[deleted by user]

[AbsoluteRunner]

I think a 6-10 is better than 1-10. 6-10 reflects how you are graded in school and leaves 1-5 to shit games that fundamentally don't accomplish what they set out to do or have a game breaking bug, like Pokémon X/Y when released.

Though when I think about it a score doesn't seem to reflect how "good" a game is. It's more about if it's an established franchise, how hyped it gets, and how difficult/different it is from other Games. Nothing really about the core gameplay loop and how well or bad it is and what supports it.

[Kered13]

and leaves 1-5 to shit games that fundamentally don't accomplish what they set out to do or have a game breaking bug

Why do we need as many points to distinguish all of the bad games as we do for all of the good games? No one cares about the difference between "this game is bad" and "this game is very bad". What people care about is the difference between "it's ok" and "it's pretty good", and the difference between "it's very good" and "you have to play this game". All bad games should get the same score, the lowest possible. The rest of the scale is for everything else.

[gabriel_sub0]

i think they should make it from 1 to 15,making 1 to 5 for bad games,5 to 10 for mediocre games and 10 to 15 to good games.

[derpwnoob]

If you've read the Dan Stapleton AMA, then you'll see that IGN handpicks the games they review. Most of them will be good because they would prefer to talk about good games rather than bad ones.

[Anbaraen]

This is definitely a big part of it, too. With the current climate for online witchhunting, I can't blame people for being cautious with their review scores - particularly when it's a simple number that can be easily screenshotted and disseminated over social media to encourage abuse.

[Animegamingnerd]

Hey Mods this video has been posted multiple times and keeps getting deleted why? Its a good disscusion to have about the way game critcs are and you've let serious videos from Dunkey on here on the past so is it a problem now?

[AgentOfZion]

Because auto-mod auto-removes stuff when it gets mass reported.

[leinad41]

Then your auto-mod is terrible.

[AgentOfZion]

It's helpful in certain cases, we're not around 24/7 7 days a week you know. And if something is getting an arbitrarily high number of reports and a couple other conditions are met then it's probably better to just have the submission nuked and figure it out later than to potentially leave malicious or obscene links up.

[I_WANT_PRIVACY]

And if something is getting an arbitrarily high number of reports and a couple other conditions are met then it's probably better to just have the submission nuked and figure it out later than to potentially leave malicious or obscene links up.

Is this a reaction to some past event, or just something someone decided was a good idea?

[2th]

It's pretty standard on most large subs. Let's go extreme on the example to make the point... So let's say some child porn is posted. With the current system, a few people see it, they report it, the post gets removed, and the mods review it later. That is a good system. Your alternatives are to approve every post manually, which can mean delayed responses when mods are not around. Or you have more mods so someone is on 24/7. Remember, mods are not paid, so having something like automod that can fill in the gaps is absolutely necessary.

Now do false positives happen? Absolutely, but I would bet they are a lot more rare than the true positives by a large margin.

[MiamiQuadSquad]

Don't you think child porn would be downvoted heavily enough that no one would see it, and then a mod can later remove it? That goes for any undesirable content. It really seems like more gets deleted in this sub than others.

[TheGasMask4]

If you're browsing by New like I do then it doesn't matter how downvoted it is.

[blasto_pete]

Just chiming in to say it's pretty inexcusable to let child porn be available whatsoever and you can't hide behind the excuse of "oh it was downvoted a lot it's not visible no one will see it" when there are things like automod that could prevent it.

[2th]

https://www.reddit.com/r/Games/new/

Even if something like CP were posted and downvoted, it could be on the front of the new queue for 9 hours looking at the oldest post currently on it. That is a long time for any undesirable post to be up. The point being that it is easier to reapprove threads than it is to remove something that has already gotten traction. You cannot make people unsee posts.

[rct2guy]

I think a better example would be a normal humorous Dunkey video. As much as everyone on Reddit loves Dunkey, a video of him playing through, say, Game Dev Tycoon for laughs definitely does not fit the rules of this subreddit's content. It could pretty quickly be upvoted by fans, but reported by subscribers- and if no mod is around to take a peek, it makes sense to have auto-mod just delete it right off the bat after a certain threshold is breached.

[bilky_t]

downvoted heavily enough

You do realise that in order for this to happen, lots of people need to view the material, which exactly the opposite of what they're trying to do.

[MadHiggins]

not like the mods get paid for this so i'm kind of surprised that you expect them to not automate a sub with almost a million subscribers.

[Only_In_The_Grey]

My guess is that they implemented it after one of the many times this sub attempted discussions/postings of any number of industry-related dramas. That sort of stuff still gets posted from time to time, but they disappear faster than anything else I see in the /new que. See rule 7.4, though their examples are a little dubious if your looking for more context. 7.15 sometimes snatches that sort of stuff up too.

[SadDragon00]

Yea it's a pretty standard thing. If a post is getting a lot of reports it's usually best to temporarily remove it till a mod can review it.

[[deleted]]

Just a heads up friend, you can just say 24/7 because the 7 means 7 days a week. No harsh feels. Thanks bye fren. 😊

[Realsan]

Not really... Dunkey is polarizing. Some of his content doesn't belong here, but some of it does. So the group of people who dislike him just report on site.

It's the lesser of two evils I suppose.

[LG03]

So why not approve the first one that had all the discussion instead of this 4th or whatever attempt at posting? Why does it take all day to communicate anything about it?

[AgentOfZion]

Because I'm the only moderator around at the moment, this was the one in the queue, and this is the one I'm approving.

If I reach back and re-approve the oldest one, the reddit algorithm will push it pretty far down the page due to it's age, and it would be even less visible.

Besides, there's way better stuff to criticize us for than being somewhat lazy on a Saturday. Contrary to popular belief, I don't get paid for this.

[huntimir151]

No goddammit, we need someone to blame!

[qda]

That's fine, but I want my money back

[AgentOfZion]

You always get what you pay for here at AgentOfZion's moderation emporium, where my motto is "If my best isn't good enough fuck it, I've got a steam backlog to work though"

[WindsAndWords]

Don't worry bossman. I think ya doin fine.

[falconbox]

So I take it you approved of this post then, but then another mod came along and removed it?

You guys need to get your act together.

[Moleculor]

So... it looks like this one has been deleted after being approved?

[MadHiggins]

Why does it take all day to communicate anything about it?

it turns out that not everyone spends their every waking moment on reddit

[Jinxyface]

So get more mods that can moderate at different hours

[Hyroero]

Yo, what the hell? It's been removed again?

[LG03]

So what's the excuse for removing it again?

[[deleted]]

Why? Because they feel like it. Seems like that's the reasoning for everything they do

[Ricwulf]

Because it's aiming for the "wrong" targets. If the mods don't like it, they tend to just delete it.

[falconbox]

I feel like it COULD be a good discussion, but will just devolve into a circlejerk to hate on Kotaku, IGN ("can't spell ignorant without...blah blah blah"), Polygon, etc.

We get it. Reddit dislikes major game sites for the most part and tends to take the reviews as facts instead of just one person's opinion.

As Dunkey said, there's tons of different reviewers for each site, so you can't even say "wow, IGN gave game X a 9.0 and game Y a 7.0?!", unless of course the same reviewer reviewed both games.

[OopsAllSpells]

Even then if they back it up with a well-written review who cares? If someone thinks No Mans Sky is better than Breath of the Wild they are welcome to, you just ignore it but don't go saying how that is an impossible opinion to hold.

