What? I'm more worried about piranhas.
AndrewWK said:
|
I'm talking about his other games, namely Killer 7 and No More Heroes.
Khuutra said:
Sorry, this assumes that there is an objective standard of quality when it comes to this particular craft, and that isn't the case. A reviewer's job isn't to tell me what I like, it's to give a fair assessment of what she likes, and by viewing the body of her work I can see whether or not we have the same values. If a reviewer doesn't show their own values in the review, the review is less than worthless, and might as well be boiled down to bullet points about framerate and the number of levels. |
So basically you're saying reviews are worthless and we'd be better off without them. You're creative utopia where everyone can discern a person's opinion (the reviewer) and transfer that information into useful personal information (what that exactly is, would be a mystery to me) all the while treating that information as being simply one persons's view and using it successfully to make a decision on a purchase, does not exist.
Quite honestly, I'm sick and tired of reading people's points of view that sound like yours. In the "old days" when we bought magazines like "Sega Power" in the 90s we read a review and bought a game based on the review, 9 times out of 10 the review was spot on. It gave a clear buy this or don't buy this.
Your view basically makes reviews next to useless.
I'll pin you on this and ask what exactly is a review for then?
I realise my tone's a little aggresive but hey this needs resolving, your someone who has been on vgchartz a fair old while, you have a very neutral fair post histroy and you're definately not an insane fanboy so I'm very curious to hear your view on "the old days" of reviews, vs the reviews of today, which I appreciate are a load of rubbish.
But that's MY point, they are rubbish because they have become "subjective opinion", instead of a damn good indicator on a if a game is worth buying. Something that you seem to support!?
dodece makes a very clear and correct argument imo. I fully agree and always have done with that opinion. People these days keep seeing games as some kind of subjective art form. Absolute rubbish, games have artistic content but their overall purpose isn't to tantalise the senses, it's to provide entertainment. Entertainment as in FUN or not FUN.
There's nothing subjective there, except it you don't like a particular type of fun, i.e - GENRE, in which case that would be clear from the review and a prospective purchaser would be well aware if the review they were reading was for a J-RPG or an FPS.
| Dodece said: @zim Obviously my analogies confused you. They aren't contradictory by the way. A glass can be both half empty and half full. You were obviously having trouble grasping it in one way. So I put it to you another way. Obviously it didn't work so I am just going to dumb it all the way down. Reviewers are being paid to do a job. You can argue for some kind of artistic license all you want, but if the audience is dissatisfied with the result. The audience is of every right to take their money elsewhere. They don't have to use a reviewer if their review score doesn't reflect their tastes. The question a reviewer needs to ask themselves is are they doing this for themselves, or are they doing this for their audience. They shouldn't confuse those things, because they are actually different. When they make it all about their likes or dislikes. Then they aren't tending to the needs of their audience, and in the long run they are going to become ridiculed. You don't tell the customer they are wrong, and if you constantly do that you should not be surprised when you get a angry response. I ain't saying they should change their score. I am saying they are going to regret handing out that high score. The number of gamers that are going to feel that score was spot on is going to be exceedingly small. While the vast majority is going to be dissatisfied, or worse will feel outright lied to. You seem to be confused about the whole price value analysis so I will now move onto that. It isn't that the game is short. That isn't the issue here. The issue is the game is short and costs sixty dollars. There is nothing wrong with a short game if that is reflected in the price. You can say fast food is good, but that comes with the stipulation for what it costs. You don't expect cheap food to be extraordinary. When the price is low you can lower your standards. When the price is high your standards should be higher. If you go into a fine dining restaurant you shouldn't expect to spend fifty dollars or more on cheap deep fried crap. Shadow Complex may be short, but it is short at a appropriate price point. As for Bayonetta I think you really have the wrong impression. It isn't one of my favorite games this generation, or a genre I am particularly fond of at all. I felt it was a good game for what it was, and deserved to be brought up in this thread, because many reviewers have highlighted the strong similarities. Personally I didn't pay full price for the game. I picked it up used for fifteen bucks. I feel I got my moneys worth. If you want to know how I would have reviewed the game if I had to pay full price. I would have given it a eighty. |
It's a shame that what your saying makes so much sense and virtually everyone took that stance in the 90s with reviews. I used to gladly pay my £3.99 for a games magazine back then and actually enjoy reading every review. You could tell if a game was crap, no question and reading the reviews was actually genuinely interesting. I'm preaching to the converted though.
