So, basically, you say that ALL racing games, sports games, tycoon games, space simulators, strategy games, puzzle games, etc, are automatically worse than a game with a linear, movie-like storyline, and don't deserve good ratings? 

Ok, putting words in my mouth

They are judging it on a wide variety of things, it prob deserved a little higher as it was a couple of games but i wouldnt go higher then 80 in all honesty. The thing is they are very seperate games, and sold seperately wouldnt get 10 percent each, they are very basic games. It is a nice starter for a console, but you do not pay 399 (aus) for a system for that game, you get it for another game

Metacritic and Gamerankings do an excellent job of smoothing cases of bias from one or two reviewers. But they are not invincible: when a huge portion of the industry has a strong bias, not even Metacritic and Gamerankings can escape unscathed, and if virtually the whole industry is biased then MC and GR are helpless to stop it.

What we're seeing in this generation is a perfect example of this, with large numbers of reviewers openly biasing their reviews against one system or another. It skews even GR and MC to the point where they're only slightly less useless than a single outlet.

How did games evolve, well games evolved with having more beef, im sure the original mario would have had more substance, more story, look at these ones, but even the mario series, you had to save the princess, coz the bad man took her. What the hell is the story line for tetris. I will give you that ignores today criteria, but if that was released TODAY, what would a game like that get, prob around 70 i would say, why? because it is an arcade game, very simple.

Dont get me wrong i would want to play tetris over a vast amount of games, but that is because i grew up on it, you show tetris to say a 13 year old today who has never seen it and what would they say, im guessing something like "when can i play the 360 or PS3 or Wii." Because as fun as it is, it is not a genre changing game, it has defined genres, it has defined gaming but there is only a certain amount you can do with blocks falling down and having to delete rows, i played a lego version of it which you had to eventually climb out. I thought that was genius because that is the biggest i had seen Tetris jump.

Super Mario Brothers 3 is not my best game of all time, mine would be prob Civilization, the way it gripped me, took my entire life, when i heard the word chariot i imaged the game. But everyone has opinions, this is mine, i have no facts to back what i am saying, though neither do most of the people, but that what reviews are. And Metacritic provides a larger source, a great alternative to having to go buy the game to then have to think about returning it because it is horrible for example.

You missing the important way. the DEMO

I prefer to just go with what I think is cool

Metacritic and Gamerankings are tools for game purchasing. It's nice to be able to look at 40+ reviews of a game in a single place. You can then make your decision based on the reviewers pros and cons. The score really doesn't matter, it's just an unfortunate thing that people expect from a reviewer to quantify their opinion into a small package.

My biggest problem with professional game reviewers is that they play too many games. The average gamer would probably take a year to play what these guys play in a month.

I think this begins to skew their opinions. What a game achieves technically becomes more important than enjoying games for what they are. A fun way to relax and escape reality for a while.

Does a little screen tearing or a few muddy textures really subtract from the games overall enjoyment? I don't think so but some reviewers will make it seem like the end of the world.

Official sites can be just as untrustworthy as the blogger sites, if not more. Many reviewers are bringing their prejudices to the net for all gamers to see.

Solution?Stop looking at the SCORES!!! I didn't say the Review, reviews are sometime needed because It is impossible to know all the inner working of a game from thin air seeing as you have not played it yet. What I am talking about is that little insignificant number that grades the quality of a game.

If you read the actual reviews you will see a world of difference. From there you can tell whether you should count the particular reviewer's opinion due to what he says. I have purchased and fell in love with Resistance 2, just like the first. If I just looked at scores, I would have never gotten it. When I read the reviews for the game I could see it was of higher quality, yet for some unknown reason to me, reviewers brought it down below a 9(Where I believe it should at least be a 9.3). Many reviews such as this, scores become completely contradictory of the actual review. Reviewers praise the hell out of some games.......yet when all is said and done give it a 8 or a 7 :\

Decisive Reading FTW!!!

I pretty much trust IGN and Game Informer and a few of the other sites that are so big that they will not give a game a fanboy score because they have a reputation to uphold. I'm officially deading Metacritic for including Nonameragtagfanboysite.com in their review scores.

   You are wasting your time, OP. You'll most likely have a lot of people here agreeing with you and saying that reviews dont matter and all that. And then you'll see the same people creating or participating in threads like "Woo-hoo! *insert some game here* is at 90 at metacritic!!! It's AAA and it's awesome!!"

   People will always trust metacritic, because 60$ is no joke, and I'd rather trust some dude who at least bothered to write a review in his blog than a bunch of kids on the internet who cant say more about a game than "it sucks" or "it rocks".