Illegitimate Reviews

So I was just thinking about GTA IV again and how it got a 98 metacritic. Last I looked this made it one of the top five rated games of all time. Looking tonight, it sits at number one, although I noticed that the list of greatest games is incomplete (Occarina of Time has a 99 if you search for it by name but does not show up on this list for some reason). At any rate, it still has a 98.

This has always bothered me. I can accept that some people like GTA IV and have a different opinion from me (it bored me to tears), but a 98? ... ? I honestly believe that something fishy happened for this title more than any, so I would love to hear inside stories about it. Or any underhanded techniques to pressure reviewers into giving a game a higher score on any game (I'm sure this is not uncommon).

Seriously, if you failed a mission in that game, you had to start over (including driving _to_ the mission start point) and you had to watch unskippable cut scenes every single time. No offense to anyone who worked on it, it was a great game that just wasn't up my alley, but... 98??!?!?

 

They fixed the mission restarts for GTA IV. You get a text msg after a fail and get plonked at the mission start...

98 is still a pretty high score though but GTA has accomplished quite a lot so its not that surprising to see it high up there

 

Surely it's because mainstream reviewers are all useless, and lost whatever remnants of objectivity that remained within them when they were faced with the first next-generation update to an incredibly popular franchise. Besides, they're only telling the public (and, yes, their advertisers too, which never hurts) what they want to hear.

GTA IV was destined to be super-popular. Saying it was less than brilliant (so long as the game is at least reasonably decent) would have pretty much guaranteed any dissenting reviewer would not be. Imagine if you gave it, say, 83%. Your readership would collectively shit their pants and then hunt you down with axes. And for what? You might as well just tell everybody it's the best game ever made and make things easier for yourself.

But then, if you want a proper perspective on anything you need to review it a few years later, not rely on scores that are given out when the hype is at its peak.

 

Someone mentioned in another thread that you should look for reviewers whose opinion closely matches your own...so it's not unreasonable to suppose that the most successful reviewers are those who make their opinion closely match the majority of people. What else would you expect?

 

One thing I noticed when I was researching games for my recent Amiga binge - the reviews in Amiga Power do actually hold up rather well all these years later.

Probably because they ignored the hype, ignored the tech, ignored the (at the time) flashy graphical effects, didn't really care at all whether the game was innovative or not, and focused instead on looking objectively at answering:

1) what is fun about this game
2) what is annoying about this game

 

This is why I like Yahtzee - because he doesn't seem to give a shit about upsetting people in his reviews.

Haven't watched any of the Zero Punctuation stuff for a while though so he might have sold out by now...

 

I don't know if wanting to please fans of a high profile release is a solid explanation though. Black Ops has metacritic averages in the 80s across all three platforms, and Modern Warfare 2 has an 86 (PC) and 94 (console). Surely both of those were _at least_ as hyped as GTA IV; in my opinion, moreso. And I feel like the difference between a 94 and a 98 is as vast as the difference between, say, a 60 and an 80. I also feel like MW2 was a much better game (haven't played Black Ops).

With that said, I don't really think Rockstar could pay off 60 reviewers either. And I also don't think that GTA IV deserves a 98, and I have a hard time fathoming that many reviewers giving it a perfect score. I don't really know if it deserves to be in the 90s, but low 90s I could deal with as "well made for its target market but just not my kind of game".

In short, I am completely baffled .

 

http://www.supernaturalwiki.com/index.php?title=Crossroads_Demon

 

Ah, now it makes sense!

 

GTA IV was released earlier in this console generation, when people were more easily excited about things like the graphical improvements?

 

Worry not, he's still an absolute prick.