Extra! Extra! Review System Fails Again!

[Crunchy English]

Ok, it is a little petty to use a whole thread to air grievances against the game review system. We all know its an imperfect system. But it very nearly cost me recently.

The game: the 360 version of BloodBowl, an "under-the-radar" budget title about the classic tabletop strategy game.

The Review Score - 60% average.

The reasoning? - It's "too hard" and "doesn't look good".

I say this with all respect to my colleagues in Games Journalism. Uh, No. Don't be stupid. IGN, for instance claimed the game was confusing and took them three or four hours just to get the basics down and start winning games. Which only makes sense if IGN is using a chimp who taught itself to type random words into a text-box. A 5 minute flip through the manual, or one completed game and everything is apparent. I had a half-dozen guys over learning the game last night. It took exactly one game for everyone to start having fun.

The graphics? Yeah the graphics suck, but who gives a damn, this is a strategy game, as long as you can tell what's going on it can literally just be inanimate pieces on the board, and Bloodbowl does much better than that.

The reason for the rant is twofold. One, if you're a fan of in-depth strategy and you've dissuaded by the poor scores, jump in. I can't wait to see you on Live.

Secondly, reviewer's slamming games for having a tough learning curve? That is bad, bad news. Games are already too easy, too short, and offer a lot less satisfaction than they used to. If reviewers are knocking off points for games being too difficult, that's only going to get worse.

 

[Littaly]

Blood Bowl eh? I've heard about it (both video and tabletop game) but never really considered buying it. Is it worth my money?

 

[The_Deleted]

Irony!!!

 

[oppp7]

I hate reviews too. As much as everyone says Yahtzee isn't a real reviewer, I've found his reviews to be more accurate than others.

 

[Lukeje]

Blood Bowl eh? I've heard about it (both video and tabletop game) but never really considered buying it. Is it worth my money?

I wouldn't bother, I mean it only has a 60% review score.[/sarcasm]

 

[Crunchy English]

Yeah. It really is. I mean, the challenge is there, for sure, but the gameplay really delivers. It looks pretty last-gen, admittedly, but then again its a budget title. I only paid 50$ brand new, and I'm in Canada, where triple A titles are 70 or 80 dollars on average.

 

[Sonicron]

The game isn't bad, but if you're going to buy it, buy the PC version. The graphics are better and the atmosphere is improved with a few little extras (like, for example when you tackle an opposing player out of the field a mob of angry fans will appear and beat the pulp out of the guy as opposed to him just vanishing).
Oh, and make sure to shut those ingame commentators up, they're horribly annoying.

 

[GloatingSwine]

Blood Bowl eh? I've heard about it (both video and tabletop game) but never really considered buying it. Is it worth my money?

The videogame is only really worth your money if you really like the tabletop game or you have a group of friends who are willing to play it with you. It's a faithful reconstruction of the tabletop version, except the computer is really bloody good at it.

 

[SnootyEnglishman]

YOu sir have given me another reason not to trust most reviewers of popular games.

 

[Crunchy English]

The game isn't bad, but if you're going to buy it, buy the PC version. The graphics are better and the atmosphere is improved with a few little extras (like, for example when you tackle an opposing player out of the field a mob of angry fans will appear and beat the pulp out of the guy as opposed to him just vanishing).
Oh, and make sure to shut those ingame commentators up, they're horribly annoying.

I'm inclined to agree with this. The presentation was better on the PC, plus it has online leagues, which are a big plus. If you don't have a mid-range PC though, the 360 version is still good. Only the most picky of Graphix-Wh0r3s (hmm, is the "leet" too much?) could be bothered with the visuals in that version.

 

[reg42]

I thought the low scores were due to a lack of content and a spot of repetativeness, rather than graphics or whatever.

 

[DeadlyYellow]

What's with all this harshing on reviews lately? Is it the trend of the month?

 

[Sonicron]

The game isn't bad, but if you're going to buy it, buy the PC version. The graphics are better and the atmosphere is improved with a few little extras (like, for example when you tackle an opposing player out of the field a mob of angry fans will appear and beat the pulp out of the guy as opposed to him just vanishing).
Oh, and make sure to shut those ingame commentators up, they're horribly annoying.

I'm inclined to agree with this. The presentation was better on the PC, plus it has online leagues, which are a big plus. If you don't have a mid-range PC though, the 360 version is still good. Only the most picky of Graphix-Wh0r3s (hmm, is the "leet" too much?) could be bothered with the visuals in that version.

There's nothing wrong with the graphics in the X360 version, and indeed I played that one first and had a lot of fun with it; but I saw a pal playing the PC version a few days later, and you can't deny that the graphics simply look better on a decent PC... and if I have such a device at my disposal why go for the inferior-looking version? That just wouldn't make sense.

 

[Crunchy English]

snip

There's nothing wrong with the graphics in the X360 version, and indeed I played that one first and had a lot of fun with it; but I saw a pal playing the PC version a few days later, and you can't deny that the graphics simply look better on a decent PC... and if I have such a device at my disposal why go for the inferior-looking version? That just wouldn't make
sense.

