In recent days, a news article claiming that IGN had tampered with the voting data for the game Honor of Kings has sparked widespread controversy. The game’s voting percentage dropped from 90% to 70% in just one hour, prompting players to criticize IGN’s immature behavior. Now, Peer Schneider, co-founder and chief development officer of IGN, has stepped forward to address these allegations.
Schneider, in a recent tweet, stated that the tweet in question linked to a page from six days ago and did not represent the actual game rankings. He added that the number one game had changed three times within the week based on fan support.
Schneider continued by saying that over the weekend, Honor of Kings and Cosmic Robots experienced a surge in votes. They reported this to the engineering team, suspecting it was due to robot voting. IGN did not modify any voting data and eventually removed robot and non-human votes.
Finally, Schneider noted that the page would remain open for several months, meaning the number one game could still change.
As of the time of writing, Elden Ring DLC Golden Tree Phantom ranked first (73.6%), followed by Honor of Kings at third (68.8%).
However, IGN’s statements contradict player feedback. Luo Enzuo, the administrator of the Honor of Kings Baidu forum, live-streamed the game’s real-time voting rate and found that it dropped by 0.2% per minute. Additionally, during the same time frame, Honor of Kings received 40,000 comments, compared to only 2,000 for Final Fantasy 7: Rebirth. These 40,000 comments were almost all negative, leading to the drop in rankings.
Furthermore, players pointed out that the drop in Honor of Kings’s voting rate occurred during the early morning hours in the United States, when most Americans were asleep. This led to speculation that IGN had manipulated the data behind the scenes.
Finally, IGN China issued a statement at the beginning of the day, clarifying that the various IGN sites operate independently and that there is no concept of headquarters and branches. They expressed that while they respect the opinions of other IGN sites, they also reserve their own opinions.
The situation surrounding the Honor of Kings voting data remains a topic of debate, with both IGN and players presenting differing perspectives.
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