Yooka-Laylee reviews are coming out and thoughts are ...mixed

Silvanus

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hermes said:
That is not how averages work. Averages only mean they are above or below most values of the scores. If most games were scored a 7/10 (relatively common in today's sites), a game that scores a 6 is "below average", and a game that scores a 9 is "above average". The only way 5 is considered the average value is in a uniform distribution, where every value in the scale is equally likely to be the score of a game (without seeing it), like scoring a game by throwing a dice.

Games scores are closer to a mean distribution, because no one scores lower than a 6 or 7 unless they are a steaming pile of crap, the value 6 or 7 comes to mean mediocre (nothing particularly memorable, nor particularly infamous about it). Again, that doesn't mean 7 is the mid value in the scale, just that it is the average because all values aggregate around it.
That depends on how you calculate the average. The mean is one such method. What you've described there as the "average" is closer to the median, which is another method.

Both means and medians are alternative methods of calculating the average.
 

hermes

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Silvanus said:
hermes said:
That is not how averages work. Averages only mean they are above or below most values of the scores. If most games were scored a 7/10 (relatively common in today's sites), a game that scores a 6 is "below average", and a game that scores a 9 is "above average". The only way 5 is considered the average value is in a uniform distribution, where every value in the scale is equally likely to be the score of a game (without seeing it), like scoring a game by throwing a dice.

Games scores are closer to a mean distribution, because no one scores lower than a 6 or 7 unless they are a steaming pile of crap, the value 6 or 7 comes to mean mediocre (nothing particularly memorable, nor particularly infamous about it). Again, that doesn't mean 7 is the mid value in the scale, just that it is the average because all values aggregate around it.
That depends on how you calculate the average. The mean is one such method. What you've described there as the "average" is closer to the median, which is another method.

Both means and medians are alternative methods of calculating the average.
Yeah, sorry. English not being my first language means sometimes I get confused, specially when dealing with technical terms.

My point is, having 5 as the average value in a 1-10 range is only possible if all values are equally likely, which is not the case of game reviews, polls and opinion pieces in general, where 4 or 5 (or 2 stars out of 5) is a negative review and 6 and 7 (or 3 stars out of 5) got to mean "technically competent, does what it intents but otherwise unimpressive". Because most reviews would consider most games in that category, 7 out of 10 is the score most games get, and a 5 is "below the average of most games". A 2 out of 10 is "so below the average the distinction between 2 and 1 is almost nitpick..."
 

Alfredo Jones

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From what I've gathered from all of the reviews I've read, the PC version is the best in terms of performance though it still has some kinks to work out, and those who are nostalgic for Banjo-esque collect-a-thons will like the game while others may be turned off. That seem right?
 

shrekfan246

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Alfredo Jones said:
From what I've gathered from all of the reviews I've read, the PC version is the best in terms of performance though it still has some kinks to work out, and those who are nostalgic for Banjo-esque collect-a-thons will like the game while others may be turned off. That seem right?
That sounds about right, yeah. Seems like the game has gone for sticking really close to its Banjo roots, for better or worse depending on how you view Banjo-Kazooie today.
 

Phoenixmgs_v1legacy

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shrekfan246 said:
However, saying that a 2/10 isn't a low score is just silly. Once again, there is a single score below it, while there are eight potential scores above it. It is a low score. Low scores provide just as much information as high scores do, or middle-of-the-road scores. Just because people on the internet throw tantrums whenever they see "low scores" doesn't mean we need to start avoiding calling actually low scores what they are.
I guess I did sorta argue for arguments sake at some point, a 2 is a low score. I was using the basis of knowing that Jim didn't like the game, then the 2 doesn't really come off as "OMG, that's low" as there's really only 3 scores he can give a bad game (1,2,3). I was originally responding to the following:
Holy Fuck a 2! I really can't imagine what would warrant that. God Dammit! I usually agree with his criticisms too :p
Jim just not liking the game is really all that happened. That's how I see it.

