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[TyrantGuardian]

Oh come on. Circle of the Moon being above the cutoff in 2001 should tell you all you need to know about this statistic. And that's coming from someone who grew up with the game and loves the entire Igavania series like a maniac. No way is that a 90+ game under today's standards.

 

[kromeo]

By today's standards I think maybe the top 4 and smash bros, Mario Kart might get 90+, not sure many of the rest would

 

[Trigonometrize.]

A site giving a big game you were looking forward to a decade ago less than like a 8.0 was basically an act of war. Game journalism had dug themselves into such a giant hole of positive reception that 3/5 of the scale was unusable for certain games. It was pretty sad, and I would say it's gotten a lot better.

 

[danm999]

Reviewers and the audience simply seem more comfortable with using the expanded review scale these days. Failing to hit 90+ doesn't seem to carry the same stigma.

Whereas a little over a decade ago giving something an 8.8 could lead to an explosion of controversy.

 

[IISANDERII]

The gaming development talent pool has been spread thin on bullshit like free2play, microtransactions, pay2win, season passes etc.

 

[Conciliator]

Oh come on. Circle of the Moon being above the cutoff in 2001 should tell you all you need to know about this statistic. And that's coming from someone who grew up with the game and loves the entire Igavania series like a maniac. No way is that a 90+ game under today's standards.

Yes. A lot of those games are not 90+ games. Some of them ain't 80+ games.

'Klonoa 2: Lunatea's Veil' really stood the fuckin test of time.

 

[Haunted]

A site giving a big game you were looking forward to a decade ago less than like a 8.0 was basically an act of war. Game journalism had dug themselves into such a giant hole of positive reception that 3/5 of the scale was unusable for certain games. It was pretty sad, and I would say it's gotten a lot better.

Well said.

Whereas a little over a decade ago giving something an 8.8 could lead to an explosion of controversy.

Big Jeffrey, never forget.

 

[bj00rn_]

Are you saying the growth of the media industry is creating an overall downward trend on review scores?

No doubt that is a big factor. We're also in an internet age where scrutiny and entitlement is more "popular" than ever (not saying it's categorically good nor bad). For that reason I have a feeling that some of the best, most classic videogames in history would really struggle to get scored as high if they were to be sluiced through today's partly harsh media critique climate.

..Which means comparing scores between the past and the present may be misleading.

The proper way of finding out if YOU like it or not is finding critics and other sources that you trust and you know their opinion of. Then you go to those critics instead of relying on "meta" information like Metacritic.

This is a good point. I feel that reviewers in the past was more aligned. Today we tend to be more forced to find specific reviewers that somewhat has the same taste as we have. Thus aggregated scores may have in some ways have a different meaning today.

 

[Randomizer123454444]

Um, not to push back on this, but you're missing the difference between a Steam review and a Metacritic score.

A Steam review is closer to a Rotten Tomatoes score - basically, is it a good game or not. I have no doubt that the RT number for VA11 Hall-A would be in the high 80's/low 90's because most people liked it, even if they didn't think it was a great game.

Also, Steam Reviews are quite open to frankly, vandalism from gamers if a publisher or developer does something they don't like that shouldn't affect a score of a game

But people are using Metacritic to find what games are good. High scores are associated with good games. So when you ask why games aren't getting 90+ anymore as often, you are IMO asking "what aren't games as good as before".

What I'm saying is that there is a clear discrepancy with how people feel about a game and how critics feel about a game. Thus aggregated critic information is not a useful metric to finding out if game is something people generally like. And as an extension, if game is something YOU like. It's a tool to find out what critics thought of the game on average. Metacritic does not have a predefined set of critics for each game, which means that for example and RPG game might get a lot of reviews from critics that don't like RPG games generally, while some FPS game gets a lot of reviews from critics that are fans of FPS series. Thus the RPG game gets lower metascore than what the "people who like RPG" would give it, while FPS score reflects the average genre fan opinions better. So Metacritic isn't actual indicator of if YOU will like the game or not.

The proper way of finding out if YOU like it or not is finding critics and other sources that you trust and you know their opinion of. Then you go to those critics instead of relying on "meta" information like Metacritic.

 

[wildfire]

90+ scores were handed out like candy in the wild west era of games journalism, now there's a race to be the edgiest, harshest critic.

Not generalizing the entirety of reviewers, just the trends followed by the extremes.

No they weren't. It may look that way from this chart but I remember distinctly that sequels were punished. The way reviewers reviewed in the 90s is very different from how games are reviewed today if you pay attention to the specific details they cared about.

