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Editorial Entertainment Games

Is There Something Wrong with Video Game Reviews? 98

Posted by Zonk from the they're-time-consuming dept.
unclethursday writes "GamesAreFun.com has a new editorial about what the Editor in Chief feels is wrong with video game reviews, GamesAreFun's included. The editorial touches on the importance of scores to people, the importance of getting the first review out there, the problem with trying to review online parts of a game before the game is released into the wild, reviewing games in a series, the expectations from reviews about overly hyped games, and review length."
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Is There Something Wrong with Video Game Reviews? More

Is There Something Wrong with Video Game Reviews?

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  • What about ad revenue? (Score:4, Insightful)

    by dasunt ( 249686 ) on Thursday December 02, 2004 @01:38PM (#10975901)

    There is also the problem of reviewers depending on the money of the companies they review for income...

    That is a biggie, IMHO.

    • I think the only reason you can get semi-reliable movie reviews from a newspaper is because the newspaper has many different types sponsors, and printed newspapers are not yet totally owned by the big media companies.

      IGN? May as well ask Microsoft what it thinks about Windows.
    • I completely agree. There is a LOT wrong with video game reviews, and it seems to revolve completely around money.

      The worst offender lately, as far as I'm concerned, would have to be Game Informer, though I read that magazine all the time. Only the WORST games they give a poor review, and most of the time those games are by publishers and developers that don't have much credibility (read:cashflow) anyway. The loopholes in their review system, as well as many other review sites/magazines, show if you actu

      • Game Informer (Score:3, Interesting)

        by xgamer04 ( 248962 )
        Have you actually looked at the explanation of GI's review section? They specifically state that 7 is their "average" score, on a scale from 1 to 10. Whether or not this is sensible is debatable, but the fact that that is the way they do it doesn't change.
      • So, sadly, you really can't trust any reviewer these days, and this will probably only get worse as the industry continues to grow.

        Yes, but it's not as grim a picture as you paint. If anything it will increase the popularity of forums and blogs as the de-facto source of 'from the horses mouth' information and reviews. This is definitely a change for the better imo. The death of promotional advertising is long overdue.

        Just look at newegg.com, or shopper.com. You can easily sort products or stores by cu

      • Case in point, Half-Life 2. It's my understanding that in order to get reviews of the game out in a timely manner, the reviewers had to play the game in the Valve offices.

        So ignore those reviews and read the ones written by people who tested the game after it was released. I don't understand the obsession with having to have all reviews completed before the game is even released. Just have some patience and wait for decent reviews by people whose heads aren't up $game_company's posterior.

    • I tend to agree. The best method would be to only accept advertising from related, but different fields. For example, if I am primarily a gaming review site, then I might take ads from Nvidia, ATI, or any of the other manufacturers out there that make gaming hardware, but not from anyone that makes gaming software. This ensures that my ads would be well received by my readers, but not compromise my journalistic integrity.
  • home computers were lucky to be 8 bit, and spectrum owners where fighting Commodore owner, it was exactly the same with reviews in magazines.

    Being the first to show grainy black and white pictures of the next great classic was big (for it's time) business for computer games magazines.

    You can replace spectrum with Mac, and Commodore with PCs, and magazines with websites and realise that nothing changes.

    CJC

  • The photos (Score:2, Funny)

    by Anonymous Coward
    The biggest problem with these reviews is that the screen snapshots they choose are just too boring. They'll snap a picture of the female heroine blasting some tank or ghoul away instead of bending over or reaching way up over her head to grab something hanging from the ceiling. So then I have to be stuck with trying to imagine what it will look like if I buy the game, manage to put the character in that pose, and pause the action. Maybe there is horrible pixelation that will completely ruin what I'm try
  • Anyone remember when the EBGames magazine reviewed Ninja Gaiden months before it came out? When the game REALLY was released, they had an apology and a new review of the game in it's finished state, which mostly consisted of a comparison between the finished game and the build they produced their original review from. WTF?
  • Super Play is a swedish reviewing magazine and when the makers of GTA: Vice City to be on the cover for them to let them have a preview copy so they could review it they refused. I did however see it on the cover on other magazines...
  • Most game reviews are utterly useless to me. Why? Lack of multi-player "support".

    There is not a proper focus on multiplayer gaming in ANY of the review sites. I *only* play multiplayer games (with a few exceptions).

