Its about metacritic, its about 1 fucking average number.

People actually base purchases on that number.

They are fucking idiots. Metacritic is fucking horrible. Gerstmann has AIDS.

For whatever reasons, it only seems to be the strangely over-sensitive “hardcore” gaming audience that screams about 7 being mediocre. Both the movie and music industry unanimously accept the 5 = average idea, and critic scores echo that.

The problem with the gaming media is that it’s far too reliant on the very medium it’s promoting to help fund itself. If gaming media stopped being so sensitive to the opinions of uneducated, whiny teenagers, it wouldn’t even be an issue.

THE MIGHTY GAMES MEDIA HAS SHOWN THE EVIL GAMES INDUSTRY THAT IT WILL NOT BE THREATENED OR HELD TO RANSOM! THE PEOPLE HAVE A RIGHT TO KNOW (That Lara can’t stand on curved rocks but is ok on flat-topped ones).

You can all sleep soundly in your beds…

…until Twitter twitches again..!

It tends to focus on what’s said, not what isn’t, and there very rarely any investigating done (beyond emailing some PR guy to hear their answers).

It’s stupid, but that’s how it is. Whinging about it won’t change a thing.

I certainly do wish there were more reviews for LR as well, even though my purchases are rarely influenced by reviews. It would be nice to have seen more general thoughts on it, just so I’d have *some* idea of what to expect from it.

“Something’s been taken out of hand, I talked to one of the PR guys and they said that this is all a big misunderstanding.”

Isn’t that the same thing they said about Kane and Lynch? *laughs*

I don’t think there’s some giant conspiracy going on here; I just think Eidos are doing another shit job of controlling this sort of thing, and seem to be getting “special attention” just because sensationalist journalists want to get on the Evil Eidos bandwagon.

I don’t know where the LR reviews are. Until you mentioned it, I didn’t even think about it, to be honest. I’ve just looked at MetaCritic and only one site in the world has reviewed it, apparently. Gamepro’s given it a 6.

I have no idea why this is, whether there’s an embargo in place, or what.

Normally I just see a bunch of reviews go online for a game and do a roundup. The only reason I followed up this TR story in this way was because of Guy’s Twitter post.

So where’s the Lost Remnant reviews then? And where’s the multiple headline stories about their absence?

And why did you choose to ignore those perfectly valid observations in the first place?

Everyone: BH just issued a statement on this. Top of site.

/looks at who sponsors VG247
/looks at platform Last Remnant is out on

Oh.

Then they should actually spend more time making the game better! I’m delighted sites that reviewed it less than 8 have put their reviews up. What was this guy saying the sites would get in return for not putting the reviews up?

Eidos PR obviously thinks it’s more important than you do.

True – but in this case, someone’s let the mask slip, just for a second. That’s what’s so fascinating!

This isn’t an isolated incident as far as embargoes and games are concerned. But now that there’s a nice juicy high-profile title to attach a mention of it to it makes it sound all the more conspiratorial. If every instance of such behaviour was reported as news then nobody would be batting an eyelid at this one instance.

[i]Context[/i]

Not really; they /have/ admitted up there to conspiring to pervert the initial average of Metacritic, so that their sales in the key opening period are higher.

Also, there’s that the sheep-like element of some press, who rarely move far away from the Metacritic average, and they’ll help solidify the score at that level. A high initial average, even for a bad game, tends to stick a little. And, as that_happy_cat says, that’ll boost the US PR’s bonuses!

Thanks Eidos! I’ve an extra £30 to spend this weekend!

And my “People who buy Tomb Raider..” comment wasn’t meant as some sort of snub of a demographic. Just that Tomb Raider is such a well established franchise (with more hits than misses in its lifetime) that people who like Tomb Raider generally know what to expect and whether a new installment will be their thing or not.

I love agile platformers like Tomb Raider, Mirrors Edge and the Prince of Persia series – so this Christmas is looking to be a good one for folk like me.

Additionally, this sense of “EMBARGO = THEY MUST HAVE SOMETHING TO HIDE – HAVE NO FEAR FOR THE GAMES MEDIA IS HERE TO SHOW YOU THE TRUTH” is kind of undone in that Eidos put out a demo of the game for people to try out for themselves.

Want to know whether you’ll like the game? Play the demo!

Phew. Conspiracy theory averted eh?

Thanks Shat, that line really made me smile. I’ve only ever met one person to whom Tomb Raider holds any interest, and I can say that they fit that sentence to a tee.

I agree.

However, as TR: Angel of Darkness clearly demonstrated, not all Tomb Raider games are worthy of your money or time, so trusted reviews are still important.

Just to make myself perfectly clear, I’m not implying that TR: Underworld has anything in common with TR: AoD apart from the main protagonist. Quite the opposite actually, as I enjoyed the x360 demo and plan to purchase the full game in due time.

Pat, can you ask EuroGamer what kind of “problems” did their review cause?

Also, I read that Eurogamer review. It was fucking awful (the review) in that it ranted about REALLY IMPORTANT THINGS (like why Lara can’t stand on a round rock but can on a square one) for ten paragraphs and in then summed things up with “..but it’s Tomb Raider. 7/10″

It’s Tomb Raider. People who buy Tomb Raider games don’t need a review to make their mind up for them.