Oh I'm sorry, I didn't mean to imply that YOU were teh Graphix--, ahem, that YOU were being too picky. I just meant that the PC stuff were cool extras, if you had the machine to run it, not a necessity.

 

[olee12343]

Secondly, reviewer's slamming games for having a tough learning curve? That is bad, bad news. Games are already too easy, too short, and offer a lot less satisfaction than they used to. If reviewers are knocking off points for games being too difficult, that's only going to get worse.

Well, I mean, Demon's Souls for the PS3 has a metacritic score of above 85 I believe, and it's apparantly the hardest game ever. I wouldn't say Blood Bowl got a bad score just for being hard or bad graphics, seeing as how there are millions of others things potentially wrong with it.

And why do you take reviews so seriously? Reviews are OPINIONS, not God's word on what's good or bad.

 

[Babrook]

Just because you don't agree with a review does not mean doesn't mean that the review has 'failed'. Typically, the job of a reviewer is to look at the game through the eyes of the average consumer, which would likely find BloodBowl to be difficult and confusing because they don't understand the ins and outs from the tabletop game. The average consumer doesn't like overwhelming difficulty. The average consumer cares about graphics. You're part of a niche market, reviews aren't aimed towards you.

And 60%? That makes the game better than acceptable. I don't see what the fuss is about with the score.

 

[GloatingSwine]

Secondly, reviewer's slamming games for having a tough learning curve? That is bad, bad news. Games are already too easy, too short, and offer a lot less satisfaction than they used to. If reviewers are knocking off points for games being too difficult, that's only going to get worse.

Learning Curve /= difficulty.

When you know what you're doing, Hearts of Iron 2 is not "difficult", but it's a total ***** to learn how to make the game do anything.

Blood Bowl does suffer from problems with it's learning curve, true to the spirit of the game, it will give you a few pointers on the rules and then stomp repeatedly on your face when you actually try and play it for real.

It doesn't make much effort to draw new players in by actually teaching them what to do to win, let alone specific tactics for using different races, which is not "difficulty", it's just bad design that is bound to put off new players.

 

[Crunchy English]

Secondly, reviewer's slamming games for having a tough learning curve? That is bad, bad news. Games are already too easy, too short, and offer a lot less satisfaction than they used to. If reviewers are knocking off points for games being too difficult, that's only going to get worse.

Learning Curve /= difficulty.

When you know what you're doing, Hearts of Iron 2 is not "difficult", but it's a total ***** to learn how to make the game do anything.

Blood Bowl does suffer from problems with it's learning curve, true to the spirit of the game, it will give you a few pointers on the rules and then stomp repeatedly on your face when you actually try and play it for real.

It doesn't make much effort to draw new players in by actually teaching them what to do to win, let alone specific tactics for using different races, which is not "difficulty", it's just bad design that is bound to put off new players.

Meh, a matter of preference I suppose. I can't say I care for games that simply give up all their secrets in the tutorial. I prefer having a lot to learn and master. After all, what reason is there to experiment if the game designer's have laid out optimal strategies for each race right from the get go?

On the point of "reviewing" for the mainstream. I hope not, you should review games for their target audience. If the game is aimed a niche market, find someone from the appropriate market to review it for you.

Also, on the point of taking reviews too seriously. I guess you're right, its really not important what a bunch of reviewers think as long as I like. Or that would be the case, if not for the fact that poor reviews do actually impact sales, and less sales, means a smaller base of opponents on Live. I've been down this road with Culdcept Saga.

 

[messy]

Secondly, reviewer's slamming games for having a tough learning curve? That is bad, bad news. Games are already too easy, too short, and offer a lot less satisfaction than they used to. If reviewers are knocking off points for games being too difficult, that's only going to get worse.

A hard or decent game can still have a fairly gradual learning curve. Most find fault if it starts off really difficult; after the basics have been learnt feel free to ramp it up to essentially vertical but to it straight away alienates newer players and frustrates some earlier ones.

For examples on how not to do a learning curve; Demon souls (good game though)

I think a good learning curve is on DMC where the easier difficulties more or less function as the learning curve and the player can go onto the ball bustingly difficulty when they feel they can handle them. Because at the end of the day a game which is really difficult just isn't fun and serves to further scare people away from the idea of playing video games.

 

[GloatingSwine]

Meh, a matter of preference I suppose. I can't say I care for games that simply give up all their secrets in the tutorial. I prefer having a lot to learn and master. After all, what reason is there to experiment if the game designer's have laid out optimal strategies for each race right from the get go?

The trouble is that if you're not using a relatively optimal strategy you get fuckstomped, and the game gives you no indication of how you can prevent this from occurring.

It doesn't endear a game to people if they can't win and they don't ever figure out why they aren't winning, and unless you're already familiar with Blood Bowl, you are not going to get that from the computer version.