    There are some issues that simply are not touched. In Burnout2, my wife & I could race against each other using 2 forcefeedback steering wheels. In Burnout3, the same 2 wheels don't work -- only 1 is recognized.

    But no reviewer out there even mentions using two wheels at once. Th

    • You're within an EXTREME minority, on a fringe. Almost no games *period* support what you want to do, which is two local player online from one game. Reviewers play the games as an AVERAGE player would-- as they would themselves.

      If you want reviews that meet your odd requirements, you're pretty much going to have to go out and develop them yourself-- you're just not within the norms for reviews.
      • Actually on Xbox live, you can have "Guests" sign on too.

        Halo 2 can support you and three friends on one tv, all playing on Live.
        Pretty sure Crimson Skies does too, as well as a few other titles.
      • I think "married couples who game" is not the extreme fringe that you think it is. There are more married people with income to buy a PS2 than unmarried people and the age of the average gamer has been rising for years.

        But you don't hear about us, becuase, well, why would we become part of a scene that doesn't acknowledge us or give us the information we need?

        • Oh boo hoo. Heaven forbid that something might not actually cater to you smug married people. In this case, you are more of a fringe group than you care to admit. There may be a lot of married people who play games, but there aren't that many cases where both people in the marriage are into video games.
          • Ironically, every couple I know who owns a playstation (about 6) all play together. But hey what do we married people know? We only constitute the bulk of the population. :)
            • You're making a real chicken and egg argument. You refuse to join in officially on this subculture, but you deride it for not providing the information you need. I won't argue with you that some of the info that you're looking for would be nice to have, and that multiplayer configs are often glossed over in reviews. But if you just sit around and complain about it, your civil disobedience isn't going to make the product any better for you. Try sending your thoughts to the editiors of the online review house
              • Unfortunately I and most people are governed by the path of least resistance, which means it's easier to click 'reply' than to go on a wild goose chase surfing around for people who i think MIGHT be influential.

                Maybe since I don't know who these people are, one of them is reading slashdot, y'know?

      • Alright, this is kinda-sorta semi-offtopic, but I'm going to ante two modpoints (no karma bonus; this isn't _completely_ related to the topic) on this one just because I'm really curious..

        What did I say that was so offensive? I'm merely pointing out that the VAST majority of gamers (I'm going to guess 95% or more) are NOT looking for those options, and thus they're not going to be catered to by reviewers. As a result, I'm suggesting he might have better luck building a new site TO that angle.
    • Well, I think you are a bit crazy...maybe in a good way, maybe not.

      Every online review that I read mentions online support. I've seen great single player games get points off for no multi-play. Sorry, I dont have an example - check out just about any sp game review on gamespy.

      It sound's like what you want (and just about everyone else I talk to) is co-op. Co-op on the same copy of the game though, that doesn't sound very likely. Usually it's co-op online.

      I think what you need to do is stick to consol
      • Um.... I'm actually TALKING aobut console gaming.

        I realize I mentioned Quake3 as my rant decended into "general dissatisfaction with the world around me", but I actually ONLY play console games at this point (and any point in the last year).

        And ideally it would not be co-op, but deathmatch :)
        (Yes we can chat by looking at the other side of the screen, it's akin to having telepathy.)

        (BTW, I'm crazy in a good way.)

      • I wish more games had co-op play.. I see more and more games that have singleplayer and deathmatch, but no cooperative, or even deathmatch but no bots.

        For cooperative play, I guess it is level design (scripted events, hallways smashing closed behind you, doors closing and locking behind you, etc.). Couldn't they at least put magic cooperative-play teleporters or something in these games?
    • Clearly this poster is trying to karma whore, by impressing moderators with the fact that he has a wife.

      Remember, when moderating, it is the content of the post that matters, not the mythical nature of the poster.
      • Actually if you check my signature you would see I don't really care about karma. Sure I'm impressed when a comment of mine scores 3... but... What does karma DO? Help me slashdot better? Give me free money and sex? Allow me to moderate more? (Like I care?)

    • Uhh (Score:2)

      by sg3000 ( 87992 ) *
      > I WANT TO PLAY WITH MY WIFE *AND* A FEW COMPLETE
      > STRANGERS

      Uh ... you're talking about video games, right? With a computer?