---

hermes said:
That is not how averages work. Averages only mean they are above or below most values of the scores. If most games were scored a 7/10 (relatively common in today's sites), a game that scores a 6 is "below average", and a game that scores a 9 is "above average". The only way 5 is considered the average value is in a uniform distribution, where every value in the scale is equally likely to be the score of a game (without seeing it), like scoring a game by throwing a dice.

Games scores are closer to a mean distribution, because no one scores lower than a 6 or 7 unless they are a steaming pile of crap, the value 6 or 7 comes to mean mediocre (nothing particularly memorable, nor particularly infamous about it). Again, that doesn't mean 7 is the mid value in the scale, just that it is the average because all values aggregate around it.

Also, the idea that "about half the games should be bad and half should be good" is also flawed. Personal opinion does not divide the world in two perfectly balanced bags of "things I like" and "things I don't like". If I try a new food that I ended up liking, I don't have to move one of the items I used to like to the "don't like" bag to keep both sets about equal. Good/Bad is not a binary distinction, more like a gradient. By the same token, someone that is a lot more "picky" than me could have a lot more in the "don't like" bag than the "like" bag.
That's improper use of a scale if you're not going to use all of it (baring broken early access Steam games). Having 7 as average bunches up all the good games to where it's hard to tell if a game was good or great. It's an accomplishment for a movie getting an 80+% fresh rating, it means something. A game getting an 80 Metacritic means nothing because just about every Triple-A release does, it's an "accomplishment" to get less than an 80 in fact. I didn't mean to literally say half of anything should be bad and half should be good as nothing works out that perfectly and there's lots of things you just feel was "meh". But for the most part, we should have a much better split than we do now. It's OK to not like a game. The fact that there is so much agreement among game reviewers of a game's "quality" is unprecedented for any kind of art form, and not only do games have to be games (gameplay, game mechanics, etc.), they also have to have the same story elements of a movie or book. Siskel and Ebert disagreed quite a bit, how often does IGN and GameSpot reviews greatly differ?
 

Samtemdo8_v1legacy

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I am surprised the whole Jontron controversy with this game is not being factored here.

Jim could be giving the game 2 out of 10 to spite the game creators for what they did to Jontron?

But than again I would not know unless Jim himself admits he did. And I have yet to play the game myself but if I do it might be on PC.
 

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Samtemdo8 said:
I am surprised the whole Jontron controversy with this game is not being factored here.

Jim could be giving the game 2 out of 10 to spite the game creators for what they did to Jontron?

But than again I would not know unless Jim himself admits he did. And I have yet to play the game myself but if I do it might be on PC.
I don't recommend the PC version, because it's known for having a lot of frame rate issues. It's not exactly game breaking, but it does pose problems. Here's the video review for it from ACG

<spoiler=ACG Yooka Laylee Review>
 

shrekfan246

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Phoenixmgs said:
shrekfan246 said:
However, saying that a 2/10 isn't a low score is just silly. Once again, there is a single score below it, while there are eight potential scores above it. It is a low score. Low scores provide just as much information as high scores do, or middle-of-the-road scores. Just because people on the internet throw tantrums whenever they see "low scores" doesn't mean we need to start avoiding calling actually low scores what they are.
I guess I did sorta argue for arguments sake at some point, a 2 is a low score. I was using the basis of knowing that Jim didn't like the game, then the 2 doesn't really come off as "OMG, that's low" as there's really only 3 scores he can give a bad game (1,2,3). I was originally responding to the following:
Holy Fuck a 2! I really can't imagine what would warrant that. God Dammit! I usually agree with his criticisms too :p
Jim just not liking the game is really all that happened. That's how I see it.
Well, that's true, but the score is more of an incidental addition that accompanies the words anyway. It's not "he gave the game a 2 because he could only give it a 1-3 on his scale", it's "he gave the game a 2 because he thought it was bad". The scores don't exist in a vacuum separate from the rest of the scale; when you take just the low end of the scale, sure, a 2/4 isn't nearly as low of a score, but... the full scale isn't out of 4. The possibility existed for Yooka-Laylee to score up to a 10/10, therefore the 2/10 is low.

