MetaCritic pressure on devs is “ridiculous,” says Splash Damage boss

Meh, I don’t care anymore…

These days, I just buy all the games that I want, regardless of review score, anyway! lol.

I hereby officially quit this comment section.

Yeah, let’s go wrestle, big boy.

lol.

I would actually like to properly apologise for calling you a “fucking idiot”. Totally unnecessary and unhelpful. Sorry.

No worries fella. Apology totally accepted.

G1GA, allow me to clear things up for you, given that in comparison I am a vastly superior human being.

You said: “The entire gaming press has totally got it wrong for the last 3 decades, and nobody knew what they were doing. I suppose they’ve just been doing it without really knowing why all this time…

I already said: “In the old days, of Crash! and Zzap!, a 5 out of 10 game was still a recommendation. Back in those days, zero started at 4 (or possibly even 3). Over the years competition has heated up to ridiculous levels. Until recently, zero started at 6 – now if a game gets a 7 it’s seen a failure. How long before a game is only seen as being any good if it gets a 9 or above?”

What you ought to have inferred from this is that at one time the current system of scoring was a fair and reliable method, however it is now very broken. This is evidenced by the fact a score of 75% = just an average game, not 25% above average.

If we somehow got everyone (by that I mean both those that write and those that read reviews) to agree that 5/10 is an average game, then perhaps that system could be salvaged. That, however, is totally impossible in practical terms.

If lone sites do try and buck this trend and employ full-scale scoring, then gamers and developers alike complain when a (sensible) 7/10 score brings down the Metacritic average of an (inflated) 9/10 game and we’re back to square one.

You said: “And of course, nobody has ever found review scores useful. I suppose that I’m the only one in the world who mistakenly thought that this totally bankrupt scoring system had any use whatsoever.”

Where did I say that? Show me where I said that? What I think you’ll find I actually *did* say is this: “Bring in stars, that’s what I say. Blerk’s right – there’s no need for more than five levels of grading in a score.”

By that you ought to infer that scoring *is* useful, when used appropriately. If we got to the stage where 4 stars out of 5 = just an average game, than that system would be broken too and we’d have to move onto something else.

This is about improving scoring so that it becomes logical and sensible again – not claiming that they serve no purpose nor doing away with scores altogether.

Thus speaketh SticKboy, in accordance with prophecy.

Ok, thanks.

Heh!

I WIN!!!

ah man, I missed the ruckus…

is everybody ok and still enjoying our hobby?

Oh god, so much fanboy drivel…

“The entire gaming press has totally got it wrong for the last 3 decades, and nobody knew what they were doing. I suppose they’ve just been doing it without really knowing why all this time…”

Yes. the entire gaming press has gotten it wrong for the past 3 decades. I’ve been playing gamse since before most of these reviewers were even out of diapers, but I’m not stupid enough to be nostalgic about it.

Games reviewing as a standard is still living in the dark ages; the main reason for this being highlighted in the news story itself. The gaming review market has absolutely no balls; it almost universally refuses to score anything under 60. And don’t even try to convince me that its because few games are that bad.

Every other market – movies, books, music, etc, already has a scoring standard in place. 1 = crap. 5 = average. 10 = classic. Games reviews have been stuck in the mentality that 6 = crap for decades.

Frankly, I blame the gamers. They’re so snotty and obsessive about this sort of thing that the magazines and websites are simplying pandering to what they want. Could you imagine what would happen if Roger Ebert started upping his scores because people didn’t like them?

What’s the POINT of reviews if they aren’t based solely on personal (but hopefully non-objective) opinions? What’s the point where reviews are being written with concerned for the reader, not the quality of the title?

Then again, this is the same industry where Gears of War 2 gets awards for storyline and character developement… so intelligence clearly isn’t a requirement for this industry.

Of course, there’s also the price of games. If they weren’t so expensive, people wouldn’t be so concerned with reviews in order to ensure they don’t waste their money on a competely crap purchase, whereas you can rent every movie that comes out, and lets be honest, who buys music CDs anymore?

I buy music CDs. I don’t like downloading music.

I would sort of agree. I’ll skip to a score before reading the full review, but I won’t make my mind up about a purchase until I’ve read a few. I would have bought Far Cry 2 based on a score. I changed my mind having read the reviews.

Some of my favorite games have recieved average scores, while others that have scored really high didnt really capture my interest that long (GTA series).