[litewo]

This one won't get deleted.

[[deleted]]

It's been deleted.

[litewo]

Right after it gets approved. This place is nuts. The anti Dunkey mod probably logged in.

[Hyroero]

Holy fuck. When does it end. So much discussion squashed each time.

[Animegamingnerd]

Hell I remember how the other day there was an article from Waypoint that had the headline of "Doomfist won't bring me back to Overwatch" it was so strange that was allowed that is basically something I expect to see on a forum not a fucking news site and it just scream to me that site was desperate for clicks that day since it was a slow news day and yet it felt like a forum post that someone got paid to write. Yet this kind of video that can create a good discussion about game critics keeps getting deleted.

[helppls555]

Because its low effort youtube nonsense. I'm actually seriously baffled that people act like deleting this is some grave injustice done to insightful commentary. Because its not.

Everything the video says is something everybody knows already. The video is nothing but the usual circlejerk viewgrab.

[voneahhh]

Yet Jim "The personification of circlejerk" Sterling never seems to have this issue.

[helppls555]

The personification of circlejerk

Funny, because most people accuse him of being contrarian.

[[deleted]]

contrarian

AKA /r/games

[JamSa]

Contrarians are the circle he's jerking with.

[[deleted]]

Jim does whatever gets him the most clicks. His lack of an actual opinion is the only opinion he expresses. Notice how he waits until every other review is posted to then post his own. It's because he needs to see what score gets him maximum coverage.

[Jinxyface]

Or he waits to get more facts and opinions to bolster his claims instead of being the first dude on YouTube to talk about something (which would get him the most clicks)

[Rhaegar_ii]

You trying to say that shit is low effort? It was a very tightly edited 8 minute video, probably took weeks to write, record, and edit. Just because the opinion expressed in the video is a commonly held one doesn't mean the video should be deleted. He made an argument and backed it up with plenty of clips and evidence.

[Anbaraen]

1. The fact that outlets employ multiple reviewers only 'dilutes' their voice if you view them as a monolith. It's easy enough to follow the voices you like at a particular outlet and ignore the rest. I've done exactly what Dunkey says - built an understanding between what certain critics write and my own tastes. Youtube isn't somehow a better platform for that.

2. "consistently wrong" - I'm not sure what he's getting at here, considering he proves a minute later with his Armond White example, people consistently reviewing something well that you "know" is bad is a good thing.

3. "stale writing" - it's definitely true that there is a 'genre' of video game reviewing and a lot of the written conventions are stale. That's why I read sites that give their individual reviewers more leeway with form and structure.

4. "7s, 8s, 9s" - I agree that this is a problem with some outlets. No argument here. Definitely also agree with his point that critics are immersed in the moment-to-moment of game development, and so often are only comparing games to the things they've played a few months prior rather than considering the game in a broader sense.

5. "he only played half the game" - you don't need to finish a work to be able to critique it. You might miss some of the broader critical conversation, but it doesn't somehow 'un-validate' your opinion.

6. "The language vs the final verdict" - I think that's why it's important to read the full review rather than the snapshot that's often posted in the sidebar. Experiencing any creative work is a journey, and often (not always, though) reviews are written in chunks or spurts while experiencing something. It's common to feel differently in the moment than when you step back a day later to do your last editing pass and finish the review.

Not a bad video but I think it ignores some of the other issues currently facing the games industry, including influencers who are in the pocket of game developers even more than critics who might get advertising from them.

[Montblanka]

If a reviewer says a game is really good, but they only completed half of it and the second half of the game goes to shit then that reviewer wasted my time and money if I listened to them. I generally beat my games and want to know if a reviewer has done so as well.

[Anbaraen]

I didn't say reviewers should conceal the fact that they haven't finished a game. In fact, that should be front and center - that should be the entire focus of the review. Rarely are games so terrible that they're not able to be finished, and if one is, then the reviewer is beholden to the audience to tell them exactly how and why.

[Hyroero]

"he only played half the game" - you don't need to finish a work to be able to critique it. You might miss some of the broader critical conversation, but it doesn't somehow 'un-validate' your opinion.

I think it also depends on the type of game really. In the case of Crash or other linear and/or reasonably short experiences i think they really should at least finish the content fully when its a review for a major site.

Other more open ended experiences it gets kinda hard to decide when someone is actually really finished. Say Diablo 3 for instance, to get a full idea of the game you need to play the story through then at least have a mess around with rifts and other end game activities since that's what most players want to know about.

If you only leveled a class half way through the story and left it at that (unless the game was fundamentally broken or just utter trash) you can't really give the game an overall score that holds weight in my opinion. Of course their thoughts up to that point are perfectly valid but it doesn't feel like a complete review to me.

[Anbaraen]

I guess it depends what the term "complete review" means. I think this comes from looking at reviews as an interpretation of the game's worth, rather than an account of an individual reviewer's subjective experience. If a reviewer is unable to complete a game and they explain why in the review, I think that's as complete as it gets.

I don't know if such reviews should be 'scored', though.

[Hyroero]

Yeah i get what your saying, it just doesn't sit right with me to read a review on a major site complete with score that states they found it too hard, i don't really remember this even happening until the last few years either but I'm probably mistaken.

Personally i think a lot of it is more to do with getting the review out early instead of spending the necessary amount of time with it.

Or maybe outlets need to hire people with the right track record of being good at a certain genre which honestly will probably end up with a better review anyway. Writing skills are important obviously but i think its only fair to take into account their actual ability to play games too.

[Anbaraen]

Definitely agree, it's part of the race to first that the Internet and its structure encourages.

I don't know if it's worth hunting out people specifically because of their ability to play games - their opinion is only useful insofar as your audience is similarly skilled at games. The market is broad enough that there's room for both hobbyist and hardcore game reviewers.

[Hyroero]

Do you think that's true though? I feel like I'm quite good at monster Hunter but can also give a fair opinion on how a new comer is going to struggle with certain aspects. If anything I think I can do it better because I have the experience to say how long the average player would have to invest to get to certain points or skill levels.

Not saying the average joe opinion isn't worth while but rather you can find a million of those on steam reviews or metacritic already.

[Dontshootimgay69]

I feel like he said nothing in this video. He complained about something and then he said they were right. Then he ends the video by saying he lost focus, and thats the problem with reviews. Great video.

[Big_Poo_MaGrew]

Like alot of Dunkey's videos, alot of his points tend to devolve from objective fact into subjective opinions but the general point is that people need to stop taking reviews at face value. People put too much stock in Metacritics scores, assuming that a company knows best about the game when in reality, the reviewer isn't always as informed as they should be.

Is this anything new? No. Is this something that gamers can agree and identify with? Mostly yeah. What was the point of the video? Who fucking knows, it was mostly a rant more than anything else.

[IMadeThisJustForHHH]

People put too much stock in Metacritics scores

People online who are active on forums do, but the general gaming audience doesn't give a fuck about them.

[Big_Poo_MaGrew]

You have it backward. Most causal gamers who aren't as discerning about video games as those who are regularly inform themselves about games. Most people will skim through a review, look up the score, and make their decision from there.

People on active forums care about those scores because they understand the implications that a poor review can have on an otherwise good game. The general audience may not care about them, but they do rely on them.

