Seems to me like this is more of a transparency issue.
I am baffled that although Early Access titles (EAt) have been already on sale for months even performing quite well in some cases and had certainly everybody in the press talking about them, nobody is reviewing them.
Why?
Why exactly, are they being completely ignored and taken out of the equation? Why can't I find Metacritic scores, to these games that are being advertised on the Steam storefront, next to seemingly identically priced reviewed software, for weeks now? I can find user scores, but they usually are all over the place scoring wise.
I can't for the life of me understand why they aren't being reviewed. Is this some sort of "fair play" because it's not "finished"? Because they are constantly changing and a review score today might not reflect it's state tomorrow? Well tough titties to both reviewers and developers. Review'em and keep on reviewing them.
Because the dollars, euros, and pound sterling they are taking are certainly "finished" and unrefundable.
For all I know EAt are running away with easy money considering the competitive advantage they have now, to similarly priced and "finished" products with bad reviews, thanks to the lack of transparency that is in the worst cases even enforced by shitty developers silencing disgruntled customers, as you say.
Even the threat of reviewing these Early Access products alone would put enough pressure on the "stinkers" to put more effort in.
And reviewers should keep tabs on the games they reviewed in general. If the game gets worse, adjust the score: case and point Battle-fucking review event went perfect-Field 4.
Yes, with the flood of games on a multitude of devices and plattform, reviewing every game out there, is an impossible job for one person alone. And keeping tabs on them after reviewing them sounds too much, but although the market space in gaming keeps on evolving and getting more and more dynamic, gaming press seems reluctant at least in terms of reviews to change other than switching from papermagazines in the 80s/90s to going fully digital. It seriously needs to catch-up to the market in this point.
And if you say it's financially impossible to gather enough staff: Charge for EAt reviews. The way I see it it caters to the, (I hate this expression, sorry) hardest of the core gamers, willing to spend money on highly experimental/early stuff. A few dollars for more transparency won't bother them.