This change in style was partially caused by economic reasons such as the consolidation of more and more reviewers under a bigger umbrella like IGN and I think these cultural changes is why 2001 was the peak before the massive decline in how games were analyzed.

 

[marcbret87]

I think it's pretty clear that the review scores this gen have been much much tougher. I remember someone said that in the period 2007-2012 you had 17 games which had an average >=95 (or perhaps 93) in MC. From that point onwards there are only 3.

I suspect games like Forza Horizon 3 or Uncharted 4 would have been 95+ games.

 

[RowdyReverb]

Bigger, more expensive games from established franchises taking fewer risks probably makes reviewers feel like they've been playing the same game over the past several years with minor variations. Of course there are exceptions, but the trend is undeniable.
Increasing homogeneity is failing to impress reviewers

 

[Theslammer]

90+ scores were handed out like candy in the wild west era of games journalism, now there's a race to be the edgiest, harshest critic.

Not generalizing the entirety of reviewers, just the trends followed by the extremes.

I remember when Vice City came out, the fanboy wars at 1up.com were huge. "Oh c'mon, how does Vice City get straight 10s when it's more of the same from GTA3?! Metroid Prime is the best!"

Just one example, but yes, scores were definitely inflated back in the day. I'll repeat my Goldeneye/Perfect Dark example: no way those games, with the incredible multiplayer slowdown, wouldn't be docked off harshly for that. People go nuts if there are a few dips in a 30fps game, and those games were 30fps that regularly dipped way lower, especially in multiplayer.

 

[ScientificPizza]

Critics have gotten better and have been more critical. There's also a lot more of them so one or two outliers can tank a score and vice versa. Also, yikes 2015 was rough.

Yeah. As games and gamers have grown up the critiquing of games has as well. It's not odd to see this happen at all, especially with how the way review outlets have changed so drastically over the last decade

Or games just got worse and less polished.

No :/

 

[2+2=5]

Go to the article and they have a table of every 90+ game. Sort by release year.

97	Grand Theft Auto III	8.5	2001
97	Halo: Combat Evolved	8.6	2001
96	Metal Gear Solid 2: Sons of Liberty	8.7	2001
95	Gran Turismo 3: A-Spec	8.4	2001
94	Devil May Cry	8.5	2001
94	Madden NFL 2002	7.9	2001
93	Mario Kart Super Circuit	8.3	2001
93	Paper Mario	9.2	2001
93	NBA 2K2	7.7	2001
92	SSX Tricky	8.9	2001
92	NHL 2002	8.5	2001
92	Advance Wars	9	2001
92	Super Smash Bros. Melee	9.1	2001
92	Final Fantasy X	8.7	2001
92	Conker's Bad Fur Day	9.2	2001
91	Klonoa 2: Lunatea's Veil	9.1	2001
91	IL-2 Sturmovik	8.8	2001
91	Twisted Metal: Black	8.4	2001
91	Golden Sun	9.3	2001
91	Castlevania: Circle of the Moon	8.5	2001
90	ICO	8.8	2001
90	Tennis 2K2	8	2001
90	Black & White	7.7	2001
90	Dance Dance Revolution	8.8	2001
90	Jak and Daxter: The Precursor Legacy	8.7	2001
90	Star Wars Rogue Leader: Rogue Squadron II	8.6	2001
90	NCAA Football 2002	8.7	2001
90	Unreal Tournament	8.6	2001
90	Sid Meier's Civilization III	8.4	2001
90	NFL 2K2	8	2001
90	Flight Simulator 2002	8.4	2001

Is that list reliable? Unreal Tournament is also known as UT99 for a good reason(it was released in 1999).

 

[whalleywhat]

Clear evidence of the negative effect of thing in industry that is currently annoying me.

 

[Widge]

What's the quantity of reviews making the average up looking like over time. More reviews can lead to more negative outliers.

 

[butman]

A lot of these retro high metascore are nostalgia evaluation.
Metacritic exist since 2001.

 

[Greddleok]

Considering review scores are a subjective measurement, trying to make some sort of conclusion out of change in the scores over time seems like a foolish task.

As others have mentioned the culture of scores have changed - not getting 9/10 in 2000 meant the game was utter shit. This culture of scoring will continue to change, and hopefully follow the downward trend as fewer people give fewer games 9 or 10/10 and recognise mediocrity when they see it.

