Halo 4 gets a 2/10...

[freaper]

Diablo 3 scores higher than Mass Effect 3?

I've seen enough.

They were both huge disappointments. I'm not sure what you're outraged about, unless it's both of them getting higher scores than they deserved.

Mass Effect 3 was NOT a huge disappointment. If you honestly believe the last 10 minutes ruined the game I feel sorry for you.

Besides, I couldn't give less of a **** about what some dude thinks about some game (the reviewer that is).

 

[RedDeadFred]

Ok so recently there was a post that pointed out a review of Halo 4 which criticized the game for not having iron sights and not being linear enough. The reviewer gave the game a 7/10 which isn't a bad score, it's just that his complaints seemed ridiculous (my opinion, yours may differ).

Now this reviewer http://www.quartertothree.com/fp/2012/11/04/halo-4-is-half-the-game-it-should-be/ has given Halo 4 a 2/10. Which in my mind means the game pretty much has to be broken but he doesn't say anything about it not working. These seem to be his primary reasons for the 2/10 score:
Too much like the past Halo games

Not enough like the past Halo games (yes I'm aware that these first two contradict each other)

You don't get to fire the big gun on the Mammoth

Enemies are Tron like

No scoring system in single-player (I agree with him on this, that's what made Halo 3's campaign so replayable)

AI's having a lifespan

The story is slow, sentimental and too serious

A 2/10 score really stands out on Metacritic so my review will get more traffic (oh wait, that's my assumption not his written reasoning)

Anyway, what do my fellow Escapists think about the review. I myself got a bit of a laugh out of it but a lot of the things he was criticizing I don't personally think are all that bad. I'm not going to get the game anyway because I've only ever really cared about the campaigns in Halo games but I'll definitely rent it.

The reviewer obviously just didn't play the game.

First way to tell so? Calling the story slow. It moves VERY fast, but not overly fast thankfully. Second way to tell? That big gun? Yeah, I'm sorry but I remember shooting it a few times. I want to know how he even finished that level without shooting it, because the game clearly doesn't even let you continue till you use it.

I have a feeling this site is like another site, one that I actually had the displeasure to work for. I was unable to finish the product by the date they needed the review in (due to a problem on their side. They lost the CD key >_> Pushing me back by an entire day. In a two day project.) So you know what they did? They ended up telling me to just read other people's reviews and form an opinion; which is what it looks like this website did. Also, just a heads up, the grade scale is out of 5, not out of 10.

...worst part of that little story? I ended up giving the game a bad review, because the game was TERRIBLE (from what I did play) and he ended up cutting out every negative part of what I wrote, then just threw in a few false positive comments and gave it an 8/10...oh, by the way, the game was Alpha Protocol. Yeah...gave it a 8/10 because they were afraid of not getting more free review copies. They used it to buff their personal stash...and I have a feeling this site is the opposite extreme. They don't want to write a review, they just want to get paid, so they slap together other site's reviews.

Ah. Thanks for the interesting insights! Also, I know he uses a grading scale of 5 but he gave it 1 star only which translated to 20% on Metacritic. Not sure why I picked 2/10 over his actual score or just the Metacritic percentage though.

 

[kortin]

You just gave him more hits...

If you want someone to not get hits, you don't talk about them, you don't mention them, and you most certainly don't link to them.

 

[Not G. Ivingname]

Too much like the past Halo games.

A completely fair criticism, games to similar tend to get stale...

Not enough like the past Halo games.

What.

You don't get to fire the big gun on the Mammoth.

Oh cry me a river. At least you get to drive it. How many FPS's even let you in vechiles now-adays?

Enemies are Tron like

The AI has never been that good in these games, although that still is legitement problem.

No scoring system in single-player (I agree with him on this, that's what made Halo 3's campaign so replayable)

Also a fair problem.

AI's having a lifespan

I'm... what? I don't even have a clue what that means.

The story is slow, sentimental and too serious

Oh no, a game has a half-way descent story that has actual pacing, oh the horror!

To be fair, I never really liked the Halo games, so much wrong with modern FPS's got there start in Combat Evolved. Still, a 2? A five, a completely average score I can understand. Was it physically painful to play and programmed by eight year olds? No? Then it does not deserve a 2.

 

[Itsthefuzz]

Oh gee, 1 reviewer gives a game a bad score. The end of the world is near!

I don't look at game reviews anymore; I haven't for years. Because the reviewers can not be trusted. There are mostly unprofessional, biased and sometimes even corrupt. There are a few exceptions, mostly the independent reviewers, e.g. hobbyist.

Based on your generic "Haha I can use sarcasm" post, I'm going to bet you just read the title of this thread and didn't actually read what the post was about. He isn't complaining that someone gave the game a bad score, he's pointing out that it's probably just for publicity and the review itself makes no sense.

 

[BloatedGuppy]

Mass Effect 3 was NOT a huge disappointment. If you honestly believe the last 10 minutes ruined the game I feel sorry for you.

