It depends, but usually no. I'll go off of reviews way before I would go off of sales. Sometimes both are wrong. Xenosaga II is a perfect example. I absolutely love the game and liked most of the things the reviewers didn't. People complained about it being too complex and difficult, but it was extremely well done compared to the watered down, but still good, combat system of the 3rd installment.
Silent Hill 4 is another good example. Extremely creepy, more visceral feel, and an engaging story that got back to the series' roots a la Silent Hill 1 and 2.
Both examples I gave were established franchises, and I can't think of a gamble on a new franchise I have taken where the reviewers/sales didn't like it but I did. I am sure there is one, Disgaea maybe, but I never checked the scores or the sales cause I saw my friend playing it and loved it to death. So I guess to answer the question, no.
We had two bags of grass, seventy-five pellets of mescaline, five sheets of high-powered blotter acid, a salt shaker half full of cocaine, a whole galaxy of multi-colored uppers, downers, screamers, laughers…Also a quart of tequila, a quart of rum, a case of beer, a pint of raw ether and two dozen amyls. The only thing that really worried me was the ether. There is nothing in the world more helpless and irresponsible and depraved than a man in the depths of an ether binge. –Raoul Duke
It is hard to shed anything but crocodile tears over White House speechwriter Patrick Buchanan's tragic analysis of the Nixon debacle. "It's like Sisyphus," he said. "We rolled the rock all the way up the mountain...and it rolled right back down on us...." Neither Sisyphus nor the commander of the Light Brigade nor Pat Buchanan had the time or any real inclination to question what they were doing...a martyr, to the bitter end, to a "flawed" cause and a narrow, atavistic concept of conservative politics that has done more damage to itself and the country in less than six years than its liberal enemies could have done in two or three decades. -Hunter S. Thompson
