Which reviewer do you trust the most?

[Nomanslander]

Personally, it isn't a matter of trust; it's about my consideration to other people's opinions. I like to be an open minded fellow and not make any real judgement on a game or the product of any medium for that matter. And to do that, you can't really depend on a single review. The point of viewing or reading reviews - for me - is a means of enlightenment. Maybe the reviewer will enlighten me on what might make a game tickle my fancies, where as, I wouldn't have been able to attain on my own.

 

[veloper]

While Angry Joe does appear honest enough and while he does inform the viewer, you have to take into account that how super positive he always becomes whenever a game is average or better. He'll still point out the flaws, but he also gets alot of enjoyment out of simple things.
To put ratings into perspective again, I substract a full point from Joe's scores.

Yahtzee's ZP is mostly comedy, but since he does point out flaws, he's still a better source of information than most reviewers.

I prefer to watch for low scores and that usually means keeping an eye on Destructoid. A high score on Destructoid doesn't mean much, but when they give a low score (even when everyone else is selling 10/10s) it is time to pay attention, to read the review and to reconsider burning your money on the game.

 

[FFP2]

The people from Dtoid and the escapist
Angry Joe
NerdCubed

Still though, I tend to trust my gut on games. All the above people hated FF13 but I still loved it.

 

[Mr.Squishy]

That snarky englishman who moved abroad and now works for the escapist. You know, the one with the glasses.
Also Angry Joe does, indeed, tell it straight.

 

[Vhite]

I second you OP. Angry Joe is my favorite reviewer too, although maybe for different reasons. Those are simply that games he like usually match with what I like more than any other reviewer. I realized this in his Sacred 2 review. That game certainly got a lot of deserved criticism but loot whore in both of us loved it anyway.

 

[Magicman10893]

Angry Joe, Yahtzee, Jim Sterling (even though I haven't read his reviews, I trust his character based on episodes of the Jimquisition) and the guys at Xbox360Achievements.org

 

[Shadow-Phoenix]

Angry Joe is my main guy I watch for when he tears a game down first but then sometimes gets to liking it, DMC the reboot does not count as such.

Yahtzee is the second I watch purely because he's brutal in most cases, funny in others and though I like his videos his reviews do not influence me in not/getting a game.

and 3rd and final is Jim because thank god for a Brit like him.

 

[Frezzato]

I tend to trust Jim Sterling, and even though Yahtzee sounds like he hates some of the games I love, like Mass Effect 1, at least he's funny about it. Also, Susan Arendt makes some good comments on the podcast (it seems that only Susan talks about stuff she loves while the guys need more prodding), and I agreed with her about her review of Journey. Also, she tweeted that Dredd was a good movie, and I have to agree, that shit was awesome.

Granted, she did say she liked the Total Recall remake, which felt like it was just a dozen chase scenes chained together. I'll let that one slide because Colin Farrell was in it. That's like me recommending anything Ellen Page is in. Or Parker Posie. Or Kristin Scott Thomas. Emma Stone. Anna Faris. Amy Smart, et al.

 

[Assassin Xaero]

I don't really "trust" any reviewers. They have their opinions and I have mine, and I have yet to find a reviewer that has the same views as mine. Yahtzee is entertaining to watch, haven't wanted Jim review a game yet though. TotalBiscuit, or whatever the hell his name is, is probably the person I would least trust.

 

[Sir Pootis]

I watch Yahtzee because I find his opinions very agreeable (mostly). I like Angry Joe and Totalbuiscuit as they provide a mostly objective view on the games in question, though TB does first impressions more so than reviews.

The Completionist (Jirard Khalil) often looks at games for how fun they are.

Although I watch JonTron and PeanutButterGamer, it's more for entertainment than for a review of the game.

 

[etnavningenhar]

In my case, I dont really have to "trust" a reviewer, because I dont watch reviews of games I want to play.

I do look at reviews after completing games though, as I always find it interesting to see if my opinion is shared by others.

When I do, I tend to see if Yahtzee has reviewed the game in question, as he often brings out similar bad points about the game that I might notice, or when he says something which is terrible about a game, I will be like, "Yeah, what he is pointing out actually WAS annoying now that I consider it."

I also have a look at IGN or Gamespot, just to get a review where they usually highlight the positives of the game, just to get both ends of the scale.

