Are Nintendo games held to an unrealistic standard?

[LMU Uncle Alfred]

Chrkeller said:

"**As gamers of any type we typically feel that all games can and should be graded on a general level of fun or good experience to make up the majority of their score, yes. But that doesn't mean they deserve the highest acclaim.**"

Disagree completely. Fun is fun. That is all that matters.

"Online and coop criteria are limited to people (including how well mannered they are) so for online and coop I could argue that they're not as consistent or as important for a game to excel objectively at as much as story, art design, soundtrack and innovation/uniqueness. "

In your opinion, which is fine. Not in my opinion. That is my point. Basically things you find important should be part of the review process, things other people find important, well you don't think it should be included as criteria. You do see the problem there, right?  Which you, kudos to you because you acknowledge it at the end of your post.  Again, credit for the honesty.  And I agree, I don't take any of this heated.  I just don't think art (books, movies, videogames, plays, etc) should be rated on anything other than enjoyment.  Art is designed with a specific objective, there is reason why certain elements may have been included while others have intentionally be left out. 

At the end of the day I will take Odyssey coop (I have young kids) over any videogame narrative in history.  I hate stories in games.  If anything I think too many games push the story too hard, and it distracts/interrupts actually playing the game.  I would be pleased as punch (outside rpgs) if stories disappeared in gaming.  I have beaten Dark Souls 1-3 at least a combined dozen times.  My understanding of the story is something something fire, collect souls, something something fire.  Stories just don't do it for me.    

As an easy example, I don't think Schindler's list should max out at 9.25 because it is black and white.  It was filmed black/white (minus the red coat) for intentional purposes.  Something like Mario Galaxy doesn't have a narrative, because a narrative would absolutely ruin the flow of the game.  So Galaxy shouldn't be held back (in terms of reviews) because Nintendo made the correct choice by not interrupting the game with a narrative that would serve no purpose.

A lot of the stuff above you actually agreed with me on despite saying or swaying into some disagreement.  Like the majority (or all) of a game's score being about how enjoyable it is. Fun is fun, but fun is subjective and that's where I disagree that being the only important criteria.  I myself would also need a game to be engaging in a variety of other ways to feel like it deserved something extra. I myselft like you also prefer RPGs to be the ones to have heavy stories only compared to other genres.  Very few exceptions with action games, but there are some.

Not everyone has kids, but even if you do you may still prefer a game to have a story.  If you don't and feel it interrupts that's fine.  But to fully satisfy for the sake of acclaim I think a good story/soundtrack/innovation etc should be prominent as much as possible to give it that added sense of worth over other games.

Generally speaking I don't believe there even should be a review system, but they've been around for so long creating their own trends on what ought or what not ought to be so it gets annoying to me sometimes.