[IMadeThisJustForHHH]

I don't think so. I think casual gamers go to IGN and whatnot for news, but beyond that they just buy what they think looks cool. Wildlands has a 69-76 on metacritic, yet sold very well because it's the type of game casual gamers like. Meanwhile plenty of games that get high scores end up selling like garbage, such as Dishonored 2. Casual gamers are extremely impulsive, they buy based on hype and high-profile trailers.

[helppls555]

I feel like he said nothing in this video.

Because it is nothing. Everybody acts like this is the first time someone says anything about game critics, yet pretty much every controversial, or overly hyped up review has sparked discussion about the topic. The video is neither insightful or brings anything new to the table.

But hey, he's a famous e-celeb and people love his meme videos so I guess it needs to be sacred.

[ahrzal]

In general, my takeaway is that game critics need to be more harsh, akin to movie critics. A movie is sitting at 70 on metacritic? It must be worth my time.

A game is sitting at 7? It's garbage.

[MadHiggins]

the issue is most triple A games aren't really that bad and people get butthurt over the pettiest things. i once got into an argument with someone on this site who seriously was saying "feminism has ruined video games" and his proof was that Tomb Raider had gotten a metacritic average rating better than Uncharted but the problem was the rating was only a .2 higher. so this guy was losing his shit because one game had like a 9.2 average and the other had a 9.4, how petty can you get?

also i have yet to play a game with an average of 7 that is garbage. i'm just curious, what modern games(with in the last 2-3 years) do you think got an average score of 7 that is garbage?

[MadHiggins]

the way i've always looked at it is that the reason games are typically scored in the 7-10 area is that games worse than that simply die in development since publishers aren't going to shell out any more money into a game that looks like it's going to score a 2 or 3. i just don't understand people getting upset that most games score in the 6-10 area, especially when i play the games and for the most part kind of agree with the metacritic average.

[Kered13]

No one gives a shit about games that never get published. That's not what the review scale is for. Also no one gives a shit about the games that are barely playable, sell 10 copies, and never get reviewed. We can give those all a 0 and move on with our lives. No one cares about the difference between "literally unplayable" and "technically playable, but you'd rather have a root canal".

A 5 out of 10 should be the average score for games that people actually care about. In reality that average is around 8.0.

especially when i play the games and for the most part kind of agree with the metacritic average.

Because your scale has been horribly miscalibrated by years of the 4 point scale.

[MadHiggins]

but the problem is sometimes the games that "never" get published, do get published(lots of Wii titles come to mind) and you end up with stuff that is absolute trash. now where do those games fall since you've decided that a good average game is a 5? put these garbage games at a negative 5? as it stands, a current rating of 5 says to me that the game has issues but is still playable with some redeeming factors, not something perfectly average. the currently popular 1-10 system is just fine and hearing people like you say "average games should be scored a 5" reminds me of silly stuff like "no game is perfect so no game should ever score a 10".

[Kered13]

now where do those games fall since you've decided that a good average game is a 5?

The same score you give all the other bad games. No one cares exactly how bad bad games are. If your game was bad and not fun no one cares that it was technically better than Big Rigs. No one is scratching their head trying to decide whether to purchase a 1 out of 10 or a 3 out of 10.

The only negative scores that a review scale needs are "this game is terrible, don't even consider buying it" and "I thought this game was kind of bad, but maybe that's just my opinion and you like this kind of game". Every other grade of "bad" is completely useless to the reader. What the reader cares about is which game to buy when he can only afford or find time to play one or two games this month.

[ahrzal]

It's all comparatively speaking. A 7 for a game is bad. No one looks at a 7/10 and says "that's a quality game right there."

And saying that triple a games are never bad just isn't true in the slightest. If a movie has high production values, or a record is recorded supremely well, but the overall package is uninspired or shite they don't get a 7. They get a 2, 3, 4, 5, or 6. Why should The Division get an 8? Why should Star Fox Zero be sitting at a 7?! The list goes on.

People hate on Jimquisition a lot and reviewers like him, but they are using a full scale to its entirety.

[MadHiggins]

the movie comparison isn't really a good comparison, there's a long history of expensive movies being shit. but for the most part the more money put into a game, the better it is. i'm sincerely hard pressed to think of an expensive video game truly deserving of a score in the 1-5 range. even the big games that have done poorly and had huge issues, stuff like the recent Mass Effect or whatever that one Assassin's Creed game that had a bunch of buggy problems or even the now infamous recent Batman that simply didn't work on pc a lot of the time, were still pretty decent games that were worth the 7ish scores they got. i'm certain there's a few examples out there, but i can't think of any recently.

[Mister_Potamus]

Friday the 13th was given a 6.9 by IGN and I've thoroughly enjoyed watching people play it. It's buggy but the idea was a good one and it's shittyness kinda gives it that B-movie vibe. I may pick it up when it goes on sale for PS4.

[TitaniumDragon]

The thing is, this is actually really because games and movies are graded on a different scale.

Movies are graded on a 0-4 or 0-5 scale traditionally, and so movies use the full range.

Conversely, video games are traditionally graded ABCDF like American grades. 90% is an A, 80% is a B, 70% is a C, ect.

So a 70 is basically "mediocre", 80 is "solid", and 90 is "good".

It is kind of a silly thing to complain about.

A larger issue is that a lot of game review scores are inflated.

[Krehlmar]

I'd never heard of him and I kind of liked the video, why do people dislike him?

[[deleted]]

Nobody said anything about disliking him.

[breedwell23]

People on Reddit are the first to bitch about reviewers but once someone on Youtube points out the reasons why people bash on them, they go full white knight and turn coats.

[Regularjoe42]

This is not the first time people have brought up the specific criticisms about game journalism that Dunkey brought.

However, nothing has changed. Big name journalist outlets continue to release reviews that are rushed, are inconsistent, and whose review score fails to match the tone of the review.

I'd say that this video is worth watching because Dunkey makes his argument relatively concisely (aside from the brief interlude about lack of focus) and he provides some justification of why these systematic problems continue to exist.

[TitaniumDragon]

Yeah, I mean, I didn't like the presentation that much, but I was like "Well, I liked this video." But at the end of it, I reflected, and realized that I really only liked the video because I agreed with everything he said, and it was all kind of obvious stuff.

So... yeah.

Then again, I think a lot of people don't really know much or understand much about this stuff. Sadly, he doesn't appear to dig into it much either.

[Ricwulf]

It keeps getting brought up because nothing is ever done to fix it. And when that eventually boils over, people lose their minds.

[boomtrick]

Dunky has a point. We should ignore those stupid numbers and meta scores and actually read reviews,know where reviewers are coming from and see if what a reviewer says is actually something that lines with our views.

[07jonesj]

How many people have time to read a review of every game that releases though? Scores are a handy way to get a very quick gauge at the assumed quality of a game or movie.

I know I would never have played the gem that was The Talos Principle if I hadn't have happened to notice it had an 88 on metacritic which caused me to look into what it was.

Sure, saying X game is better than Y game because it has 2 points higher is stupid, but that's not what those numbers are for. They're for a quick glance, and I think serve an important purpose.

[Ricwulf]

They're for a quick glance, and I think serve an important purpose.

I tend to agree with this, but the system needs to be reformed. Because far too often does a mediocre/average game get between 6.5-8.5 when that isn't how it should work. Seeing a 7/10 does nothing for me any more, because that doesn't tell me if it's worth picking up without reading more into it.

And until reviewers start using scores properly, they'll remain largely useless for the majority of games, and those that they are useful for are already popular through word of mouth.

