| Jumpin said: You also have to admit that, in their quest for objectivity, reviewers as a whole tend to flock toward metrics that are often irrelevant for the vast majority of players. That’s why review scores are often inconsistently low with some of the most heavily loved games of all time. Pokémon Go is a great example of a game that became a cultural phenomenon and is one of the highest grossing games of all time, generating money on what really amounts to a whole lot of good will since the game is free and isn’t pinchy at all. Sure, some reviewers scored it high, but the meta score is low. |
I think the difference here is that you are equating time spent or money spent with quality. Though these may be correlated, they are different concepts.
In the case of Pokemon, it is an international sensation and has been for many MANY years now. Pokemon Go being a cultural phenomenon is less about the game itself and it's mechanics (specifically early on) and more the fact that it is Pokemon. We can easily see this by looking at the popularity of Niantic's previous game before Pokemon and even the Harry Potter and Pikmin themed versions (which were all MUCH less successful). A reviewer is providing an objective measurement of a subjective experience based on graphical presentation, narrative, gameplay mechanics, etc. But we know that quality doesn't always equate to sales (Persona 5 vs. Pokemon Sword and Shield). This doesn't mean that the reviewers are "wrong" as so much more goes into the popularity of a game than just it's general gameplay. Targeted demographic, cost, amount of platforms it's on, marketing, etc. all of these factors play a huge role but none of these are typically considered when looking into a review (aside from maybe cost occasionally).
