A review of Yatzee's ZP reviews of anything multiplayer

[MiracleOfSound]

My COD4 single player playtime:
17-20 hours (normal/veteran)

My COD4 multiplayer playtime:
9 days.

 

[Inarticulate_Underachiever]

lol @ people taking yahtzee's reviews seriously.

 

[joe the janitor]

http://www.escapistmagazine.com/articles/view/columns/extra-punctuation/6832-Extra-Punctuation-On-Multiplayer

 

[joe the janitor]

The problem here is that you take Yahtzee seriously.

Whats wrong with that? Hes a critic. I take his review into account when I'm buying a game. I can kinda understand why you might just watch his reviews for laughs and giggles. But that just seems low when he spends all that time writing them and formulating an opinion.

 

[Poyer]

The problem here is that you take Yahtzee seriously.

Whats wrong with that? Hes a critic. I take his review into account when I'm buying a game. I can kinda understand why you might just watch his reviews for laughs and giggles. But that just seems low when he spends all that time writing them and formulating an opinion.

I'm afraid you've misjudged me there.

His reviews are funny, yes. But i watch them because they usually give me a few interesting ideas to consider after the review is done.
I say you should not take him seriously because its dangerous to take anything seriously, especially someone you might be inclined to look up to. His opinions are well put and worth considering, but to base your own ideas on the result of his thought process sound quite dangerous as well.
I've enjoyed the way his minds works. it helps me adjust my own to absorb things differently or quicker, perhaps in a more interesting way.

But, he is just a reviewer, and Zero Punctuation, is just a video series.

 

[MiracleOfSound]

My COD4 single player playtime:
17-20 hours (normal/veteran)

My COD4 multiplayer playtime:
9 days.

In contrast

My COD4 single player playtime:

30+ hours (hardened/veteran)

My COD4 multiplayer playtime:
18 Hours

And don't take Yahtzee's reviews as the word of god. He makes good points but they should not be the basis upon which you purchase a game.

He would lose a lot of his comedic appeal and opportunity for material if he commented primarily on game's good good points unless every game he reviewed was virtually perfect.

Imagine an episode of "The gameplay mechanics are so good and polished that it's worth spending your money on!" Not quite as humourous.

I hope you're not directing the rest of that post at me.

I've been in arguments numerous times on this website for disagreeing with the Yahtzee clones.

Who said anything about his reviews being the word of God?

He's a critic. I don't trust any critics opinions on anything.

 

[PurpleRain]

Yahtzee, I'm going to be speaking to you in this review though I doubt that you'll climb down from your Olympian perch atop Mt. Escapist to read this lowly user comment in the user section, but dammit this needs to be said.

Your reviews are entertaining and uplifting for my masochistic brain. It has provided a necessary 5 minute escape from the drudgery of real life in the middle of every exasperatingly benign week. However, your reviews fail to capture something rather important: the multi-player aspect. You've said many times how you "don't do multi-player" because you hate interacting with other people or whatever, but it's time for you to stop copping out.

Okay, hold up. Drudgery of real life? Someone's a little pessimistic.
Benign week? Do you understand what benign means?
be⋅nign
?adjective
1. having a kindly disposition; gracious: a benign king.
2. showing or expressive of gentleness or kindness: a benign smile.
3. favorable; propitious: a series of benign omens and configurations in the heavens.
4. (of weather) salubrious; healthful; pleasant or beneficial.
5. Pathology. not malignant; self-limiting.

I'm sure you meant limiting, but it's generally in good favor. To me it's a positive word. You could say that a kiss was languid meaning slow, but it would mostly imply that it was sluggish and without vigor. See what I'm getting at?

Also, don't refer to Yahtzee as a god of men. To a lot of people he is nothing. Just putting it out there. He reviews games like most people online do. I could point you in the direction of a few people I rank higher then he.

Your Halo 3 supplement was equally flawed. The single player experience is only a fraction of the game (one personally that I feel should have implants added to add substance and size). The online multiplayer is what keeps people playing this game. It has tons of game variants, ranked and casual arenas, and best of all, you can mute everyone. Yes, that group of people you charitably described as lively can be muted. All of em. You can make a party for yourself, you can individually mute annoying pricks, or you can just turn down the volume on the headset (my favorite, because they can hear me but I can't hear them). Yet this, as shown by bungie.net is where everyone spends their time playing this game.

I don't care for multiplayer games much either and never play them. To me this sounds like a person scorn or a child not getting their way and causing a tantrum.

Come on Yahtzee, like it or not you're a celebrity now...

No he isn't.

Suck it up, renew your XBL account, and participate in the online multi-player experience long enough to tell us why to get one online shooter over another. This is a recession and people want to know the best bang for their buck. So many people play WoW because it provides so much "entertainment" for so little monetary investment. Also, we crave interaction with other humans, though not in person, because then we get self-conscious.

