Jim Sterling Quits Traditional Reviewing

[Weaver]

Jim blocked me on twitter and I don't know why.

 

[DaCosta]

You follow certain reviewers you like, not follow websites or staffs.

You don't follow them at all. That's the part that seems to be completely lost in this old conversation.

Websites like Gamespot and IGN get like 40 to 50 million views per month. They are meant to offer something to everyone, so that when the average person googles for a review on a certain game, they may be useful.

Following reviewers is for Youtubers, who try to force some kind of intimacy so they can create fanboys who'll give them money on patreon.

 

[PurplePonyArcade]

I haven't read a game review in years. I don't care what critics or reviewers think. It's an obsolete and inherently arrogant medium.
This clip basically sums up what all critics think of themselves:

Shilling DWK out of fucking nowhere? I think I like you.

 

[PurplePonyArcade]

Jim blocked me on twitter and I don't know why.

It is probably a block bot. Block lists I feel are necessary yes but Block Bots are where I draw the line and say you. the person who uses them, are just a really shitty person. I do not know if Jim Sterling uses one I am just saying its really dumb and cowardly.

I also want say that it is clear that somewhere in the last decade reviews have become less and less trusted. I do not want traditional game reviews to go away and believe they never will, but public trust has gotten worse all around for people who review games.

 

[kilenem]

I think you just have to find a reviewer who likes the games you like. Daniel Blood worth who use to work with Gametrailers and is now with Easy Allies is my favorite reviewer for racing games. He usually doesn't shit on game but explains the issues he had with it.

Also I constantly go to Game informer for reviews which is owned by gamestop, I just subtract 1 point off of the total score of a game because I imagine they can't get risk getting Black Listed for review bombing a game. Hell they're recently held of on posting reviews of games with heavy online components until after release.

Yathzee is probably one of my favorite reviewers even though I like Nintendo games. Its actually funny when he doesn't shit on a game you like. I like his reviews because if he finds a game he thinks its good, its probably not trash.

 

[jademunky]

Especially when they get their games for free.

Can't speak to the other guys but I understand that Jim does not get games (at least not AAA) for free. Granted he can still probably write them off as a business expense.

 

[Phoenixmgs_v1legacy]

You follow certain reviewers you like, not follow websites or staffs.

You don't follow them at all. That's the part that seems to be completely lost in this old conversation.

Websites like Gamespot and IGN get like 40 to 50 million views per month. They are meant to offer something to everyone, so that when the average person googles for a review on a certain game, they may be useful.

Following reviewers is for Youtubers, who try to force some kind of intimacy so they can create fanboys who'll give them money on patreon.

Firstly, nice of you to ignore my questions because you have no legitimate answers for them.

Secondly, I ALWAYS follow reviewers whether it was Siskel & Ebert or this movie reviewer on WGN radio that I used to love (he even hated Star Wars just like me). I don't care what say Rolling Stone, the New York Times, or IGN rate a movie. I care about the REVIEWER. I didn't care what the Escapist rated a game although I did if it was Greg Tito but not if it was Susan Arendt for example. I've always followed reviewers that share similar opinions to me whether it was someone in the newspaper or radio before the Internet or if it is now some guy on Youtube. Even within my circle of friends, certain friends are more in tune with my likes/dislikes and I put more weight on their recommendations than others.

Lastly, how is every site/staff saying every game is good offering anything to anyone?

 

[Vigormortis]

The problem with game reviews is that very few people these days use them to actually inform themselves about a game they're interested in; instead, they want reviews to buttress their already-formed opinions.

Bingo.

About the only thing reviews are good for nowadays are 'rebuttals' in arguments over whether a thing is good or bad.

And that says a fucking lot about people today.

 

[Silentpony_v1legacy]

Especially when they get their games for free.

Can't speak to the other guys but I understand that Jim does not get games (at least not AAA) for free. Granted he can still probably write them off as a business expense.

But he didn't always have to buy them. That's actually a pretty recent development. Jim cut his teeth at Destructoid as a reviewer who made videos about all the free merch he got for reviewing games.

 

[CritialGaming]

I'd like to point out to everyone that Gamespot and IGN have both given The Evil Within 2 an 8.0 score. Meanwhile both website's front pages have full gusto adds for the game itself. I find that all very very curious.

 

[Xorph]

What about Batman Arkham Asylum? That was the 1st game with said combat system. Why is there no negative review for that game then? Plus, games heavy on story are all reviewed the same as well. Where's a negative review for say Metal Gear Solid 4? Not even all MGS fans liked the story. Or what about Metal Gear Solid 5? MGS5 was quite the departure for the series.

You can learn about a game via a positive or negative review. Sometimes a positive review can tell you that you won't like the game and vice verse. And going to a website for reviews is not helpful because they have a staff. Getting something out of a review is finding reviewers that share similar opinions or at least are good at explaining why they liked or didn't like something. You follow certain reviewers you like, not follow websites or staffs. You follow certain movie critics, who they work for is meaningless.

