Namco/Bandai BBB Review

Old review on since deleted business page

This is a review that was submitted to the Better Business Bureau, however it got HEAVILY censored once accepted & published, so to save the confusion & make sense out of the mess that the review become after published to the BBB website, I am republishing it here.  The highlighted words indicate censoring in the BBB review after it was censored & published on the BBB website:

This company is known for showing hostility towards users who write negative reviews on their games & ignoring requests of their customers. They are aware of my YouTube account & (mostly negative) review of Dragon Ball XenoVerse only because I posted links to the review & videos of excessive spammers on their forums, requesting something be done about the griefing problem on 4/10/2016, to which I still have not received any official response on it (only one response from a player who was supporting counter-measures be taken against the griefing).

Bandai/Namco has made it a point to attack my YouTube channel with copyright complaints in retaliation to the review; the first one was on 7/11/2016 for a standard gameplay stream (expected to be because of the link to the review in the description of the stream or the thumbnail, which was a Dragon Ball XenoVerse desktop; this ended the stream prematurely & limited my YouTube account to nearly being unusable for around 13 hours), the second on 9/23/2016 (no stream was active at the time, so there's no way it could have been targeted for an actual video, yet it still got issued a strike for a copyright violation). The appeal on the first incident reversed the violation & set it back to good standing, however the appeal on the second incident was unfortunately ignored by YouTube & even though a BBB complaint was filed against Google (owner of YouTube) to have the strike reversed (I wasn't concerned about streaming abilities being revoked, as I already decided I wouldn't be doing gameplay streaming to YouTube again after the first incident), Google used a loophole stating I needed to re-file the complaint under the correct email (using a Hotmail account rather than the email account associated with the YouTube account) to verify ownership of the, where I think they were aware that I wouldn't be able to open another BBB complaint against them for the same incident, so this was manipulation of the system to avoid having to do anything about it. None of this started happening on YouTube until after somebody joined the chat of the first stream I attempted, tried to build hype to get me to purchase Dragon Ball XenoVerse 2 & I responded to them I wasn't in any hurry to get the game if they couldn't fix the current problems in the original game; the stream ended up getting killed in the middle of that discussion. I have checked other YouTube channels & also searched the web looking for other incidents such as I have had to deal with, so far I haven't found anybody else having the same problems...

To further complicate things (before the YouTube incidents started happing), I was having problems with archived streams getting muted on Twitch due to the music in the opening movie of the game. I contacted Namco/Bandai requesting to obtain a legal documentation (if any) for right to share videos of Dragon Ball XenoVerse online to be presented to Twitch when appealing muted videos. The Support Rep. gave me an email to contact for their Legal Team, to which I never received a response to it. Shortly afterwards, Twitch streams of that game started getting hit with misdetections of other songs that weren't in the game; the misdetected music (using audio detection algorithms) in those videos were appealed on Twitch, but never actually processed to the point of being unmuted & I never received a response from Twitch on a decision. The muted videos on Twitch was what made me decide to try streaming to YouTube instead, which was a BIG mistake & only escalated the situation to overbearing abuse from YouTube that I can't get to stop even thought I'm no longer streaming the game (or any other game for that matter) to YouTube.

For this reason, I REFUSE to continue purchasing anything with the Namco/Bandai logo on it or anything that originated from a Namco/Bandai franchise (i.e. has a character they own copyrights to). They have lost a customer because of this & no more of my money will be going into their pocket. A PSN friend of mine that I made in DBX was talking to me about DBX2 over Twitch yesterday, my response was that I wouldn't be getting it due to the attacks on my YouTube channel (only way that would change would be if they publicly apologized for the attacks & made an effort to reverse the strike they caused) unless somebody gifted it to me (I've told 2 other friends I've made in DBX this, 1 stated that he felt like throwing away his copy of DBX2 afterwards); despite my reluctance to accept the offer, that 1 friend stated he was going to gift me a PS4 & a hard copy of DBX2 when he had the money (and this isn't even a family member, which only further added to why I didn't want to accept it, beside the fact I don't want to mess with the company anymore, don't expect I'll be getting the DLC since I won't purchase it myself while the boycott continues & PSN doesn't have the ability to gift unless through gift cards).