Finally I check out Metacritic's user ratings, but only the reviews which graded the game as mediocre. The lowest grades tend to be "OMGZ This game suxxors!", and the highest grades often tend to be "This game is the most awesome game ever seen, go buy it now!" If you read the mediocre reviews you tend to get some pretty well rounded reviews, where both highs and lows are highlighted.

I think this gives me a pretty thorough general feeling of how others find the game to be.

 

[Cheesus Crust]

There's no such thing as an unbiased review.

Now that that's out of the way.

I only really follow Yahtzee and Jim Sterling as far as reviews go, because they're both entertaining while still pointing out the highlights or flaws of whatever they're reviewing.

Otherwise I look at summaries and/or watch gameplay of the game in question.

I could be wrong but I believe the whole "no games review is unbiased" was discussed during last years escapist expo, and I agree. I for one prefer to see game reviewers as critics. The reason being, a review is something that one does for something that you can objectively scrutinize like the performance of a hacksaw for example. Not that you can't measure the quality of a game on a certain objective level but in the end most of the things we say about a game is subjective. Like Yahtzee said, although he dislikes certain games he acknowledges that certain games are popular because they pull things off very well its just that he hates it when a sequel is basically just a rehash of the previous installment because it will start to get old, lame and boring.

I like Jim, Yahtzee and Angry Joe, in no particular order, because they're not afraid to voice their opinion. They often even highlight the redeeming qualities of a game even if they do tend to accentuate the negative, which is sometimes understandable because most interesting reviews are made that way.

 

[mohit9206]

on youtube i trust this guy's reviews
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TpMzmlBRw2I
on web there's many like rock paper shotgun,psxextreme etc

 

[mohit9206]

on youtube i trust this guy's reviews
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TpMzmlBRw2I
on web there's many like rock paper shotgun,psxextreme etc

i don't like ben's and joe's reviews good at all . joe's reviews are too long to sit through his unfunny videos and yahtzee's reviews i cant understand 90% of what he says in his videos .
they pretty much talk about anything but the game itself . i just want the damn review. stop giving me references and trying to make a review funny.

 

[Username Redacted]

I'm a little surprised that no one has mentioned the best reviewer or all: time. Is a game still viewed as being good or noteworthy 1-2 years after it came out? Now, obviously, I don't wait that long before picking up every game but review-wise I'm just looking at a title that's caught my eye and then trying to piece together an amalgamation of what others have experienced about it. Hell, even then 'time' could be 1-2 weeks after launch when people who aren't being given advance copies and gotten paid off by the developer have had a chance to vocalize their thoughts on a given title.

I view Yahtzee and Jim as entertainment and I find Angry Joe to be pretty insufferable. Originally it started for me with him [Angry Joe] saying something about 'Marvel vs. Capcom 3' that immediately made me think that he couldn't have missed the point worse than he did had he actually been trying to and every attempt since then to watch one of his videos has ended in less than a minute because I can't stand him.

 

[Dale wheeler]

i go with an independent guy or people i know, i have watched other reviews from big names and they're completely unfair sometimes

 

[neonsword13-ops]

Classic Game Room. Mark is so awesome.

As long as the game has El Caminoes and/or flame throwers, he loves it.


The spin-off channels are pretty good, too. I especially enjoy TJ's review of Persona 4 on CGR Undertow.

Other than that? Eh... Matthewmatosis. He hasn't been around for a long time, but his reviews are lengthy and enjoyable. His retrospective of the Zelda series is quite good.


EDIT: Oh yeah, I wanna give a quick shout out to DMJared. He does "1 Minute Reviews". He's really good.

 

[Darren716]

Razorfist,I'm able to take his opinion seriously because he isn't judging games based on the amount of ad revenue like sites such as IGN and Gametrailers but he is far from being totally negative since he recomends about half the games he reviews

 

[mitchell271]

Favourite reviewers? I can give you a top 5

Spoiler: ProJared (formerly of Screwattack)

Spoiler: xRazorFistx - The Rageaholic

3. Angry Joe
4. Yahtzee
5. PeanutButterGamer

 

[Sammyjb17]

There are two that I really like:

Randy Yasenchak of Eldergeekdotcom. If you haven't checked out this reviewer yet, I highly reccomend him and his channel on Youtube. While he tends to like games rather than dislike them, he has really good points.

Alec Meer and the others at Rock, Paper, Shotgun. I've never found myself really disagreeing with any of their reviews. And they are often funny.