NowGamer Columns: NowGamer Team Blog
There was, of course, a minor meltdown this morning when the review scores for Gran Turismo 5 – the longest-awaited of all the Gran Turismos ever (mainly because it took so bloody long to come out) – were unleashed. Some high numbers, some less-high numbers and a lot of discussion came out of it as a result. But I have one question in particular I think is reasonable to ask: can these reviews really be trusted?
The game arrived in our office on Monday, and I seriously doubt it arrived much, if any, earlier in the hands of other games writers across the UK and Europe. This means a conservative estimate would put the review at two days of play, one day of writing. If you’re not a typing idiot, two-and-a-bit days play, the end of Tuesday writing it. Sony specifically requested that online was included with all reviews of the game – a fair request, and something a lot of places would clearly do anyway.
But online was only activated yesterday, meaning those who have put their reviews up this morning really haven’t caned the game in the online world as much as they maybe should have. There will be teething problems, there will be issues with lag, stability and whatever else – these might be ironed out, they might not. Either way it’s a huge disservice to your readers to write off an online mode based on less than a day’s play, on what I would call (from what I’ve played) ‘something that needs a bit of work’. If it’s still dodgy after a while, fair enough – the system is flawed. But if it’s fixed swiftly, all these first-past-the-post reviews will look a bit… well, wrong, in comparison.
Now I’m not stupid enough to think a person is incapable of coming up with a genuinely held, honest opinion on a game from a couple of days of play. I’m not stupid enough to claim people are incapable of coming up with a genuinely held, honest opinion after just a few hours of play. I know I still hold opinions from games I only put a couple of hours into – that’s not what I take issue with here.
What I take issue with – what I’m questioning – is how much faith you can put in a review of a massive title like GT5 that has literally only had a couple of days put into it. It’s a release that’s been five, six years in the making, and people are shitting out reviews as quickly as possible just because it’s the internet and they have to.
I’m sitting here in my ivory tower of print publishing casting judgement down on the world around me, which is a little unfair. I know how the ‘net works – I’ve worked there for many years. If you’re not first, you’re nothing. But in the case of Gran Turismo 5 I think a more careful, considered approach is the right way to do things. Take a few extra days, make sure you’ve seen everything the game has to offer – or just as much as you can fit into a reasonable amount of time. That’s ‘reasonable’ as in ‘enough to do the game, and your audience, justice’.
Ian Dransfield
http://www.nowgamer.com/columns/casual-games/580/gran-tursimo-5-reviews-can-they-be-trusted
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