No, the terribly uneven game ruined the game. The last 10 minutes just put a period on it.

Besides, I couldn't give less of a **** about what some dude thinks about some game (the reviewer that is).

Says the guy sharing his opinions on games in a public space. Your total lack of interest and respect for the opinions of others is really refreshing. Must be a point of pride for you.

 

[00slash00]

well ive never played the game and dont plan to, as ive never enjoyed the halo series. however, it goes without saying that the score is unfair. seems like this person is calling the came uninspired and mediocre. thats not a 2. given his arguments id say a 5 or maybe even a 4 would be fair. certainly not a 2 though

 

[AzrealMaximillion]

People are still harping on about this shessssh

Guy didn't like it and rated it accordingly END OF

Now go play some halo and have some fun dammit!!

Captcha: which one is math? (I find this an unanswerable question as maths is spelt incorrectly, I will therefore answer with chocolate pudding!)

So the guy can criticize the game but no one can criticize his review? Kind of ass backwards thinking, don't you think?

Not even a Halo fan but 2/10 is a troll rating, and it'll be called as such.

Criticise as much as you like it doesn't make him any more wrong or right, it's his opinion and it's just as valid as yours. Which in my opinion makes bashing the guy repeatedly utterly pointless. But hey it's my opinion

Anyway

Back to halo

Opinions can be wrong. They can also be ignorant. And judging by the review itself, the author didn't really give much of a reason as to why he rated the game so low other than, "I've done this before."

He starts the review off with the title that says "Halo 4 is half the game it should be" and then doesn't go into what half of the game was missing. He instead whines about not being able to shoot the gun mounted on the Mammoth. I don't know about you, but complaining for two paragraphs about not being able to shoot a gun in the beginning of a game seems petty.

He also had a little cryfest about the replacement of Firefight mode. He then doesn't even describe in any detail what he doesn't like about Spartan Ops, the aforementioned replacement.

It was more whining and less actual review of the game, and that's what has people calling this reviewer out.

So yeah, I think his opinion can be called less "valid" as he didn't actually state that the game played horribly. In fact he didn't really talk about him playing the game at all.

 

[Pyramid Head]

You know my negative review of My Little Pony which pushed me into temporary retirement had a lot of accusations of just making a negative review of a popular item for attention. I really wish i had this review to reference so i could show them what such a review actually looks like. Then again, someone criticizing the lack of a scoring system and saying the story is to sentimental and serious almost makes it sound like Halo 4 might be better than Halo 3, but the review clearly isn't valid so i'll just wait for either the Zero Punctuation review or check it out on Blistered Thumbs.

 

[Andy of Comix Inc]

Oh, this is the guy who gave Max Payne 3 a ridiculously low score while having opinions which contradicted the score. Yeah, low scores are fine - I quite enjoy them, actually - but goddamn it, if you don't have text which backs up the score there's no point scoring the game in the first place!

There's a difference between people who genuinely loathe a game, and people who just want to upset Metacritic's rankings, or want to disagree to cause trouble. This guy doesn't really think Halo 4 is worth 2/10 - he's giving it that score because that is what best suits him, whether it nets him more traffic or gets him more comments or... anything. If he gave reasons that made me think, "yeah, I can see how your opinion would measure 2/10," I'd be okay with this. ...but he's not making a good argument.

 

[kaizen2468]

But mountain dew gets 10/10 right?

 

[AzrealMaximillion]

You just gave him more hits...

If you want someone to not get hits, you don't talk about them, you don't mention them, and you most certainly don't link to them.

More hits didn't help Ian Miles when he wrote that article about KSI. More hits kind of ruined that guy's credibility.

And judging by what people are saying on this forum and on the website itself, it won't help this Tom Chick person either.

Even Jim Sterling backed off of his usual trollish style reviews a bit when he rated Assassin`s Creed 2 with the infamous 4.5/10 for reasons like "I wish that the quick travel system was better because walking in this game is boring"(paraphrased), or "climbing buildings isn't fast enough."

Point is, this guy may get hits now, but he just drove off hits for any future reviews he does for a while.

This is the same guy who tried to call the original Dues Ex a bad game when it came out...

 

[AzrealMaximillion]

Oh, this is the guy who gave Max Payne 3 a ridiculously low score while having opinions which contradicted the score. Yeah, low scores are fine - I quite enjoy them, actually - but goddamn it, if you don't have text which backs up the score there's no point scoring the game in the first place!

There's a difference between people who genuinely loathe a game, and people who just want to upset Metacritic's rankings, or want to disagree to cause trouble. This guy doesn't really think Halo 4 is worth 2/10 - he's giving it that score because that is what best suits him, whether it nets him more traffic or gets him more comments or... anything. If he gave reasons that made me think, "yeah, I can see how your opinion would measure 2/10," I'd be okay with this. ...but he's not making a good argument.

