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Forums - Sony Discussion - Sony Representative Contacted Vice After Critical Review of The Last of Us 2

DonFerrari on 01 July 2020
The_Liquid_Laser said:

I've always known that there were shenanigans behind AAA game reviews, but I still find the details interesting.  Looks like Sony is both putting pressure on Metacritic and on the game reviewers themselves.  Of course I say this knowing that Sony is not alone.  It's a huge industry wide problem.  I personally feel most Mario and Zelda games are overrated.  That's why I could say that BotW is an exceptionally good game, but some people didn't believe it at first.  If you look at the reviews, all of the Zelda games are rated high.  So when an actually exceptional game comes along it gets rated the same.  These games don't look any different based on the review scores.

Why even listen to reviewers if all big budget games get good reviews?  The Metacritic score is basically pointless, and Opencritic has not solved the problem in any way.  All big budget games get high reviews, but some of these games are actually better than the others.  Reviewers just don't give any indication about which ones are authentically better.

So talking about TLoU2, I'm looking at the the user score on Metacritic, and it is 4.9 based on 104,424 reviews.  That is a hell of a lot reviews.  I was comparing it to Animal Crossing NH.  It has a 5.3 user score based on 5149 reviews.  I'm still not sure how much AH is review bombed.  I do believe that some people are upset by the one island per system thing and some of those 5149 are review bombs.  But TLoU2 has 20 times the amount of user reviews.  That is a crapton of reviews.  I think intentional review bombs are miniscule when you get to those numbers.  People are authentically pissed.

TLoU2 seems to be more of a "love it or hate it" kind of game.  I don't doubt that some people really love it.  I also don't doubt that some people really hate it.  In a situation like this a 94 from reviewers is extra suspicious.  But to me it confirms that the whole AAA game industry is suspicious when it comes to game reviews.  This game just makes it easier to notice the shenanigans.

So please explain the scores of DC, GTS, Days Gone among others. Sony just so happens to randomly select the games it will pressure reviewers?



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KLXVER on 01 July 2020

I dont get it. No reviewer has given the game a horrible score. It just makes Sony look petty. Maybe not spend millions upon millions of dollars on games if you are this insecure about them.



Ljink96 on 01 July 2020

This is embarrassing. The game sold very well, has a Metascore some series could only dream of and now they feel the need to do this? Grow some thicker skin.



pikashoe on 01 July 2020
The_Liquid_Laser said:

I've always known that there were shenanigans behind AAA game reviews, but I still find the details interesting.  Looks like Sony is both putting pressure on Metacritic and on the game reviewers themselves.  Of course I say this knowing that Sony is not alone.  It's a huge industry wide problem.  I personally feel most Mario and Zelda games are overrated.  That's why I could say that BotW is an exceptionally good game, but some people didn't believe it at first.  If you look at the reviews, all of the Zelda games are rated high.  So when an actually exceptional game comes along it gets rated the same.  These games don't look any different based on the review scores.

Why even listen to reviewers if all big budget games get good reviews?  The Metacritic score is basically pointless, and Opencritic has not solved the problem in any way.  All big budget games get high reviews, but some of these games are actually better than the others.  Reviewers just don't give any indication about which ones are authentically better.

So talking about TLoU2, I'm looking at the the user score on Metacritic, and it is 4.9 based on 104,424 reviews.  That is a hell of a lot reviews.  I was comparing it to Animal Crossing NH.  It has a 5.3 user score based on 5149 reviews.  I'm still not sure how much AH is review bombed.  I do believe that some people are upset by the one island per system thing and some of those 5149 are review bombs.  But TLoU2 has 20 times the amount of user reviews.  That is a crapton of reviews.  I think intentional review bombs are miniscule when you get to those numbers.  People are authentically pissed.

TLoU2 seems to be more of a "love it or hate it" kind of game.  I don't doubt that some people really love it.  I also don't doubt that some people really hate it.  In a situation like this a 94 from reviewers is extra suspicious.  But to me it confirms that the whole AAA game industry is suspicious when it comes to game reviews.  This game just makes it easier to notice the shenanigans.

