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Thorondor

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IGN's review are a bit of a joke

 

Corrected that for you. IGN are infamous and are probably the lowest-standard of the big sites, even Gamespot has a little more pride (see their Resident Evil 6 review for evidence of some testicles). You cannot spell 'ignorance' without IGN.

 

Why do people put so much effort into reviews - I bet that some of you played a game that was scored very low but you enjoyed it much more then so called reviewer.

 

If you enjoy a game, does that mean it's good? No. I played Resident Evil 5 with my brother in co-op and had a great time, and that game is shit. I had a great time because all we did throughout was mock the game. On the flipside, I find the Mass Effect games to be awful. I can appreciate that technically, they're very good, very polished, but Alpha Protocol is far superior to all of them. So, bad games can get good reviews, good games can get bad reviews, and you can enjoy a bad game, and not enjoy a good game.

 

A review is an attempt to evaluate a game objectively. In order to do so you need to be able to think clearly, have a good knowledge of the medium, if not the genre, know your own biases, and be able to sum up your unwieldy thoughts with some clarity. This is beyond most people (hence terrible, polarised user reviews). The vast majority of (one could easily argue all) reviews fall down to some extent in one or more areas, making the review imperfect. This doesn't mean it's wrong, it simply means it is not 100% correct. Reviews, taken from several different sources, offer the most reliable indicator of quality, given that multiple independent views will present congruent opinions about what is bad and what is good about a game, regardless of the individual differences in reviewers.

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I don't - you don't play bad game unless you are masochist. I stop playing bad games if I see when it is bad game - just because you don't like it it doesn't mean you have to shout to the world - OMG THIS IS SO BAD GAME. I enjoyed RE5 and I enjoyed ME series and I say they are good games.

 

And no - a review shouldn't say is the game good or bad. It should point out - what is the game about, what mechanics are used there do they work or not, what innovations where used, etc. A reviewer might add his personal opinion but that should be left outside scoring.

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I don't think you could write a review where you gave something 4/10 without giving your opinion otherwise you may as well get your reviews from a robot.

 

The whole point of a review is that it's based on the reviewer's experience of the game, but yes, it should try to be balanced unless something really has no redeeming qualities.

 

The reviewer is making a recommendation which is best left to the end if that's what you mean? "Buy this game because its awesome" is something best left for the conclusion, but they should have given you the impression it was good before then by commenting on its many fine features.

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I always feel you really need to experience many reviews to be able to form an opinion of your own without actually having to experience the subject being reviewed first hand.. Even if the reviews are biased based on the reviewers background and tastes, you generally pick up some of the more common trends this way.

 

Unfortunately, many people do get swayed by the opinions of reviews and will pick up or ignore the subject simply based on it. There are people who have already predjudged EU2012 and have deemed it as a Very Bad Game ™ just because they've read that it's not a reskinned carbon copy of the original, or has changed the TU system, or the menu is the bland holographic blue every other sci-fi game use nowadays, etc, etc.

 

 

- NKF

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Unfortunately, many people do get swayed by the opinions of reviews and will pick up or ignore the subject simply based on it.

 

Indeed, I actually quite enjoy films like AvP whereas every other sane-minded individual seems to hate them..

 

I wonder if the whole system would be better if reviewers had a side panel next to each article listing their top 3 film and game likes where the film or game in question was generally scored quite low? At least you'd know if you were reading a review from a like-minded individual ;) Of course it would never work in reality, and at the end of the day the best gauge of whether you'll like something or not is to play the finished product.

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Ah beat me to it, I was going to link to that :) The Eurogamer podcast this week is of the same discussion.

 

As for reviews, I prefer the RPS "Wot I think " approach that doesn't include a score. You get a well written article with the pros, the cons, and the reviewers opinion of whether they personally like it or not. Never really been sold on the need for a score after a review.

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Right, guys, it's official: XCOM has received its first patch.

 

It weighs in at a respectable 2Gb and here's what's in it:

• Various visibility/hiding optimizations

• Multiplayer text chat support (press J to activate)

• Mouse button 4/5 will switch soldiers in the Barracks

• ESC hides the movement grid, if you do not want to commit to a move while it is activated

• Squad Sight ability optimization

• Fixed issue when equipping two grenades with Deep Pockets.

• Fixed Rapid Fire sometimes consuming too much ammo.

• SHIVs that are damaged will no longer become unusable.

• Fixed some hangs/soft crashes in tactical combat.

• Replaced software cursor with the operating system cursor to reduce lag and framerate dependence.

• Fixed rendering bug which causes some soldier’s hair to appear as if it is rendering on top of environment fog.

• 1080p movies are now used at all times on the PC.

 

::

 

Well, this means we'll at least be picking up a more polished game. grin.gif

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Aww Thor, thought I was going to be first with this but you beat me by a clear hour and a half.

 

Where the hell did that time just go? Feels like I was caught up on the forums about 5 minutes ago grin.gif

 

Oh, and I quote this from Twitter:

 

Denise Kuan@denisekuan

This is how I feel about XCOM: the world is a baby made of glass, it is handed to you, keep it safe while you run through Jurassic Park.

 

Amazing description smile.png

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you don't play bad game unless you are masochist.

 

Unless you enjoy it. Exactly.

 

just because you don't like it it doesn't mean you have to shout to the world - OMG THIS IS SO BAD GAME.

 

I don't see why not. Freedom is speech is something quite a lot of people think is very important. The fact that most of them are too stupid to argue their corner coherently doesn't diminish the importance of the principle.

 

I enjoyed RE5 and I enjoyed ME series and I say they are good games.

 

But that doesn't make them good games. If you enjoy something, that doesn't necessarily mean it's good. That's the difference between you and a good reviewer. A good reviewer will do their best to objectively evaluate a game. Yes, their opinion will end up colouring their review, but it shouldn't stop them accurately evaluating the game.

 

a review shouldn't say is the game good or bad.

 

Unfortunately this is practically the very definition of a review.

 

It should point out - what is the game about, what mechanics are used there do they work or not, what innovations where used, etc. A reviewer might add his personal opinion but that should be left outside scoring.

 

This is what PR departments are for. The prospect of reviews marking games based on what features they have is nightmarish and has led to the "games must have a multiplayer component" idea which is currently scarring the industry. See for instance Spec Ops: The Line, where the suits at the publisher (2K Games) brought in another developer to make the multiplayer part of the game when the developer refused.

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Unless you enjoy it. Exactly.

 

That means it is not bad game - for you.

 

But that doesn't make them good games. If you enjoy something, that doesn't necessarily mean it's good. That's the difference between you and a good reviewer. A good reviewer will do their best to objectively evaluate a game. Yes, their opinion will end up colouring their review, but it shouldn't stop them accurately evaluating the game.

 

Reviews says otherwise - so if we go by review standars - your point is invalid. For me they are good games. If you enjoy something it is good.

 

 

This is what PR departments are for. The prospect of reviews marking games based on what features they have is nightmarish and has led to the "games must have a multiplayer component" idea which is currently scarring the industry. See for instance Spec Ops: The Line, where the suits at the publisher (2K Games) brought in another developer to make the multiplayer part of the game when the developer refused.

 

We made this and this but it doesn't work - surely nice PR.

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SO. VERY. WORTH IT.

 

I haven't played near enough (only 5 hours!) to give a 'full review', but I am very much agreeing with my dad's verdict so far: Very good. Not quite excellent, but very good.

 

I'm biased though, since I'm having a ball.

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