Reviewers Should Finish Games, Says Zampella

[Rocketboy13]

I completely agree. If a movie critic put out a review that said, "'Dinner for Schmucks' was the worst movie this year. I only saw the first ten minutes, but I could tell.", they'd never be taken seriously in their industry again. Why should game reviewers be any different?

Sorry, but that should be obvious: A game takes longer than two, maybe two and a half hours. Except for the occasional XBLA title most games exceed the average movies' length by far. Movies work distinctively different from games, as do books and music. Every medium has to be treated according to its needs.

I totally agree with this. A game is fundamentally different from a movie or book and to say that judging a game is the same as judging a movie is silly. Just the way narrative structure exists in a game in which the character is almost constantly in a rising narrative trajectory moving to greater and greater challenges before hitting a climax (as opposed to a movie or book whose traditional structure is establishment, then falling action, then recovery, rising action, climax, and resolution/epilogue) is different.

 

[Arkhangelsk]

Yeah....so how DO you finish an MMO...or TF2...or The Path

Even a linear structure like Fallout 3, how long would that take? Yahtzee would be down to one game every two months.

Yahtzee is a critic. He goes by the Guitar Hero review style. If it starts sucking way too much for him, he's done. He won't give points based on how good it theoretically might be.

You're missing the point. It goes for all reviewers. Yahtzee is just an example, and a good one at that. Imagine if he actually had to go through the entire games.

 

[Skorpyo]

Yeah....so how DO you finish an MMO...or TF2...or The Path

Even a linear structure like Fallout 3, how long would that take? Yahtzee would be down to one game every two months.

Review a game in its context of course.

Reviews are "Context Sensitive".

 

[tehroc]

The worst offenders are MMORPG reviews. They put in maybe 20 hours or so and review it off that base, but never have a chance to make it to endgame and find out how dull it really it is.

 

[Shamanic Rhythm]

See, this is the problem with gaming as a medium: everyone tells the reviewers what to do. It's not like in cinema or literature or fashion, where critics really have grown into such an entity unto themselves that artists are genuinely afraid of them; that fear of getting a crappy review keeps them on their toes and ensures they continue to evolve artistically.

Gaming journalists, by comparison, aren't feared by anyone. On the one hand, because most of their publication is online and allows for instant feedback, they are constantly being berated by fans of the game to give it a good review; they tell them what's wrong with their style of reviewing. On the other, the games industry is constantly demonstrating that they are the boss of reviewers; in conferences like this, in the way Rockstar sends out emails telling journalists their game is a likely candidate for game of the year, in the way Blizzard recently completely snubbed the gaming press by not sending out any pre-release copies of Starcraft II; so on and so forth. As a result, developers can get away with barely pushing to evolve their products artistically or to at least be forced to really compete with one another to give the best value for money, because they have nothing to be afraid of. A reviewer's word doesn't mean jack for a game anymore, not when most games by big studios get a default rating of 8/10.

This is why I uphold Yahtzee to be the only true critic of the gaming press, because he doesn't take shit from anyone. Every week he has fans lambasting him, telling him how to do his job, and he continually gives them the middle finger. As a result, he is probably the only person that developers might actually fear: look at Extra Punctuation on Dark Void for evidence of that; the dev team admitted they were 'a little terrified' to get the ZP treatment.

 

[Cabisco]

Really its game dependant, but when I think about the games Zampella is normally involved in yes i'd agree it must be very annoying for someone to only play half the game and give a verdict on all of it.

It's nice to see him talk about something else apart from The whole Activision thing though, I like to think it means he's starting to find his feet again.

 

[Dragunai]

See, this is the problem with gaming as a medium: everyone tells the reviewers what to do. It's not like in cinema or literature or fashion, where critics really have grown into such an entity unto themselves that artists are genuinely afraid of them; that fear of getting a crappy review keeps them on their toes and ensures they continue to evolve artistically.

Gaming journalists, by comparison, aren't feared by anyone. On the one hand, because most of their publication is online and allows for instant feedback, they are constantly being berated by fans of the game to give it a good review; they tell them what's wrong with their style of reviewing. On the other, the games industry is constantly demonstrating that they are the boss of reviewers; in conferences like this, in the way Rockstar sends out emails telling journalists their game is a likely candidate for game of the year, in the way Blizzard recently completely snubbed the gaming press by not sending out any pre-release copies of Starcraft II; so on and so forth. As a result, developers can get away with barely pushing to evolve their products artistically or to at least be forced to really compete with one another to give the best value for money, because they have nothing to be afraid of. A reviewer's word doesn't mean jack for a game anymore, not when most games by big studios get a default rating of 8/10.

This is why I uphold Yahtzee to be the only true critic of the gaming press, because he doesn't take shit from anyone. Every week he has fans lambasting him, telling him how to do his job, and he continually gives them the middle finger. As a result, he is probably the only person that developers might actually fear: look at Extra Punctuation on Dark Void for evidence of that; the dev team admitted they were 'a little terrified' to get the ZP treatment.

Dude you read my mind and yeah Yahztee may rant in his videos about how stand alone and aggressive he is but he doesnt realise just how well he is doing his job by sticking to those very grounds.

