Critics are paid because of their skills in predicting/judging if a product is (or is going to be) hot or not
AfroJedii
I read GameSpot far more than any other gaming news publication, and I think you'll be hard pressed to demonstrate that GameSpot predicts which games will be good, and which ones won't. Gamings previews here, and in much of the mainstream press, are always positive, examining a game's development and features in an upbeat fashion. Rarely, however, will a GameSpot preview suggests that a game will dominate online popularity. I say "rarely," though I can't think of any examples where I've read something like this. I certainly can't think of any previews where GameSpot has said "X game will be better than Y game."
Professional critics judge games in relation to others, and the industry as a whole, based on finished products. People pop up on forums with polls like "Will Deus Ex 3 be better than Bioshock 2?" Attempting to accurately judge the relative merits of two games that will not be released for multiple quarters is next to impossible given the number of variables involved and the paucity of information with which to refine them. It's a futile investigation, and one that should not be taken too seriously.
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