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Yeah, us poor Europeans would clearly know nothing.  And heaven forbid the Japanese, who drove so much of videogame history, would know anything worthwhile about videogames.  But wait, why should I even post, apparently only US opinion matters.

But heck, I will post.

OT - game reviewing is pretty variable and that's all there is to it.  Every job, whether a plumber or a reviewer, has people who are amazing (normally a small minotiry), ideally a decent number who are good, and some real idiots at the bottom of the scale.

Videogame reviewing though, is harder than most, as for a number of reasons the basic criteria for reviewing aren't even clear.

Take films.  In principle, if you want to be a professional film reviewer, you are not just offering another opinion, but an informed opinion (a distinction often missed on the internet I find) - i.e. you will very likely undertand more about films, acting, narrative, cinematography, etc. than the average man in the street, and you will also attempt to review free of bias.

Now in films, few reviewers in reality are of this level.  Most are just offering an opinion, no different from you or me, others are actually informed, and therefore worth the read.

But in games it just all seems less clear.  Is a short SP game as good as an MP game with lots of online?  Well, that seems to vary from site to site and gamer to gamer?  Should a game with equally fun gameplay but better graphics score more or the same than another very fun game with slightly weaker graphics?  Again, very divided opinions.

All I can say is any official magazine should be viewed with utmost caution, obvious fanboy or biases reviews should also be treated with caution, unless you are a similar fanboy in which case they are proabably perfect for you, and a few sites/magazines do seem to have a certain level of reliability, although again, I've never found one which attains a truly consistent level, with even Edge (which I tend to like overall) having a reasonable number of review 'wobbles' where they clearly show inconsistent standards across their review team.

Personally, I believe the best reviewer for you is you (or people like you on the internet).  Think about what you like, what you don't and just pay attention to what a game offers vs any marketing hype or bullshit and you should be able to buy wisely.

The toughest test is not buying day one.  Sure, it's tempting, and if you're sure about the title why not, but personally, with games as with films, I find that there is a whole lot more interesting info available in the days right after release for those who want to chose carefully or with limited budgets, and if you can hold of diving right in you'll cut down a lot on the amount of games you regret buying.

I will say (impartially too) that I've been quite impressed with the approach Naz is taking on this site, even if I do feel the value score is proving hard for the reviewers to apply sensibly acorss different genres/games.

GameSpot and Eurogamer for me.

M! Games (consoles/handhelds), GEE (consoles/handhelds/PC), Gamestar (PC)

I don't care about the scores my 3 favourite games magazines give (and GEE doesn't give scores anyway), I'm interested in their articles and opinions. Plus: M! and GEE have no bias against or for any system. I love (music/movie/games) magazines with well-written articles, interesting background stories, intelligent interviews. All the print magazines I read will disappear within the next few years though.

gamespot have been good with me

wish they would do 2 separate reviews for games one for online and another for SP

also i tend to find out issues with games that are never mentioned in the reviews which is sad

Other than the Japanese, I think American reviewers are the worst (and I will chalk up my differences with Japanese reviewers to cultural differences and different preferences in style of gaming). Eurogamer and Edge are two of the only major publications out there that don't seem to mind ripping a game to shreds if they feel it deserves their wrath.

I like gametrailers.

I really think it is about finding the reviewer with your taste. That is the biggest factor.

I find people with similar tastes and go from there. I like some of the editors from IGN, Gamespot, and 1up. Some folks from those sites I tend to disagree with so I give less credence to their advice.

People find one bad review from a site and use it as damning evidence against anything a site has to say, which is unfair. No review site is written by one person so find the reviewers you like and for fuck sake read the damn reviews instead of just looking at a number.

A reviewer is as reliable as you want them to be.

At the end of the day, most reviewers will say what they will to keep their sites/publication relevant and get a paycheck every 2 weeks or so.

Those.