A number of sites now don't even give a review score, which I'm sure confounds things, however in the end, it's a pointless comparison because review scores are entirely subjective.

 

[Lux R7]

Is that list reliable? Unreal Tournament is also known as UT99 for a good reason(it was released in 1999).

maybe ps2 or dreamcast version

 

[U-R]

As AAA have become better and better iteration of the same few games, one would expect the average to go up not down: that would be the effect of refinement over experimentation.

So it's likely a result of fewer games being published overall.

 

[LukasTaves]

Take a release like FFXV. Why a game serie which used to score to the likes of 90 and beyond is now sitting at 82 ? Because it's less polished and less good.

I could agree with that if FFX wasn't sitting at a 92 score. For me it was a tremendous drop in quality from IX, which was the last FF I truly liked.

Then you have something like Halo at 97. It feels that even if they make a halo campaign that just as good, and keep improving the current mp that's at its best it won't ever achieve this score because of the impact the first had on the industry.

 

[kiguel182]

Before critics gave an high score to every game that was polished. Now they are much more critical and try to analyze games behind "does it have good graphics and play well?".

There have never been so many good games to play and choose from. Some might say it's the best time to be playing video-games.

 

[DiscoJer]

Looking at the list, it strikes me that in most cases the user score seems more accurate.

Users seem less prone to buying into hype than critics.

 

[Starwolf_UK]

It isn't really that large of a difference tho, if you compare the number of critics counted in the score ,some random pick from 2001 and 2016 90+ games:

2001
GTA 3 - 56
Jak and Daxter - 35
Advance Wars - 28
FFX - 53

2016
INSIDE - 86
Overwatch - 62
Uncharted 4 - 113

Maybe doubled in number over the years, I would argue that is not that much of a significant difference.

Also when it comes to older reviews I'd expect metacritic to not be complete due to lots of print media still being a major review source and these not necessarily being covered.

 

[2+2=5]

Honestly i don't see the problem, obviously the fact that many games release bugged and other game-related reasons are a factor, but let's be honest the huge number of games with big scores in the past was ridiculous, to get a 90+ a game should be really excellent, i still can't get over GTA4 being a 98, to get a 98 it means that basically everyone gave it a 10/10, sorry but i can't believe that all the reviewers were honest, and gta4 is only one example.

Reviewers now are probably more honest and less fanboy, this statistic actually gave me back a little of the confidence on reviews that i lost many and many years ago.

maybe ps2 or dreamcast version

You are right, the ps2 version released in 2001, but since the statistics didn't consider rereleases, remasters etc i didn't think of it and to be fair UT99 shouldn't be in that list if we want to stay faithful to how those statistics were made imo.

 

[Zaventem]

This just means they've stared to use the full scale.

Looking at the list, it strikes me that in most cases the user score seems more accurate.

Users seem less prone to buying into hype than critics.

Users are also more prone to spamming 1 and 10s. I can click on a random metacitic user and 9/10 times i'll find system war shit.

 

[Soul Lab]

Nintendo in 2002. Damn!
Which games were released in that year?

 

[Harmen]

I have played many unpolished games that got critical acclaim back in the day. This "games are a mess now" narrative is nonsense. Hell, quite some major n64 classics would've been lynched when released today in their state because they run dreadfully. Hell, one of my favourite games of all time, SotC, ran at like 15-20 fps at its original ps2 release. Bugs could be more prominent due to patches being a thing, but I have experienced "shit out of luck" situations during the earlier generations as well.

Standards change over the years and not all 90+ titles from back in the day are still revered. We got used to certain elements that used to be much rarer and very impressive (open interactive worlds, good voice acting and animations, orchestrated music etc.).

 

[Kill3r7]

Jesus H Christ, what godly year.

Advance Wars, Golden Sun and SSX were all great too.

 

[Triteon]

I think the there are more outlets and we just expect less garbage nowadays. I look at that "godly" list from 01 and while i do see some great games i also see alot of shit. Black and white? Conker? They arent 9/10 games they're garbage.

Also nearly all the games that have had sequels have generally had superior releases since then.

 

[Ganrob]

Reviews and their aggregation are so subjective, imprecise and unscientific there's no way to draw a line between actual quality of games over time. You can analyze metacritic scores though.

 

[2+2=5]

This just means they've stared to use the full scale.



Users are also more prone to spamming 1 and 10s. I can click on a random metacitic user and 9/10 times i'll find system war shit.