The games industry has sadly devolved into this autocratic entity where upon one major title will make a company immune to any genuine critism because lets be honest gamers are some of the easiest things to manipulate with their self righteous shut in ways and they are forever lead by their noses when the PS3 shows off a new exclusive. Ive been called a fan boy by one of my friends who owns a PS3 because I wouldnt admit its the best console ever made so because I own an Xbox Im a fanboy even though I agreed both consoles are equal in their own rights while he insisted the PS3 is THE console and the xbox is a piece of garbage.

The industry needs to be shaken up and damaged some how to make these companies realise that remaking MW2, Wow and other major titles in their own flavours ISNT going to fly anymore but this wont happen as the modern age of gamers are all brain damaged self rightous jerk offs and as mentioned above, easily lead.

The cycle basically goes - Title launch, critic gives it some shit, fanboys give critic shit, company makes the title again because the fanboys dollars had more impact than the reviewers professional thoughts as a games Journalist.

Cant blame the companies in the end just for wanting to make money off of easily pleased idiots.

 

[Dexiro]

Reviewers play a game until either they can't bare to continue or they feel like they've gotten the full picture. A lot of the time they DO play the game all the way through as well.

With most games that's just too demanding, you can't expect someone to complete Fallout 3 or some MMO. Reviewers may choose to but noone should ask them to put 200 hours into a game before giving an opinion.

 

[Indignation837]

I think there's a major distinction that needs to be made here. SHOULD critics finish games before writing reviews? Absolutely (that is, assuming that it's the kind of game that can be finished). CAN critics finish every game that crosses their desk before writing a review? No way, considering the amount of shovelware that comes out these days - as well as the amount of time that a truly great game can require to see every bit of content. I've spent over 200 hours on a single character in Oblivion, and I've still never beaten everything. Does that mean that I'm not allowed to say with confidence that I think it's a great game that you should definitely play if you haven't already?

It's all a matter of reputation. If a critic gets a reputation for obviously writing a review before they finish a game, their opinion will cease to carry the weight that it used to.

 

[Furious Styles]

I don't know, if I couldn't stand oblivion i certainly wouldn't want to play the whole thing just to review it.

But then who can't stand oblivion?

 

[Ironic Pirate]

Depends on the game, really. A five hour, linear game with no multiplayer? Yeah, you should finish it. Something with an open world, branching storylines, and customizable maps? You should play the shit out of it, but it'd be hard to really finish it.

It's like reviewing a movie versus a theme park, really.

 

[p3t3r]

I completely agree. If a movie critic put out a review that said, "'Dinner for Schmucks' was the worst movie this year. I only saw the first ten minutes, but I could tell.", they'd never be taken seriously in their industry again. Why should game reviewers be any different?

because movies are how long at most? two three? how does it take for you to do every thing in video games 20 30 hours. i heard some people say it takes 50 hours to play through dragon age. not all people have that kind of time

 

[BrownGaijin]

"This game is twenty hours long. The bad controls, weak story and abundant glitches gave me a headache by the first hour".

There I said it.

 

[awesometron]

i think they should finish the game unless it is horrable they have to pretty much suffer to keep going kinda like do with mario sorry to all mario fans i just cant stand it

 

[tcurt]

I completely agree. If a movie critic put out a review that said, "'Dinner for Schmucks' was the worst movie this year. I only saw the first ten minutes, but I could tell.", they'd never be taken seriously in their industry again. Why should game reviewers be any different?

Well, while I agree that reviewers probably should play the majority of a game before passing judgement, I think the comparison is unfair. When a film reviewer steps into the theater, they know exactly when they will be finished. They know that as long as they don't leave to hit the restroom or the concessions stand that when the credits are finished and the lights come up that they haven't missed any aspect of the film. Films are a neat, tidy package with a clear beginning and end.

Many games on the other hand are a complete mess. Do you only review the main quest? Do you have to complete ever side quest? What about all these great, but sometimes random open world games?

Maybe it's a ridiculous example, but at what point would you stop reviewing Space Invaders? Because some of our current games are just that dull and repetitive, with their long "wash, rinse, repeat" gameplay. But they do have an end! Will finishing that make for a better review?

I want good, clear, honest reviews, but I don't think we should over simplify what reviewers may be up against.

 

[Cynical skeptic]

Then ship review copies out earlier. Derp.

The only reason to say something like this is an attempt to have a monopoly on the first week of media after a game's release. I've often wanted to play the magical gift from the gods [every big new game] is supposed to be the week before and the week after its out. But I never really have.

 

[MatsVS]

This is pretty obvious stuff.

The only people shameless enough to review games they haven't finished are quacks and comedians. Funny how often the two overlap.

 

[Vires Vox]

It seems ridiculous to me that a reviewer can even consider not finishing a game (with the exception of online only and mmo's of course).

A film reviewer would never walk out of a film because it was "too long" and still write a review about it. Someone reviewing a book wouldn't read half of it, guess the ending and say "to be honest there were too many pages but i got the gist".

And frankly claiming a game is too long and boring suggests they probably shouldn't be reviewing games anyway.