Niche Gamer Admits To and Issues Apology for Plagiarizing Gematsu Content

Spencer Baculi |

Dec 19, 2019

Niche Gamer, a video game news outlet which touts itself as an alternative to the mainstream video game press, has issued an apology and admitted that the site had plagiarized Gematsu content, particularly translated Japanese press releases, for years, following initial denials and a lie attributing the plagiarism to a non-existent ghost writer.

The accusations first surfaced over the weekend when Sal Romano, the Editor-in-Chief of Gematsu, began accusing Niche Gamer of regularly publishing Gematsu content without sourcing.

He provided multiple links comparing his original work and Niche Gamer posts:

Hey the various edits I made to the press copy here are exactly the same as mine, yet there is no Gematsu sourcing. Where did you get that information?

— Gematsu (@gematsucom) December 16, 2019

Oh hey there are also the same exact minor edits that I made to the app store description here as well. I feel like I’m starting to notice a pattern.

— Gematsu (@gematsucom) December 16, 2019

Really fixated on what to translate 出るボリューム as here, so it’s neat that you also decided to go with “screen time” as well https://t.co/9jhs6virCR

Also interesting that in every Japanese story I find, it’s always vaguer + uses all these weird synonyms for words that I used

— Gematsu (@gematsucom) December 16, 2019

OK, this one is pretty funny. NG accidentally left the intro to my post that was initially copy-pasted in the fourth paragraph here. https://t.co/WUsA53nles pic.twitter.com/V0qDYDkoX3

— Gematsu (@gematsucom) December 16, 2019

Wow and the same exact edits / reorganizing I made to my description of the game is replicated here as well! Even the extra dash before “Crimson Night” I accidentally added when first publishing. https://t.co/oUVjj7UB8H

— Gematsu (@gematsucom) December 16, 2019

Responding to these accusations from the official Niche Gamer account in a now deleted Twitter thread, the site’s owner, founder, and Editor-in-Chief, Brandon Orselli, initially identified the perpetrator as “a ghost writer” and claimed that this anonymous contributor “has since been terminated.” (Archive link: https://archive.ph/Hyl2w)

“We’ve investigated accusations for recent content on our site to another site, Gematsu. We’ve recognized similarities with some content, which had been generated by a ghost writer that acted as a contributor for our website on some content. This writer has since been terminated.”

He continued:

“This is Brandon here, the EIC. I apologize for letting this slip by, I’ve been exhausted running everything with the site and should have double checked their source(s). I need to delegate more and with our new hires we are doing just that.”

He concluded:

We’ve investigated accusations for recent content on our site to another site, Gematsu. We’ve recognized similarities with some content, which had been generated by a ghost writer that acted as a contributor for our website on some content. This writer has since been terminated.

This claim was soon refuted by Romano, who recalled that Niche Gamer and Orselli had a history of “denials” when accused of plagiarizing, specifically towards Romano after he had “kindly” approached them about this same issue in 2015:

A thread of denials, “I also get press releases,” and “you’re just looking at coincidences” followed, to which I continued to provide new evidence that I intentionally left out of earlier emails.

— Gematsu (@gematsucom) December 16, 2019

Eventually, the proper sourcing was added. But then it happened again later that month, and I had to email him once more. That, too, was eventually corrected—following more denials.

— Gematsu (@gematsucom) December 16, 2019

One of the denials at the time was basically ‘you guys pick good thumbnails, so we use your images, but we write our own posts,’ which was hard to believe considering there were the same images at the source (just not my exact crop—which they used in tons of posts).

— Gematsu (@gematsucom) December 16, 2019

So yeah, don’t believe this “ghost writer” scenario. I was super nice about it back then and kept it under the radar, even when it happened a second time. And with folks finding content dating back to 2016, it looks like it never stopped.

— Gematsu (@gematsucom) December 16, 2019

On December 18^th, Orselli issued a lengthy apology on Niche Gamer, admitting that he “lied with that ghost writer statement” and claimed that the issue was “a complete oversight on my part, mostly due to sheer overwork and lack of delegation.”

“For those unaware, we’ve recently had accusations from another website, Gematsu, of plagiarism here on Niche Gamer. While not all of the claims are true, regardless, I take full responsibility and we have already removed any legitimately suspect content from said articles, and are looking at other articles as well. This was a complete oversight on my part, mostly due to sheer overwork and lack of delegation.

I’m not going to lie, I was really stretched thin with my time between my day job, my family, and running Niche Gamer as a second job. There have been many times I neglected my family so we could make embargo deadlines. My small team has asked me to hire more people for too long now, and by postponing that, I simply made things worse. When the accusations came out, I panicked and I lied with that ghost writer statement, and hid a few replies on Twitter. It was wrong, it was a breach of trust, and I’m sorry. This does not reflect my own moral standards, the high moral standards our staff strive for every single day, or the ethics that drive Niche Gamer forward.

I’ve been managing, editing, and publishing things on Niche Gamer mostly by myself for some time now, from all the staff reviews, the day to day content from staff, our editorials, everything. I’m exhausted. My day job takes up most of my time and then I’ve been running the site in all of my free time. This doesn’t excuse how I let this become such a problem, but I am truly sorry to Gematsu (and its owner, Sal), my staff, and most of all you – our fans and readers.”

Orselli concludes his apology by announcing that he will be “stepping away from managing the front-end content of Niche Gamer” and “will be taking more of a back-end role with the site, focusing on back-end tasks while also working on our server upgrades, new site features, and more.”

Romano responded with a lengthy Twitter thread questioning many of the statements made in the apology before ultimately stating that he considered the apology to be “hollow.”

The apology is hollow. Orselli is still involved with and making money off the site. To all the NG staffers who got caught up in your boss’ mess, I apologize. If I can provide a bit of advice, you’d probably all flourish more without your names attached to his website.

— Gematsu (@gematsucom) December 18, 2019

Niche Gamer has since announced various changes to their staff, including Ryan Pearson’s new position as managing editor, despite standing accusations by Romano that Pearson had also plagiarized “full press releases [he] translated”.