I think a big issue is one you brought up. Giving games to reviewers who aren't familiar with the genre or have no respect for the game they're given. Case in point, giving someone from Kotaku a Modern Warefare game.Savagezion said:
Worst review ever?
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I've yet to find a reasonably priced copy here in Iceland. So I sometimes think I should have rather gotten Nier than Demon's Soul from you.Julianking93 said:
OT: I don't really follow reviews or reviewers. I like to get community instead of, ahem, "professional" opinions.
You do know that reviews are actually just opinions, right? Very little about video-games, movies, art or whatever is objective and even then the subjective parts can easily overshadow everything else.Dansen said:
This is not a competition, reviewers are not judges and metacritic is not a contest to see what is the "best" movie or video-game. Reviews are there as tools to aid you in your decision-making, they are meant to be contrasted with other reviews in order to get a clearer picture of how fun/enjoyable it is.
Sure, there will always be a difference in how well the reviewer articulates his/hers opinion, but that doesn't make them any less "right". A reviewer or critic might claim that Transformers 3 is the best movie he has ever seen and guess what? HE WOULD ALWAYS BE RIGHT.
That's right, he can never be wrong.
Unless he was lying, he would always be right because he is describing what he felt and experienced. And the same goes for anyone who said that they hated something and found it to be the worst X they've ever played/watched/listened to.
Reviewers have no obligation to pander to everyone's specific taste and doing so would only be a waste of times, they don't need to tell your mind for you. You already know whether or not you like cartoony-visuals or whatever, if the reviewer doesn't share your tastes, THEN READ ANOTHER REVIEW. Reviewers have no power over whether or not the reader will take their opinion as hard fact or whether or not they will dismiss it. Don't expect them to shepherd the consumer, choosing what their opinion of this and that game is gonna be and whether or not you're going to buy it. That's their own responsibility, asking them to make up the minds of the readers is pointless.
As I said before, reviews are tools. Its your own goddamn fault if you don't know how to use them.
Psychonauts. Tommy Tallarico gave it a bad score because it was annoying(read, he didn't work on it so it sucked) then he had the balls to blame the game for when Advent Rising flopped(a game he worked on).Ando85 said:
Play Magazine was pretty good. Just learned they ceased publication. EGM was good up until it was revived. Seriously they gave DQ6 a 6/10 because it didn't have the monster catching theme like how 5 did it.
And for those who are attacking people for attacking reviewers, you gotta remember that in the early 2000's nearly every game was being compared to whatever was popular at the time. Released a RTS set in 25th century Mexico? 5/10 cause its not Halo. Released a life simulator about shark people? 56/100 cause its not Final Fantasy.
Well... there is no such thing as an "objective review" because when someone is giving a review of something they are in fact stating their opinion on it, and opinions are always subjective.
I've encountered poorly done reviews.
Some old, and long since dead, video game show did a review of Metal Arms.
The whole review was nothing but praise. Not a single word was negative. What was the score at the end? A 6/10...
Way to not cover the issues the game had that were present enough to reduce the score by 4 points there guys. There's nothing worse then when a game's score conflicts with what the article/video says about it.
I've encountered poorly done reviews.
Some old, and long since dead, video game show did a review of Metal Arms.
The whole review was nothing but praise. Not a single word was negative. What was the score at the end? A 6/10...
Way to not cover the issues the game had that were present enough to reduce the score by 4 points there guys. There's nothing worse then when a game's score conflicts with what the article/video says about it.
Thank you, i hadn't seen this review. I love that game it was really good, he seems to miss the point that dirty ammo is meant to be less powerful on purpose. That you don't run and gun as it is the type of game you don't do that. So Yes i agree this review i feel really missed the point.NewYork_Comedian said:
IGN. Sonic Unleashed.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BjyWXiZrSlQ
Listen to him talk about how every decision was a bad one then contradict himself by praising a decision a few seconds later. Watch him say that the jump button is "fatally unresponsive," then slow down while running to jump over a ramp placed directly in your path to his death. Says the frame rate is bad while the footage runs perfectly fine (in fact, the frame rate never slows down at any point during the review.) He writes off all of the werehog platforming sections as terrible with no explanation as to why. Criticizes the werehog for having stretchy arms because "everybody knows werewolves have stretchy arms." Yeah, and everybody knows that foxes can fly and plumbers can grow to twice their height if they eat a mushroom. And then he tops it off by reusing the same footage of slowing down and jumping over the ramp to his death.
