Could a spin-off of a cartoony franchise that is often called over-saturated get 10/10 from large name reviewers IF it were a paragon of its genre and oozing with charm?

Would you trust IGN, or Gamespot, or Kotaku, etc? Or do you think they'd put their supposed Street-Cred before an honest review?

So Mario games.

that's kind of what I was wondering, but overall I enjoy mario and cartoony games a lot soooo...

Maaaaybe. There is a vague chance the question was inspired by a Captain of Treasurology who's game, despite many big name previewers who admit they'd wanted it and love its demo, has come to my attention it is at risk of serious underscoring IF it manages to perfectly execute its potential.

I assume you're referring to Captain Toad.

IGN has been talking the game up a lot, so no, they're not afraid to risk their "street cred" by giving praise where praise is due.

Great games deserve great scores. Unfortunately, I have no faith in most game journalists to correctly identify a great game when they play one.

You're definitely right about IGN talking it up already, but the pessimist in me feels like this is early damage control because they suspect it could easily warrant/demand 9.0/10. The fact it was possibly demanded into existence though does it a significant benefit.

But it still presents the opening for a fascinating hypothetical - could it be docked even 0.1 of a score from reviewers afraid of backlash due to it being so immensely pre-judge-able by consumers?

It's EAD Tokyo. No one who knows their pedigree would be remotely surprised if this turned out to be one of the best puzzle games of the decade.

The people who would be surprised are not the sort who browse the Nintendo section of IGN, so they probably won't even be aware of the score.

Anyway the game probably won't get a whole lot of 10s. Expect mostly 9s. This has more to do with it being a puzzle game than a Mario spinoff, I believe.

I generally trust the reviewers I trust.

Don't trust that from IGN. They talked up Flappy Bird non-stop talking about how addictive it is and then gave it a 5.4. Did the same thing with Amazing Spiderman and then gave it a 6.

Of course opinions can vary between the person writing the preview and the person writing the review. But I already don't trust IGN, so you needn't worry about that.

Anyway, I don't see how that matters. A variety of factors can change the impression a game gives through a preview versus the final product. For instance, the levels previewed might be outstanding, but maybe come release there simply aren't enough of them; the game is just too short on content. Point is, OP expressed concern that major sites like IGN might be afraid to present Captain Toad in a positive light, but they have already done so. Whatever score IGN ultimately gives the game, I see no reason to suspect it might be influenced by their preconceived fears of how closed-minded non-Nintendo fans will be regarding the game's reception.