For a copy of the censored review after being published to the BBB, it can be found here:

Download PDF of BBB censored review

5/27/2022 update
New review

After the de-indexing of this site & my Twitch blog was noticed on 5/26/2022 (Bing Analytics indicating that the site stopped receiving traffic from Bing roughly 4/26/2022), it became clear this was an obvious attack to get negative publicity hidden from the public (which is still very much the case, at least if you are a Bing user or use a search engine that pulls results from Bing), Namco/Bandai being the most likely adversary to do it based on past cover-up attacks (however Epic Games is also very possible, seeing as this was the last company to have a boycott published against them before this database wipe of WonderGamer.net happened).  I decided it was time to submit an updated report, expecting I would have to delete the other one first, but seeing as the last business page was actually removed from BBB's website, I had to find a new business listing to submit the review to.  Originally I spent a few hours working on the following review:

Bandai/Namco is an extremely manipulative company who aggressively targets negative reviews (or reviews that have negative points in them, even if not fully negative) by attacking those who published those reviews, usually through manipulation of the report function on free sites where reviews can be published (or linked). This happened not once, but twice on my YouTube channel the first time I attempted to stream Dragon Ball Xenoverse, the attack targeting a link to a review of the game in the description that they didn't agree with (the second time I wasn't even streaming, but they hit the LIVE page a second time 2 months later when it wasn't even active & hadn't been streamed to since the first stream that got cut short with a strike on my account as a result of the first attack, simply because I never removed the link, but they'd only know that the link was never removed if they went to the URL directly, which could be categorized as internet stalking).

According to Bing Analytics (that account I closed on May 26, 2022, deciding it was pointless to have an account for it if Bing was not going to index my site anymore), it appears they succeeded in fully wiping my site from Bing search results (as well as other search engines that pull their results from Bing) roughly April 26, 2022, only noticing it roughly a month later & spent the day publishing some new reviews and articles in response to Bing's wipe of my site from their database (even making a couple attempts to contact them directly). Additionally, my Twitch blog also got hit with the same wipe (the blog expected to get de-indexed, but apparently not through the site itself, just fully wiped from Bing & partner search engines). There are other search engines that still have my site indexed, but are mostly incomplete as they focus on indexing sites that are mobile browser friendly, my site not being designed for mobile browsers, therefore over 95% of the site not getting indexed in those search engines).

This issue originally started in 2016 with the attacks on YouTube, now affecting not only Bing (as well as Yahoo, DuckDuckGo & other search engines that get their results from Bing), but also my blog; I decided it was time to submit an updated review to the BBB (especially since the last business page the last review was submitted to has since been removed from BBB's database, now throwing a 404 error). Through manipulation of Bing's reporting function, my personal site (where the original review was & still is of Dragon Ball Xenoverse, linked from YouTube when the original attacks started, leading to my disabling the page & refusal to do any more gaming-related streaming to YouTube) and Twitch blog now can't even be found on Bing or a number of other search engines, which has me considering hitting them with a lawsuit for losses on web hosting & domain registration fees over the past 6 years, as well as defamation & mental anguish over the strikes incurred over their cover-up attacks (of course I don't expect I'd get anything out of it with their high-priced lawyers, so for now, I'm just sticking to the methods of reviews I know that work & they can't easily manipulate into getting removed, outside of apparently getting the business page removed like with the last one in San Jose, California).

