ckmlb said:
Penny Arcade also thought the original Halo was shit and look how that worked out for them... I'd rather listen to the other reviewers that didn't like it. |
As Gelmar said, they only thought the single player sucked.
Also there are games that suck for reasons such as controls, raw gameplay, story, etc etc. Games that are simply poorly designed or unfinished and people can pretty much agree that they suck. I would argue that Lair is such a game.
Then there are games that are fully polished and personal preference further comes into play. Like Halo for example. I played it on the PC and enjoyed it, but it did get repetative fighting the same monsters over and over in a series of identical rooms. For me though the fighting was really fun, I loved the carrying just 2 weapons thing and switching depending on the situation. I thought the story was awesome and it was enough to involve me. I think playing it on the console would have been more trying, since it seemed like the PC version was easier with the mouse controls. I'm not sure I would have perserved on the console. Anyway this was their point:
http://www.penny-arcade.com/comic/2001/11/28
I can't get to the news post to read more unfortunately. If Halo was universally agreed to be perfect in every way then I might start to doubt them, but they raise a good point. It is very valid strike against the game and doesn't mean they are bad reviewers. It just means that for them, the gameplay and story were not good enough to overcome the games repetative issues.
Perhaps more to the point though, in respect to the thread, I would not say they are reviewers. Nor would I say they have any bias to speak of. So regardless of whether you generally agree with them or not, I believe they fit the OPs description of gamers, not reviewers who have played the game which is why I feel they are relevent.
