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Forums - Gaming Discussion - Jim Sterling’s site under attack after Zelda: BotW review

potato_hamster said:
fleischr said:

Zelda had dozens, if not hundreds, of "0" review scores the day it released. Are you honestly going to believe those?

Can't say I've met a single other gamer IRL lately that played the game and really, really hated it.

Just my impression - seems to me the only fanbase really upset about Zelda is a certain one that is missing out on it entirely.

There are people that actually feel they need to rate Zelda "0" every chance they get to "counteract" all of the raving reviews of the game. It seems to me like a "rabid" fanbase brings with it "rabid" haters.

Both of those people aren't quite right in the head. I mean just look at this shit. Someone dares to give the game a "good" rating and a swath of a fanbase goes full psycho on him. If Jim gave this game a 9/10 no one would have batted an eye. It makes you wonder if other reviewers gave the game a higher score than they otherwise would have out of fear of the hate mob as much as you wonder if Jim gave this game a 7 than say an 8 just to get the attention. It has to  go both ways.

Don't get me wrong, this game is the best game Nintendo has put out in years, possibly ever. It will undoubtedly go down as one of the greatest games of all time, but let's just temper our enthuiasm just a little, on both sides of the fence, shall we? This isn't a perfect game. It's okay to criticize it. It's also okay to love the shit out it despite not loving every single aspect of the game. It's also okay to acknowledge that you can understand why someone might not enjoy the game as much as you because some of those aspects might hamper their experience more than it does yours.

It is okay to only give a 7/10 if that's what it deserves. It just seems suspect Sterling gave this the lowest rating among all other Zelda games he's reviewed. But to each their own I guess.

I also find it odd that Sterling is starting a lot of really hurtful, insulting, unnecessary (imo) digs at the Zelda fanbase. It frankly is very unprofessional behavior for a professional reviewer.



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Kyuu said:
Shiken said:
Honestly anything under 8/10 is clickbait for a game so widely praised, even by non Zelda fans. Reviews should be based on quality of the gameplay alone, not if you like or dislike Zelda.

And aside from a few minor framerate issues, the quality of Breath of the Wild is matched by very few games. I van see nit picking it down to an 8, but a 7 is reaching.

Quality is subjective. The near-unmatched quality you're speaking of is your opinion and nothing more. Yes, your opinion is apparently shared by a large number of people but in no way does that invalidate the opinion of someone who disagrees with it, who does not see the game to be all that great. I'm pretty sure there are thousands of Nintendo gamers who wouldn't score The Last of Us anything over a 7. Many wouldn't even give it a 6, using the little myth of it being too cinematic with forgettable gameplay.

I for one hate open world games in general and view The Elder Scrolls (especially Oblivion), GTA (especially 4), and MGS5 as some of most overrated games of all time. I skipped Horizon but will get Zelda, because it's Zelda. Hopefully it doesn't disappoint me like MGS5 did.

As a former HONEST reviewer, an opinion or personal disappointment in a product is not a measure of quality.  Letting personal feelings get in the way of a final score is hack writting and clickbaits are even worse.

 

Example, GTAV to me is horrible.  It is boring and I just cannot get into it.  However if I were to score that game I would give it a 10.  This is because even though it bores me to tears, I can see the actual quality within the game.

Likewise, I loved playing the game Xedge for the PS3.  The story was all over the place however and the quality o the game is a 6 at best.  This is what it means to write an honest review.

If yiu are go ok ng to pose as a professional critic and be put on metacritic, you need to act that way.  Zelda is a 9 or a 10.  If you nitpick, an 8 is acceptable.  Anything less and you are really reaching, no matter how you look at it.



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Mnementh said:

 

 That's why you see the phenomenom, that people watching Youtube-videos of it dislike it, while people playing it mostly like it. Reviewers have to play it to give a vote.

 

Just a thought but out of those playing Zelda at the moment, what percentage do you think is non-hardcore nintendo fans?

