The problem with only concentrating on the graphics is that most people forget that their are a number of different decisions that make a game look the way it does. There are a lot of tricks that a developer can use to increase the visual fidelity of a game and a lot of it are under the hood. These decisions are things most gamers will not understand because they are looking for the wow on screen instead of thinking about the tech that gives them a lot of different options
Case in point would be Halo Reach. I am sure any one of you would put KZ3 graphics as crushing Halo Reach but thats all do to the different designs goals and immediate on surface wow factor. Halo Reach is as much a technical visual masterpiece as KZ3 but the difference is what the developers considered to be the main goals of each game. One of the main design goals within Halo reach that has an impact on the graphics is Co-op You have four player local and online co-op. This alone means the game has to scale to a totally different level than KZ3. While KZ3 only support offline Co-op for 2 player, you have just about every co-op option available on Halo Reach. Then you take the size of a level, the number of objects within a level. Can you interact with objects within a level. All of these things take away from a games visual wow factor because the developer has to balance what they want to do within a game compare to how it looks. So when I see or here such statements as polish like the OP but do not see them breaking down the design decisions that go on within a game, I cannot fully come to terms with their analysis because it's based on what they can see instead of understanding what actually is happening behind the scenes.
The reason I mention this is that to only look at a games graphics and say ohh it's the best looking game on consoles etc but not take into fact the design decisions is doing a lot of games a disservice. The more flexible a game world is, will dictate how well the visual polish the developers have room for.