Okay, now you're getting a tad ridiculous. You know that guy you like is still a human? He doesn't have to jump hoops for you. People don't have to suffer others if they don't want to. If I don't feel the same as you I shouldn't have to be forced into doing so. Leave it alone.

Ok, thank you everyone who reads this but isn't Yahtzee...god knows he won't.

Then why write this? Why post it on the Escapist? Just in case? I feel this is a little shout out for fame you're trying to grab. Why not just email this to the guy and leave it alone for everyone else.

Now we're starting to open up a different can of worms. You're telling me that what I get out of a piece of art is wrong. I am being a little generous with my definition of art here, but writing, animation, and performance (all of which are used in his videos) certainly be described as art, and one purpose of art is to entertain. Once an artist has created his art and presented it to the public, regardless of the initial intention of the artist, he now has no control of how it is interpreted. While there are informed and ill-informed or even misinformed opinions, opinions and interpretations are by nature incapable of being wrong.

Far from my definition of art. I would have imagined it to be a piece in which it was made to be viewed and appreciated as art. Something like images like Banksy to Rembrandt or words like Dante. Yahtzee has written a few pieces I would consider art because of the fact he put effort into creating it as such, but this is far from it. ZP is made with profit in mind lacking real want to create it.

anyway, what do you care what someone else thinks can't you form your own opinions?

I can form my own opinions, but I am not so attached to them as to prevent others from influencing my view on the world around me. People seem so set in their own ways as to not empathize or even understand other points of view. Yes I have my own opinions but if I hear another opinion that I like better than my own, I'll take it for myself.

That's actually a little scary. Holding opinions and being narrow minded like that means that you aren't looking to learn and argue. Holding onto positions is a bad way to be.

 

[Sad Robot]

Now we're starting to open up a different can of worms. You're telling me that what I get out of a piece of art is wrong. I am being a little generous with my definition of art here, but writing, animation, and performance (all of which are used in his videos) certainly be described as art, and one purpose of art is to entertain. Once an artist has created his art and presented it to the public, regardless of the initial intention of the artist, he now has no control of how it is interpreted. While there are informed and ill-informed or even misinformed opinions, opinions and interpretations are by nature incapable of being wrong.

Far from my definition of art. I would have imagined it to be a piece in which it was made to be viewed and appreciated as art. Something like images like Banksy to Rembrandt or words like Dante. Yahtzee has written a few pieces I would consider art because of the fact he put effort into creating it as such, but this is far from it. ZP is made with profit in mind lacking real want to create it.

anyway, what do you care what someone else thinks can't you form your own opinions?

I can form my own opinions, but I am not so attached to them as to prevent others from influencing my view on the world around me. People seem so set in their own ways as to not empathize or even understand other points of view. Yes I have my own opinions but if I hear another opinion that I like better than my own, I'll take it for myself.

That's actually a little scary. Holding opinions and being narrow minded like that means that you aren't looking to learn and argue. Holding onto positions is a bad way to be.

Ok, I feel compelled to step in here, but I don't think there's anything wrong with squirrelman42's definition of art. Actually, it's the most reasonable I can think of; art only really means "craft". But look at it however you wish, the definition of the word has been argued to no end for millenia.

On the last part there about holding opinions, I think you completely misunderstood squirrelman42.

 

[squirrelman42]

wow, I can't believe that this thread is still alive. And I don't remember who said it, but no this isn't just something for me to try to get a shot at fame, I wanted to start a discussion, and it happened.

On the last part there about holding opinions, I think you completely misunderstood squirrelman42.

Yeah, I said that having an open mind is a good thing.

Also, my original reasons for writing this have been addressed by Yahtzee himself in the thread that someone posted a few posts back, and I am satisfied by his answer so I consider the original issue at hand closed. However, feel free to continue telling me how dumb I am and how my opinions are poorly formed.

 

[squirrelman42]

*snip*

People who make big deals out of this topic (and it has been done way worse in comparison to this) would demand for Yahtzee to include multiplayer, and criticize the living hell out of him. However, the OP basically offered it in a manner of suggestion rather than the big deal you assume he is saying it in. He plays the role of Devil's Advocate quite a bit, praises Yahtzee, and basically says that he should do it, while Ive seen many others basically say that Yahtzee's reviews are pure shit due to the fact that it doesnt cover anything.

Personally, I disagree with the OP for the sole reason that I consider his reviews are pure satire, with the review part of the review being almost completely diluted. But for argument's sake, he hits the right points that a proper review should hit the MP component, shows relevant examples to back up his argument, and basically states that Yahtzee should do this, but his reviews are still great. The fact that he's still willing to watch and enjoy them greatly means that he cant really be making that much of a big deal out of it. But like you said, the term "big deal" is subjective. It only makes sense to me that if he were making a big deal out of it, he would stop watching altogether, due to the videos being so far from what he would like.

