Poll: Is Yahtzee serious?

[Casual Shinji]

Jokes are only funny if there's an aspect of truth in them.

And since his reviews usually have me in stitches, I can only conclude that his opinion is sincere.

 

[Xirema]

He's not a reviewer, he's a critic. A reviewer will take a balanced look at a game and deliver an unbiased report. A critic will examine a game and pick up on all its flaws, glossing over the good and emphasizing the bad.

No difference. A Critic and a Reviewer are the same.

And the idea that someone could give an unbiased report on anything Art is laughable.

 

[Zay-el]

Not necessarily. He strives to make a good joke of just about anything, but there's always a difference between what he portrays in Zero Punctuation and in actual life. I wouldn't even be a 100% sure Extra Punctuation is always fully in line with his views, you can never know with him. Take everything he says with a grain of salt and you'll be fine.

 

[Erttheking]

Not necessarily. He strives to make a good joke of just about anything, but there's always a difference between what he portrays in Zero Punctuation and in actual life. I wouldn't even be a 100% sure Extra Punctuation is always fully in line with his views, you can never know with him. Take everything he says with a grain of salt and you'll be fine.

More like a couple of pounds of salt, but I see your point. Fair enough.

 

[Moooo4me]

I think he is. He usually has extremely valid and relevant points to any topic in his videos, and makes (in my opinion) quite brilliant comments stemming from unique views on games. I hold his opinions in high regard, even when I don't agree with him.

 

[Xirema]

If he is in character I can't help but notice that he practically never breaks it on this website and quite a few people has begun to despise him. On the other hand if he isn't in character it's rather jarring that he honestly hates so many of the games out there and truly beleives them to be bland and unoriginal.

False Dichotomy.

I'm not really surprised that people forget this, or that they weren't aware of it to begin with, but Yahtzee uses "praise by omission" as his standard for critical review. He pointed out once that he considered it a response to the (not in his words) 4 point system that tends to permeate review sites, although whether that's informing his ideology now is debatable.

Here's the thing. I really like the games Borderlands and SSBB. Neither of which he reviewed favorably. So does that mean one of us is wrong? No. If more people hold that the games were good, does that mean his bias against the game makes him unreliable? No. I liked both those games, but there wasn't a point he brought up in his reviews that I could dispute. It's just that the overall impression we got was different because we have different tastes.

And that's what needs to be taken away from this.

 

[Erttheking]

If he is in character I can't help but notice that he practically never breaks it on this website and quite a few people has begun to despise him. On the other hand if he isn't in character it's rather jarring that he honestly hates so many of the games out there and truly beleives them to be bland and unoriginal.

False Dichotomy.

I'm not really surprised that people forget this, or that they weren't aware of it to begin with, but Yahtzee uses "praise by omission" as his standard for critical review. He pointed out once that he considered it a response to the (not in his words) 4 point system that tends to permeate review sites, although whether that's informing his ideology now is debatable.

Here's the thing. I really like the games Borderlands and SSBB. Neither of which he reviewed favorably. So does that mean one of us is wrong? No. If more people hold that the games were good, does that mean his bias against the game makes him unreliable? No. I liked both those games, but there wasn't a point he brought up in his reviews that I could dispute. It's just that the overall impression we got was different because we have different tastes.

And that's what needs to be taken away from this.

I think I recall the "Praise by omission" thing, but it's rather easy to forget when he's constantly churning out new reasons for why a game is awful.

 

[dantoddd]

It's sad that some people have lost actual logic behind all of yahtzee's jokes. For example look at how he exposed the complete lack of character development in gears of war 3. If you listen to him carefully there is a lot you can learn about games.

 

[Von Strimmer]

He's not a reviewer, he's a critic. A reviewer will take a balanced look at a game and deliver an unbiased report. A critic will examine a game and pick up on all its flaws, glossing over the good and emphasizing the bad.

Yahtzee exaggerates for comic effect, but he's pretty on the ball when it comes to finding a game's weak spots.

Once upon a time I would have agreed with that but lately. I dont believe that for a second. You only need to look at his treatment of games like Witcher 2 or Gears of WH40K to realise he isn't even making an effort anymore.

 

[Zay-el]

More like a couple of pounds of salt, but I see your point. Fair enough.

The amount of salt is merely the question of personal taste. XD

Every game he has reviewed, wasn't very enjoyable for me. Except of those who praises and Battlefield. Coincidence? no. This is why I trust his reviews and I sometimes quote him.

