So after the very divisive reviews of Sonic lost World, Wonderful 101 and Zombi U, one concern many gaming journalists brought up was the difficulty levels of the games in question. This has me thinking..are these journalists frustrated by the games so called shortcomings, or are they just not good gamers at all and lack the patience to try and master them.

Don't get me wrong these games arent to everybodies tastes, but ive found each one so far to be very rewarding because i have taken the time to master the controls, level design and pacing of the games. Wonderful 101 in particular can be brutal, yes at times drawing the shapes on the gamepad can be clunky, but instead of putting down the gamepad and declaring the game as crap, i have mastered the controls to a point where i can execute all the drawings everytime without even looking at the gamepad. 

Do a lot of modern gamers and journalists prefer easy accessable games, with a certain element of hand holding? hence the reason more challenging games can often get penalised. 

What is a "poor gamer"? And, of course they lack the patience to master a game, as they're almost always writing for a deadline. They aren't going to spend hours trying to draw shapes just right. It's not going to happen.

If you're asking if they're below the skill level of most gamers, I really doubt it. Most of them play a lot of games, which is generally how you get better at something. Many of them have also been gaming for years, so I'm not sure why they would be worse than previous generations.

One of the biggest improvements in gaming over the last couple of decades has been the phasing out of the "difficulty by frustration" method of the past. A lot of older games were just really cheap. I, for one, am very glad of that. Many people bring up Battletoads as though it were something great, when in fact it was just broken and frustrating. Other than that, a lot of old games relied mainly on timing and were absolute cake once you got that down.

For the most part, I don't think games should be frustrating due to clunky controls or cheap tactics. That's a lot different than challenging game-play.

If that's true, then please explain the high scores demon's souls and dark souls have received.

I don't know about that. There are many problems with game journalists and journalism, but I'm not sure this is one of them. I think the bigger problem is that reviewers simply don't spend enough time with each game. But that has more to do with workload than with skill level.

I think a lot of it has to do with a lack of skill. Its just not needed in a lot of games today, so when they do come across one that requires skill, many will write it off. Most of these reviewers do spend hours with a game. Most will try to beat a game before the review and you cannot do that in a couple of hours, and you cant get a feel for what a game is like in a couple hours. Deadline or not. Many times they receive these games weeks in advance of the review. That is plenty of time to spend with any game. If they are not playing the whole game, how can they accurately review it? That's like reviewing a movie by watching the first 20 minutes then leaving the theater.
I cannot speak for Sonic but ZombiU was hardcore and many reviewers were not use to that style of game.
W101 was not only hard but had a new style of control that many were not use to and didn't want to take the time to learn it. Also a few hated it simply because it was on Wii U.
Also there is a growing trend by many sites to hate on games simply because they are on Nintendo platforms.
Take something like dark souls. If it was Wii U exclusive it wouldn't have those high reviews.

Do you have a feeling Bayonetta 2 will have divisive reviews? or be compared unfavourably to the first one? simply due to the fact its a Wii U exclusive. I have that feeling....

Yeah I know tis going to happen. Not every review of course but many will play it down simply for being Wii U exclusive.

Not only are they bad gamers, I highly doubt many actually pick up a controller everyday anymore. Just scan forums to create their 'opinion'.

I love difficult games. There was a time when it was a badge of honor to play a hard game and see it through to the end when everyone else threw their controllers at the screen. I hate games that I can beat in 12 hours without dying more than a dozen times. It's why I buy RPG's because at least I get my value.

Actually, Adam Sessler, a very well known game journalist brought up this topic not too long ago. He was doing reviews and had noticed how he had problems actually beating a game as deadlines grew ever shorter. At some point he had to give review copies to co-workers cause he just couldn't beat the games he was supposed to review.

He implied that age had probably weakened his hand-eye coordination.

No.

I've heard the argument a lot recently, and often times the person making it is ignorant, arrogant, immature, or any combination of the three. Sometimes there is a legitimate criticism, but there are a lot of cases of old-fashioned elitism.