Again, you attack reviewers and their ablity to review games fairly. You can claim to be innocent in your ORIGINAL POST, but you are clearly too uninformed to be making such accusations. You haven't even read the reviews. You say THIS POST IS NOT ABOUT GTA IV but your thread title clearly says otherwise. It's convienient for you to be able to say "this thread isn't about GTA." Yes. It. Is. Your title says it. Oh but wait...here it comes..."my title is just hyperbole...please read my essay" that says very little other than: GTA IV is overrated because reviewers are biased. You also say great things about the Wii such as: it has seperated itself and the PS3 and 360 haven't. The contrls show its dominance over PS2. If you think this essay of yours isn't flame bait, you're wrong. Your attack isn't very subtle, there's no chip on shoulder required to see that.

Wrong. What "casual" games have been unfairly judged? Should Wii Sports have perfect scores? Should Carnival Games have perfect scores? His perspective is uninformed. You can't doubt reviewers without at least reading the reviews. Again, IF YOUR THREAD TITLE CALLS HD USERBASE DESPERATE AND DIRECTLY REFERENCES GTA IV, YOUR THREAD IS ABOUT GTA IV AND FLAME BAIT. The essay trys to be subtle, but isn't. It is attacking both reviewers and the fan base for not liking the Wii more. Just let it go. GTA IV is one of the best games ever. It's ok. We'll get past it. To me, the Wii userbase seems more desperate with attempting to discredit reviewers and GTA IV.

About "casual games..."

For years reviewers have given mediocre scores to crappy licensed games that still sell well because of their license. Reviews often have no influence on how a game sells. Sometimes it does, sometimes it doesn't. But to say all reviewers are biased against casual games is just ridiculous.

I'm sorry Grey, but you're wrong on this one. The simple truth is that the statements your making in regards to the game itself just can't be made without having played GTA IV or any other GTA games.

GTA IV is a masterpiece. It's also a game from a series that a lot of people who haven't played it think they understand. A lot of those people that claim "It just doesn't appeal to me" end up quite liking it when they finally try the game and realize that there's an incredibly fun and varied game behind the glossy package of preteen aimed violence.

*1 - I have never attacked any reviewers, but have merely noted the difficulties that reviewers face in forming their review and the scores they give.

*2 - my response to this is to refer you back up above to where I point out "a story about million's cat is not a story about million, even though his name is clearly mentioned" get over the game. this has never been what about think of the game, and I have stated numerous times that this is the case, yet for some reason you can't let go of that idea.

*3 - Focus is different than bias, I specifically stated that their focus on things that other types of gamers may not have on their focus. I did not state this as being wrong, but merely a weakness when trying to create a scoring system that can work for more than just a select group of people. The most I stated as it being overrated was by.1, if this is what your issue is about then I just don't know how you're going to be abel to deal with metacritic giving it a 100%/99% and gamerankings giving it a 99.6/98.8. but oh noes, Someone says it might be worth a 9.9 instead of a 10 and that must be BLATANT WII FANBOYISM!!!!!

*4 - So stating facts is a bias now? Everyone knows that Wii has its own focus in how to advance gaming(controls) that is very distinctly different from 360 and PS3, who have very similar focuses on how to advance gaming(graphics and complexity) Wii is entirely different from PS3 and 360, and everyone including 360 and PS3 fans have said this quite vocally. PS3 and 360 have been constantly comparing each other on any multiplatform game between the two looking for differences and have rarely come up with anything of signifigance.

*5 - Why are properly done Wii controls being dominant over PS2 controls an issue here?

*6 - It must be very subtle indeed if I can't even see the attack myself.

 Well, You are wrong about me at the very least. This bolded statement has a bit of a view to it. I gave GTA IV the benefit of the doubt since I have not played it and agreed that it deserved all 10 points. Now how am I desperately trying to discredit reviewers and GTA IV?

Games like Wii Sports, and other "casual" games, should not be judged on the same scale as other games. Really all games should be judged against only other games in its genre, and what each game is trying to accomplish.  There is a problem and it needs to be addressed. The current system has worked great for most all past games, but now it is out of date and needs to be changed to reflect that.

Actually, grey is discussing the reviewers reaction to casual games. 

hrmm... lets see, from what I've heard, people are reacting to the huge world, the high quality graphics, the unique and detailed interactions created by high level AI, and the freedom offered by not being required to do anything specific in the game, and the complexity of the game world in general.

Did I miss anything?

also, this. I dont' need to know that much about GTA IV to know that it's considered the best in its genre, but quite frankly, Brawl is the best at what it does and Wii sports is the best at what it does, DDR is the best at what it does, yet there are going to be differences in score due to what individual preference is, and GTA IV, regardless of what it actually has, demonstrates the focus of what reviewers are scoring games based off of, which judging by sales rate of other lower scored games is obviously not the ONLY thing that gamers are interested in.

Wow, you guys are so lol worthy, seriously how low can you go.

Here's the context of the OP in plain and simple english.

GTa = whatever the hell it wants to be
GTA IV = who cares, it is what it is
REviewers = may not know how to grade casual games (NOTHING TO DO WITH GTA)
Reviewers 2 = Know how to grade non-casual games (NOTHING ABOUT GTA SPECIFICALLY)
Users = Become overly defensive about anything that make them insecure (AS proven by the thread.)

Clearly the title was put there just to get a nice showing aka antagonize the HDDF to rear its ugly head and prove a point.

Gosh wasn't it freakn obvious!? It's like Acumen was hiding it right in your face.