What people don't really understand is that users' scores are more reliable than critics' score for a single simple reason: number.
Yeah many users just give 1 and 10 but when the number is high they don't count, one wrong critic's score has more weight because critics' reviews number is smaller, it's one of the basic rule of statistic science, the higher the number of data the more reliable it is.

Simple and quick example:

votes: 5, 10; average: 7.5
votes:5,5,5,5,10; average: 6
votes:5,5,5,5,5,5,5,5,5,10; average: 5.5
and so on.

Another example? That 2001 list, those users' scores are less fanboystic and more equilibrated.
Another example? Gta4(yes it still burns!) critics' score:98(ps3 and 360), users' score: 7.9(360) and 7.5(ps3), just saying.

 

[redcrayon]

It isn't really that large of a difference tho, if you compare the number of critics counted in the score ,some random pick from 2001 and 2016 90+ games:

2001
GTA 3 - 56
Jak and Daxter - 35
Advance Wars - 28
FFX - 53

2016
INSIDE - 86
Overwatch - 62
Uncharted 4 - 113

Maybe doubled in number over the years, I would argue that is not that much of a significant difference.

Double the number is a huge deal considering that the difference we are discussing is whether games hit an arbitrary point (90+) on metacritic or not, and hitting 89 is enough to not be in that group.

A larger number of critics will trend the average down as it tends to include a wider variety of people- not just games journalists dependent on games industry advertising, but also national press critics who perhaps don't have such links, enthusiasm or are reviewing for a different audience. Also, more titles that use the full scale (5=average) vs clustering at the the top end (7=average).

I agree that it's not going to be the exclusive cause of a huge discrepancy, but it is enough of a factor (across any large vs small group of reviewers) to lower the average slightly, just due to the variety contributing to the number of chances for outliers.

I think the games press in general isn't quite as quick to hand out top marks for AAA games as it used to be too, which can only be a good thing.

 

[Maxim726X]

The games are worse.

Or, the scoring is more stringent.

 

[deriks]

2006

 

[Doffen]

What came out in 2001?

Xbox.

 

[Kill3r7]

I think the there are more outlets and we just expect less garbage nowadays. I look at that "godly" list from 01 and while i do see some great games i also see alot of shit. Black and white? Conker? They arent 9/10 games they're garbage.

Also nearly all the games that have had sequels have generally had superior releases since then.

Opinions and all that. There is nothing like Conker on consoles anymore and Black and White was far more ambitious than many beloved indie/PC games today.

 

[Com Truise]

Maybe critics don't have to care so much anymore because gamers as a whole stopped caring with age and a longer "gaming career". The last time I read a review was more than a decade ago, I think. It's just that I kind of figured out what I want from games and what to look out for so the need to seek out the opinions of other people is non-existant for me.

The Uncharted collection was gifted to me last year, and man, those games are fucking dire, no wonder I was never interested. Hopped on PSN, downloaded Gravity Daze Remastered because it appealed to me somehow and had the fun of a lifetime.

I obviously still buy a lot of shit, but at least it's my own tastes leading me astray and not someone else's.

What am I even rambling about? Still on-topic?

 

[Marky Mark]

I didn't even realise Metacritic was 20yo but then when I went to the waybackmachine and saw a capture of what the site looked like in at least 2001 I immediately remembered that layout.

Going by that 2001 capture, Who Wants to Beat Up a Millionaire on the Dreamcast had a meta score of 10. I can't see why https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8_gJOnzXt-g
This host is hilarious lol
Wait, now some middle-eastern guy

 

[KillerMan91]

Or games just got worse and less polished.

It's pretty much complete opposite. Average release is so polished nowadays that it doesn't give you extra points like in the past.

 

[meerak]

Yeah, people nitpick way more today.

 

[Circinus]

As far as 'game quality' goes, I don't think there's much meaningful information to be discerned here. I think some people are drawing conclusions way too quickly here in terms of games being 'less polished' etc.

Like I've said before, rating video games isn't an exact science, there are no standardized procedures to attribute a score to a certain video game, there are no parameters (or very little) that can be objectively quantified and assessed.

That doesn't mean that metacritic isn't a good tool; it reflects how a game is received by the media very well obviously and thus it might give a good indication how likely someone would enjoy a game.

But obviously, among reviewers, their standards aren't interchangeable and the standards of one person might change over time. So to approach these findings as if it's reflective of a decline in game quality is drawing conclusions way too quickly.

Not to mention, the graph doesn't really show a steady decline.