Agreed %100 percent. People need to realize that bad reviews do exist and that the "it's their opinion so you can't judge them" shield doesn't work in all cases.

 

[sgtslacker]

he clearly was just doing this for attention esspecially seeing as he wrote a comment saying that 1 Star is actually his lowest possible score meaning Halo got a 0% which is well BS in my opinion

 

[Dooly95]

But mountain dew gets 10/10 right?

Only if paired with Doritos. Otherwise it's a solid 8 at best.

 

[BaronIveagh]

Mass Effect 3 was NOT a huge disappointment. If you honestly believe the last 10 minutes ruined the game I feel sorry for you.

No, the terribly uneven game ruined the game. The last 10 minutes just put a period on it.

Besides, I couldn't give less of a **** about what some dude thinks about some game (the reviewer that is).

Says the guy sharing his opinions on games in a public space. Your total lack of interest and respect for the opinions of others is really refreshing. Must be a point of pride for you.

This^.

Here's something to remember folks, most reviewers give an 'average' game a 7 out of 10. This is partially to give head to the industry they are parasites of. In an honest system, an 'average' game would get a 5 out of 10, with 1 being reserved for the truly horrid and 10 being reserved for the mind blowingly good.

 

[freaper]

Mass Effect 3 was NOT a huge disappointment. If you honestly believe the last 10 minutes ruined the game I feel sorry for you.

No, the terribly uneven game ruined the game. The last 10 minutes just put a period on it.

Besides, I couldn't give less of a **** about what some dude thinks about some game (the reviewer that is).

Says the guy sharing his opinions on games in a public space. Your total lack of interest and respect for the opinions of others is really refreshing. Must be a point of pride for you.

Yep, you correctly pinned my personality to your imaginary dartboard.

 

[BloatedGuppy]

Yep, you correctly pinned my personality to your imaginary dartboard.

I guess I couldn't give less of a **** about what some dude thinks about some topic on the internet. Wait, no. That's not true. I stopped having that attitude in my teens.

PS - All I will ever have of your personality is what you present of it.

 

[BloatedGuppy]

Not to be mean to you, but lately I have seen a lot of posts pointing out publications that hand out low review scores and I am somewhat annoyed by it now. I write for a website myself and nothing bothers me more than people commenting on my articles without actually reading them (this happens a lot on top 10's). I read this guy's review and aside from the last paragraph or so it seemed very straight and honest, so I see now reason why we should point out his heresy on different sites.

He had the temerity to give a popular game a low score.

People can talk all they want about "honest" reviews. They don't want honest reviews. They want reviews that align with their opinions/preconceptions. If they don't, the reviewer will be accused of either trolling for hits or shilling for companies, depending on whether or not the review is perceived as scoring too high or too low.

 

[BloatedGuppy]

It's kinda depressing to think about, but I do agree. One article I wrote a while back got a lot of flame and people just won't let it fly already. I hope this guys gets a rest soon

From his Wikipedia page:

Chick's reviews are no stranger to controversy as he has been an outspoken critic of what he calls the "7?9 rating scale" at some game review sites,[11] and due to occasional game reviews which were widely considered to be different from the main, such as his harshly critical review of Deus Ex of which he said "I'd say it's only 90% bad." in a June 2000 review.[12]

Chick is no stranger to controversy. I don't know if he actively courts it, but he's extremely stubborn about using the entire review scale and giving his opinion as he sees it in spite of whatever the populist perspective on a particular game might be.

I posted it earlier in the thread, but this is his response to the issue in his interview with Rock Paper Shotgun:

It?s sort of cute. We all have strong opinions about different things, and I?m lucky enough that some of those make an impression on people, for better or worse. But I do wish the reaction was to wonder *why* I didn?t like Deus Ex. Instead, it?s often just shorthand to dismiss something else I?ve written. ?Oh, he didn?t like Mass Effect 2? Well, he didn?t like Deus Ex either!? That?s just lazy and it ultimately hurts the level of discourse when we talk about videogames.

For instance, if I hear that someone doesn?t like Casablanca or Jaws or Moon, I want to know *why* he didn?t like it. Those are interesting conversations and at their best, we each learn something, even if it?s just about each other. But unfortunately, those are conversations missing in the internet videogame culture. People tend to judge opinions based not on their insight, but on whether they agree with that opinion. A good review isn?t a good review. It?s a review you agree with.

I don't really like Chick as a reviewer, because I find his tastes idiosyncratic and extremely different from my own. I've gotten weary of him coming out of left field and blasting something, seemingly randomly, to the point where when I hear he's hated something I like I can't help but think "Okay sure, but it's Tom Chick". However, I respect the guy. He's honest. He's educated. He knows the industry. It irritates me tremendously to see an online community that whines hourly about integrity in gaming journalism crucify him for not liking something. I maintain my stance from page 2 of this thread. There are a lot of hypocrites around these parts.