Jay, I appreciate you dispelling the myths of Metacritic, but I strongly disagree with the assertion that games like Halo: CE and Ocarina of Time are great only for their time and pale in comparison to more technologically advanced games from this generation.

Compare games like Ocarina, Halo, and Final Fantasy III against their more modern counterparts and they still emerge as the best games, any gap in technology notwithstanding.

I believe they show they can still stand on their own feet as good games but certainly are no longer "the best" games.   They show their age in gameplay, graphics, features, etc

Games advance just like anything else does and since those games were released they show their age in more than one way.  As I said, still good, just no longer the best.  All three scores would be hurt "if" they released now as new ip's.

The thing is they set the bar and paved the way for what games are now but you certainly dont believe games havent advanced since then do you?

Great read indeed..there tends to be a lot of misconceptions about metacritic from gamers in general.

slightly off topic: but wouldn't it be cool if there was a thread to keep track of the average of all exclusive games from each of the big three seeing as how its a new generation. Sort of like an "EXCLUSIVES METACRITIC" if you will.

Games have advanced technologically, but game design has deteriorated since the fourth, fifth, and sixth generations, which I would identify as a golden age of gaming.

Advanced AI, physics, and online capabilities are worth very little if the foundation of the game is poorly constructed. Great games are being made all the time, yes, but modern games aren't eclipsing classic games simply for being more modern, for having a modern aesthetic, for supporting a modern online infrastructure.

If a game as great as Ocarina or Halo arrived in 2013, armed with the technology of 1998 and 2001, respectively, I would rank it among the best games ever made. Would critics? I don't know. But, as you wrote, the system is full of flaws.

Have not been to that site in a very long time.

If anything, it just confuses the crap out of me. You are better off finding a few sources that you trust and sticking to them.

Check my  signature, already doing it ;)

        In my opinion, Halo 4 is worse because it's not a true Halo game. It's Call of Duty mixed with Metroid Prime. Agree with the rest though.

yeah.... thats how i used to find good book.... back in college :P

great post!

IMO Metacritic is only as useful as the work one puts in it to research a game- it provides a semi starting place with the aggragate score and a database of written reviews- if one only uses the score to make game buying decisions then Metacrtic will not offer nearly as useful guidance as it would if it is used as a starting point to research the game via reading a cross section of reviews, looking at a cross section of scores etc If someone only uses the score they are likely to .miss out on games they may have seriously enjoyed or buy a game they really don t like- I m not sure which is worse.

You have a point, good arguments