We have a console that just launched so those buying it day one are probably huge fans, and those who bought it on wiiu, a console that flopped hard and was bought mostly by the most loyal nintendo fans.

Had it been on 3ds which has a userbase consisting of all sorts of people, I, personally, would trust those reviews just a bit more.

What do you think? Is it possible/likely that the people who are currently playing it are bound to like it being such huge fans of nintendo or perhaps of Zelda?



naruball said:
Mnementh said:

 

 That's why you see the phenomenom, that people watching Youtube-videos of it dislike it, while people playing it mostly like it. Reviewers have to play it to give a vote.

 

Just a thought but out of those playing Zelda at the moment, what percentage do you think is non-hardcore nintendo fans?

We have a console that just launched so those buying it day one are probably huge fans, and those who bought it on wiiu, a console that flopped hard and was bought mostly by the most loyal nintendo fans.

Had it been on 3ds which has a userbase consisting of all sorts of people, I, personally, would trust those reviews just a bit more.

What do you think? Is it possible/likely that the people who are currently playing it are bound to like it being such huge fans of nintendo or perhaps of Zelda?

May or may not be true, but is ones opinion not more valid if they have played a game versus not having played it?

Regardless if biased or not, their thoughts on the matter should hold more weight than another who has never played the game.



golfgt170 said:
palou said:

Again, looking at the amazon scores should make it fairly obvious that exceptionaly few people that reviewed on metacritic actually played the game. There are also far more 1st 3 day reviews than would be normal, both positive and negative, which further indicates that the score is more a fanboywar than anything to do with he quality of the game. Look also at the number of reviews, well over twice as much as any other game selling similar amounts would have after a little more than a week of sales. This is an unusual case.

Horizon is a new IP but with a lot of hype behind it. Got 4000 user review scores which is again pretty impressive. Yet it has 89% critic and 84% user. your point?

Zelda has twice the user reviews Horizon had in the same time frame (add 900 reviews for the WiiU version), for approximately equivalent sales. If Horizon had 3000 earnest reviews and 1000 fanboys (of either side, doesnt matter) reviewing, then Zelda had 3000 earnest reviews and 5000 fanboys.

Also LOOK AT THE AMAZON REVIEWS FOR ONCE! Both Zelda and Horizon were well received by the people that ACTUALLY HAVE the game.

 

Amazon reviews have their problems - people also take off points if delivery service is bad. But if, on amazon, 89% of people gave it 5 stars, and only 5% of the reviews are 1-2 stars, while Metacritic has 20% of reviews in the red, it seems fairly evident that the people voting on Metacritic are not representatif of the people that actually bought the game.



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palou said:

Zelda has twice the user reviews Horizon had in the same time frame (add 900 reviews for the WiiU version), for approximately equivalent sales. If Horizon had 3000 earnest reviews and 1000 fanboys (of either side, doesnt matter) reviewing, then Zelda had 3000 earnest reviews and 5000 fanboys.

already answered: 

All games on metacritic get a 0% as soon as the game opens for rating. Ofc games that have a history of 20 years arent comparable on the same degree as new IPs. Haters gonna hate that's for sure. But then again haters aren't only in zelda territory. See CoD etc...



golfgt170 said:
palou said:

Zelda has twice the user reviews Horizon had in the same time frame (add 900 reviews for the WiiU version), for approximately equivalent sales. If Horizon had 3000 earnest reviews and 1000 fanboys (of either side, doesnt matter) reviewing, then Zelda had 3000 earnest reviews and 5000 fanboys.

already answered: 

All games on metacritic get a 0% as soon as the game opens for rating. Ofc games that have a history of 20 years arent comparable on the same degree as new IPs. Haters gonna hate that's for sure. But then again haters aren't only in zelda territory. See CoD etc...

Then if you agree that it isn't reliable, why not look at Amazon reviews instead?