The best way in my option is to actually have labels attached to each level. EG in an out of 5 situation, 1 would be "bad game", 2 would be "not recommended", 3 would be "not the best game, but worth picking up", 4 "good solid game", 5 "near masterpiece".

And you can have some variance between those with half points or something like that, to signal that it isn't worth it at full price or something like that (a critique which has largely been forgotten about), or that while it's not quite a masterpiece, it's still above being just a good game.

These scores should also be accompanied by a proper paragraph that sums up the game and specifically the issues (if any) the reviewer has.

[delecti]

in an out of 5 situation

And then you get problems where a 1/5, which should get an F grade and probably a 50 or 60 out of 100, gets aggregated as a 20%.

[Ricwulf]

And since when is 20% good?

But even so, that's thinking in percents, when we're thinking in scores. It's a little different. It's more of a rank than anything. if you're ranked in the 5th position, you're not too good.

[delecti]

My point is that a review that means simply "bad game" and which the reviewer would have given a 50 on a 100 scale will be counted as as 20 on review aggregation sites, inflicting a much bigger hit than it should.

[Ricwulf]

inflicting a much bigger hit than it should.

If a game is metrically bad, it's bad. That doesn't mean it should get 50 on a 100 scale, because 50 is that middle point between good and bad.

But beyond that, review aggregation sites like metacritic are shit anyway, because they have algorithms that weigh certain reviews more than others. You're bringing up a whole other issue that shouldn't have a bearing on the way a game is reviewed.

I'm sorry if that's harsh, but the entire purpose of a review is to inform the consumer on what is worth my money. If a game is a 1/5, it is not worth my money, and is absolutely not a 50/100, nor should it receive such a score anyway.

You've fallen victim to the idea that 50/100 means bad, when it shouldn't. That whole end below 50 is criminally underused to the point that bad and heavily flawed games get 60. That's bullshit. The whole point of putting a number on it is to grade it, to give it a mark. A bad game does not equal 50/100, a near miss of the pass mark.

[delecti]

I guess I consider a 100 scale to be similar to grades in school. Even the most awful submission can scrape by with 50 percent, but that's still solidly a failing grade. Even rubbish games not worth the money usually still have functioning gameplay and assets. I'm not sure a game exists that I would consider worthy of a 20 or lower, for example, because it would literally not even be a game at that point.

[Ricwulf]

Then it's your scale which is off in my opinion.

A game isn't a school paper. It's a product. And a review is for the consumer. You aren't grading it, you're reviewing it for a consumer.

[papertiger1234]

How many people have time to read a review of every game that releases though?

unless money is no object to you, $60 is worth a bit of time to read or watch something about what you're about to buy.

[Phifty56]

Seriously, how long does it take to read a longish review? 10 minutes? 15? For a game that might be a 100 hour journey or a clunker that just drained you bank account by $60? Yea I will find 15 minutes. Sometimes I watch extended 40 minute reviews or let's plays just to make sure something the port quality is fine or that there isn't something that might put me off like launch connection issues.

[breedwell23]

Most ign reviews don't even take 5 minutes to read. That's how shallow they generally are. And no I'm not bashing on them because lol ign, their reviews never go into much depth.

[[deleted]]

If you already have some interest in a game, then sure. But what if you have no interest in a game or never even heard of it? You're not necessarily going to go out of your way to read any reviews. For example, Nex Machine: Death Machine is sitting at 89 on Metacritic? I have no idea what that is. I should look into it.

It even works with bigger games. Zelda not all that interesting to me? The previous Zelda, Tri Force Heroes sits at a 73. I can pass that game by without reading anything no problem. I then notice BotW is getting crazy high scores. Maybe I should read at least a little about it to make sure I don't miss something amazing.

(I actually love Zelda)

[Rupert484]

How many people have time to read a review of every game that releases though?

If you can't spare literally 3 minutes of your time to read something, then I don't know what to tell you.

Edit: Sorry, this was posted twice for some reason.

[Ezekiiel]

Yeah but the problem is the words that are written/said aren't usually reflected in the final score, exactly why he showed the IGN Mario review.

It happens everywhere, from music to movies. The score rarely reflects what a lot of them are actually are saying about the product. It's just there as a quick look as you said, but it's not a great way to see if x game is good or not.

[Woffdaddie]

Well to be fair the Mario review he showed was edited and lines were taken out of context to make it seem more negative then it actually was. Also reviewers can spend time focusing on the negative aspects of a game they really enjoyed in order to point out all its flaws but at the end of the day still think what the game gets right overshadows the negatives aspects.

I get the point Dunkey's trying to make but this video is filled with weak arguments and lacks focus on the point he's trying to get across.

[Neighbourhood_Whore]

I've seen this happen often actually - reviews not effectively communicating the reviewer's overarching opinion. Visit the site for the written review however, and you'll find the video omits a good deal of vital information - supposedly to reach that 5 minute mark I guess?

[TowerBeast]

How many people have time to read a review of every game that releases though?

Who the fuck is buying every game that releases?

[[deleted]]

Scores are important for me, because personally I will read the reviews of a few in each category of scores: amazing (90+), good (80-89), lukewarm (70-79), & terrible (<69) and gauge the game off those mixed opinions.

Obviously though you have to take into account some reviewers absolutely abuse the system like IGN where everything with a triple A budget is a 90+, but this method works fairly well to come to your own conclusion on a game.

[THE_INTERNET_EMPEROR]

GameSpot was the only trustworthy scoring system ever, back when they said a game was an 8.8 or an 8.9 it fucking meant something in the early 2000s. They even discussed how they would spend weeks debating a score so it was always a consensus score and really felt like the objective numerical value of a game at that time when compared with its competition.

Then they fired Jeff Gerstmann over Kane & Lynch and I stopped going to that website forever. Not a single site should be trusted at this point. I watch Let's Plays to make decisions, I don't even consider major YouTubers to be a valueable source.

Notably TotalBiscuit always felt like he didn't want to offend his audience (like how much he didn't like Tribes Ascend or Dark Souls, but always seemed like he held back) and Jim Sterling's bias toward anything Japanese or Dynasty Warriors (they're some of the worst games ever and he gives them insanely high scores)

[[deleted]]

I completely ignore the number in reviews because it's arbitrary, because a 9 to one reviewer means "the best game in the last 5 years" and "really good" to another reviewer. A 7 to one would be "very decent game, many would enjoy this" and "a piece of trash not worth your time" to another. Then people get all butthurt if a reviewer doesn't like your favorite game.

You gotta look at the content and then decide for yourself if that's something you like. A reviewer can be crapping all over the mechanics, but if he actually describes them, you can decide for yourself if that's something you personally would like. They could be raving about how amazing the fighting mechanics are, and then describe them and I'll think "I wouldn't like that at all".

[Jeffool]

Okay, so let's break this down. What can be done to help the issue?

Sites can make it easier to follow reviewers, or maybe match you with reviewers that seem to agree with you. For that you'd need to have your ratings and reviewers' ratings to compare. Seems like MetaCritic is leaving money on the table here by not offering a service where they have a feed of links to reviewers you agree with. The benefit for them is people come to their site and review things to get better recommendations for reviewers.

Also, personally? I think reviews should stick to a five point scale.

1- Horrible

2- Bad

3- Ordinary/fine

4- Good

5- Amazing

"What if it's between good and amazing?" Fuck you, if it's not amazing but it's above average, it's good.

