When you write about games, your calendar will soon begin to look like a maze of embargoes. When you agree to play a game or see a presentation before a title is released, you are stuck agreeing to the publisher's schedule, which dictates exactly what you're allowed to talk about and when you can talk about it. This is par for the course, and when you see a rush of reviews all at the same time, you'll know an embargo has lifted.

The problem is not that embargoes make everyone equal—it's that some websites are more equal than others. There are, of course, plenty of objections to make about the whole embargo process. Today we're going to look at what happens when embargoes are no longer used to keep everyone on equal footing, and are instead leveraged to make sure only the chosen few sites are able to share the hoarded news.

What happens when embargoes are seemingly broken?

Today's look at embargoes came from the story we broke about the keytar peripheral and the "Pro" game modes coming to Rock Band 3. While the company refuses to use the term "keytar," the fact that the peripheral came with a handle and could be played standing up was enough for us to use the term, either rightly or wrongly. The information came from our ever-reliable Mole, who has helped us break many, many stories for us in the past, with an incredible accuracy rate.

What we didn't know when we received the original information was that much of what was given to us was already known by many people who write about games—the new Rock Band content was shown at an E3 preview event we didn't attend, and journalists had signed pieces of paper saying that they wouldn't discuss what they had seen. This presents a sticky situation: information which some know is accurate is out there, but if they tip their hand and say that it's real, they could get slapped down by the publisher and their coverage could be hurt in the future.

For our part, we were threatened with a lack of access in the future if we didn't take the story down. We left it up. Some gaming sites wrote it up and made sure to stress that this is a rumor, and others ignored it completely. Why would an editor who knew the story was accurate decide to sit on the information? Rumor posts are common in this business, and our Mole is probably he most reliable in the industry.

An editor from one of the major gaming sites agreed to speak with us about the issue on condition of anonymity, and his worry was that running the story would have broken the terms of his embargo. His other thought? Our story only had a few details, and it was worthwhile to wait until they could run the full story after the embargo dropped. We had a few juicy scoops about what was coming, sure, but at that point the editor in question had all the details (under embargo), and so decided to wait.

Because USA Today got a better embargo

As if our scoop didn't give news outlets enough of a headache, those that didn't run our news woke up on Thursday morning to find that USA Today had run a full story about Rock Band 3, including details about the song lists, videos of the peripherals, and all the other good stuff that the other sites weren't allowed to write about until Friday, when their embargo was up. They could then write about the details that USA Today talked about, but any of their own thoughts based on the time with the game? Their mouths had to stay shut for another 24 hours.

That's one problem with this sort of embargo: it's not to make sure that everyone's story goes up at the same time; rather, it's done to ensure that the publisher gets to pick who drops the details first. Writers waking up to the USA Today news soon realized that their own coverage was going to seem late, and would mostly repeat what USA Today had already said. USA Today, of course, has been given a huge advantage in terms of timeliness.

We spoke to Chris Grant, the Editor in Chief of Joystiq, and he confirmed it's a common practice to give some outlets videos, images or even stories ahead of everyone else—he named IGN as an example—but giving someone an exclusive on an event is less common, but more annoying. "Less common, and less acceptable, is the event exclusive where dozens of outlets attend the same event, often on their own dime, agree upon the same embargo, but one outlet is granted that exclusive, usually in exchange for the promise of special placement," he told Ars.

In these situations, you simply have to wait your turn until the blessed news outlet's exclusive period runs out. "It stings to hold your story, your impressions, and instead link out to another outlet to get the news up. It reminds me of sitting at the kid's table, and waiting for Uncle Ignatius (or whomever!) to finish their meal."

That's where it gets maddening for outlets who take part in these early preview events: you're giving up your time, attention, and even travel budget to cover a game, and only later do you find out that one of your competitors is allowed to run the story first and there is nothing to be done about it. Grant's preferred tactic is to find out ahead of time if someone has an exclusive, and back off on covering events held by publishers that have burned them in the past. Another writer told Ars that's it's a tricky thing, as many exclusive deals are struck after the event has concluded.

The wasted time may be the worst part

The time it takes to cover these events, not to mention the travel budget some sites pay, and the investment is only worth it if the news is timely. This year, the shifting embargoes and timed press releases sent out by publishers after preview events are causing frustration and anger at some sites. In one case, Activision gave writers a lengthy preview of the upcoming DJ Hero 2... only to release all the information talked about as a press release before the embargo was up, scooping the very writers invited to come and take a look at the game. One writer expressed the anger he felt about having his time wasted, and hinted that he's skeptical of giving Activision any more energy during the show.

The Rock Band 3 story deals with every aspect of embargoes. One site has information that could endanger the exclusive going to someone else, so they're threatened in order to have it removed. Other news outlets ignore a story they know is true because it might break their embargo, only to find out that USA Today has the exclusive, so their own stories are going to feel like yesterday's news by the time they're allowed to publish. In some cases, writers go see a game, only to have the details, images, and gameplay details published by the developer before the embargo drops, destroying the value of the pre-release briefing.

In other situations, a news outlet given a break can have disastrous consequences. It seems USA Today was given the contents of the Microsoft Project Natal reveal in advance, and when its story ran ahead of time it seemed to be speaking of events in the future in the past tense. The story was soon pulled, but the damage was done: the name of Kinect and the games coming to the system were all over the Internet before the Cirque du Soleil event had even begun, stealing the majority of Microsoft's thunder. Whoops.

Embargoes are meant, in part, to level the playing field, but instead they're often used to make sure some outlets get to break stories. Try to fight the system, and you can expect an angry e-mail and perhaps future repercussions in terms of access or game reviews. Why do some outlets get to run information before anyone else? In some cases it's because they promise good reviews scores, and in others it could be story placement or other goodies were decided between publisher and outlet.

What's clear is that exclusives carry a high value, and valuable things are never given for free. Sadly, embargoes will always be used to keep some stories secret, until one outlet is allowed to break the news for everyone. When it comes to gaming coverage, we'll accept embargoes in order to get timely information to you. We will not accept any offers for special treatment in exchange for an advantage, however. And keep this in mind: when you see someone bringing you a PR-blessed mother-lode of gaming news before everyone else, you'd be quite right to approach it with skepticism. Who knows what they had to do to get special treatment.