EZ, there's no negative review for Asylum because it's a well made combat system, and was clearly marketed as a melee/gadget focused stealth/action hybrid. As a result of the game' genre being clear from the start, it was easy for sites to assign the right reviewer for the job, and easy for solo reviewers to decide in advance whether or not they wanted to play the game. Reviewers who like that genre bought it and enjoyed it, and it was clear to reviewers that don't enjoy the genre that it wasnt worth their time well in advance of release.

In this regard, a review that's negative with the reason being "I'm just sick of arkham combat/never liked it to begin with" is by and large a useless review due to the fact that all of the games that use arkham combat have clearly communicated that fact prior to release. Someone who doesn't like Arkham combat isn't going to like the game no matter what, so there's zero reason for them to read reviews on Shadow of War or etc because they had all the info they needed prior to release to know they wouldn't like the game.

A game's score is meant to reflect the expected enjoyment for fans of the game's genre, not gamers in general, as if it was the latter there wouldn't be a single game scoring more than 5/10 due to people who never would've liked the game leaving uneccesary negative reviews.

Regarding MGS4, I feel that the issue is likely that professional reviewers tend to put less of their score's weight into the story than the gameplay. In all but the most narrative-heavy games like Gone Home, a bad narrative is going to get you docked like a point and a half at most on a professional review site, and its something that I personally am also unhappy about, I'd say weight it 50/50 if anything.

As far as 5 being a departure, pro reviewers likely graded it as "open world action/stealth game" and not "MGS game", though even if they graded it as the latter I wouldn't neccesarily assume being a departure would lead to lower scores if the game was still fab (and again, 5's issues seemed to mostly be with the story, so ign and co likely didnt dock it as many points as they probably should've).

As far as following reviewers with similar tastes to you, my response would have to be "If you don't like Arkham combat, and the reviewers you follow don't like it either, what good does it do any of you to waste time writing/reading reviews of them when you all know you'll dislike them from the start?"

 

[Silentpony_v1legacy]

I agree with him for the most part, and this coming from someone who used to write game reviews.

Straight-up game reviews are in such a problematic state right now I really don't see how they are of use to any consumers.

No one really trusts critics and reviews anymore. The gaming industry matured with the internet and the suits realized its cheaper and easier to pay for good reviews than it is to make a good game. Why put hours and money into a game when you can give reviewers free stuff and pamper them, have them praise your title with pre-written reviews and press packages, make bank on pre-orders and then totally forget about the game a week after launch?

If GG was right about anything it was that critics and devs being besties who hang out all the time and throw each other parties probably shouldn't be happening and doesn't exact make us trust in their 'objective' opinion of a game their friends are making.

 

[Fappy]

I agree with him for the most part, and this coming from someone who used to write game reviews.

Straight-up game reviews are in such a problematic state right now I really don't see how they are of use to any consumers.

No one really trusts critics and reviews anymore. The gaming industry matured with the internet and the suits realized its cheaper and easier to pay for good reviews than it is to make a good game. Why put hours and money into a game when you can give reviewers free stuff and pamper them, have them praise your title with pre-written reviews and press packages, make bank on pre-orders and then totally forget about the game a week after launch?

If GG was right about anything it was that critics and devs being besties who hang out all the time and throw each other parties probably shouldn't be happening and doesn't exact make us trust in their 'objective' opinion of a game their friends are making.

To be fair that criticism/concern was already being voiced by gamers long before GG was a thing. Remember the Kain and Lynch controversy? Even the Doritos pope stuff predates GG.

 

[Silentpony_v1legacy]

I agree with him for the most part, and this coming from someone who used to write game reviews.

Straight-up game reviews are in such a problematic state right now I really don't see how they are of use to any consumers.

No one really trusts critics and reviews anymore. The gaming industry matured with the internet and the suits realized its cheaper and easier to pay for good reviews than it is to make a good game. Why put hours and money into a game when you can give reviewers free stuff and pamper them, have them praise your title with pre-written reviews and press packages, make bank on pre-orders and then totally forget about the game a week after launch?

If GG was right about anything it was that critics and devs being besties who hang out all the time and throw each other parties probably shouldn't be happening and doesn't exact make us trust in their 'objective' opinion of a game their friends are making.

To be fair that criticism/concern was already being voiced by gamers long before GG was a thing. Remember the Kain and Lynch controversy? Even the Doritos pope stuff predates GG.

I think? Was the K/L thing where some guy gave it a poor score, so the Devs basically had him fired?
What was the doritos thing though? I want to say it involved Halo 3, but that might have been mountain dew...

 

[Fappy]

I agree with him for the most part, and this coming from someone who used to write game reviews.

