MobyGames on Its Option Letting Developers Reclaim Missing Credits

MobyGames, a comprehensive database about video games and its creators, recently introduced an option for creators to claim video game credits if they, for some reason, were not listed as contributors. The function, which is now in beta, with full release planned for autumn, has proven quite popular.

Product manager Reece Denzel told GamesIndustry.biz at Gamescom that "thousands of developers" have claimed their pages on the service and explained how it works.

"There's now a claim page button, which allows for the association of that user's account to the actual public-facing page. It's very important for us to note that that does not give them the ability to edit any of the structural information about things like their credits. What it does give them the opportunity to do is to go in and edit some details about themselves that are then listed as coming from the verified source of that developer."

MobyGames has also introduced a verification process for avoiding false claims. One part of this process is confirming the identity of a person, which is a human-driven verification process run in the background. As for the credit history itself, the process has not changed since Atari was involved, and there are no plans to change it. There are also workflows to correct misspellings or name changes, for example. Denzel also shared that the goal is to make information on the site "as accurate as humanly possible." 

The information about credits usually comes from a game's screenshots, credit rolls, or spreadsheets in which companies list project contributors. However, a lot of the information is "community-sourced and community-verified," Denzel shares.