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naruball on 06 February 2012
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Runa216 said:
naruball said:

On a serious note. When I firs saw the score. I was really surprised and commented on the article. Then the author asked me if I had read the article, which I had not. So I assumed that I was terribly wrong and there was something extremely annoying about the game that I had never heard of. Well i was wrong. I've read most of the comments on this thread and I have to say that I disagree with most of you.

Here are my issues with the article:

1. When a game I'm interested in comes out I read the review of a website or two that I trust, because I don't have time to go through every site's review to see if a game is worth buying. The reviewer keeps mentioning how awful FF XIII was despite the fact that the game received a 9 on VGC. Thsi really doesn't help me. Had FFXII recieved a 6 and ffxiii 2 a 7, I would be ok with it, cuz I would assume that it is an improvement.
In other words: consistency for me is a serious issue

2. The review doesn't justify the score. I realise that a lot of people don't like the fact that most games get a 7 or higher, but a 5/10 score means to me a mediocre title which is probably not worth my time, since there are plenty of 9+/10 games. He also mentions that he loved the first 5 hours. Do those 5 hours really count in this score? Cuz as far as I remember the main story of God of War 3 and Metal gear Solid 4 was about 6 hours long. Sure, this is a jrpg, but that doesn't change the fact that the game offers a significant amount of time of pure fan (since he/she loved it).

3. I really can't take someone seriously when they assert that "no one wanted/was asking for..." (a sequel in thsi case). It's a phrase you would use on a forum, but not when writing a review/a serious article. You don't know everyone and the sales alone (even if it sells 100.000 copies) suggest otherwise.

4. The reviewer is not supposed to give his personal opinion on a game. Same with the movie critic. When I first saw "Hugo", I posted on my facebook status: 7/10, but I'm sure the critics will love it. And they apparently did. If I was a reviewer I would have given it at least an 8 or 8,5. Because as a reviewer you're supposed to give a somewhat objective opinion (I know this sounds ridiculous, but it kind of makes sense). For example: I remember being in the cinema and not laughing at a single joke during the movie, but everyone around me did. And while I was watching it, I could see that it was funny, just not for me. Similarly, though I absolutely loved the Immortals, I would give it a 5,5, because that's what I think it deserves (I'm not saying that the score should be based on what the people wanna hear, but instead on its quality, e.g. acting/music/cinematography, plot etc).

5.The reviewer seems to be nitpicking. I could find tons of faults in every single game. I could say that there's grinding in every Pokemon game. That the music wasn't always great in Eternal Sonata (though it was superb most of the time). I've read that he/she was a well know hater of FFXIII and was still appointed to review this game. I expected better. Because a reviewer should put his feelings over a game aside and I was given the impression that they did not.

There are many more points that I have in mind, but this post is already too long. I hope I don't hurt anyone's feelings. This is just my opinion and I may be completely wrong. All I can say is that I am very disappointed in the reviewer and somewhat in VGC (for approving it). I really feel like it has become a cool thing to hate on Sqare Enix and Final Fantasy and that may have influenced the score and the review.

1 - I am not the same person who reviewed Final Fantasy XIII. Nobody else in our team wanted to review XIII-2, so that left me.  If I'd have reviewed XIII-2 compared to that, using the 9 as a starting point...well that would be horribly dishonest of me.  I start at a 5 and go from there, no exceptions. 

2 - I'm curious what about the score I didn't justify, for discusson's sake.  I said the first half was good, and that I liked the changes/improvements they made all around, but the second half of the review represented the second half of the game and how my opinion changed.  while the first half started great and gave me lots to look forward as far as both gameplay and plot was concerned, the second half was immensely disappointing.  The story never added up to anything significant, the ending was easily the worst ending I've ever seen in a game, and as far as gameplay is concerned I spent the entire second half mashing X and looking for other things to do when the battles played thmselves out.  as for content...well as much as I wanted to praise it for having loads of sidequests and minigames, the only standout was the casino (which I honestly didn't find fun), and most of the sidequests were incensequential, repetitive fetch quests and monster hunts. The game gave the illusion of content when it was just tedious.  as for the "well call of duty has a 5 hour campaign" argument is faulty becuase this is a different genre, the best way to compare games is within their own genre.  In this case, that's the JRPG.  I may not be the JRPG afficianado that Torillian is (dude knows his stuff), but I am a huge fan of final fantasy, pokemon, the Tales Of series, Star Ocean, and even Xenosaga to know enough about how turn based combat works and what works well; this does not work well.  The story is short and bland by comparison even to its own predecessor (which I felt was lackluster in its own right.)  I think the review is fully justified.  

3 - Well when Final Fantasy XIII-2 was announced, there was a veritable roar of "just finish Versus" from everyone I knew, only the biggest fans of XIII wanted a direct sequel.  Even people I knew that liked it said it wasn't good enough for a sequel, and if final fantasy is getting sequels/remakes, I think it's almost unanimously agreed upon that Final Fantasy VII is the one they should be focussing on, not their lowest rated, most divisive entry.  (On both metacritic and Gamrankings, final Fantasy XIII has the lowest score of all mainline FF games, and is even lower ranked than X-2)  

4 - it is virtually impossible to be completely objective in a game review (though I'd love to be).  an objective review would be a list of features and nothing more, as we all have our opinions on what works and what we like.  Objective is my opinion on Final Fantasy XII:  I absolutely adored that game as one of my all time favorites and defend it at every opportunity I get...but I can understand why someone would dislike the battle system, gambits, and relatively weak plot.  (the plot is actually good, but like XIII, it takes some work to unravel in its entirety).  This review is both objective and subjective, I listed the many changes to the game, I gave a basic idea of how things worked, and I then weighed in my own opinions on whether I felt it was appropriate or not.  More often than not I felt what they were doing did not work, even within the genre and considering what FFXIII fans might want.  

5 - I did nitpick, but almsot all the inconsequential stuff (Chocolina, Serah the schoolteacher kicking ass, the lyrics, etc) had no bearing on my final score, they were just there for the sake of me pointing them out, be it for a bit of subtle humor or to add some personality to the review.  yes I disliked XIII, but I was legitimately excited about the prospect of XIII-2, becuase I felt that they could very well have done this one right.  as mentioned in the review, they did fix the two major things I hated about XIII, but it had its own problems and was sorely lacking in content.  Also, as mentioned above, nobody else on the team wanted to review it becuase they all disliked XIII.  trust me, I wanted to like it, I DID pay 70 bucks for it with the hopes that it was better than XIII, but it was just boring.  All the subtle improvements on the combat and overall feel be damned, it still was boring, not interactive, and filled with design choices made seemingly to make you waste your time.  

I cannot give a game a good review that does that.  

Hey, thanks for the elaborate response. I mean, I still disagree with you, but it was nice of you to address every point like that.