      My wife and I play plenty of games on our Macs and our Playstation 2, but I have to admit, reading your post made me feel a little dirty
  • I think one of the biggest problem with reviews (if we ignore the corruption) is that we all enjoy different types of games. If a reviewer is a big RTS fan, he may not understand what's new and speical about a game like HL2. I think the best thing a person can do if they want to read reviews is to find a reviewer that has a similar taste in games. That way you stand a better chance of enjoying a game based on the review. Personally, I don't read reviews (unless you can count Penny Arcade). I will wait
    • For me, the most informative reviews are not ones that take a generic approach to a review and compare it against other games in the genre but those in which the reviewer personally states his likes and dislikes often and mentions the particulars that made the game special (or not so special) to them.

      I'd say that's one of the biggest reasons that Tycho and Gabe are so respected. I know that Tycho likes computer games of the strategy variety and Gabe prefers action packed consoles, and so when I read thei

    • Thats why multi reviewer ratings are good, have 10 people rate it on gfx/sound/etc, and ignore sequel ratings other than the story.

      The biggest problem I have is how can they call every game a 90+ game? 90+ should be earth shatering with the most advanced in every aspect from gameplay to the graphics.

      He makes good points, people rate games they dont know or novel games way to low. Tetris was a novel game, and look how that has changed gaming. And I'm not into DDR, but there are people who love that game li

    • Re:The most difficult part of reviews (Score:1, Interesting)

      by Anonymous Coward
      I think one of the biggest problem with reviews (if we ignore the corruption) is that we all enjoy different types of games

      While I understand exactly what you're saying, and think it can be a big issue in game reviews, for me the biggest problem is the opposite:

      Certain types of games become entrenched as "canonical" among every reviewer--and gamer--and there is no "bigger picture" analysis of how a game is or isn't innovating in terms of gameplay. That is, every reviewer, whether preferring RTS, FPS, or
  • more hardware information. For example tell me what my video card can reach in frames per second for a said resolution. Yes I know there are too many combinations to know all video cards but I'd like to have an idea.

  • Not that it'll ever work for major sites... (Score:4, Informative)

    by jvmatthe ( 116058 ) on Thursday December 02, 2004 @01:53PM (#10976031) Homepage
    ...but I am more comfortable with the progression I've used on my own site:
    1. First impressions - After an hour or two with the game, putting down just what things are like early on, and useful for comparison when I'm finished with a game.
    2. Updated impressions - After several days with a game, revising anything from the first impressions, and starting to really get into the things that are working and the things that aren't.
    3. Review/Final impressions - If I finish a game, I write a review that summarizes all previous writings and gives a plain English summary of my opinion. No score is assigned, since that seems pointless to me.

      On the other hand, if I decide a game's not worth finishing, I just put up some final impressions and a summary of why the game wasn't worth my time to finish.

    To really see how I feel about a game, you'll generally want to read all the parts, and I've tried to keep them as brief as I can. I try not a give laundry lists of features, but instead focus on the experience of playing, story, and quality of the gameplay (e.g. is it fun driving game, does this particular fps work with a console controller, is that puzzle game addictive, etc.) I will also knock a game for crappy production values, load times, and other annoyances that we shouldn't have to deal with anymore.

    The real down side is that I often won't finish writing about a game until several weeks after it's been released, if not months later. They're not always timely, that's for sure.

    If a real publication did something like this, I'd be impressed and more likely to read it regularly.

    Here's an example with Ace Combat 04: First impressions [curmudgeongamer.com], Updated impressions [curmudgeongamer.com], and Final review [curmudgeongamer.com]. The game is old (it was an early PS2 title), the total process took from 10 March to 6 May 2004.

    • Three MONTHS? Yeah, that won't work for the professionals. They need to have that review ready within days of release, if not well before. If you take three months, you'll haver zero revenue, so the review gets rushed and focuses on first impressions instead of deeper game elements.

      Black & White was an excellent study for this effect. Myself, I was absolutely engrossed with the game; it was exciting, inovative, refreshing, funny... for about three weeks; then it was repetitive and uninteresting. A

  • Same ole, same ole (Score:3, Interesting)

    by (trb001) ( 224998 ) on Thursday December 02, 2004 @01:54PM (#10976052) Homepage
    Is this much different than what happens with any media? Look at news corporations...I will assume that at one time they actually understood their job to be informing the public, being a trusted figure, etc. Now look at Rather; rushing to break a story that wasn't properly vetted in order to be the first, and only, person out there with "the scoop".

