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Forums - Gaming Discussion - How much weight do reviews have on your purchasing decision?

 

So?

Alot, reviews come first 29 22.66%
 
Somewhat, reviews and faith 59 46.09%
 
None, blind faith! 27 21.09%
 
hmmmm 12 9.38%
 
Total:127

I don't think reviews have ever stopped me from buying a game. However, good reviews will encourage me to check out a game I may not have been interested in before.



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It depends. For new IPs, or franchises I've never played, they mean a lot.

In the case of Wonderful 101, there is no way I'm missing it. That demo was balls to the walls awesome.




It gives me someones opinion of the game. The things I look for first are the concretes, the sound, graphics, story synopsis and presenation. I weigh the things they all agree upon not the things they disagree upon. I also rely upon their words upon video evidence or proper articles with pictures of moments that hurt the game. If things are petty, I ignore them. There are so many games coming out these days that I primarily use them to weed out where my money goes first. 

There are some games where I ignore reviews good or bad and dive straight into though, if enough to make it special is made open to me.



I used to like Videogame Magazines. I grew up with the good old NES ( I just bought the remastered Duck Tales and it brought back good memories. Great Game!) and I always bought Magazines up to the PS2 era. Even now I buy a magazine from time to time.

But with the coming of the internet my interest in reviews was fading. After buying some highly rated "Western Games" like Oblivion or Dragon Age that I simply did not like a single bit I started to question the review system. The internet gives me access to reviews for free... But most of them are useless. It is not possible to rate a game with a number... And I highly doubt that an online magazine can really be independant when it is dependant on advertising revenue.

I have my own special tastes and they are simply not represented in most review systems:
Offline Coop is more important than online coop for me.
Online multiplayer is not a plus for me... it is NOT adding replay value to me. It only adds "repetition value". And if stupid online multiplayer trophies are added the online mode is a big letdown.
Non-linearity and Decision making are not that important to me... they can even lead to extremely boring games with no depth at all.
A game can be great despite only lasting 10 hours. In fact most games that last for 30+ hours are simply getting boring because you are doing always the same things.

So all in all, Reviews do not matter any longer for me. There are games with a reviewscore of 60% that I have enjoyed much more than games like Oblivion or Dragon Age. Even a game like "The last of us" can be boring to you if you do not enjoy post-apocalyptic worlds, no matter how good the reviews are.








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How much does a penny weigh? Multiply that by two.



A lot, though not just the score. My friends always get on my case about reviewers being dumb or snobby and how it's completely worthless to listen to someone else's opinion about a game. But if a reviewer gives a lot of factual reasons why a game sucks, I'm going to listen to it. If they say half of the game is a rock-paper-scissors mini game, that's a good reason why it sucks. If they say there's not a lot of content, there's a good reason why I might not want to buy it yet. It's not just about them liking it or not--it's getting information on the experience. And "I thought it sucked" is an opinion without weight. "I thought it sucked" coming from eighteen out of twenty reviewers has a lot more weight. And why would I want to take a $60 gamble that I'm like those last two guys?



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Bloodbath Paddy Wagon Ultra 9

I don't look at scores, i look at what the reviews says. Also reviews show footage that we didn't see before so that also helps.



In Wonderful 101's case, I loved the demo so I pre ordered. The reviews will have no impact on my purchase decision. Lately I've found myself disappointed with many games that get really high review scores (looking at you: Infinite), so I think I'll just find a way to try before I buy to see if I like the games.



After the unreliable GTA4 and MGS4 reviews i find it hard to trust reviewers