The problem is, journalists at review sites are writing to advance their careers and thus, stripping down a game and giving the details on it's quality in a clear non fluffy form is hard to put across in a dramatic style. So they don't.
It's a fuckup.
...Again, preaching to the converted but fuck me, it's amazing so many people these days don't get it!
| fillet said:
Quite honestly, I'm sick and tired of reading people's points of view that sound like yours. In the "old days" when we bought magazines like "Sega Power" in the 90s we read a review and bought a game based on the review, 9 times out of 10 the review was spot on. It gave a clear buy this or don't buy this. Your view basically makes reviews next to useless. I'll pin you on this and ask what exactly is a review for then? I realise my tone's a little aggresive but hey this needs resolving, your someone who has been on vgchartz a fair old while, you have a very neutral fair post histroy and you're definately not an insane fanboy so I'm very curious to hear your view on "the old days" of reviews, vs the reviews of today, which I appreciate are a load of rubbish. But that's MY point, they are rubbish because they have become "subjective opinion", instead of a damn good indicator on a if a game is worth buying. Something that you seem to support!? dodece makes a very clear and correct argument imo. I fully agree and always have done with that opinion. People these days keep seeing games as some kind of subjective art form. Absolute rubbish, games have artistic content but their overall purpose isn't to tantalise the senses, it's to provide entertainment. Entertainment as in FUN or not FUN. There's nothing subjective there, except it you don't like a particular type of fun, i.e - GENRE, in which case that would be clear from the review and a prospective purchaser would be well aware if the review they were reading was for a J-RPG or an FPS. |
No, see, I thought reviews in the 90's were primarily horrible. Christ, have you ever read the old EarthBound reviews? A non-stop travesty.
Fun is subjective.
Back in the mid-to-late 90's I read a lot of IGN reviews, and I became familiar with a few of the reviewers in particular. Some of them I disagreed with - a lot! One of them, I think Peer Schneider, I thought his stuff was pretty on-the-ball. I did better by listening to his reviews.
No single review is going to be perfect. Even in a review where I disagree with the writer, I can usually pick out elements of a game that I think will be good for me or not.
The purpose of a review is to lay out what a reviewer liked or did not like about a game and why. That's it. Proper communications of a reviewer's values will let the reader know if those values will appeal to them or not.
Fair comment, I respect your opinion as it comes down to taste then in what type of reviews people find most helpful or interesting. Could I ask you to have a quick look at any review on the bluray review site called highdefdigest. It is exactly imo what reviews for games should be like, it has a review of the movie, a review of the video, audio and then the extras.
I'm curious if you would prefer that type of format, from virtually all game reviews on gaming websites I just don't have any idea how the game will play. Maybe it's nostalgia and as a child reading a review I could imagine how the game would play and I guess games back then were a lot more simple.
For me at least, I'll read a 5 page IGN review and really have no idea what the game is about, there's so much filler, not enough technical specs, I like to know about frame rate for example and the word "smooth" simply isn't enough for me. I need numbers or at least language that is universal and not some creatively worded prose to describe very basic ideas, direct analogies or condemnation if deserved to the nth degree. That information should be balanced directly with how good the game is to play not some wishy washy poem with clear self promotion at it's heart.
I appreciate a discussion like this could go on forever, I'm curious though what you disliked about reviews in the 90s specifically? I haven't read the old Earthbound reviews.
Reviews in the 90's were shoddily written, as most enthusiast reviews tend to be.
I like Edge's reviews. Communicative without being flowery, effective without resorting to bullet points.
| Andrespetmonkey said: 5/10 on IGN :S |
And CVG. I think we can just assume that it is a fairly mediocre game.
As far as the debate about whether or not reviews are a good thing or not, after a lot of looking around, I've come to the conclusion that the kind folks at GamesRadar are the people most in line with my personal opinions. About 80% of the time, anyway. Of course, I still read the content of the reviews but IF I WERE the type of person that just went by a number score, more often than not, I agree with their conclusions.
On a different note, what the hell is wrong with Jim Sterling? This guy seems to have some serious issues.
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