Bottom line is Bandai/Namco would rather target the negative reviews through attacks on the publisher & cover up any negative publicity rather than targeting the issues that are stated in such negative publicity to correct what made them a negative point to begin with. When a company can not accept criticism of their products (much less make an effort to correct what is being criticized, just go after who published it with "takedown" manipulation), they really don't deserve to have customers at all; I hope over time they will learn this & stop chasing off all their customers that have received the wrath of their cover-up attacks in response to a published review they don't agree with. When you search for reviews on Bandai/Namco products (or the business itself), you'll find that there isn't much to be found; this doesn't mean that it isn't being published, it just means that they are doing everything within their power to hide it from the public & punish those that publish what Bandai/Namco doesn't want to be found. I have a recorded video of a discussion with another individual in a game by another company that confirmed he was also targeted over a review he wrote of Dragon Ball Xenoverse (resulting in a ban in the game on Steam), highlighted after a stream of that other game on Twitch & later exported to my personal site (in downloadable or streamable format, depending on the viewer's choice of viewing), which only got published as supporting evidence of this matter after I got permission from that individual to use it in my own review regarding retaliation to negative reviews (that request for permission is actually in that same video, along with their confirmation that it was okay to do so).

Unfortunately I didn't notice that there was a 2000 character limit in BBB reviews, this review being over 5000 characters (note that the previous review was just under this amount), so I had to scrap this version of the review (originally written in Microsoft Word, expecting to copy it over when submitting the review to the BBB), but deciding I would still publish it here regardless seeing as I spent so much time on it (not wanting that time to go to waste).

I ended up having to limit what I was saying in the review (at least the BBB version), bringing it down to about 1500 characters, then adding some additional statements afterwards (ending the review at just 7 characters shy of 2000 with spaces).  The revised review that was submitted to the BBB was as follows:

Company has a habit of attacking reviewers that publish negative feedback against their company or products, rather than targeting what was wrong that resulted in the negative feedback getting published in the first place. I have become a victim of these attacks on multiple occasions, starting with attacks on my YouTube channel in 2016 (the 2nd attack when the LIVE page wasn't even active & hadn't been streamed to since the first attack 2 months prior, simply hit because of a link to a review of their game they didn't agree with that never got removed/updated due to refusal to stream to YouTube after the first attack), to now in 2022 (which resulted in a search result wipe of my personal site & Twitch blog from Bing, as well as other search engines that rely on Bing for their results). While I can't go into too much detail on BBB due to character limitations (my last review being over 5000 characters before I realized I wouldn't be able to submit it), I will say I have a video-recorded discussion about this with another individual during gameplay disclosing details about what happened to him when he wrote a review of Dragon Ball Xenoverse (the same game I started getting targeted on when I wrote a review on the PS3 version); this same video also has me requesting his permission to use his statements in my review of the company on my personal site, along with his confirmation that I could before embedding from the site I was streaming to at the time & later exporting it for a downloadable/streamble version on my personal site.

As far as I'm concerned, a company that attacks it's reviewers & doesn't take constructive criticism should not have customers at all; I can only hope that Bandai/Namco will learn this sooner or later, before they chase off all their customers when those former-customers resort to spreading the word on this company by word of mouth (one thing they can't censor unless they hear it personally).

NOTE: I would vote 0 stars if I could...

Given the history of this company (and personal experience of their attacks), not to mention the BBB gives the company a chance to reply before it's published, it wouldn't be surprising if the review got rejected (especially since there was a review published to the BBB prior, however that business page was removed along with all complaints & reviews on that page, so this is a follow-up to the de-indexing of this site from Bing as an expected result of this poor-excuse of a company's actions) due to their manipulative & aggressive nature.

Even if the review does get accepted on the BBB, it's likely to be heavily censored (as is the case when you start mentioning other sites, this was made clear when I attempted a review of Twitch comparing the differences between other video-sharing & streaming sites), so as with all BBB reviews that get republished to this site for full exposure, any censoring of the review published to the BBB will be highlighted to show where censoring was compared to the original submitted review.

If by chance the review does get rejected (I believe I've had a review rejected in the past, I expect it's still on WonderGamer.net), I'll be sure to update this review as being rejected & not accepted by the BBB (likely successful manipulation by Bandai/Namco if it does get rejected, as is expected with the de-indexing of this site & the blog from Bing).