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[Moondrop]

The data is not normalized to the number of releases per year. Therefore the trend could be explained by fewer multiplatform studio releases over time, among other factors.

 

[tr1p1ex]

It doesn't mean anything by itself.

Not like there is a universal criteria for giving out scores and it's the same now as 15 years ago. Not like same sites/mags/people are scoring game reviews. Not the same editors. etc etc.


I'd bet MetaCritic gets its scores today from many more sources particularly many smaller "grass roots" sources who are less "corporate" and whose tastes are more niche. The sources for scores 15 years ago were likely mostly the big gaming magazines and fewer in number.

You can't judge whether games are any better or worse based on scores because grading scales over time are fluid. Not static. Look at grades in colleges. And trophies and awards in schools. They've exploded. It's not because of extra achievement.

 

[Danthrax]

Hmmmm. I swore 1996 was the peak awesome year, but it is the low? My mind is playing trick on me.

Or the cut off at 90%

1996 featured Wing Commander 4, so.

your memory is accurate.

Hold the fucking phone here. It looks like Sega's output is still being factored into the average despite the obvious fact that they're out of business. Look at 2016 for example: The average 90+ count is somewhere between 2 and 3 and closer to the latter. Taking Sega into consideration, the average is (6+4+3+0+0)/5 = 2.6 when it should actually be (6+4+3+0)/4 = 3.25 because Sega is actually business rather than just publishing a bunch of games that scored below 90. This fucks up the entire average after 2001.

Haha, I wondered about that when I looked at that chart. Glad you did the math. Did Polygon make this chart for them?

 

[purdobol]

SO speaking of 2001, interestingly enough I"m currently playing Jak and Daxter (90+ on Metacritic) on the Vita as well as Max Payne (89 on Metacritic) via PS2 on PS4 and I can for one say that people who think games were more polished back then and had less issues have some serious nostalgia glasses on.

More polished? No.
Introduced something new? Hell yeah.

Jak and Daxter was first 3D platformer that had seamless world. Without hub and clear level division.

Max Payne was the first title that used bullet time to such an extent. And at the time it was new and cool gameplay feature.

Hence the high review scores.

 

[eot]

It's just score inflation slowly going away

 

[Sanctuary]

This is grave disrespect towards 2015.

So Bloodborne and The Witcher 3 somehow make the entire year one of the best in general? The best years aren't the best just because they might have had a few of the better (or best) games of the last 5-10 years.

Are we counting re-releases and remasters now or something too? Because that's something 2015 had a lot of.

 

[dragonelite]

It's just score inflation slowly going away

Didn't press also made a big deal about it a couple of years ago.
Normalizing the rating scale again.

 

[GameAddict411]

I highly doubt is because of lower quality content. Grading scales change over the years so are critics. What was considered to be a 9 might not be a 9 by today standards. It's not like inflation with currency. It's very hard to compare scores from years ago to scores coming out today.

 

[phant0m]

'06 was a rough year

 

[xevis]

My first thought looking at those plots is that they don't show the number of reviews that make up the score. One plausible explanation is that there's so many more critical voices on the Internet now compared to 20 years ago and each one has a different set of ideas about what "good" looks like. Given the diversity of metrics it any surprise that the average opinion will be different than the one computed from fewer critical voices? Without such controls the analysis appears to me superficial and pretty much useless. That's even before we get to the fact that metacritic is an opaque aggregator with its own internal weights and score conversions -- all of which make it very difficult to create any kind of meaningful time series!

Make what you will of the obvious downwards trend in critical favour. Maybe critics are becoming more scrupulous in their scrutiny; maybe there's been a collective shift in what makes a game near-perfect; maybe the games being released really aren't cutting it. I'd argue for the former.

Fucking lol. Here's a plot. I don't know what it means but let me tell you what I think anyway.

 

[GearDraxon]

Hey look, it's a graph of how useful Metacritic is:

 

[Theslammer]

So Bloodborne and The Witcher 3 somehow make the entire year one of the best in general? The best years aren't the best just because they might have had a few of the better (or best) games of the last 5-10 years.

Are we counting re-releases and remasters now or something too? Because that's something 2015 had a lot of.

Vast majority of 2015 was new releases.

 

[jholmes]

BS. This is your nostalgia filter talking. Tons of AAA games had glitches/bugs/crashes galore 15 years ago. Just nobody cared. Hell, stuff like AGDQ love the fact that older games had tons of glitches, a large percentage of speedrunning is based on finding the bugs and (ab)using them.

Madden today doesn't get 90 because "It's just more Madden". There is nothing functionally wrong with Madden now compared to Madden then other than time passing/criteria changing.

Publishers (EA) didn't pull shit like NHL 15 and NBA Elite before the advent of Day 1 patches but yeah sure "BS" "nostalgia filter" "nobody cared"

 

[HeelPower]

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

Konami actually released MGS2 & Silent Hill 2 in the same year.

That Kompany isnt even a tenth of what it used to be.lol

 

[notacat]

I've used that site to gauge purchases.

For example, I sorted PS4 by user rating, and found Deus Ex: Mankind highly rated. never played any of them before, so gave it a shot. Great game, now i'm looking forward to the next in the series.