I think that you get my argument better than anyone else here, and while i do not agree with what you say (Yahtzee is pure satire) I will defend to the death your right to say it

 

[SomeUnregPunk]

Metacritic @ www.metacritic.com

I don't care about the average score for the games, movies, etc. they provide of a product.
I like to read the reviews of a product before I buy. It's a hell of lot easier to use metacritic as a source than to use one man's opinion on a product. Many thoughts is always better than one thought.

If you have time to wait for and watch a five minute video, then you must have time to use metacritic to click on the game you want to buy and read a few of the reviews that pop up. If your afraid of the sell outs then don't read the perfect score reviews or the perfect failure reviews.

Trying to get one critic to change his viewpoint when you have easy access to so many others is pretty pointless. He's not gonna to change his ways while he is working for this place.

 

[VonBrewskie]

Fair post. I hate to say it yo, but for 99 percent of the population, gaming is not a craft. Making games is a craft. Playing games, for the majority, is not. I provide for some exclusions in my argument; pro FPSers and some folks I've seen do amazing stuff to make real money in WoW come to mind as examples of gaming as a craft. But that's like 1 percent of gamers. Some people are friggin GOOD at games. But not sponsorship good.

 

[The Undoer]

At the orrigional post, as I can't really be bothered to troll through 3 pages of replies, sorry but I can't. I agree with Yahtzee not doing multiplayer, though I do wish he had looked at the multiplayer on CoD Mw2, as well, they fucked it up on the PC, and I'd like to have seen his reaction but OH WELL. He's right: There's no need to do it as Multiplayer is an addition to the game like the poster above me said, it's there to increase the time you spend playing it. But focus should be on Single Player, like every Half Life game (L4d and TF2 are not included as they are not Half Life games), and for the two I just mentioned in brackets, well Valve got the wrong end of the stick, I don't buy a game to be sworn at and told I'm an idiot by retards. So, sorry Orrigioonal Poster, I dissagree, Yahtzee should perhaps take a look and play a game of Multiplayer to be able to say something about the features, but it's been almost a month since CoD MW2, and I'm still not 70, let alone prestige 10, want month long gaps between reviews so he can "complete multiplayer"? I don't.

 

[PeterDawson]

When I opened this thread I was expecting a point, but it appears squirrelman missed it entirely.

Just to toss in some comments of my own, if a game is going to include single-player, make it good. A game deserving of these 10/10 things don't need excuses, as Yahtzee has said. It should be a game where nothing in the game is lacking. So if the point of the game is multiplayer, make it a damn multiplayer game and scrap the single-player. It's a long established tradition of games being multiplayer as an option but in a world with online play and MMOs it seems pointless to strap on offline content if nothing else to toss in a story that a drunken McCarthyist coughed out one night. So yeah, if they include something but its not meant to be the focus of reviews and such then don't even bother.

Plus, as stated, reviewers are giving opinions that are their own.

 

[Uszi]

I don't think you really watched his SSBB review. He got together 3 of his friends and they hated it. Except for the catharsis factor.

SSBB was the game most made specifically towards people who were already smash players, IMO. Compare the level of complexity to the other two games. I think all of the original criticisms are valid -- but at the same time, I know that if you are instead playing with someone who knows what they're doing, and you actually get good at it, the game is a lot of fun.

...

Not to derail the thread.

I agree with the OP to a certain extent. Many games are multiplayer only. MW2 has a message that comes up if you try to dive straight into multiplayer: "We strongly recommend you play through the single campaign first." I laughed. I haven't touched any of the COD campaigns and I don't plan to.

On the other had, it's Yahtzee's segment, and he gets to decide how he goes about it. Demanding that Yahtzee review multiplayer is like demanding the Movie Bob review the concession stand in the movie theatre, or the sound systems in the theatre, or made for TV movies.

 

[Misaek]

I think that's right how multiplayer shouldn't be a selling point like he said it should be a cool little thing attacked like,"HALF LIFE A COMPELLING STORY ABOUT A SCIENTIST WHO etc. etc. AND NEW ONLINE BRAWL PLAY WITH F-F-FRIENDS IN A BATTLE TO THE DEATH" not "COD:MW2 ONLINE MULTIPLAYER PALLOOZA (oh yeah there's also a story mode somewhere hidden in there). Not to mention people on multiplayer are either kids or asses.

 

[Helimocopter]

just sort of a blanket response to the whole "multiplayer doesn't make the game!" crowd
(really tried to make the above not sound douchey, but couldn't think of a better way to get the point across.)

it does make the game if the game is made for multiplayer which mw2 almost certainly is.