You're really picky then, apparently. I enjoyed a fair number of games he didn't like too much, or even outright hated. I don't think there's any reason to trust Yahtzee more than any other random videogame reviewer, because they'll all stick to their subjective view of the game and unless you're a clone of them, chances are your tastes don't match.

 

[count9]

He's serious, he exaggerates all his points to ridiculous degrees for comedy, but an exaggerated truth is still the truth.

 

[Sexy Devil]

This is something I have been thinking about for some time now, Yahtzee has stated to hate a lot of games and when I try to remember it all I recall him hating, third person shooters, first person shooters, real time strategies, RPGs JRPGs and just about everything the Wii churned out, and that's just off of the top of my head. I've seen a couple of people say that he's in character during his reveiws while others say they're his honest opinion and frankly I'm a little lost here. If he is in character I can't help but notice that he practically never breaks it on this website and quite a few people has begun to despise him. On the other hand if he isn't in character it's rather jarring that he honestly hates so many of the games out there and truly beleives them to be bland and unoriginal.

I get the feeling there is no right or wrong anwser to this so what do you think?

First and foremost it's his job to take this piss out of games. For the sake of humour he is going to exacerbate issues he has with a game, but if he can't find much to criticise then in all likelihood he's going to be pulling stuff out of his ass (see: Resistance 3). You can usually tell whether he's serious or not, but I wouldn't treat his work as doctrine like some idiots do.

 

[rc0ll]

I think Yahtzee likes a lot more games then he lets on about, sometimes he will outright say he enjoyed a game, but I find Yahtzee good in that he'll expose plot holes and weird elements that don't get picked up by traditional reviewers. IGN, Gamespot and all the others only really pull a game up for technical problems, whereas Yahtzee explores more amateurish syntactical errors in the storyline.

 

[Joccaren]

He is rarely 'serious' but he does mean what he says. If he points out problems with games, he has probably felt them, though I believe he stated that he sometimes just took the most common complaints about a game and added them in too.
He presentation style is in no way serious, but the points he raises are meant to be considered, as they are legitimate points.

It really depends on what you mean by serious.

 

[Phishfood]

In the core of what he is saying, he is serious. However he clearly a. exagerates and b. ignores the good parts as much as possible. In one of his videos he starts out listing good points for a game and then says "but we don't want that, you all love it when I poke holes in a game so here goes" or something along those lines.

 

[Grouchy Imp_v1legacy]

He's not a reviewer, he's a critic. A reviewer will take a balanced look at a game and deliver an unbiased report. A critic will examine a game and pick up on all its flaws, glossing over the good and emphasizing the bad.

No difference. A Critic and a Reviewer are the same.

And the idea that someone could give an unbiased report on anything Art is laughable.

And you're automatically assuming that games are art. Not only art, but Art. Don't confuse 'a medium through which artistic merit can be portrayed' with 'a medium through which artistic merit is always portrayed'. Doom is not art. Descent is not art. Rise of the Triads is not art. Whatever happened to the days when games could get by just by being damn good fun?

Once upon a time I would have agreed with that but lately. I dont believe that for a second. You only need to look at his treatment of games like Witcher 2 or Gears of WH40K to realise he isn't even making an effort anymore.

He's gone and gotten a following now. Certain things are expected, he has a perceived image to maintain, etc. Basically he made waves in the industry a few years back and people are still expecting, maybe even demanding, that he carry on making the same waves again and again.

 

[EmzOLV]

I reckon he's being serious (and as most of these have been mentioned before, I'll just add to them)

1) I'd agree with people saying he's a critic and not a reviewer
2) Definitely allowed to be snarky as he's British and we're all like that (well... I am)
3) Comedy is such a fantastic way to get the truth across, definitely agree with this
4) It's a technique which WORKS. This way of producing videos, with that tone and those cartoons and the way he talks about games brings people to view it. I don't see the video views decreasing as a general standard?
5) In a world where there are so many magazines and TV shows and video clips and exclusive interviews all telling me how AWESOME a game is, I truly appreciate having someone just list all the negatives.
6) I still buy whatever games I want regardless of whether he hated them or not

I would be interested to see a really enthusiastic happy "oh my god the most amazing game ever" review, but then I think it would only be interesting if it was done in the way that at the end he woke up from this mystical dream and it all turned out terrible

 

[Shadu]

I think he's prone to overexaggeration in his reviews, but that he does truly believe what he's saying. And there's probably stuff he does like, but he can't make a review over everything. And besides, he does conceed that he likes somethings some times, even as he's tearing it apart. He is a critic, after all.

 

[Henkie36]

There is a small core of honesty in his reviews, but most of it is just meant to be funny.