According to the graph we have in 2016:
PlayStation: 6 games
Xbox: 4 games
PC: 3 games
Nintendo: 0 games

But if you look at metacritic we have in 2016:
PlayStation: 4 PS4 + 0 PS3 + 0 PSV
Xbox: 4 Xbox One
PC: 5
Nintendo: 0 WiiU + 0 3DS

and if you include games with few reviews:
PlayStation: 4 PS4 + 1 PS3 + 2 PSV
Xbox: 6 Xbox One
PC: 9
Nintendo: 1 WiiU + 0 3DS


So, what have I done wrong?

If you remove the games that have a metacritic score of 90 in your findings, then it fits their data. So yeah, it's >90 (91 and above).

It's a bit misleading indeed because in one graph it's 90 and above and in the graph with different platforms it's 91 and above.

 

[yurinka]

2016 was an awesome year for gaming with a lot of great games. I think this just means that now it's harder for reviewers to put scores over 90% more than lack of awesome games.

 

[Tecnniqe]

Hype killed the industry 👀

 

[Memento]

Well, reviewers are way harsher now than back then, so it is not surprising.

 

[jg4xchamp]

I think it's a bit of it being both that critics got a bit more critical (which is good) and that games themselves became shittier products. Be it lack of polish; shitty service models, missing content and all that jazz.

 

[Birgitte2004]

Go to the article and they have a table of every 90+ game. Sort by release year.

97	Grand Theft Auto III	8.5	2001
97	Halo: Combat Evolved	8.6	2001
96	Metal Gear Solid 2: Sons of Liberty	8.7	2001
95	Gran Turismo 3: A-Spec	8.4	2001
94	Devil May Cry	8.5	2001
94	Madden NFL 2002	7.9	2001
93	Mario Kart Super Circuit	8.3	2001
93	Paper Mario	9.2	2001
93	NBA 2K2	7.7	2001
92	SSX Tricky	8.9	2001
92	NHL 2002	8.5	2001
92	Advance Wars	9	2001
92	Super Smash Bros. Melee	9.1	2001
92	Final Fantasy X	8.7	2001
92	Conker's Bad Fur Day	9.2	2001
91	Klonoa 2: Lunatea's Veil	9.1	2001
91	IL-2 Sturmovik	8.8	2001
91	Twisted Metal: Black	8.4	2001
91	Golden Sun	9.3	2001
91	Castlevania: Circle of the Moon	8.5	2001
90	ICO	8.8	2001
90	Tennis 2K2	8	2001
90	Black & White	7.7	2001
90	Dance Dance Revolution	8.8	2001
90	Jak and Daxter: The Precursor Legacy	8.7	2001
90	Star Wars Rogue Leader: Rogue Squadron II	8.6	2001
90	NCAA Football 2002	8.7	2001
90	Unreal Tournament	8.6	2001
90	Sid Meier's Civilization III	8.4	2001
90	NFL 2K2	8	2001
90	Flight Simulator 2002	8.4	2001

I think this list alone demonstrates that it's not just about game quality.

There is zero chance that many sports titles would get 90+ today, and I highly doubt several of the other titles would get to that lofty milestone either.

 

[Iksenpets]

I think this is much more reviewers being better now at not giving in to hype and using more of the review scale than it is some actual decline in quality. There are also way more, more varied press outlets now, so pretty much every game is getting reviewed by at least a few places that aren't part of the game's target demo, whereas before the reviewing community was pretty small and homogenous. And on top of that, it's just way harder to make that sort of revolutionary, mindblowing thing that reviewers just want to throw 10s at anymore. You can see that big early PS2 spike when people could really be blown away by new tech, but what a game can be has largely stabilized now.

I think this list alone demonstrates that it's not just about game quality.

There is zero chance that many sports titles would get 90+ today, and I highly doubt several of the other titles would get to that lofty milestone either.

Yep, easily half of those would get dragged down into the 8 range today.

 

[Shai-Tan]

sites like gamespot used to be more collective and collaborative in their scoring so you would expect a lot more variation in the scenario where scores tend to represent individual opinions. that said, this is in line with how gamespot used to score under Greg Kasavin all those years ago, where 8.5 is fantastic and 9 is something really special in an unusual way. under that criteria very few games deserve a 9 although it gets muddled in 5 point systems that don't have half points (like 4 and a half stars)

scores are also only relative to other scores so even if quality didn't change there's the possibility of drift over time in the numbers relative to older games. you can't really compare recent games to the older ones in score as if there's a direct quality comparison because games today are scored relative to other games today, especially in direct comparison to other games in a genre