@Salt_AU: Yeah console gamers don't "cry and whine". At least until someone like Microsoft tries to close off the used games sales industry for their console. Then it's "Oh heck no Microsoft! It's our God given right to do with our games as we please!! Even if that means indulging in the console industry's version of game piracy.

@JEF8484: Oh I wouldn't use the user review section on Metacritic for anything more than an ongoing study of the "hive mind" mentality of the human species. The most common review scores are 10 and 0! People are basically throwing free thought and objectivity out the window to either support a game that they like and/or haven't played or to trash a game that they don't like and/or haven't played.

@texasgoldrush: I think that this game's core issue is that so many people are keen to compare to the the first 3. So it's not really an issue of "is this game good?" It's more of a "does this game best our memories of the previous entries?" I think that's why BotW scored so high because the more recent entries weren't that great.

I don't care how intelligent you are how great your memory is, your recollection of the first three games is most likely exaggerated and over flattering. So when you hold one game against your own "best of compilation" from the 3 previous games, it's easy to be disappointed.

I played the 10 hour trial and was thoroughly enthralled with what the game was attempting to do so I bought it and haven't had any reason to regret that decision so far. I'm sitting at roughly 55 hours of playtime with approximately 40% completion and am still enjoying myself. I can see where it's not a game for everyone, but for the traditional RPG gamer I feel like it's right up their alley.

My biggest fear from the overall reception that I've seen is that this new storyline will be driven down the same path as the previous entries which is to say "an action game on broad rails with a heavy narrative focus." Hopefully the developers find a way to incorporate the collective criticism into their current game design, but as a betting man I wouldn't count on it.

I disagree. For me, I enjoy the classic RPG approach to games which is what I believe the developers went for here. There's a core story arc that you can plow through or pace yourself with and then there is a litany of side content that is consistent with the narrative focus of the game and builds upon the overall universe that you're exploring/creating. I love this style of game as it allows me to engage the content in way that feels natural. I feel like far too few reviewers appreciated the careful crafting that was required to make this world feel authentic and believable. It's all there. Whether you decide to pay attention to it is entirely up to you.

In my opinion we have plenty of brief heavily narrative focused games that players can get through in 10-20 hours. That isn't what I want from a space based RPG epic. Perhaps I'm in, what appears to be, a narrow subsect of gamers that appreciate ambition and depth. I wouldn't give BotW a 10/10 but I also don't see how MEA is worse than Ghost Recon Wildlands. I guess I'm just a dying breed.

This is all pretty pointless. Bungie has already stated that they didn't favor the PS4 during development, and that Destiny was designed to give everyone the "same experience" across all of the platforms. In other words, any advantage the PS4 might have power wise won't be getting utilized. The bright side is that it should allow for smoother gameplay at 30fps on the PS4. I look for this to become a pretty common trend for this generation of consoles, at least for cross-console titles. It's just easier to give everyone the same experience compared to getting bashed with hate mail and accused of favoring one console when the performance marks don't match up, which is exactly what would have happened otherwise.

@brandoko @micnet007 I understand that they are intertwined. My point was that Microsoft isn't really changing their policies because of a new found love of gamer's opinions, so much as they are due to a perceived loss in profits. Consumers have been complaining since day 1 of MS annoucements regarding their new policies.

While feedback and sales are very tied together they aren't entirely the same. Bioware changing the ending of ME3 because of fan feedback is an example of a change due to consumer feedback. That changed earned them no profit, at least not on that game. Microsoft changing their access policies is solely about money, not the consumer, and yes I know everyone likes making money, myself included.

Did Microsoft listen to their consumer feedback or was it their sales analyst forecasting quarterly profits for the Xbox One after two weeks of lack luster pre-orders that really changed their software rights policies?