Society: Game Critics (Warning: You'll have to read, lol)

The Performances of the Critics

When going into a game I think critics should consider being observant, informed, sensitive, demanding, and articulate. Being observant is having an opened mind and is going into the game as if it's a clean slate for the developer. It'll be one thing going into a game just to say to yourself I have to sit through this garbage, you'll be surprised of the results. Being an informed critic is more on the professional side of things for the fact that not everyone will buy every single game available.

How many amateurs played every single PlayStation 2 game so that they can compare it to others? Being a sensitive critic is questing, not self-satisfied; kind, not self-absorbed; and overall understands we all need helping hands in this never-ending adventure of development. Being a demanding critic is holding the developers to its highest standards in other words don't expect a 20 person crew to create a Killzone 2 / Halo 3 killer. Lastly an articulate critic is to express one's thoughts with precision, clarity, and grace. Simply saying "I hate this" or "I love this" is just expressing ones opinion. Robert Cohen says, "Articulation means the careful building of ideas through a presentation of evidence, logic argument, the use of helpful analogy and example, and a **** of expression neither pedantically turgid nor idiosyncratically anarchic." Basically criticism should be a pleasant read and not suffocating readers with prejudices or egotistical showing of the critic.

Continued...

I just copied and pasted the one of the important parts of my blog because everyone knows gamers are avid readers, right? Anyways I posted this in the forums for people to question my thoughts so I can see how strong my points are against other gamers if they dissagree. So if you do dissagree state why in order to get something going and keep in mind I won't answer right away.

I assume that by saying critics, you're referring to website reviewers. I think for the most part they do a good job. The problem with critics is that they can only give you their opinion. Those opinions should really not be what other people go by. The other thing is that reviewers play so many games, that its easy for them to become jaded and bored by games that may appeal to people who do not play that same number of games.

One last thing to think about is the audience that reviewers are reaching out to. I'm sure reviews and opinions are written with "short attention span" teenagers in mind.

That said, I think reviewers are doing a good job these days of being as objective and as informative as possible.

I assume that by saying critics, you're referring to website reviewers. I think for the most part they do a good job. The problem with critics is that they can only give you their opinion. Those opinions should really not be what other people go by. The other thing is that reviewers play so many games, that its easy for them to become jaded and bored by games that may appeal to people who do not play that same number of games.

One last thing to think about is the audience that reviewers are reaching out to. I'm sure reviews and opinions are written with "short attention span" teenagers in mind.

That said, I think reviewers are doing a good job these days of being as objective and as informative as possible.

Grieverr

I'm a teenager and I read reviews as well as watch them if available. Have you have thought a review of a got so high / low and wasn't justified? I also think when gaming sites have a scale of 1-10 they tend to never give a score out of the rang of 5-9 or 6-9 when I consider a 5 and up a buy. Since 5 is in the middle that would mean the game is mediocre / average which isn't a bad thing because the game isn't broken. I also find that they love to give many sports games around the same score no matter how much or little content is put in. I find most sports games around 5 because they don't really do much to differentiate themselves from others.

I find Reviews on the Run one of the few sites / shows that have a scale of one to ten to actually use their whole scale. For the most part I think the industry is a hit and miss with the critics. I can never really tell from the score if I should get a certain sports game when every version is pretty much the same score. I would have to read each one to actually determine if it's a good upgrade or not. It almost ruins the whole point of the scoring in the first place and then there are games that are over hyped with no substance to hold it down.

Generally speaking though if someone does like a product / event a lot they tend not to have much to say than if they didn't enjoy it. Now that is understandable, but that isn't the problem.

Critics have burned their reputation with me over the years, and as such, I prefer to be my own critic when it comes to entertainment. The funny part? So far, it's working out pretty damn nicely. There are way more sources for someone like me to glean information on a game from than there were during the dark ages when I first started using reviews to decide purchases. I can watch a video, and in many cases -- PLAY A DEMO -- of a game, which kills reading a review for a game that the reviewer probably didn't even finish to begin with, and absolutely KILLS any need for the BS, softball previews the industry doles out like Black Cats and Ludes.

I think there was a time when reviewers were necessary, but that era passed. I can form my own opinion with the information at hand most times (and when there isn't I simply wait for player feedback). So in order of importance: My opinion>Anonymous Forum Poster opinion>(P)Reviewer.

LOL, Shame-us! I love that the reviewer is at the bottom of your list, lower than the anonymous forum poster :)

I agree that reviews are not really needed for the educated gamer. But I think we all know that the majority of people who play games buy Madden year after year. So they need that "9 out of 10" sticker on their game boxes.

I've been gaming since 1985. By now, I can usually tell if a game interests me or not just base on the genre and seeing a video or two. So, I certainly don't need a review.

So, again, given today's state of gaming, I think reviewers and websites are doing a good job. When gaming hits the level of movies and we can have a real awards show not sponsored by Spike and porn starts, then we can reevaluate gaming journalism and demand more.

LOL, Shame-us! I love that the reviewer is at the bottom of your list, lower than the anonymous forum poster :)

Grieverr

Yeah, I tend to agree. For the most part, a large part of the gaming industry is controled by money, not honest opinion. If they know the game is going to make money, or make them money, most commercial reviewers are going to give it a great review, regardless of how or why money is made. That's why I tend to adhere to Shame-'s policy as well.

Maybe it's just me and I'm just creating something that isn't there because I'm not as an informed critic as I liked to be. I was hoping that fanatics of different kinds of games would come forth to contradict me. Since professionals and fanatics of particular series would know a lot more than me. At the same time I don't understand when a game like Ninja Gaiden doesn't get a 9.0 people start saying it sucks. At the same time X-Play would give it a 4 and everyone is happy when in reality 4 is equivalent to a 7-8 margin on a 1-10 scale. Then sometimes I agree with the score, but now how the score came to be.

Well there is a thing called "over analyzing" and I just might be taking the reviews too seriously. The Haze example to me was a pretty good one because IGN gave it a 4.5, X-Play 2 (3-4), while Game Spot a 6.0. If the controls didn't work respond properly all the time and had poor design chooses shouldn't Game Spot given it anything under 5.0? In the end I'm guessing its just opinion that drives the scores the most.

If anyone is still reading / watching this forum here are a couple of games that were review to me seem wrong:

The Getaway - Game Spot 6.9/10, IGN 7/10, Total PlayStation 8/10 (Should have got anywhere under half way 5.0)

Perfect Dark Zero - Game Spot 9.0/10, IGN 8.4/10, 1Up 9/10 (It was a dated Golden Eye an average at best with buggy multiplayer)

Resident Evil: Outbreak - Game Spot 7.2/10, IGN 7.6/10, and anyone else who gave it above average (If anything you could get away with an average score 5-6/10, but this game was pretty much unplayable)

I have been playing games long enough to know what I like, and in most cases like Shamus said I hold the opinion of friends around in here in a lot higher regard than any reviewer. But nowadays you can download demos for yourself too so its a lot easier to make a buying decision.GodModeEnabled

Some good games have bad demos, in the end I just use collective info/reviews on whether I want a game or not.