Samtemdo8 said:
I am surprised the whole Jontron controversy with this game is not being factored here.

Jim could be giving the game 2 out of 10 to spite the game creators for what they did to Jontron?

But than again I would not know unless Jim himself admits he did. And I have yet to play the game myself but if I do it might be on PC.
Considering that Jim condemned Jon for what he did, I highly doubt that he's spiting Playtonic.
 

BX3

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Phoenixmgs said:
BX3 said:
Phoenixmgs said:
A 4 means below average, not awful. Thus, if Jim really didn't like a game, it's at best a 3 then. With that in mind, a 2 isn't THAT low. Just because major sites like IGN and Gamespot use 7 as "average" only makes stuff like 2s or even 5s seem really really bad.
Er... dude or dudette? A 2 out of 10 is actually really, really bad. Like, in pretty much all school systems, that'd be a failing grade. The literal only reason it'd probably be seen as not that bad is because at least it's not a 1
What's with you people (gamers) and comparing school grades to game ratings? What other art has ever been rated the same as school grades? They are 2 completely different things. If someone doesn't like a game or movie or book, they will rate it as below average. Average is conventionally 50% rating whether using a movie 4-star system or a 10-point scale. A 2 only seems so horrible because other game reviewers don't rate games like they should. Even IGN and GameSpot's scales state that 5 is mediocre so they don't even properly use their scales as they define them. Unless you are to believe that basically every game is average and above average, which makes completely no sense with regards to what the word average means. Here's the 1st page of GameSpot's most recent reviews, every game is average or above!!! Gaming must in such a golden age no other medium has ever seen.
https://www.gamespot.com/reviews/
What... are you talking about?
"you people" and myself compare it to school grades because it's the easiest mathematical comparison. And I use a mathematical comparison to turn art into math in the first place because grading art already does that. As well, you say yourself that if he thinks the game is bad, it ranges from 1 to 3... which means he thinks the game is bad. Which means the score is bad. Especially on a scale where there are 8 other ratings higher.

I don't know what you're arguing, but it sounds way more pedantic than it needs to be.
 

MonsterCrit

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Me thinks this is a case of some rose tinted goggles being broke and some fresh eyes seeing something.. a little plainer than they'd expected. Still at least it did better than m#9. Seriously. Not everyone liked Banjo.
 

Phoenixmgs_v1legacy

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BX3 said:
What... are you talking about?
"you people" and myself compare it to school grades because it's the easiest mathematical comparison. And I use a mathematical comparison to turn art into math in the first place because grading art already does that. As well, you say yourself that if he thinks the game is bad, it ranges from 1 to 3... which means he thinks the game is bad. Which means the score is bad. Especially on a scale where there are 8 other ratings higher.

I don't know what you're arguing, but it sounds way more pedantic than it needs to be.
What other art form is rated where 7 is average? Video games only started to be rated as such rather recently. The comparison to school makes no sense even historically for gaming let alone movies or another art form. A 2/10 is only shockingly bad if you think 7 means average. There's plenty of games rated in the 90s that I'd rate below a 5/10 because I thought the games were below average. There was a 3-year span where I didn't give any game an 8+.
 

Rangaman

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Jim, you make great points about game design and the state of the industry sometimes but god damn. I honestly can't take you seriously when you do shit like that.
 

Elijin

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So by the sounds of it, it does comes down to the fact that its a 3D platformer, and by current standards 3D platformers are heavily flawed, and most have outgrown them.
 

sageoftruth

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CoCage said:
sageoftruth said:
This thread should be called "Why Game Reviews Shouldn't be Scored"
Hence why I prefer ACG or Yahtzee style of reviewing; especially the former.
I know right? All this number comparing and hardly anything about what the reviewers liked or disliked about the games.
 

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sageoftruth said:
I know right? All this number comparing and hardly anything about what the reviewers liked or disliked about the games.
When God Hand got a 3/10 from IGN, and the Kane Lynch fiasco at GameSpot that got Jeff fired for an honest opinion, that's when I lost trust in both. In IGN's case, I never cared for them to begin with, and GameSpot, I grew weary of their overly nitpicking on decent or good games, yet praising average or generic games like they were the next best thing. 2009 was where I more or less gave up on review scores.

