya cheap bastards.

No way they can enforce that. I hope nobody is going to intimidated by this.

I hope there is a bunch of really sarcastic positive reviews, listing everything they hate about the game as if it’s what they really love about the game.

It must be a REALLY good game. Only the best games that were already going to get high reviews would ever resort to such a policy

"I signed a contract that forbids me from saying anything negative about this game. I am therefore contractually obligated to say nothing"

Shows that they have amazing confidence in their product. This is the same to me as saying "We know it sucks so please don't say so if we give you this key."

My first thought is: This is probably a shitty game because if it was good, they wouldn't be worried.

It says not to leave "subjective bad reviews". As in, objectively bad is fine.

This is utter hogshit, but also seems relatively easy to work around. "I am legally forbidden from sharing my opinions on the quality of Marvel Rivals." is a pretty clear and succinct review that technically flies under their legal fuckery.

Basically makes any test results null and void

UPDATE:

https://gamerant.com/marvel-rivals-apologizes-alpha-banning-controversy/

This is market manipulation at its best. The whole board should be jailed for it.

Every reviewer who signed this should post a review, but of the business practices and why not to buy the game.

They saw what MKBHD's honest reviews did to Fisker and Humane and said "can we stop that from happening?"

Well that's stupid. Getting negative reviews is also a good thing. It allows you to re-evaluate your product(s). Pretty much you're going to sell a half assed product, pretending it's amazing because you refused to take critically-negative feedback from your paying customers. Guess they just want to completely obliterate their company.

As stupid as it is, it doesn't stop a creator from simply demonstrating issues, without commentary. Just show people the issues and don't remark on them.

That being said, nobody should sign this. Trying to forbid people from making satirical remarks? What the crap?

This is so stupid. Isn't this a free-to-play game? With one-time-purchase games you can try to fool people, then take your money and leave while people complain about the game behind you.

But this is a free-to-play game, they intend to make money by gradual ongoing revenue from in-game purchases, etc. You can't fool people who are actively playing the game.

The contract hurts their image, and prevents them from receiving critical feedback.

That contract has absolutely no legal bearing in any way shape or form.

Let them go to court over this, get thrown out and counter sued.

It doesn't feel practical to enforce, save in so far as it lets them put you on a list of people not to extend future early-release games to. But you have to assume they were already doing that, as any marketing department worth its salt is going to have a boutique set of insider streamers who are effectively just contracted media flaks plugging your product.

On today’s episode of “This shouldn’t be legal”…

Think about it this way. The same guys who stream video game reviews to make money are paid by the advertisers who sponsor their streams. And the sponsor won't pay for a stream if its disparaging of their content. So the streamer is being paid to cut an ad.

Imagine if you hired someone to go door-to-door selling people your sandwiches. And in the middle of each sales call the guys you hired would take a big bite, spit out the sandwich, and say "This is awful! I hate it!" What are you paying these asshole for?

Just stop pretending streamers are these independent objective observers and recognize them for what they are - online door-to-door sales guys. These early releases are just their sales kits. And why am I going to extend a sales kit to a guy who isn't going to sell my shit?

This is being blown out of proportion. These sorts of terms are pretty standard for a closed playtest, as it doesn't represent the final product and the developers don't want reviews to be published criticising things that will likely be fixed for the release version.

i feel bad for the developers who worked on it because from what i played so far it looks like a surprising amount of love and care was put into the game. they didn't need something like this at all to get generally favorable first impressions. shameful display from the suits who are always ready to ruin everything.

Not bootlicking, just reading the letter of the law. I read this more as "don't be a total dick about it" so I'd love to hear a contract attorney's take on this.

Ok regardless of whether or not you should be able to. Why the fuck would you? Wouldn't it be in your ultimate best interest to recieve negative feedback early? So that it could be addressed?

Just black list people like a normal company - whoever i suspect they did this to revoke access during EA.

If I were forced to not say anything negative about a game, I would painstakingly refrain from saying anything positive as well.

"Do I recommend this game?..."

I mean most play tests let you say nothing at all. So not sure if this is better or worse.

Oh, you want only good reviews? It'd be a shame if people reviewed your game like "I apologize, I have nothing to say - I am under contract to say nothing bad about the game, and I have nothing good to say about it either."

No satire either??

So you can say nothing but praises for the game, but if they detect sarcasm, you're STILL getting sued?

This is just my opinion but most comic book based games suck anyway.

Hmm... A perfectly neutral review with a share of the wording from the contract is nothing but factual, and I believe could be argued to be non disparaging?

I was in his stream when people sent him the contract they signed just to get the key. Wild. The game is janky looking as fuck so they definitely know how bad it is.

I’m assuming it’s with regards to the Play Test which is in very early stages and shouldn’t be judged as completed. Seems fair enough if it’s nowhere near complete

It did say "subjective negative reviews". I would take that to mean that strictly objective negative reviews are perfectly acceptable.

Don't worry folk's. We pay taxes so that the FTC and FCC gotz our backz broz.

It's one of the reasons that nobody says anything bad about the product that their sponsor provided to them. Either that or people don't want to ruin their relationship with their sponsors so they will talk highly of a product even if it isn't good.

Iron Man is shooting green lasers? wtf?

Edit: After watching the gameplay video, I can say it's a similar game to Paladins by Hi-Rez studios. The only thing is that Paladins has EAC and makes it unplayable on my OS.

Does the contract also require a review to be made at all?

I think we should rename this community "gaming controversies" because that's all that's ever discussed here.

Aww, the Devs feelings might get hurt

Could be wrong but this does not sound sound outlandish for a alpha. There should be no point to ruin a name/brand before it is out. You should not leave a "review" of a unfinished product.