i knew this would succeed, it looks so much polished.

Correct. They expected a GT4 clone. And because it wasnt they gave it bad reviews, which is ridiculous.

I was expecting a score of 4/10. This is surprising.

I think the PSP team is very generous in their scoring, similar to how the Dreamcast IGN team was(Don't kill me Sega fans, I love my DC more than you do!). That's not to say Motorstorm isn't a great series, because it is, but you can see a big difference in the scoring being alloted to the PS3 Motorstorms and the PSP one.

I disagree. No PSP team on any website seems generous.

I don't know about this case, because I have not played the new MS. In general, I really don't think they give games too high scores.

They have been anything but generous lately.

I was always more excited for this than GT PSP. I'm glad it turned into a very good game, but I am not to confident in sales.

They stated that this game was just as good as the console versions. The last console Motorstorm got an 8.2. Therefore I see the PSP team being much more generous to the series than the PS3 team is. In other words, if they let the guy that typically does the Motorstorm reviews do this one also, then I figure he probably wouldn't have scored it as highly.

Also, here is every game IGN US gave a 9.0 or over to:

Daxter 9.0
Disgaea: Afternoon of Darkness 9.0
Final Fantasy Tactics: The War of the Lions 9.0
God of War: Chains of Olympus 9.4
Grand Theft Auto: Liberty City Stories 9.0
Grand Theft Auto: Vice City Stories 9.0
Jeanne D'Arc 9.0
Killzone: Liberation 9.0
LocoRoco 9.0
LocoRoco 2 9.1
Lumines II 9.0
Metal Gear Solid: Portable Ops 9.0
Motorstorm: Arctic Edge 9.0
Patapon 9.2
Patapon 2 9.5
PixelJunk Monsters Deluxe 9.0
Puzzle Quest: Challenge of the Warlords 9.0
Ratchet and Clank: Size Matters 9.0
Resistance: Retribution 9.2
Ridge Racer 9.1
Sid Meier's Pirates! 9.0
Syphon Filter: Dark Mirror 9.3
Syphon Filter: Logan's Shadow 9.5
Tekken: Dark Resurrection 9.2
WipEout Pure 9.3

1. You can notice Parasitic is right and IGN hands out a crapload of 9's right on the money. 15 out of the 25 games to get a 9 or over were directly a 9, including 2 in just the last week.

2. Not a single game on this list, which are all the 9 and over IGN(US) scores are lower than their Metacritic average. Every single game is higher than it's Metacritic/Gamerankings average, no exceptions. Not even one is right on the money or lower.

This isn't necessarily a bad thing. There is always going to be a site or sites that are a champion to a certain platform and seem to like it more than most other sites do. I loved IGN's Dreamcast reviews. They were ridiculously high scoring and they praised and praised a console I still feel is the best 2 years of gaming ever. That doesn't mean I can't tell they were scoring the games higher than most other sites were. Now IGN is very loving to the PSP. No harm in that, but no need to deny it either.

Figures. They're glad it's a "carbon copy of the big screen experience." Just like with Chains of Olympus.  Meanwhile with GT PSP they're disappointed because it lacks certain features usually found in console GT games (career mode), despite the addition of other, more handheld-esque features (emphasis on short challenges, trading cars with friends).  I'm becoming more and more inclined to think my theory that GT PSP was shafted because it wasn't simply GT4 on PSP is correct.

I don't want half-assed versions of console games on my handhelds. Give me something new and fresh. If I want to play a MotorStorm game like this, I'll go play Pacific Rift on my HDTV.  Handheld games have to differentiate themselves from console games if they want me to buy in.  Gran Turismo seemingly does this.  MotorStorm doesn't. 

And I still haven't finished Chains of Olympus, despite it being so short.  There's nothing there that compells me to keep playing.

Wow that's really good.

I want a PSP so bad so I can get great racing games like Motorstorm AE! However, I am so poor at the moment :(.