Well played IGN, well played.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BjyWXiZrSlQ
Listen to him talk about how every decision was a bad one then contradict himself by praising a decision a few seconds later. Watch him say that the jump button is "fatally unresponsive," then slow down while running to jump over a ramp placed directly in your path to his death. Says the frame rate is bad while the footage runs perfectly fine (in fact, the frame rate never slows down at any point during the review.) He writes off all of the werehog platforming sections as terrible with no explanation as to why. Criticizes the werehog for having stretchy arms because "everybody knows werewolves have stretchy arms." Yeah, and everybody knows that foxes can fly and plumbers can grow to twice their height if they eat a mushroom. And then he tops it off by reusing the same footage of slowing down and jumping over the ramp to his death.
Well played IGN, well played.
No disagreement here, but how do you evaluate them? Graphics wise, what looks good to one person might not look good to another. Bugs wise, it is entirely possible not everyone will encounter the same bugs, or any bugs at all. How is someone supposed to look at it from an objective standpoint then?Julianking93 said:
How is someone who does not find any enjoyment in a game supposed to recognize that it is "constructed in a technically well thought out manner"? I don't understand that. An explanation would be welcome.
People will always have biases. There is no way to escape that fact. There is no way to not have biases. Even if I go into a game, free of all expectations of what a game should be, I still have biases relating to storytelling, characters, themes, hell, even colors. To say to someone "look at it without bias" is impossible.
Really? Going for the ad hominem there, eh? To rebute that statement and not dismiss it out of hand: I replied to everyone who quoted me (only 2 so far, including you) on that original post. If there was nothing more to say, I did not say it. I did not read the rest of the thread. If you want to point out where people quoted me and I missed it, or people who brought up good points, feel free.
No it didn't. Space Marine came out last year. Gears of War came out in 2007. If you'd said that it can't be like Gears of War because the 40k universe was around first, then sure. Or if you'd said that it can't be like Gears of War because one's a cover based shooter, whereas the other is a hack n' slash with guns, I'd also agree. But saying that Space Marine came out first is provably wrong.DJ_DEnM said:
My reviews would fit the Terrible Review niche. They're all pretty inaccurate and biased, seriously: http://spoilerwarned.wordpress.com
OT: I'll have to agree with the already mentioned Metro 2033 reviews, both on the escapist and everywhere else in the internet.
OT: I'll have to agree with the already mentioned Metro 2033 reviews, both on the escapist and everywhere else in the internet.
Incidentally, anyone whining about reviews being subjective is missing the point of a review. Your best bet is to find five or so reviewers whose tastes tend to line up with your own and just pay more attention to their opinion. Or do the opposite even. Find five reviewers whose tastes don't line up with yours in the slightest and do the opposite to what they say. Or even try both methods.
The thing I like about Adam Sessler is that he does do followups to expand on his points. Really, his soapboxes are one of the few things I still like on G4.darkcalling said:
http://www.g4tv.com/videos/57249/sesslers-soapbox-high-hopes-and-heartbreaks/
He addresses here why Amalur was a disappointment for him.
Simple solution, don't buy the gamechadachada123 said:
I thought that IGN reviewed MW3 fairly, my feelings on the subject are summed up in the opening statement, "People love to hate it, but the Call of Duty franchise is successful for a reason". Yes it is, because it's actually quite good
Your theory is sound to a point, but by the same logic, incredible games like Super Mario Galaxy 2, Zelda: Twilight Princess, Mass Effect 2+3 (I could go on) would receive no more than 5/10, simply because they're similar to their predecessors and cost just as much as they did when they were released. If you saw a 5/10 score, would you buy the game? I wouldn't, then I would miss out on the funnest games ever made. Reviewers don't include price when equating the score because it throws it completely off.
As for the OP, The reviewing site "Destructoid", gave Assassin's Creed II a 4.5/10. Even if you were focusing entirely on the flaws of ACII and taking none of its good features into account, it would deserve no less than 7/10, because there's hardly any flaws in it at all.
And that's why sites like Destructoid are going under, no one wants to read reviews that aren't even close to being fair assessments
Saying a review that doesn't agree with your personal opinion is one thing. It is another thing entirely when the review in question ignores fundamental flaws, or focuses on certain aspects to the neglect of others.
For example, a person who says "I dislike this game due to the clunky combat design and bland character models" has more clout than a person who says "I don't like this game because the trees are blue".
For example, a person who says "I dislike this game due to the clunky combat design and bland character models" has more clout than a person who says "I don't like this game because the trees are blue".
Aside from this being an opinion (just to note, I also liked AC2), there's no way Destructoid is going under. Podtoid is getting record numbers of listeners, the Dtoid Show on Youtube is very successful, and the site itself receives a healthy number of hits. As for myself, it's one of only three video game sites I bother visiting any more along with here and Giant Bomb.Dutchy115 said:
How could anyone dislike the music in a game that features that masterpiece, you can put that song in front of anything to make it the most epic thing ever, I'm not a fan of complex fighting games (anything with combos is complex to me) but in the Phoenix Wright games I don't think I ever got as pumped in another game as I did when I had the perp on the run to this tuneThe Wykydtron said: