I don't disgaree, I'm just thinking of Reggie's simplified reasoning around "software sells hardware" (as in; not much else matters), which would by extension indicate that "good software sells more hardware", which in turn brings me to the belief many hold that high quality 1st party software alone can somehow help the Wii U become a contender.

Not saying you are one of these people though.

I agree that good games are desireable, of course, that's why I stick to the platform where I feel I get the best quality software for the best prices. That said; metascores are rarely a good metric for me personally in deciding which games are fun to play, I found myself being incredibly bored by a lot of very highly rated games in the 7th gen and I feel that the whole review system has collapsed on itself, asserting that production value is the supreme merit of a solid title, before any other aspects, leading to some gorgeous but shallow game experiences in the past 6-7 years.

Critical hit is like 80+ imo.

For a high budget AAA game, 80+ probably is a better mark. On the other hand, games in certain genres like Party games tend to be reviewed more harshly, so that 70+ is a better mark for being a critical hit. Ultimately, I agree with Metacritic in that 75 is a decent "average" line between critical success and failure.

That said, perhaps we could also examine this topic with a stricter definition of "critical hit." Maybe we can even jack it up to 85+, simply because that's when people start generally agreeing that a game is great.

Alright. I think I just misunderstood your tone.

The "software sells hardware" line is a good one, but overstated. Software may sell hardware, but hardware defines software. I am not under the delusion that the Wii U will compete for the top spot this gen.

I'm not sure about the idea of production value being the primary driver behind critical success. Too many indie games, many of which have retro-style graphics, have been acclaimed this past half-decade or so for that to make much sense to me. That said, I myself don't view aggregate review scores to be more than a helpful tool in determining which games I should buy. The difference between a game rated 80 and 90 is much closer to me personally than it is in reviewing circles, to the extent where I find the 80 game to be often better.

On the other hand, I still believe that using reviews and aggregates of them via Metacritic and similar sites to be a useful tool, at least if not too heavily relied upon. In this thread, for example, we can compare a bunch of reviews in 2014 to those in 2008. So long as we understand what we're actually measuring, I think reviews are still valuable at least in the macro sense.

This number should be revised to 30, Call of Duty: Ghost was basicly not reviewed and thats a solid game on WiiU a system that really doesn't have any other FPS games. 

I think the more important question is how many mega hits will the WiiU get this year. I'm talking games with score of 90s and above. None in 2012 and only three in 2013 (including the remake of Wind Waker). This number need to be at least 5 this year.

Almost as many games that will be launching in 2014 on the système. So like... around 5 or 6?

Good Indie games are often judged based on actual merits since it is implied through the genre/branch itself that it has lower production value by default, that's one more reason to love Indie games. I'm mostly talking about so-called "AAA" productions, where production value seems to negate massive flaws, shallow designs, linearity with poor scripts and writing and baseless gameplay mechanics that only detracts from the immersion of the medium (insta-fail stealth missions, QTE's etc).

It's like reviewers are blinded by the dazzle and fail to see that that is basically what it is in most cases; dazzle. I'm not saying all 7th gen games were bad, but there was a crazy amount of inflated reviews scores for games and franchises with obvious and sometimes incredibly deep-set and massive flaws and faults (that sometimes weren't even mentioned or commented upon much at all).

For retail games... more than 2013.

Isn't a critical hit 90+?

The majority these days thinks a game is shit when it's not green on meta