kber81 said: Casual gamers don't read reviews so why bother...

That's actually very true, I wonder why I hadn't thought of that fact.

Gballzack said: kber81 said: Casual gamers don't read reviews so why bother... That's actually very true, I wonder why I hadn't thought of that fact.

 ... Are you ok?...

The IGN NYT Crosswords review is actually a pretty good example of how to review a more casual-style game.

http://ds.ign.com/articles/792/792517p1.html

wii games get quiet a lot of glowing reviews in the mainstream press. Often outside of 'gaming' sections, which I'm sure has more of an impact on sales.

If IGN etc are mainly read by hardcore FPS gaming fanatics, I'd expect them to tailor their reviews for them. The idea of giving a game a percentage is a bit of a hit and miss idea anyway.

 Well I completely disgree with that statement. Big Name Franchises and heavily promoted games tend to have thier reviews written for them in stone before the reviewer ever gets a copy. Famitsu even admitted they give "courtsey" reviews for fans of the game, and they used to be known for very strict scores.

 I remember after I got Super Mario Sunshine, was finding it pretty disappointing, and one day I was watching TechTV (Back before they were called G4) and whatever show it was that did games back then, they had thier guy reviewing Mario Sunshine, and at the very end he says "Is it as good as the other Mario games? Who Cares, it's another Mario game, 5/5.) And that just pissed me off, struck me right then and there how horrid most game reviewers are. And I'm a diehard Mario fan, but Sunshine was a dud. It's not nostigila either, I tried to replay Sunshine, and just got to bored to go on. Super Mario World or 64 I can still replay and enjoy to this day. But sunshine got near perfect reviewers from almost every major gaming source.

And that's not the only one. Metal Gear Solid 2. That looked good, loved the first one, gets incredible reviews.
Horrid game in my opinion, WAY too much dialogue and cutscenes. The first one was pretty talky too, but the
sequeal just wouldn't just the hell up you tpically just sneak from cutscene to cutscene. And of course the whole Snake/Raiden thing. I think they went as far to insert Snake into Raiden's scene for some of the commericals and even pushed the game's release date so they can use the tag line "The Year of the Snake". Yet he's a minor side character. Inane and idiotic story, and what's with the message? Aliens may kill us all some day, but we should leave behind ruins to bore thier offspring in history class? As opposed to message in MGS1, which was "...just live.". MGS3 (Which also hated the reviews for) seemed to sell a decent chunk less than MGS2 on the PS2, despite the larger instal base at the time. I wonder why that is?

 Or what about Grand Theft Auto? Now going on rampages and driving over freeways with a tank is a LOT of fun. But the games typically have very redudant and tiring missions, graphics are usually sub-par, they tend to be VERY glitchy. With San Andreas they indulge in some convulted and pointless story as opposed to one thug killing his way to top. They add in a ton of annoying mini-game-esqe that are inserted into the main missions, so you need to do them to progress, like the dull "Girlfriend" missions which you had to repeat several times to get that damn Casino Keycard, or those terrible RC Plane missions where you have David Cross whining in your ear about how low on fuel you are. And none of this phases reviewers for thier scores, just about everyone gives it over 100.

 I could probably go on for another ten paragraphs but I think I ranted enough. And I'm not saying every high rated game is only rated high because of coporate pressure and fan influence, or that even if it is, still doesn't mean it couldn't be great. I'm saying those scores and letter grades are meaningless and often misleading, and they only way to get useful information is to read thier entire review, and look for issues or sentiments you can relate to. You might hate hard games, but a reviewer might say something like "It's very hard, but completely 
worth it." but that'd just be worth it for him, because he probably likes hard games.

 Sorry to stray so far off topic, but "Professional" reviewers tend to just annoy the hell out of me. About you point, them not being ready to review Wii games, yes. Depending on the game, a long time hard core gamer could feel like a complete noob due to the controls, and thier ego may be too stubborn to try and learn them. And it is why Wii games tend to get very mixed reviews. Look at SSX Blur, 1UP and GamePro said they hated it, controls were horrible, only sadisitic freaks would enjoy this game. Gamespot said it was okay, and the controls worked well enough. IGN and ArtsTechnica loved it, with Bozon saying the ubertrick control system will "seperate the men from the boys". I thought Blur was great, it's problem, like most EA Wii Games, is it has horrid instructions, and you're left guessing the many different variables to pull of complicated tricks. Something I don't think any reviewer bothered to mention. But once you get them down, they feel great.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hLRxXmPQxek 

the average player review score is more accurate than any website/magazine...

eg. gamespot review give 5.7 while 524 player review give 9.3...
http://www.gamespot.com/ps2/rpg/hackguvol2/review.html

i think that gs"professional" reviewer give low score coz he don't like rpg, when u don't like this type of game then don't rate it just to get your ''paycheck'' dammit...

btw, he only give high rating to ''big'' name like ffxii or something...

saddly, most "professional" reviewer do that & that annoy me to ''hell''...

In accordence with the original question, I don't beleive reviewers can review Wii games(DS is a little better).

One major Problem I see is they put a lot of empises on graphics. Wii games put it on Gameplay. So, a average looking Wii game gets a bad scorre. i agree with how X-Play(strange I know) reviews games. They base it of the fgact that Gameplay is king. If gameplay works, it's a good game. If it's broken, it's bad. Graphics and all this other stuff will only bump scores and isreally the only difference between a 4/5 or a 5/5 or a 2/5 or 1/5.

I think what critics forget is most everyone is in it for the gameplay, not the pretty visuals. Graphics are good for the first 10 minutes and then lose their shimmer. You still have 9hrs and 50min with the gameplay.

kber81 said: Gballzack said: kber81 said: Casual gamers don't read reviews so why bother... That's actually very true, I wonder why I hadn't thought of that fact.  ... Are you ok?...

Head Crab.

Sorry to dig up an old post, but I just read the Gamespot review for Big Brain Academy: Wii Degree and thought of this topic while reading the review.  Two things jumped out at me as I looked at their 7.3 rating for the game:

1. The only negative in the whole review was that you had to pass the remote between players in most of the multiplayer games.
2. The reviewer said you only hear a female voice from the remote which is completely false
   

So for the first part, the only negative thing in that whole review was that you have to pass the remote in most of the multiplayer modes (not even all of them), nothing else.  The reviewer touched on everything else from graphics, sound, and gameplay and had only good things to say about the game.  So why would a game with only one minor negative thing (that's actually just a personal preference for players) get a 7.3 rating?  That's the question of the day.

 The second thing that jumped out at me was the fact the reviewer said "A fair amount of speech comes out of the Wii speaker, but most of it is just encouragement from a female voice that eggs you on as you play."  If anyone reading this has played the game more than once you'll quickly find that their are multiple voices, male and female.  Seriously, all you have to do is turn it off and then turn it back on and you'll more than likely hear another voice.  So why does this matter?  Because 1) it makes me think the reviewer played through a few of the practice modes and did the test once and 2) makes me think they didn't even bother with the multiplayer (or at least with more than one person) since the voice comes through the remotes on the game type that uses more than one remote. 

 So yay, a reviewer game a game a low score even though he found only one minor negative and it looks like he barely even played it.  Way to go Gamespot, and people wonder why I hate reviewers.

And I should say, I don't mind the game gets a low score. If they have a reason to give the game a 7.3, that's fine, but the reviewers only negative was about the remote which for some reason got the game the lower rating. Everything else the reviewer talked about was completely positive. I understand it shouldn't get a 9+ just because of that, but should be somewhere around 8-8.5 range.