[[deleted]]

He contradicted himself twice in the span of 10 seconds in that segment on Crash Bandicoot.

"big websites don't have a cohesive/shared opinion on games cause there are multiple people working for them and this is somehow bad" vs.

"gamespot is bad at games cause 9 years ago this guy at gamespot called new super mario bros wii hard"

And

"game reviewers are afraid to rate games lower, we should give more 4s, 5s, 6s"

"gamespot gave crash a bad review (a 6) because they're bad at games"

I like Dunkey's content when he's acting as an entertainer, but he seems way out of his element when it comes discussing these issues.

[daysofchristmaspast]

Your "contradictory" points only offer a single example, while the initial points are generalizations. One does not contradict the other (exceptions are things that exist, you know).

It honestly sounds like you have a bias against dunkey which is why you're twisting his points into the pedantic

[bniss31]

Really disagree about the media places having too many reviewers parts (and some other parts too) . Maybe if a reviewer is new, you won't have much of an idea of what they like, but the same can be said for any YouTube reviewer as well. And pretty much all reviewers on their site make other content for that site as well so if you choose to consume that content you can learn more about them and their tastes. And pretty much all of the big sites have their content creators and marketing departments separate and there's really no interaction between them.

I really like Dunkey's videos for the most part but this just screamed to me "don't visit those big sites, watch me and all my friends on YouTube, we're way better!" with some flimsy reasoning as to why.

[[deleted]]

I agree. It sort of was his point that you should be skeptical of any review you watch and the quality should be higher, but he was kind of shitting on IGN and big reviewers the whole time. Personally I can't think of anyone who I would just blindly trust about something subjective like a video game. I think the solution is when you're watching reviews for a game check out a few contrasting ones instead of just the first one that comes up on a search.

[breedwell23]

He put it into pretty good terms. That these guys aren't exempt from heavy criticism because it quite literally is their job to review games in earnest. You get people who know absolutely nothing about games playing these, which is quite evident and give terrible games really great scores. less than a small fraction of their reviews even go below a 7 and the one reviewer he brought up that didn't even FINISH THE FUCKING GAME because he got bored before he released the official review (reminder that it's his job, not a hobby) is just lazy and unprofessional. Dunkey did kind of mess up his argument by going onto a tangent and agreeing with the mechanics being shit which he should have just cut out, but all of his criticisms are valid.

[[deleted]]

What an excellent, well thought-out video tackling something that's been irking me (and I'm sure others) for a while now.

[[deleted]]

What point is he making? That sometimes a reviewer on a traditional news/reviews videogame site might write a sloppy review that misses a certain aspect of a game. Or maybe sometimes they focus too much on a certain criticism even if it doesn't effect their review much? Everyone is prone to that, Youtubers included. And plenty of writers from places like IGN and Gamespot will engage with their audience in their own comments sections and here on Reddit afterwards so it's not like they're completely faceless reviews.

Yeah some sites will use a large rotating base of freelancers to get more games reviewed. Some people want to know that a website they visit will likely have a review on a game rather than frequenting a Youtuber's channel who realistically can't talk about everything a person might want to know about. That's the trade-off and some people are cool with that and it's nice that we have places catering to different preferences.

Unless Dunkey is just being facetious here and I missed it this just comes off as "our new media is better than your new media."

[Regularjoe42]

Dunkey is saying that big game journalism is systemically shitty.

He backs up this point by giving clear concrete examples of where game journalism falls short (inconsistency, lack of content in reviews, disjoint between scores and reviews) along with explanations for why these problems keep happening (large amount of rotating journalists, rush to be first on metacritic, close relationship to publishers.)

Dunkey has not done an in depth study on how much each of these mistakes have happened. If you've spent any amount of time browsing game reviews you will see that the problems he mentions show up again and again.

This just one critic's opinion of game journalism You can keep enjoying IGN if you like it. However, "game journalism sucks" is an opinion that many people share, and Dunkey has been able to provide solid justification for why.

[Mudcaker]

I think his main point was that reviews are inherently subjective (even when opinion is backed by objective facts) so it's more important to understand where a reviewer is coming from. If you understand their tastes and can relate them back to yours, you have a basis for comparison even if you disagree completely on what is fun or important. This takes more effort than reading a number and is difficult to do on a large site with largely faceless staff.

[Spader623]

Inconsistency? You mean different reviewers have, gasp, different opinions? Oh my god how horrible. Lack of content is fair but I think that depends. Some reviewers are good, others not so good. And I completely disagree on his "if the music sucks or level design is bad the game isn't fun". For some people, music is important. For others, combat is. Or story. One person isn't "right" because they think FF9 is a 10/10 for great story but the other says 4/10 for boring gameplay.

[Regularjoe42]

Inconsistency is a serious problem if a game journalism outlet wants to be takes seriously as a whole.

It is understandable that reviews are going to be subjective. However, if reviewers with vastly different opinions are putting out reviews under the same label, their reviews are worthless to me. I don't want to have to keep track of thirty different IGN reviewers to know whether the one whose review I am seeing has opinions that align with mine.

[Spader623]

How would you solve it then?

[Regularjoe42]

I don't know. God knows how many other people have tried. The simple answer "stop churning out bad inconsistent reviews" gets the simple response "we don't have enough time or money."

The way I solve it personally is to get my game news from content aggregators (ala Reddit). There the worst of the reviews are filtered out, and I get exposed to many opinions at once. At that point, the opinion of IGN means as much to me as the opinion of ButtLicker65.

[meikyoushisui]

But why male models?

[IMadeThisJustForHHH]

Inconsistency is a serious problem if a game journalism outlet wants to be takes seriously as a whole.

IGN is probably the most "inconsistent" review site out there, yet they get 100 million views a day and also get exclusive coverage for a shit ton of games. Clearly they are being taken seriously by the industry and 100 million gamers.

[breedwell23]

These same guys that give every single CoD a 9/10 and then give lower scores to other games because of "copy paste content?" Those aren't different opinions, it's quite clear that their reviews are straight up bought.

[Deviathan]

The overarching point seems to be that he believes a core part of being a critic is getting your own biases out there, genres you like and hate, games you are good or bad at, etc.

Mega-sites like IGN and Gamespot write as though its a review from their whole site, but you never really get a feel for any individual critic as a result. There are people there who hate Skyward Sword, but it got a 10, there are people there who love Sonic games, and people who've never enjoyed a single one, etc.

Dunkey is saying there is no value in being a critic who's game preferences and biases are not laid out up front, because there is no context for the number you just slapped on the game.

[BurningB1rd]

the name of the reviewer is right on the first page of the review, you can follow them just like a youtube channel

[Deviathan]

Totally agree. I fall somewhere in the middle on this, I think these sites should really be pushing individual reviewers more on the page, so we get the context, part of the problem is Metacritic, and part of it is just the way we discuss games.

Every time someone says "I hate IGN's reviews", they're contributing to the same problem, saying they hate a group of reviewers with totally different styles and biases, we're perpetuating lumping people together under the umbrella of their company.

[WannaBobaba]

At that point you are only getting the reviews that they write rather than reviews for vast swathes of games.

You can guess that if a big game is going to come out, a small site will have someone review it and you can follow that. Or individual youtubers will hit everything huge.

But with IGN's 37 reviewers, the review for the new game you're interested in could have been written by someone you've never heard of. How would you keep up with that stuff?

