BREAKING: Women of #GamerGate Make Breakthrough on HuffPo Live

[Calbeck]

"Objective review."

*sigh* There is no such thing in gaming. With artstyle, gameplay, story etc all including subjective qualities you can't have an objective review worth a damn.

But on the other hand we have now "graphics are shit because I PERSONALLY don't like the art-style". When people ask for "Objective reviews" they want reviewers to dismiss their own biases to see the bigger picture.

Rule 1 of Armchair Psychiatry: Biases are symptoms of the very things that make a human being's personality what they are. You cannot ignore them, because they affect everything from the length you spend on a subject to the order you portray them in, and natural things you do to start, finish and counter point opposing points, down to the very way you type and speak. Hence why everyone tends to have their own personalized ways of explaining their various points.

Artstyle is subjective. (some people adore Andy Waholes's untalented shite they call art)

Gameplay qualities are subjective. (Dynasty Warriors is awful at everything, and many people love the gameplay)

Story quality is subjective. (Some people think Sword Art Online is the best written, best told anime of all time, despite spending a quarter of the show on pointless side stories, then an ultra generic tsundere romance, then a second arc that while better paced, is set around a plot point that is about a million times lower stakes then the first arc with a super overused plot that resembled Mario)

Controls are subjective. (Some people think Dark Souls had awful controls. I believe they are superb. Some people like Gears of War for its tight controls, when I found it glitchy, loose and unresponsive)


The only things that are not are emotionless descriptions, lists and technical details on graphics, which even then, can reveal author bias quite a bit more often then you think.

Excellent points. I think we can agree that bias exists, but it's more like looking through a window than anything else. There will always, always be that slightest of reflections no matter how hard you try to eliminate anything imperfect in repeatedly cleaning it. And there's a point of diminishing returns where trying extra-hard doesn't really net you much of a difference.

But the alternative of never cleaning the built-up residue means your viewpoint becomes muddier and muddier, until you cannot really see what is outside your window at all... your vision is reduced to what you can conjure in your imagination.