    Sports is the same...it used to be to entertain people and compete (what were salaries in the 20's and 30's?), now it's about how young you can get recruited by a team and how many ridiculous numbers of zero's are attached to your paycheck.

    The only reviews that I'll trust come from amateurs...ie, other gamers. Just like most of the sports I enjoy are the amateurs, like college athletes. While they may have agendas, a whole lot of them play just for the fun of it, like me.

    --trb
    • I think the real problem with news organizations is that they are now aligning to think for people and tell them what their opinion should be. You have the Fox right wing channel, the CBS right wing channel, and so on. Sad really, I like to think for myself and make my own opinions.

      Google appears to have pretty bad bias now (pro US, pro right wing), I would like to see another aggregate service that I could see all the news and make up my own mind.
      • My mind reels trying to comprehend how you figure that CBS is a voice for the right wing. Rooney and Rather ring any bells? And Google?! They link to other newspapers, half the time the New York Times or LA Times are the first articles on Google news, and if those papers are bastions of conservative thought, I'm Mickey Mouse.

        I spent election night watching NBC and CNN, and I swear to God I thought Brokaw and Wolf Blitzer were going to cry when it started to look like Bush would win. They weren't even a
        • Yea, i messed up, i was trying to say CBS has a left wing bias. Google very rarely puts up anything with a negative US bias. They use to, it is to bad.

          My point was that it is hard to get all of the information in a form not on someone's lead the masses by the nose agenda, and then make up your own mind.
  • There is nothing mind boggling or new that he's stating here. In fact, most of what he's saying comes across far more as a whiner or an english prof. than an actual analysis of game reviewing.

    I've found multiple instances where it seems he's either contradicting himself or carrying on some strange arguement inside his own head and translating the results onto paper. He also makes some GRAND assumptions that gamers rely off of reviews to buy games even though they already know about the game itself. Pe
    • :: I could CARE LESS what numbering system people use, personally, I can count from 1 to 5 or 1 to 100 and I also know that 5 is a greater number than 1 and 100 is a greater number than 1. This to me, means that a higher score is better, despite minor differences, this is pretty clear, even between such devious numbers as 89 and 98 which seems to perplex him.::

      I believe the point is that a game that gets 4/5 is certainly NOT NECCESSARILY the same opinion as a game that gets 80/100. The fact is that the s
  • We just ran an editoral on that ourselves over at . The writer argues game reviews should be more consumer-centric. [redassedbaboon.com]
    • This pretty much nails it. Any core gamer is going to have his purchase decision made 90% before he even reads a review. A non-core gamer is not going to read the review (because they don't read game magazines) and will just buy on word of mouth or what's at the store.

      Reviews, therefore, are mostly useless.

  • I don't read or care about reviews (Score:3, Interesting)

    by Fr05t ( 69968 ) on Thursday December 02, 2004 @02:16PM (#10976256)
    Warning I did not RTFA.. I might later but honestly I stopped giving a crap about reviews years ago, same with movie reviews.

    Games like movies are a matter of personal choice. God some of the movies and games I have loved the most have been slammed by reviews and won awards for being among the "worse".

    Every reviewer will be biased based on their own preferences, tack on some nostalgia related to the old games they loved then given a rating based on what they like - not what I like. Worse than that is the problem (and I do believe it to be a problem) of reviewers catering to game companies to get favors like early review copies, and various free crap.

    I rent games, read the manuals online and look at screenshots and make my own opinions.

    • Walkthroughs are a great way to review a game before playing it. Granted, they don't come out for a while after a game is released, you can read the "what you have to do to beat level 1" quickly and decide if that's the type of game you want to play.

      "Go get wood, bring wood back, get more wood, bring wood back, get amulet, give amulet to girl, throw girl in lake ..." sounds boring to me. If I read that, I go for a different game.

  • How about severe bugs being overlooked? (Score:3, Interesting)

    by iwadasn ( 742362 ) on Thursday December 02, 2004 @02:20PM (#10976306)

    I can't tell you how many times it's happened. I read a dozen reviews online to hear that a game is great (baldur's gate for mac was a classic example), so I buy said game, and WHAM severe bug. Every time you try to rest (in certain circumstances, which occur about half the time) the game just crashes completely. This now fundamentally changes the nature of the game. Rather than trying to fight bad guys, your primary mission is to find a way to rest without crashing the game, the actual plot of the game becomes secondary to working around the bugs in the game.

