I am firmly against a score that's easily looked upon and makes the escapist seem to compete on the same level as IGN, or any other website that metacritic is privy to.
While I understand the main two issues with it, as well as the need for Escapist to change, it continues to irk me how everything seems to be so similar. Now that I'm finished ranting, I'll respond to the article:
In the past it has been our policy that raw numerical data is irrelevant to the process of reviewing games, and so we invested our energies instead to delivering the highest-quality experiential reviews that we could, offering, instead of a score, a taste of how it feels to actually play the game. Today, however, we find that raw data is becoming increasingly more relevant to how reviews are consumed. Entire industries have spawned to chew on review data and spin it into meta-data, and readers have clamored for this information. The game industry itself has attempted to reward quality in game development by tying product royalties to review data. While this latest effort is beset with problems, it does point to an overall trend that shows no signs of changing course.
I have to ask, what is it about a scoring system that makes a game worthy of play? FFX received a 10 at the time of its review through Play magazine. But was it worth it? Was it worth a brief glimpse into a game that impressed the reviewers in the first 30 minutes to 3 hours?
In the end, when I played it, I don't feel it was worth the absolute best score in regards to an RPG. Tidus whined like a school girl, Kimahri's Ultimate Weapon was a pain in the keister, and dodging the lightning 200x was annoying even with the pause button. I received a fair amount of time out of the sidequests, but there was no limit to the linearity and nothing like Jade Empire, which would come later.
I just don't see how review data is doing anything but attracting an incentive for people to focus only on the first few hours and leave the end to whoever they want. All in the name of a good review score.
The first criticism is that review scores can provide game publishers leverage to use against us in order to coerce us into compromising our editorial ideals. A publisher could, for example, threaten us in some way if we offer a review score lower than what they feel they've earned.
I know this is true. We've seen it happen over and over again. Fortunately for us, The Escapist was founded in the belief that our editorial integrity is sacred, and that no publisher will have the right to dictate what we can and can't say about a game. I'm pleased to say that, to this date, we have an unblemished record in this regard, and I don't expect that to ever change.
To this firstly, Thank you. No one should have the right to pull ads simply because their game sucked. Kane and Lynch comes to mind and the horrible ordeal that game caused. Though it's not right, I love the fact that game makers happen to be hypocrites when they can't take a few bad scores.
Secondly, I have to ask for constant vigilance in this regard. It's a slippery slope when you give in once. I would severely hate to give up a magazine that I hold to be fairly high on great editorials.
Though I'm concerned, I'll take a "wait and see" approach to this. It seems fairly reasonable that there may be growing pains with this new system, even if I feel it's not necessarily right for Escapist (IMO)
