Michael-5 said:
That's definatly true for some reviews. I noticed on IGN, KZ2 got 9.4/10, and KZ3 got 8.5/10, and the only drawback I saw them list was poor story. Even if the story/end boss was not as fun, a full grade score drop? However at the same time, people expect more out of games. Halo 3 scored 9.8/10, but Reach only got 9.3/10. Reach is a better game then Halo 3 on every front, but because Halo 3 did what it did in 2007, when competing games were just nowhere nearly as polished, it got a higher score. This is why you should read multiple reviews, and make your own opinion. Just like voting, don't just read one democratic or republican paper. Read one of each and accept what you feel is important to you. |
Yes, I agree. Another faster but almost as reliable method, as it's not only about absolute values, but also personal tastes, is knowing a site or magazine enough to trust them. In the past I trusted PCZone, they were very strict, but in an equal way and their tastes were very compatible with mine. If they gave any score above 80, the game had to be very good, any above 90 meant excellent. I liked Charlie Brooker desecrating style and I knew that he liked RPGs generally, but not those with too many classic fantasy and D&D clichéd elements like trolls, goblins, wizards, etc, so, despite liking those elements a lot more than him, I could "weight" his review and get useful infos even when he was ranting. Now I don't trust any source as much as PCZone in its golden years, so I follow your method.
Alas, gamers less assiduous than us and more recently "converted", tend, at least initially, to trust any of the most known reviewer they stumble upon first, so a bad and biased review by one of them may do some damage. Luckily, the most casual ones often don't even know any reviewer and ask friends and relatives that play more than them, so the damage can be limited if the negatively biased sites aren't in a too large number. But undoubtedly they can do damages that only positive word of mouth and other reviews exposing and debunking them can at least partially remedy.