I think the entire game industry is overrated at this point. The amount of insanely high scores thrown around is ridiculous at this point I feel like reviewers need to get more critical of everything and not be so afraid to use the entire range of scores when reviewing games.



Doctor_MG on 01 July 2020
JapaneseGamesLover said:

The game deserves a 100 Metascore, so i guess the low score was payed beforehand by Microsoft in this case, cause it doesnt make sense to rate below 9. Simple as that.

Is this sarcasm? I sure hope so. 



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The_Liquid_Laser on 01 July 2020
DonFerrari said:
The_Liquid_Laser said:

I've always known that there were shenanigans behind AAA game reviews, but I still find the details interesting.  Looks like Sony is both putting pressure on Metacritic and on the game reviewers themselves.  Of course I say this knowing that Sony is not alone.  It's a huge industry wide problem.  I personally feel most Mario and Zelda games are overrated.  That's why I could say that BotW is an exceptionally good game, but some people didn't believe it at first.  If you look at the reviews, all of the Zelda games are rated high.  So when an actually exceptional game comes along it gets rated the same.  These games don't look any different based on the review scores.

Why even listen to reviewers if all big budget games get good reviews?  The Metacritic score is basically pointless, and Opencritic has not solved the problem in any way.  All big budget games get high reviews, but some of these games are actually better than the others.  Reviewers just don't give any indication about which ones are authentically better.

So talking about TLoU2, I'm looking at the the user score on Metacritic, and it is 4.9 based on 104,424 reviews.  That is a hell of a lot reviews.  I was comparing it to Animal Crossing NH.  It has a 5.3 user score based on 5149 reviews.  I'm still not sure how much AH is review bombed.  I do believe that some people are upset by the one island per system thing and some of those 5149 are review bombs.  But TLoU2 has 20 times the amount of user reviews.  That is a crapton of reviews.  I think intentional review bombs are miniscule when you get to those numbers.  People are authentically pissed.

TLoU2 seems to be more of a "love it or hate it" kind of game.  I don't doubt that some people really love it.  I also don't doubt that some people really hate it.  In a situation like this a 94 from reviewers is extra suspicious.  But to me it confirms that the whole AAA game industry is suspicious when it comes to game reviews.  This game just makes it easier to notice the shenanigans.

So please explain the scores of DC, GTS, Days Gone among others. Sony just so happens to randomly select the games it will pressure reviewers?

It's not random.  It's based on sales, which means it's likely based on the game's budget as well.  Do you think TLoU2 will sell like the games you mentioned or do you think it will sell a lot more? 

Like I said, I think Nintendo is doing this as well with Mario and Zelda, but those are flagship IP for Nintendo.  For something like Clubhouse Games, I don't think the reviews are padded.  Naughty Dog games are flagship IP for Sony.  They can't afford to get bad reviews for a Naughty Dog game.



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Immersiveunreality on 01 July 2020

I must say that the thumbnails used for these kind of videos disgust me a bit,it is all cheap childish mockery and they should take a softer approach if they expect everyone to try and see things from their perspective cause this just stops people from even watching a second of it.

This sort of attitude keeps his arguments in a bubble for people that are already agreeing with him.



setsunatenshi on 01 July 2020

stopped reading at Polygon.

does it mention Kotaku later on? i'll stop reading even harder if so



crissindahouse on 01 July 2020
kirby007 said:
not suprised nor by the practice nor by the comments

It was always bad with some comments but the last months reached a new low. Almost feels like with ultra Elon Musk fans and a discussion is just useless. 



sales2099 on 01 July 2020

Makes me think we should have a gaming regulatory body that holds companies accountable. Between contacting low review authors (with implications to play ball next time or else), disabling comments in official YouTube videos, 5 star reviews in the thousands on the PS store before the game was out, and overall with people having some suspicion that reviews were bought and paid.

Before I’m vilified I recall an example where Gamespot reviewer Jeff Gurstman was fired in 2007 for giving Kane and Lynch a 6.5 when the IP was being advertised on the site.

I’m saying for a while now companies do shady things and it’s about time we regulate this. Once in a while we have stories like this that remind us nothing has really changed 



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