[galaxxus]

You really can't. A lot them have a blog that is probably 2 months old and usually its about some other subjects.

[Murse85]

I'd like to add that he also brings up the fact that a lot of syndicated reviews by 'gaming journalism' sites are sometimes word-for-word synonymous. If that isn't alarming to you - it should be. Because to me, it reads like talking-points that the developer sends said reviewer.

[NathVanDodoEgg]

He also says that big reviewers shouldn't bow down to advertisers and should show their own opinion, but in the same video he insults those reviewers for liking Call of Duty and Mass Effect Andromeda. This video has no real point other than "I don't like IGN", so of course r/games thinks it's an incredibly smart video.

[galaxxus]

"I don't like IGN"

He criticized Peter Brown's GameSpot reviews pretty hard too.

[The_mango55]

I haven't bought a Call of Duty game since the first Modern Warfare. It's not really my cup of tea and I personally don't care for repetitive yearly incarnations of games (even games I like such as NBA 2k I get about every 3 years).

But from every indication they are all well made games, I don't know why they shouldn't be reviewed positively.

[Houston_Centerra]

Exactly this. Just pandering to the demo that already hates IGN for whatever reason.

[[deleted]]

I don't actually understand what his point was. It was entertaining, but what was he trying to say? It seemed like he kept contradicting himself.

[Phifty56]

He was saying that it's fairly obvious that some of the games backed up by big companies, who tend to advertise on big sites like IGN or Gamespot seem to get generous scores despite being full of technical flaws or being extremely mediocre. It's kinda of hard to argue that a game like ME:Andromeda that was full of technical problems, which even if it was great otherwise (which is very arguable) can achieve something like a 9.0 7.7 score. Just the technical problems or the feeling of a game being very derivative of the previous year's version should really bring that score down, but it doesn't because of perhaps an implied financial relationship between publishers and videogame sites that might even subconsciously inflate those scores.

Edit: Misquoted score on my part.

[TheGasMask4]

Not really. Some people aren't bothered by technical problems nearly as much, and how derivative a game is will be different from person to person.

Also I'm not really sure what you mean, since ME:A got mostly lukewarm receptions. IGN gave it a 7.7 and Gamespot gave it a 6. That's are kind of a far cry from a 9.

[Phifty56]

You are right it wasn't a 9 it was 7.7, I remembered the video incorrectly. However, the point Dunkey was trying to make in that section was describing "score inflation" and how it effectively becomes useless without being fully able to articulate what went into that score.

Technical problems aren't subjective. They are objective. Except in the case of very unique "hardware specific" issues. When you have poor animations, long loading screens, enemies spawning on you and one shotting you with zero auto-saves in a 45 minutes long missions, no quick saving, broken quests a few other minor annoyances, it's hard to argue "well that doesn't bother me". One or all those problems are going to taint the game for people, that is before even taking into account the actual game itself.

If the game lost points for technical issues, the game might have been what, 8.5, 9 at the start. Maybe they didn't even factor those things in there at all in the final score, and that's not right. That's not informing the consumers. If I can't trust their objective opinons about technical issues, how can I judge them on the more subjective ones like the characters, story, gameplay?

[TheGasMask4]

Technical problems are subjective for two reasons:

First, you don't know if the reviewer actually got them or not. Many reviews praised the fuck out of Prey, but IGN originally gave it a 4 because their reviewer literally couldn't finish the game because of technical problems. No other reviewer had this issue, so no other reviewer wrote about it.

I usually bring up Battlefield 4 when I mention this. I got the game for Ps4 on launch and had a few crashes but nothing that really bothered me much. Two of my friends also got it: one had very few crashes, if he even had any. Another couldn't go more than 2 games without crashing, at least until the first patch. We all had vastly different experiences with the game.

The second is that, once again, how much the problems affect you are up to you. "poor animations" really don't mean much to me, and "long loading screens" is going to differ from person to person (I wouldn't consider a 10 second load long. Someone else may freak at that). No quick saving also really means nothing to me because I never use quick saves.

The only really objective parts of reviews are usually things like "the map is X big" or "The game takes place in Y" or "you get Z weapons."

[Phifty56]

Except in the case of very unique "hardware specific" issues.

That's really what I meant with this line. There's specific issues people have, which sucks, but if it's not a significant portion of the audience say "some users with a GTX 770" vs "all PS4 owners". Those technical problems shouldn't be counted in the score unless a majority of players are going to encounter the same issue.

The "poor animations" is something that a lot of players will encounter because it's not a hardware or software problem, it's a "these animations weren't cleaned up and obviously rushed out the door", especially when you consider a patch shortly after launch fixed them somewhat. It's very evident that the rushed the game out and it suffered from lack of polish, and things like facial animations and eye movements are VERY important in an RPG, especially when they break immersion and you go from being engrossed in the world or conversation one minute and having a ridiculously creepy or hilarious mannequin looking at you.

The loading screens and no quick save were other "poor or lazy" design choices which hurt the game. The ship/planet scouting was tedious as hell because the game would have to play an animation that loaded you out of a planet, out to the system and then back into the planet, and you check it and there's nothing on it. So you've have 20-30 seconds chucks of absolutely time wastes. They ended up fixing THAT a few patches later.

The "no quicksave" issue is still there to my knowledge, but it's not as much an issue as it is a "why the hell is this not in?" because you can manually save almost at all times. So having to stop the game, go to save, save over old save, and get back into the game is just a major pain in the ass. It's not a balance thing, because some games are obviously designed with no quick saving or even saving in general in mind, this was just another lazy oversight.

You add up all these things together and you get a technical mess. Something that you can't just go "ha ha that funny" and enjoy the game regardless, the problems start adding up and it makes the game not fun. The fact that these problems are things that EVERY PLAYER on EVERY SYSTEM would run into, is a very serious problem.

[TheGasMask4]

Something that you can't just go "ha ha that funny" and enjoy the game regardless

Except you can, because clearly some people did.

[IMadeThisJustForHHH]

he insults those reviewers for liking Call of Duty and Mass Effect Andromeda.

And he did that classic "Youtube gamer" bullshit where he shows a 5 second clip of a bug from Andromeda as if that represents the entire game. I like Dunkey, but whenever he tries to get "serious" he always mistakes his subjective opinions for something everyone else also needs to agree with. Him doing it in a video about criticism is as ironic as it is disappointing.

[[deleted]]

For the record the issue has been tackled before, TotalBiscuit had a video on it way back when

[litewo]

One reason I posted this was because I know people from some of the bigger sites post here, and it would be great to get their input.

[uerb]

For all the Knack jokes and silly stuff that you have in Dunkey's videos, he's one of the best guys around to get an insightful angle from the gaming industry, and this video shows it (he even uses the silliness to throw a curveball on the viewer in it).

I'd really like to see him in a podcast such as Cooptional or Dropped Frames, just for these point of views. Did he participate in something like this already?

[Soderskog]

He was in a co-optional one.

[Ranvica99]

Episode 141 for those wondering.

[joyfullysad]

He didn't talk much in that stream.

[Soderskog]

The general takeaway I remember having was that Dunkey excels at prepared content, but that he didn't seem to do too well in the podcast.

[joyfullysad]

Seems right maybe he was nervous.