    Once the game has been out for a little while, this is all over the bulletin boards, nearly everybody (or maybe actually everybody) has this bug, so..... How did the reviewer not know? Did he even play the game? Did he think that a single bug that crashed the game 5 times an hour was insignificant? What exactly is going on here?

    For reviewers, first and foremost, actual obvious bugs should be the first thing to look for. If you play the game for a whole day and it ever crashes, that should go in the very first sentence of the review. In addition, include a full list of the bugs you saw, and any game with more than a few obscure bugs (or god forbid a single crasher or severe bug) should get the thumbs down automatically.

    I can't stand the reviewers ignoring obvious deficiencies and claiming "this game played like a dream......" when it is a scientific fact that they couldn't have played more than 10 minutes without having a complete crash.

    • For reviewers, first and foremost, actual obvious bugs should be the first thing to look for.

      But, those bugs are only in the pre-release version. The developers know all about them, and fixing them is their top priority. They'll be fixed before the game goes gold. Really.

      Yeah, yeah, yeah. So I'm lying. I'm in marketing, and in charge of getting prominent positive reviews for the game. So sue me.
  • I've always hated the idea of "scoring" games in reviews. A review is subjective and should be treated as such. A score promotes the idea that the review is a sort of scientific process, wherein the reviewer distills the game down to its very essence and then measures it against some standard.

    What I'd like to see more of is review sites where a review is written by multiple reviewers, each getting their own say. This way, the readers can decide for themselves which reviewer's preferences most closely m

  • That's why I skip most of 'em. With rare exceptions, I don't buy games on release day, and wait for a demo. If the demo sucks, the game will usually suck as well. Given time/money constraints, I only want to play what I view as the 'best of the best'.

    Which leads into one of the reviewer's complaints: numerical scores. These are an utter waste of time and energy. How can one number (or even three or four) possibly capture a game. I've got two speakers, so who cares about the audio portion? I like the same o
  • I did RTFA, so I'll address a couple of his points.

    re: Scoring

    I don't mind seeing scores, so much, as long as I have an inkling as to how they were arrived at. Admittedly, when you see a score (like in PCGamer, for example) you have to take it with a grain or two of salt to begin with. Still, if a 100 point score could be proken down into four categories that offer 25-point rages, that might be helpful. In such a case, having a game score in the 90s would be pretty rare, but if all of the objective crit

    • In response to PCGamer, I need to say that they are the best magazine out there in terms of accurate reviews. Graphics dont make a game, and they dont break reviews into "graphics score, sound score, fun score, etc.". The score is the average reflection of how a reviewer feels about the game overall.

      Ive seen them give games 5% (mad dog mcrae), 12% (armored moon). Or give a game 98% (half-life 2), 97% (half-life 1), 94% (far cry). C&C Tiberian Sun got a 77. Its on the high end of the "good" scale, recom

  • Gamepro's SFII for the Genesis review. (Score:3, Interesting)

    by hal2814 ( 725639 ) on Thursday December 02, 2004 @03:29PM (#10977156)
    Does anybody remember this one? THis is what made me lose faith in all video game magazines. I haven't bought one since. Gamepro swore up and down that the Genesis version of SFII was better than its SNES counterpart in almost every way. It simply wasn't true. I owned both systems. I bought the SNES version when it first came out. I decided to rent the Genesis version since I hear it was so cool. I'm really glad I only rented it. It was pretty bad stacked up to the SNES version. Not only that, but it seems like the things Gamepro touted about the Genesis version were the worst parts (ex. sound, which was downright pathetic compared to its counterpart). I'm sure there have been earlier examples of misleading reviews but this is the one that made me put down the magazines.
    • I believe the Genesis SF2 (Street Fighter 2 Special Championship Edition) is the superior version. The gameplay felt closer to the arcade version - there were more frames of animation, and it had more 'polish' than the SNES counterpart (SF2:Turbo Edition). Of course, you had to have the 6-button controller to really appreciate it. Also, the music was A LOT closer to the arcade version than the re-done SNES music (which sounded horrible). The only thing that it was inferior on was the voices - they were
    • Whoa. I do work for Gamepro, *but* The Genesis version was better than the SNES version, hands down. I bought both versions and played them extensively. Controls were better, especially with the six-button controller (which along with the Saturn controller are still the best d-pad controllers, IMO)--SNES d-pads gave you blisters after awhile, and the L/R buttons were cumbersome. Sounds sounded very raspy on the Genesis, yes. But the sounds themselves were a lot closer to the arcade version. I mean, in th
      • The fighter stick I had for the SNES took care of all of my controller woes. The stock Genesis controller did feel better than the stock SNES controller, but the actual response I got from the stock SNES controller seemed to be better than the Genesis. For example, I had a hard time getting a Dragon Punch to come out right on the Genesis which has never happened to me on the SNES or at the arcade (at least ever since I learned it at the arcade).