I've been burnt on a few others though. Until dawn makes no sense to me at all. It's not even a game so much as a listen to boring actors talk back and forth, sometimes press a button to continue.

 

[IrishNinja]

there's quality all around, but shit ain't been the same since the dreamcast huh

 

[brickarts295]

In order:

1998
1997
1996
2001
2004
2007
2011
-
-
-
-
-
2017?

13 and 15 as well

 

[Power Jack]

I'd say this is pretty telling considering the quality of game reviews have also gone downhill, with critics either panning a game with a strong basis excluding gameplay or praising a game under paid reviews.

 

[JaredLetoJoker]

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

WOOOOOW!!
Amazing year

 

[Sanctuary]

Vast majority of 2015 was new releases.

New IPs? Something that truly stood out aside from just more "Look at me" graphics?

Anyway, very relevant: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jCmmYF4rOwo

Critical reviews have become much more thorough and professional, and with it comes higher standards. Read reviews from the 90s or early 2000s and they read like an 8th grader wrote them.

How many of these "professional" reviewers though are actually any good at the games they are reviewing? Quite often you'll end up with a very well written review, yet the author didn't actually know what they were talking about whether it was a positive or negative. I'd rather have an eighth grade written piece and a lot more accurate representation of the game itself than someone just doing a by the numbers "review" for their paycheck. Anyway, I think my favorite reviewer of all time would probably be Kevin VanOrd. Even though I didn't always agree with him, he not only wrote good reviews, but he really made you want to believe what he was saying in his videos. You could tell he was being sincere, and he also usually had a pretty good idea of what he was talking about.

After this, he was my go to reviewer.

 

[Chill Penguin]

Critical reviews have become much more thorough and professional, and with it comes higher standards. Read reviews from the 90s or early 2000s and they read like an 8th grader wrote them.

 

[Theslammer]

New IPs? Something that truly stood out aside from just more "Look at me" graphics?

Anyway, very relevant: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jCmmYF4rOwo

New IPs too, yeah, but you originally said 2015 was a bunch of remasters.

"Are we counting re-releases and remasters now or something too? Because that's something 2015 had a lot of."

That's indisputably false.

Critical reviews have become much more thorough and professional, and with it comes higher standards. Read reviews from the 90s or early 2000s and they read like an 8th grader wrote them.

That reminds me: read PSX Extreme's review of Metal Gear Solid for the PS1. Three paragraphs:

No doubt about but Metal Gear Solid is probabbly one of the greatest games ever created.The gameplay is spectacular, sound is extrodinary, and the graphics are to die for. Although people say the game is not long, they are kind of right (if you skip everything, skip all of the scenes,don't care about what there talking about, don't fell like getting all of the secrets etc.) Yeah so if you do that you skipped the whole game.

The game is fairly long because in order to get cool items like the Stealth suit (invisible) and Bandanna (Unlimited ammo) you will have to beat the game with both of the endings. I'm not gonna tell you the endings but if you want to get the bandanna do not submit to Revolver ocelots torture (he tells you that he will know if you use auto fire he knows auto fire but not turbo, if you have a turbo controller use it). If you want the bandanna submit to the torture. (The torure will happen later in the game).

Metal Gear Solid use of the Dual Shock is very good. Metal Gear Solid is like a movie and you are the director. Now how long will it take for you to beat the game. The first time about 10-13 hours. Second about 5-6 hours and 3rd time 3-4 hours. Then comes the VR Training mode (you haven't beat the game untill you beat VR Training mode). VR takes about 3 to beat. And after you beat VR you get 3 extra modes in VR training they are Gun shooting,Time Attack,and survival. So all in all Metal Gear Solid is pretty long 23 hours to be exact. But the weird thing about it is that I have beat the game 7 times already and I'm still not bored of it. So I guess Metal Gear Solid without a doubt in my mind deserves a perfect

 

[Randomizer123454444]

Hmm, I actually think that example proves the opposite point. Those reviews come from two different populations. VA-11 Hall-A is quite clearly a niche game with very specific aesthetic choices that some people will love and some people will hate. I expect that most people who buy it for themselves on Steam are people who think a PC-98-esque cyberpunk bartender visual novel is an awesome idea. On the other hand, reviewers who are playing the game because it is their job to do so may represent a sample of people more similar to the general gaming public.

So does this mean that games are more and more trying to specialise instead of trying to target that magical "general population"? And thus metacritic score goes down, because the "general audience critics" no longer find as many attractive games?

It would kind make sense because the cost of making those "general audience spectacles" have risen so significantly with improving graphics. It's much more cost-effective to just do your own thing, but do it well.

 

[Fbh]

But the internet tells me that modern reviewers are terrible and all mediocre games get 90+ scores as long as they have good graphics :S

 

[Kinyou]

That 2006 drop, wow.

You can really tell the launch years of new hardware

 

[Burbeting]

It's not typical of modern gaming for a game to ship unfinished and promise contents and/or bug fixes in future patches?! Where have you been this past few years?!

How does FFXV highjack every gaf thread now, it was even on the scalebound one.

--

On topic, it's good that the review scale is used little bit more. Not all games have to be +90 to be good.