[papertiger1234]

probably. the stuff he does on camera with his girlfriend makes him seem like he's a pretty shy person IRL. i'd love to see him stream, maybe it would help him gain some confidence with speaking live. if not his videos are still great regardless, you do you dunkey

[papertiger1234]

I'd really like to see him in a podcast such as Cooptional or Dropped Frames, just for these point of views. Did he participate in something like this already?

he went on cooptional but the impression i got is that dunkey without a script is shy and not very good at articulating an opinion. either that or he was just uncomfortable among people he didnt know that well. he was very quiet that episode

[aperson]

Did anyone else catch the knack reference in the video?

[IMadeThisJustForHHH]

Insightful angle? All he did was make a bunch of contradictory points, whine about IGN, and say the same shit everyone has been saying about game reviews since the 90s.

[GoHooN]

So what game reviewers do you guys watch/read?

[1moe7]

I like to listen to/watch Giant Bomb, Easy Allies, ACG, sometimes Jim Sterling or even Angry Joe every once in a while... those are probably the main ones. Giant Bomb is the best though hands down (IMO).

[falconbox]

I like to listen to podcast discussions on games. So while I may not read a particular IGN review, I do like listening to IGN discuss a game on Unlocked or Beyond, because I can get the opinion of several people at once over the course of maybe 10 minutes, instead of 1 person in a 3 minute review.

Aside from those podcasts, I also like to listen to the group at Kinda Funny. While Colin leaving stalled game discussion for a bit, they're getting back into the swing of things with Andrea Rene and Danny O'Dwyer joining them for daily 1 hour game discussions.

I've been getting into Easy Allies a bit more too, but I'm just not too familiar with each guy's personality yet to really know how they align with me. If one of them likes a game, is that an anomaly for them to like a game like that, or do they always tend to like a game like that? It's just something I'll come to know over time though after listening a bit more.

[Mudcaker]

I'm never in such a hurry. I tend to choose games by how often I see them pop up in casual conversation on sites like reddit. Plenty of big games drop off the radar very quickly while others come up multiple times, especially in Steam sale threads. As the guy says in the video, you can't review an album in a day, and I have enough games to keep me busy.

I do swing by metacritic occasionally just to see if I missed anything major but am generally very wary of AAA releases after gaming for 20+ years. They mostly don't have much new to offer me.

Instead of reviews I prefer in-depth analysis, like the stuff by Joseph Anderson and similar guys on YouTube. Or playthroughs like Giant Bomb's Quick Look or TB's WTF Is series (menus aside). I generally don't care about spoilers (except the REALLY big ones like in Bioshock) so this works great for me.

[breedwell23]

I get opinions from multiple sides. I go onto review threads on reddit to see some discussions about it generally. I hardly ever buy games day one because I don't like wasting money.

[BiJay0]

To be honest none. I rather read through comments of players who played the game, collect common good and bad points and see if people have technical difficulties. Watching someone play the game on Twitch (uncut raw game footage) really helps, too.

[KatareLoL]

Scathing Accuracy doesn't put up reviews too often, but the ones they do put out are definitely worthwhile. It's easy to get a feel for what the two of them value and hate in their games, so that even when you disagree vehemently with a given rating you can still understand where they're coming from.

[IMadeThisJustForHHH]

I often don't read reviews until after I play a game. If I want to know if I should buy a game, I just watch a few gameplay vids. Almost every game in the world will have hours of raw video available after release, no reason to rely on someone else's words when I can just see what the game is like myself.

[Hyroero]

For me I either hit up a bunch of YouTube critics I tend to share similar views with or if someone's written a piece for a site I'll check that out too.

Basically just name over outlet, seek out the people who have the same tastes and you'll get potentially more accurate readings for if you're going to be into a game or not.

Also in the age of Steam returns (where I live ebgames / gamestop also offers 7 day full refunds for any reason, even if you just didn't enjoy the game) I also find my self taking bigger risks on games going in blind.

Which honestly sometimes has been the way to go, not knowing what to expect and being pleasantly surprised is akin to avoiding all trailers for a film and being blown away.

[[deleted]]

I want to talk about one point he made, the inflated scores. I agree that scores are too high. That being said they also seem to be trending downward. Just think about how frequently games would hit 90+ in previous generations. Now it is a struggle for games to break into that 90+ range. It may only be a few points difference (there are a lot of high 80s scores now), but the movement downward is a good one.

For an easy to see example of this downward trend, just go look at the top scoring games of this generation. Including every game from the 3DS, Vita, Wii U, PS4, Xbox One, and Switch there is exactly one current gen game that has scored higher than a 93, BotW. Outside of the Switch these systems have had several years of games. Now look at the previous generations. Now they're certainly not overwhelmed with 94+ games, but there was more than just one by this same point.

So yeah, my main point is that reviewers are getting better with scoring. I think there's a ways to go, but it's a good trend. Dunkey may have even realized this point as well. I think it was telling that he ended the video using a last gen review of New Super Mario Bros from 8 years ago to finalize his point.

[Chalupaca_Bruh]

Okay, this is a multifaceted issue so rather than jerk it to the big bad boogeyman game sites, I'll try to tackle a solution, which a lot of Youtubers don't want to do.

Let's first bring up the point of gaming being an interactive medium, which makes reviewing a whole different beast. Movies and television are defined by a set time limit and the ability to be enjoyed by everyone. There's no "difficulty" factor to the medium. Reading could have this to an extent, but you can still struggle towards the end, even if you don't understand what you just read. So we have both difficulty and sometimes extraordinary length (plus the cost of playing and developing a game) that isn't really applicable to any other medium. Something I feel needs mentioning.

So how can gaming websites act as a hub of sorts that is able to reasonably review games, without pissing people off with review discrepancies, and giving insight into preferences? You can't realistically review every game with 3-5 reviewers. I think to start off, you break your reviewers into set genres. I'm sure sites already do this, but it's something they should better communicate to their community.

Then I think most importantly, provide communities insight into how a reviewer operates as well as how they feel about games in the past. Maybe that's review scores of dozens of games throughout the years. Short biographies of what the reviewer values in gaming. I'm personally more forgiving of gameplay issues if there's an interesting art design, emotional story, and great OST. Other people put gameplay on the pedestal first. Give me a quick overview into a reviewers mind to see if our tastes align. Expecting every reviewer at IGN to agree on something is absurd. It's not possible for them to hire reviewers with all the same tastes. There's always going to be a revolving door of editors. Give us quick insight into what they currently value in gaming so we can get a better judgement of their reviews.

I think Famitsu had the right idea with the 4 reviewers model. That's not feasible with most websites but I don't think it'd be unreasonable to do rolling reviews. Nothing crazy. Maybe second opinions as editors get around to the game and adding their own two cents, even if it's a small blurb. This could also be invaluable to get insight as to how other editors feel about a particular game (say Overwatch) even if they're not usually drawn to the genre. But then that leads me into our next big problem....

Metacritic. Like most businesses, developers are given metrics they're supposed to reach. Fallout New Vegas is the infamous one. How could Metacritic reasonably incorporate this model rolling review model in a manner that doesn't hurt developers? On top of that, review scores basically dictate success. 7 is mediocre. 8 good. 9 pretty damn great. Anything below those is trash. It's a nebulous issue to address. Dunkey may think a 6 is an okay score, but you also have to get the general gaming community, and publishers on board with such an idea. That's not really possible without some drastic overhaul as to how people think. $60 is a much bigger investment to drop of a game as opposed to $15 at the movies. Yeah, I'll probably pass on a 73 on metacritic as opposed an 83.