        I didn't notice the music being particularly bad on either v
        • On the contrary, I found the more difficult moves easier to execute on the Genesis than the SNES version--with or without the fighter stick.

          Dragon punch combos were especially difficult with the SNES--cancellations didn't quite work as well as they did on arcades or the Genesis. The timing for hitting the punch button for the dragon punch was closer to arcades in the Genesis version too--which is why you said you had a harder time on both the Genesis and arcade versions.

          The point about the Dhalsim music

          • The Dahlsim music on the SNES version might have been off compared to the arcade, but my point is that it didn't make the Genesis version any better for being closer. Closer to crap is still crap. Also, the only problem I had with the arcade verion was mastering the moves to begin with. Just to be clear, here's the timeline:

            1. Learn moves in the arcade. At first hard but then ok.
            2. Use moves on SNES with no problem.
            3. Use moves on Genesis but with some difficulty.

            You can argue the point that SF2SCE wa
      • Hey, remember that time EGM had the April Fools Day gag where they said they unlocked a hidden character "Sheng Long" in the arcade version of Street Fighter II CE, complete with faked screenshots? And then Gamepro wrote up an article on how you "confirmed" the "rumors", and that the secret character was real? And then EGM admitted they made the whole thing up?

        HILARIOUS!

        From an editorial standpoint, Gamepro has NEVER had any credibility.

        I will throw one bone though, Gamepro's SFII guide with character mo
        • That was a great April Fools gag. And that happened looong before I ever started working here so it's not as though I was the ringleader of that fiasco. But I wonder which editor did confirm that? Hmmm something to dig into.

          Gamepro isn't the only mag to have made "confirmed" screwups--almost every media publication has made such "confirmations" that turned out to be wrong. You make your mistakes, and you learn.

          As for editorial credibility, I think it's our reviews that could use the most improvement ...

          • By the way, I didn't mean to imply that you were responsible for that, poor wording on my part.

            Whoever wrote that in Gamepro out and out lied. They literally said that they tried it and it worked. No one actually takes video game articles seriously from a truth perspective, so I suppose the stakes aren't high, but it rubbed me the wrong way.

            My biggest complaint against Gamepro had always been the fluff reviews, almost everything got a good score. At the time (1993-4? roughly) EGM was at the top of the bal
  • There are so many factors that go into how good or bad a review of a game is that there is no way to know if you are getting useful information unless you do some homework. Having worked as a professional game reviewer, I've spent a lot of time thinking about this matter, and discussing it with fellow editors, game developers, and friends. The most important thing you can do is find a source you can trust, be it a web site or magazine, or even an individual editor. Someone brought up the point that some

  • Too much hype... (Score:3, Insightful)

    by wolf31o2 ( 778801 ) on Thursday December 02, 2004 @03:38PM (#10977248)

    What gets me is that most game reviews read more like an infomercial than an actual review. There are usually too many references to how much ass something kicks or how completely cool some stupid eye-candy effect is compared to some other game's stupid eye-candy effect.

    Hype and anticipation should have no part in a game review. It doesn't matter if the game has been anticipated for years or it is an unknown that just came to market, it should be reviewed equally.

    It seems that there are no real metrics for doing a game review that can be accepted. After all, shouldn't the results be reproducable? How do you review things like playability or replayability? What if the game doesn't deliver everything that was promised at release time? What if the game won't run on half of the gaming hardware out there? What if a game doesn't run quite as fast as a competitor on the same hardware but is much more creative and inventive?

  • Keywords (Score:2, Interesting)

    by Boronx ( 228853 )
    The point in TFA about scores is well taken.

    We once ran a set of experiments where we compared subjective taste tests against the physical properties of apples. At first, the tester were told to jot down any number of single words like "crisp" or "sour", as they ate the apple. We started to see some interesting clustering around some of the words.