Straight-up game reviews are in such a problematic state right now I really don't see how they are of use to any consumers.

No one really trusts critics and reviews anymore. The gaming industry matured with the internet and the suits realized its cheaper and easier to pay for good reviews than it is to make a good game. Why put hours and money into a game when you can give reviewers free stuff and pamper them, have them praise your title with pre-written reviews and press packages, make bank on pre-orders and then totally forget about the game a week after launch?

If GG was right about anything it was that critics and devs being besties who hang out all the time and throw each other parties probably shouldn't be happening and doesn't exact make us trust in their 'objective' opinion of a game their friends are making.

To be fair that criticism/concern was already being voiced by gamers long before GG was a thing. Remember the Kain and Lynch controversy? Even the Doritos pope stuff predates GG.

I think? Was the K/L thing where some guy gave it a poor score, so the Devs basically had him fired?
What was the doritos thing though? I want to say it involved Halo 3, but that might have been mountain dew...

Yeah, the K/L thing was basically a Gamespot reviewer giving the game a low score in the midst of an advertising campaign on the same site. The publisher bitched to Gamespot and got him fired over it.

The Doritos thing was Geoff Keighley doing a painful interview surrounded by mountain dew and doritos product placement. He's since moved on from that horrific display, but it was pretty awful at the time. The sad part is that he's not really a bad journalist. Don't think he'll ever live that incident down though.

 

[CritialGaming]

I agree with him for the most part, and this coming from someone who used to write game reviews.

Straight-up game reviews are in such a problematic state right now I really don't see how they are of use to any consumers.

No one really trusts critics and reviews anymore. The gaming industry matured with the internet and the suits realized its cheaper and easier to pay for good reviews than it is to make a good game. Why put hours and money into a game when you can give reviewers free stuff and pamper them, have them praise your title with pre-written reviews and press packages, make bank on pre-orders and then totally forget about the game a week after launch?

If GG was right about anything it was that critics and devs being besties who hang out all the time and throw each other parties probably shouldn't be happening and doesn't exact make us trust in their 'objective' opinion of a game their friends are making.

To be fair that criticism/concern was already being voiced by gamers long before GG was a thing. Remember the Kain and Lynch controversy? Even the Doritos pope stuff predates GG.

I think? Was the K/L thing where some guy gave it a poor score, so the Devs basically had him fired?
What was the doritos thing though? I want to say it involved Halo 3, but that might have been mountain dew...

Yeah, the K/L thing was basically a Gamespot reviewer giving the game a low score in the midst of an advertising campaign on the same site. The publisher bitched to Gamespot and got him fired over it.

The Doritos thing was Geoff Keighley doing a painful interview surrounded by mountain dew and doritos product placement. He's since moved on from that horrific display, but it was pretty awful at the time. The sad part is that he's not really a bad journalist. Don't think he'll ever live that incident down though.

Gamespot is a pos site. Used to be good back in the 90?s when it wasn?t so PC.

 

[maninahat]

Reviews are still useful as consumer advice, so I won't write them off just yet. One issue is that AAA games, by and large, are competently enough made to the point where even if they aren't especially good, they aren't bad on a technical or gameplay level. Basically devs have nailed making safe games and its hard for them to completely fuck it up (what Rock Paper Shotgun calls the "7 out of 10 games"). A reviewer can't recommend every game so they are put in an annoying position where they can't write off a lot of these games but they can't encourage people to buy them either. They all get a moderately positive score, making the numbering system obsolete.

Frankly I don't worry about corrupt reviews all that much. Yes they are there, but there are plenty of reviewers I trust enough to not fall into that trap. Hell, you bring up loot boxes, RPS did an entire article on whether the lootboxes matter after their review.

 

[PurplePonyArcade]

I haven't read a game review in years. I don't care what critics or reviewers think. It's an obsolete and inherently arrogant medium.
This clip basically sums up what all critics think of themselves:

Tildamort is one of those few things that R34 exceptions should be made for.

Kek.

You there there are people in every group who appreciate a challenge. Even if that challenge should never be taken...

 

[Phoenixmgs_v1legacy]

EZ, there's no negative review for Asylum because it's a well made combat system, and was clearly marketed as a melee/gadget focused stealth/action hybrid. As a result of the game' genre being clear from the start, it was easy for sites to assign the right reviewer for the job, and easy for solo reviewers to decide in advance whether or not they wanted to play the game. Reviewers who like that genre bought it and enjoyed it, and it was clear to reviewers that don't enjoy the genre that it wasnt worth their time well in advance of release.

In this regard, a review that's negative with the reason being "I'm just sick of arkham combat/never liked it to begin with" is by and large a useless review due to the fact that all of the games that use arkham combat have clearly communicated that fact prior to release. Someone who doesn't like Arkham combat isn't going to like the game no matter what, so there's zero reason for them to read reviews on Shadow of War or etc because they had all the info they needed prior to release to know they wouldn't like the game.

