Oh yeah. Some people inflate scores for the established franchises they know and are afraid of giving big names poor scores. But there are also people who intentionally give big titles slightly lower scores almost as bait, and also people who underrate big titles due to high expectations from the franchise rather than the quality of the game. So I'm not sure where it balances out. Probably on average a little higher than it should be.
GTA is probably the biggest culprit of franchise hype overscoring. Four was an offender and five maybe followed suit. Dunno, I haven't touched it.
Bioshock Infinite. Though I can't really tell if it's because it's Bioshock or simply because it looks and sounds "artsy" that it is a bit inflated over a game like Dishonored.
Halo could be one. If it didn't have the name a game like Reach/ODST would probably not get top scores.
Naughty Dog as a brand might be getting there.
Zelda's probably inflated. I'm not sure how the entire reviewing community can on average love those games as much as I do.
In general I'm a bit confused how anything at all gets a 95+ average amongst critics. I feel like there should never be that sort of consensus and if there is it's because people are all riding a train of some sort.