    Well, some people don't like qualitative data, so they switch the experiment to a score. Now testers were told to give the "sourness" a numerical value.

    Al

  • I want to see a writer who covers games as art, and examines connections between one game and another, or the influence of a developer or studio on games in general. That is, criticism of games as art rather than commercial products. I understand that most people use a review as a buying guide because they only seek entertainment from games.

    I would think that some of us longtime gamers would appreciate game critics who reviewed on the basis of more than (say) 5 years gaming. A lot of reviewers might have

  • Use www.gamefaqs.com for reviews (Score:3, Informative)

    by DarkAdonis ( 810354 ) on Thursday December 02, 2004 @04:15PM (#10977750)

    I don't purchase games based on the major website reviews or reviews from any magzine publications. I use www.gamefaqs.com. Nearly every game on that site has a review section where members submit reviews.

    A week or two after a game's release, I can get a pretty good distribution of reviews on a 10-point scale. If 90% of the reviewers give the game an 8, 9, or 10, I can usually assume the game is quality.

    However, such high scores can be a result of fanboy-ism...which is why I don't read more than two 10/10 reviews. I usually read, a 9/10, a few 7/10 or 8/10 and a few If I deem a game worthy of my consideration, I'll visit sources to obtain a free trial and I'll buy the game if it's good.


  • We recently got a PS2 as a gift.

    When I look for a game review, I am trying to figure out:
    - Will it appeal to me (male, 30s, non-stellar reaction speed & manual dexterity)?
    - Will it appeal to my wife (30s, prefers non-violent games)?
    - Will it appeal to my daughter (7, no gaming experience)?
    - Can my son (3.5) participate, or at least watch?
    - Can we play together (in any combination)?
    - Does the game becomes repetetive (boring) or too-hard (frustrating) as it progresses?
    - Will the game still be interesting
  • In movies, I check out Roger Ebert, because he knows when a movie lacks artistic merit, but can enjoy it for the action or horror! However, that's most like me!

    One of the things EGM does, is they highlight their reviewers and say their favorite games that month. For example, if Sarah J. (fake name!) is playing the hell out of Halo 2 and Unreal 2, you can bet her review of another FPS is going to be according to her standards. If you like the same games the reviewer likes, you're more in a position to tr
  • Ok, this talk about good reviews=more money needs to be debunked.

    If you know of any game companies that give money for positive reviews, lemme know, cus' I'm sure not getting any of that cut.

    Magazines and online sites are driven by ads, and that's no surprise. What's more important to game companies is circulation numbers and exposure. Doesn't really matter if a game gets a "bad" review, if millions read that medium then it gives them that much more of an opportunity for companies to get exposure for th

  • I've found game reviews are a great help. What i do is visit somewhere like GameRankings.com and read the lowest-rated reviews, and take careful note of the negative points that are raised.

    It might just be me, but "It's nothing new, but the implementation is ok and kind of fun, i guess" is not 90+% material.
    • Isn't it easier to just rent it? I mean, I just run out to Blockbuster and choose a game. The fact that someone else likes or dislikes it doesn't mean much.
  • Rottentomatoes' way of doing reviews is far superior to reading individual reviews. Their video game composite reviews are pretty good. All it needs now is a music review section.

  • Game reviews are funny things. There are things you can point out that will always make a game bad, but not things you can point at that will make a game universally good.

    I find the only thing to do is find a reviewer who's reviews of past games fall in line with your views of said games.

  • As an avid gamers since my fingers were big enough to mash the Vic 20 keys, I started to get really sick of the rating systems people use. Game themes and engines are spread across such a wide audience that one man's trash may be another's gold. I'd say reading about someone's experience in the game is quite a treat, especially if they really got into it and found things they loved about the game, beyond the usual faults like no story, glitches etc... And it can give you an insight into the possibilities ab
  • I tend to like teh reviews at gamespy, they seem to be fairly unbiased, and truthfull outside of marketing hype. At least in teh past, they got bought by IGN and the reviews are starting to look more like IGN hype drivel. Gamespy as far as I know was the only reviewer that said wait Halo is great but here are the problems. While everyone else was trying to clean the sticky stuff off of thier hands, while gushing that it was the best game ever. Gamespy also waits at least a week to review MMORPG's to giv

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