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naruball said:
Mnementh said:

 

 That's why you see the phenomenom, that people watching Youtube-videos of it dislike it, while people playing it mostly like it. Reviewers have to play it to give a vote.

 

Just a thought but out of those playing Zelda at the moment, what percentage do you think is non-hardcore nintendo fans?

We have a console that just launched so those buying it day one are probably huge fans, and those who bought it on wiiu, a console that flopped hard and was bought mostly by the most loyal nintendo fans.

Had it been on 3ds which has a userbase consisting of all sorts of people, I, personally, would trust those reviews just a bit more.

What do you think? Is it possible/likely that the people who are currently playing it are bound to like it being such huge fans of nintendo or perhaps of Zelda?

You always have people bickering. Think about Skyward Sword. Played also by the hardcore Nintendo fans, but they bickered about the game. But this time it's mostly from people who haven't played the game.

And again: do you really think the reviewers are all Nintendo-fans? I have linked before the list Metacritics highest scored WiiU and PS4-games. That list says me, that reviewers don't treat Nintendo especially better. But seemingly BotW got to them. This post you answer on was my answer to the conspiracy that Nintendo gets treated better by reviewers. I really doubt that.



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golfgt170 said:
palou said:

Zelda has twice the user reviews Horizon had in the same time frame (add 900 reviews for the WiiU version), for approximately equivalent sales. If Horizon had 3000 earnest reviews and 1000 fanboys (of either side, doesnt matter) reviewing, then Zelda had 3000 earnest reviews and 5000 fanboys.

already answered: 

All games on metacritic get a 0% as soon as the game opens for rating. Ofc games that have a history of 20 years arent comparable on the same degree as new IPs. Haters gonna hate that's for sure. But then again haters aren't only in zelda territory. See CoD etc...

So you agree the Metacritic user score can always just be dismissed as it is useless. That was already a lot in discussion in these forums, as Nintendo presented a list of games with critics AND user scores in Metacritic.



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golfgt170 said:
palou said:

Zelda has twice the user reviews Horizon had in the same time frame (add 900 reviews for the WiiU version), for approximately equivalent sales. If Horizon had 3000 earnest reviews and 1000 fanboys (of either side, doesnt matter) reviewing, then Zelda had 3000 earnest reviews and 5000 fanboys.

already answered: 

All games on metacritic get a 0% as soon as the game opens for rating. Ofc games that have a history of 20 years arent comparable on the same degree as new IPs. Haters gonna hate that's for sure. But then again haters aren't only in zelda territory. See CoD etc...

Here's a Link :

 

https://www.amazon.com/product-reviews/B01MS6MO77/ref=zg_bs_videogames_cr_3?ie=UTF8&refRID=RRG65BEYJ71R15NX7WPV

 

A few others, for comparison:

 

https://www.amazon.com/product-reviews/B00ZJEIVB2/ref=zg_bs_videogames_cr_18?ie=UTF8&refRID=RRG65BEYJ71R15NX7WPV

https://www.amazon.com/product-reviews/B0050SYILE/ref=zg_bsar_videogames_cr_15?ie=UTF8&refRID=W732XTDTK5P1XF90H4EF

https://www.amazon.com/product-reviews/B00YQ2KCWO/ref=zg_bsar_videogames_cr_5?ie=UTF8&refRID=RWC9QJQW7WRF1A76CNGV

https://www.amazon.com/Call-Duty-Black-Ops-Standard-Xbox/product-reviews/B00VU4J8YY/ref=cm_cr_dp_d_acr_sr?ie=UTF8&reviewerType=avp_only_reviews

https://www.amazon.com/product-reviews/B007CM0K86/ref=zg_bsar_videogames_cr_11?ie=UTF8&refRID=42611GGJ8XZ6B93BQ012

 

 

I think this makes it clear enough that a large majority of the people that bought and played BOTW enjoyed it alot, as was the case for The Last of Us, or Horizon.



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