About that 3/10 review, it was obvious that the guy could not get past the first stage, and till this day is filled with grammar and spelling errors. Shows you how much of a joke a majority of these "professional" journalists/reviewers are.
 

sageoftruth

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CoCage said:
sageoftruth said:
I know right? All this number comparing and hardly anything about what the reviewers liked or disliked about the games.
When God Hand got a 3/10 from IGN, and the Kane Lynch fiasco at GameSpot that got Jeff fired for an honest opinion, that's when I lost trust in both. In IGN's case, I never cared for them to begin with, and GameSpot, I grew weary of their overly nitpicking on decent or good games, yet praising average or generic games like they were the next best thing. 2009 was where I more or less gave up on review scores.

About that 3/10 review, it was obvious that the guy could not get past the first stage, and till this day is filled with grammar and spelling errors. Shows you how much of a joke a majority of these "professional" journalists/reviewers are.
Indeed. It's a mistake for one to treat a reviewer as the voice of God, unless their tastes align perfectly. I just treat them as guys with opinions and try to hear as many as I can. Getting to know certain ones pretty well helps too, since it makes it easier to figure out whether or not his opinions should apply to me as well.
 

Igor-Rowan

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Does that even matter? As Yahtzee said, there is nothing that can/could be done here because the game was already a success before it was made, before people saw it was even good.

The game wants to emulate something that happened 20 years ago, fine, the money shows there is an audience for that, but keep in mind that things like Ratchet and Clank, Mario Galaxy and Jak & Dexter exist, so forgive the general audience for not having nostalgia as the sole reason to buy the game.
 

Yoshi178

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Igor-Rowan said:
Does that even matter? As Yahtzee said, there is nothing that can/could be done here because the game was already a success before it was made, before people saw it was even good.

The game wants to emulate something that happened 20 years ago, fine, the money shows there is an audience for that, but keep in mind that things like Ratchet and Clank, Mario Galaxy and Jak & Dexter exist, so forgive the general audience for not having nostalgia as the sole reason to buy the game.
i haven't played Ratchet & Clank or Jak & Daxter. But Mario At least is very different to Banjo Kazzoie at least.

Mario you have a single objective of navigating your way through the level to get the star at the end of it. Whereas in Banjo Kazooie, your goal is more about exploring the entire level and to collect everything in it, not just the jiggies which are main items you need to progress through the story, but also things like notes, jinjos and new moves frommole hills (or jam jars in Tooies case) while not as important as jiggies, are also very important when helping you progress through the game.
mario you just need the star though and all those coins you can collect mean jack shit in the grand scheme of things. they get you extra lives. that's about it
 

darkcalling

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Meh. I was never expecting Yooka-Laylee to review particularly well since what was being made always looked like it was banking far harder on nostalgia than trying to evolve the genre. Every review I've heard has boiled down to "It's got some major issues. Mostly the same issues that Banjo-Kazooie and similar 90's mascot platformers had. Do you still like those? you might like this."

That's exactly what I've predicted would be the consensus since day 1.

That said I was kinda interested in the game 'til I saw that they went with making the characters "speak" via gibberish over text boxes which I just cannot freaking stand. I get that it's a relatively low budget production but then why not just do the text boxes? Does anyone know if you can turn that off? If so I might be willing to give the game a try if it went on sale at some point.
 

gsilver

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I know that it's kind of pointless to jump into this discussion as it's broken down as to the merits of individual reviewers, but if you actually read the reviews, they all pretty much complain about the same things. It's not like anyone's reporting a vastly different experience. It's just that the issues, which are there for everyone, bother people to a greater or lesser degree.

Personally, I could see the emptiness of some of the worlds get to me, but having not played it, I really can't say for sure.
I'll wait for the game to become available before making any kind of quality decision.

//Hopes that it's a game that I'll like