| thedawghousev2 said: So I recently played Dying Light at a friend's house, and it was an amazing experience. Almost everyone on the internet likes or loves Dying Light, and almost everyone who has played Evolve has said it's alright or it's meh. Here's the thing, Dying Light scored a 73 on metacritic, but Evolve is somewhere above 80 on metacritic. Dying Light has an 8.0 user score, but Evolve has somewhere below a 5.0 user score. Also a lot of PS4 exclusives have gotten horrible reviews but a lot of people like them. I know just because I feel a game should get good reviews doesn't mean it should, but when almost everyone enjoys a game, it makes me feel some of these reviews are bullshit. |
I agree with the thread title, but not your reasoning. In fact, I think it's this kind of reasoning that helps contribute to the problem with video game reviews.
To the first point, yes, video game reviews and game journalism in general is a mess. The industry and the media are too closely connected, personally and financially. Journalists, if they can be called that, attend industry events, accept gifts and complimentary merchandise from game companies, and share their physical and electronic space with advertisers who possess a good amount of financial leverage over their work. It doesn't help that so many video game journalists are untrained and uneducated; some of them are simply fans with a byline.
Now, not all video game journalists are part of the probem. Many are independent, ethical writers who are in now way embroiled with the runwaway nepotism and commecialism that defines the mainstream video game media. And it's these critics who, I think, suffer most from the reasoning you provided in your opener. I've said it a hundred times and I'll say it again: video game critics, like all critics, are there to inform public opinion, not reflect it. We look to critics to provide a comprehensive and, if possible, entertaining review of a particular product. They tell us what works and what doesn't, because they have access and experience we as consumers lack. If 99 out of 100 consumers like a product, they're not obligated to like it too. They're obligated to be honest with themselves and with their audience, no matter our expectations. In fact, I think this fan criticism -- that reviews are illegitimate because they disagree with popular sentiment -- distracts from the real problems, which I outlined above. As long as fans of Sony, Microsoft, and Nintendo continue bickering over which games scored better on Metacritic, the underlying problems in the video game industry and in game journalism will persist unabated.