A game's score is meant to reflect the expected enjoyment for fans of the game's genre, not gamers in general, as if it was the latter there wouldn't be a single game scoring more than 5/10 due to people who never would've liked the game leaving uneccesary negative reviews.

Regarding MGS4, I feel that the issue is likely that professional reviewers tend to put less of their score's weight into the story than the gameplay. In all but the most narrative-heavy games like Gone Home, a bad narrative is going to get you docked like a point and a half at most on a professional review site, and its something that I personally am also unhappy about, I'd say weight it 50/50 if anything.

As far as 5 being a departure, pro reviewers likely graded it as "open world action/stealth game" and not "MGS game", though even if they graded it as the latter I wouldn't neccesarily assume being a departure would lead to lower scores if the game was still fab (and again, 5's issues seemed to mostly be with the story, so ign and co likely didnt dock it as many points as they probably should've).

As far as following reviewers with similar tastes to you, my response would have to be "If you don't like Arkham combat, and the reviewers you follow don't like it either, what good does it do any of you to waste time writing/reading reviews of them when you all know you'll dislike them from the start?"

I like Arkham Asylum myself but there's plenty to criticize about the game. I can easily see the complaint that the combat system is basically a series of quick-time events. And, even though the combat system was new and fresh at the time, I even recall it being rather limited in moves becoming repetitive as Arkham City really fleshed it out quite a bit more. The boss battles did suck (outside of Ivy) and the ending sucked. The Riddler trophies were just a collectathon, not riddles or puzzles. The story, while having some good moments, was not even on par with a TAS episode. I'd call Arkham Asylum a solid foundation for sure around a 7/10 but for the game (or really any game) to have an average score of 91 is pretty ridiculous. Best Picture winners at the Oscars don't even score that high.

You can explain in detail why you don't like any specific mechanic or combat system even though it "objectively" works whether it be Arkham combat or Killstreaks in a shooter. Plus, there's obviously only so many times before something does become tiring whether it's a game mechanic or similarly structured movies (that's why cliches are a thing). There was a time when Madden got great scores yearly because it was the best football game but then reviewers realized it's just basically the same game every year. Same thing with Ubisoft: The Game. A game series staying tried and true is a valid reason to score it lower. Same thing for a mechanic.

Regards to story, you should put as much weight towards the story as the game puts weight towards the story. MGS4 was easily at least half story, half gameplay. Thus, the story should be weighted as 50% of the score. Whereas the story of say Vanquish is much less important to the enjoyment of the game. I'm a pretty hardcore MGS fan as the "mgs" in my username shows and I loved MGS4 myself but seeing the game at a 94 AVERAGE score is beyond ridiculous. Sure to some people the game was probably everything they wanted but having a group of 82 people all basically have that same opinion of the game is basically unbelievable. I'm a huge MGS fan as aforementioned and I still haven't finished MGS5, that's pretty telling. I'm pretty sure the boring world is an extremely common complaint for one and the missions are rather repetitive.

Witcher 3 would be another game that has lots of flaws. The combat is at best "good for an RPG" which isn't a valid excuse for not having good combat when so much of the game is combat. You spend more time fighting in RPGs than say Bayonetta, why are average-bad combat systems excused? Just compare Dragon's Dogma Griffon fight to Witcher 3, it's not even close. Before the patch for "alternate" movement, Geralt controlled like ass and still doesn't control well; just freaking running around town wasn't good. The combat is objectively unbalanced as shit, you can literally beat anything at level 1 if you wanted to and had the time and patience. Then, you have the subjectivity of the writing and story. I totally understand some people loving the game but where's the people that didn't like the game or at least reviewers pointing out all the flaws in the game? With most RPGs having their own unique systems and combat systems along with lots of writing that is wholly subjective, how does an RPG ever receive such high average scores? I guess Dragon Age Inquisition would be an even better example but I haven't personally played it but there's lots of complaints about that game hardly reflected in the reviews.

Someone coming at a game from a different perspective can shed insights on the game that others won't notice. I always get at least something out of a Zero Punctuation even if Yahtzee is "reviewing" a game in a series he has clear dislike of as he almost always brings up valid/interesting points about why he doesn't like such and such mechanic, story, etc.

 

[PapaGreg096]

I hope he will quit the game called life soon. It's not like his wife needs him as she is screwing people who are actually men and not some cuck like Steriling.

Something on your mind son

I'd like to point out to everyone that Gamespot and IGN have both given The Evil Within 2 an 8.0 score. Meanwhile both website's front pages have full gusto adds for the game itself. I find that all very very curious.

Also funny enough ACG gave the game a "wait for sell" I'm not calling a conspiracy but I just like to add that.