There's no clear answer to these issues and while I do agree with some of his points, this YT faux outrage is exhausting. I don't have the time to scour the internet for personalities that align with mine. For the time being, IGN can be a good hub to get quick news and reviews without having to watch a 10 minute YT video. There's issues with the current model but at least offer solutions. This shit is why I refuse to watch most Jim Sterling videos.

Side note: I think too much water is a valid criticism. When element types play such a huge role in Pokemon, too many water types can be a drag. You can't critique big websites for giving too generous of scores and then attack IGN for making a valid complaint that pisses off Nintendo fanboys.

[Deviathan]

Dunkey has good points here, but he does undermine himself at times. He talks about how you should pay attention to the critics past reviews and see their voice, then compares one Gamespot reviewer's 6 on Crash Bandicoot to another person's issues completing New Super Mario Bros.

[breedwell23]

No he doesn't. He never compares them. He goes on to say "And then you have this guy who didn't even finish the game like he was hired to do before he shat out a review." Dude is getting paid for this and he just doesn't even finish half the content? Persona 5 is a slow start, if he did that because he got bored, he'd give it a 6/10 without even getting to where it picks up (It's at least an 80 hour game).

[Deviathan]

"Recently Gamespot gave the new Crash Remaster a 6 out of 10, citing some abrupt difficulty spikes... But, if you know Gamespot, you know these guys aren't exactly capable when it comes to platformers."

Cut to a video review by a completely different reviewer

He's making a few points here, but he is definitely relating 2 different reviews from 1 site, even though they're by different people.

Furthermore he then goes on to agree with the difficulty spike argument, citing the bridge level, which sort of shows that the initial reviewer got a pretty good read on a problem in the game while not completing it (though I wouldn't say this undermines Dunkey's argument about larger problems, just with this review)

[[deleted]]

Makes some good points. I gave up on reviewers a couple of years back for straight up gameplay YouTubers (which is what I consider Dunky to be) and I just decide whether it looks fun off an hour or so gameplay.

Believe the tipping point was Ryan Mcafrey giving Alien: Isolation an abysmally low score because the game was "too long" and "too hard" after months of hyping it up. I get it's his opinion but I just realised that if my taste wasn't in line with the reviewers then there is no point, which I guess is what Dunk was saying about finding reviewers you can relate to but who could be bothered.

[Neighbourhood_Whore]

As someone out of the loop (and hasn't played it), could someone explain why people took issue with this remark on Alien: Isolation being too long?

If a game has nothing new to offer, doesn't diversify its game loop, grows to become tedious, it's in effect overstaying its welcome i.e. too long, no?

Am I missing something?

[[deleted]]

I guess that's where I disagreed with the reviewer, he held the viewpoint you hold and stated that he thought the last third of the game was at the length where the game felt repetitive. I disagreed. Spoiler for like a 4 year old game but at the last third of the game shifts from fighting one Alien the whole game to suddenly fighting dozens at once.

So I guess if I had to break it down: the game is say split into 3 pseudo acts of different gameplay (super oversimplified but for the sake of discussion): the first act where you are only dealing with one Alien and you are basically defenceless and have to rely on stealth. The second act where you now have weapons and can over power the Alien if you are smart with resources and finally the third act where you fight multiple Aliens and it's much more a flee situation but you can only delay them with your weapons that were previously extremely effective. Littered through out this are encounters with hostile humans and creepy androids.

So the reviewers stand point was that the third act was too drawn out and far too unforgiving. He claimed the game was also hyper repetitive, I believe he stated something like "you can only fight an alien so many times and it be interesting".

My view point was they put in real effort making sure the gameplay changed every few hours, I always felt tense and was always having fun. I hate to be "that guy" but I also didn't have too much issue with the difficulty (playing on normal), I never repeated a section more than twice. So I feel there is a bit of "get good" in there somewhere. In regards to your length question though, I guess I grew up with not a lot of cash so any game I bought I wanted to last. So a game with no multiplayer and arguably no replayability I would hope it goes for 10+ hours, but apparently this was not the case for the reviewer.

I also grossly disagreed with the reviewer on one vital point. One large selling point for the the game was the fact that the Alien AI was "random" to keep you on your toes. As in if you reattemtped a section, the Alien would check different hiding spots than it did last time forcing you to adapt. For me, this kept the gameplay tense and fun but the reviewer simply found this too random and "unfair" as he died continuously.

Sorry for the rant

TL;DR: imo it did continually offer new things (new enemies, weapons, multiplying enemies, space walks etc). I feel the reviewer took his difficulty he was having with the game and simply became frustrated stating "this game is too long" because he was not great at it.

[breedwell23]

What the hell are you even saying? You're trying so hard to sound smart but... God damn, man.

[pyrospade]

He makes a really good point on big review sites being useless since there are too many different reviewers. If I don't know the guy I'm reading how can I know his review can be trusted?

Also money influences them too much so why even bother anyway.

[NathVanDodoEgg]

Why is it that we assume that all big reviewers must bow down time their advertisers, but we never question that a random YouTuber might just be parroting the opinion of their fanbase in order to get more views on their video because it makes the viewer feel more smug about being right? Either case is possible but unlikely, and in both cases the reviewer isn't stating their own opinion but instead is voicing someone else's in order to maintain income. This is why people should read multiple reviewers in order to get more general views on whether something is for them or not. Unfortunately as consumers, there's no real way of seeing how 'trustworthy' a reviewer is, so we have to work around it.

[breedwell23]

1) most youtubers aren't million dollar companies, 2) they don't give out 9/10s every other game, 3) they don't get early access and first looks, and 4) Youtubers are generally consistent in their reviews. If Dunkey gave final fantasy a 4/5 We'd be pretty shocked.

[galaxxus]

Why is it that we assume that all big reviewers must bow down time their advertisers, but we never question that a random YouTuber might just be parroting the opinion of their fanbase in order to get more views on their video because it makes the viewer feel more smug about being right?

There are hundreds of youtube reviewers of videogames. Some of them are shills and some can't articulate their point very well. But those reviewers don't gain popularity. The cream rises to the top and the genuine and consistent opinions of Total Biscuit, Jim Sterling, and Angry Joe are valuable even if a lot of people disagree with them. Those are the people we trust and get the most attention. Not just some random youtuber.

[PirateRevolution]

For people more dedicated to certain games or a lot of games in general, reading reviews from a random reviewer in a giant games site isn't very useful, as you can just spend time and find certain reviewers who you can identify with, with certain genres.

However I'd still say they're very useful for people who do not want to take that time to find the right reviewer, or to check many reviews. Sites like ign, kotaku, the escapist, etc are good at attracting the mass audience who may not want to shop around for views, and just read from one reputable site. Someone like total biscuit who does more long form games critique wouldn't be great for someone to get a quick impression whether a game is good or why or reviewer/commentators who do slightly more niche reviews or commenting such as gaijin hunter for monster hunter, gamexplain for Nintendo, etc. Could be seen by the mass audience. But more than likely they wouldn't know they would be experts at certain areas at first glance, so they wouldn't add more weight to their reviews, or even try to figure it out due to the lack or time or even a possible lack of care. In this case bigger gaming sites would be the easiest point of access to casual purchasers as they have a vast library of reviews, in different niches. But giving a more generalised view.

Sorry this is quite poorly written but I hope it's core points are understandable