Why aren't early access games that charge money not being reviewed?

[Eyemus Lutt]

So I'm finding it more and more odd that early access games are getting away with charging for the purchase and not being reviewed by anyone by claiming they're early access for long periods of time or even indefinitely on occasion.

Rust and DayZ sold and were played by millions and currently Player Unknown is being talked about constantly and already is a top seller, but they don't have any reviews on major publications or metacritic and might never even get one.

People when talking about these games always give more of a pass saying it has some junk that will be ironed out eventually but AAA games don't get that luxury like Prey recently with some bugs it had on launch or even games like Destiny where it launched not fully featured until the Taken King expansion came out.

Now you might find it unfair comparing Games like Destiny and Prey to Rust, DayZ and PUBG, but they are still charging $30 or more and promising it might eventually get better, but games like Super Bomberman R on Switch just got a bunch of free updates to improve the game but the reviews will always reflect the game at launch when you were charged for it.

So am I being reasonable in wanting early access games that charge money to be reviewed?

 

[texhnolyze]

Users do review them, and that's all that matters.

 

[ClosingADoor]

Because they are sold as early access and not a finished product and consumers are warned about that before they buy.

 

[UKUMI0]

Because its in Early Access. Games that exist in this category can change a lot before release...or never get released at all. There really is no point reviewing a game that is in active development and can change on a dime.

Most reviews for an Early Access game would be out of date a month (or sometimes even sooner) after publication. There really is no point.

 

[patapuf]

So I'm finding it more and more odd that early access games are getting away with charging for the purchase and not being reviewed by anyone by claiming they're early access for long periods of time or even indefinitely on occasion.

Rust and DayZ sold and were played by millions and currently Player Unknown is being talked about constantly and already is a top seller, but they don't have any reviews on major publications or metacritic and might never even get one.

People when talking about these games always give more of a pass saying it has some junk that will be ironed out eventually but AAA games don't get that luxury like Prey recently with some bugs it had on launch or even games like Destiny where it launched not fully featured until the Taken King expansion came out.

Now you might find it unfair comparing Games like Destiny and Prey to Rust, DayZ and PUBG, but they are still charging $30 or more and promising it might eventually get better, but games like Super Bomberman R on Switch just got a bunch of free updates to improve the game but the reviews will always reflect the game at launch when you were charged for it.

So am I being reasonable in wanting early access games that charge money to be reviewed?

There's plenty of steam user reviews.

big review outlets are already flooded with games to review, so they'll pick and chose what to review - and early access is not high on the priority.

Early access is also often PC only in genres that aren't popular on consoles ---> less reviewers are going to even look at the games when they are finished, let alone when unfinished.

 

[Daffy Duck]

I could only imagine the mess if places doing early access reviews.

As stated, users review them and that's good enough.

 

[Spukc]

User reviews.

Oh and don't buy every early access survival-craft game.

 

[xrnzaaas]

One of the paper magazines I'm buying has early access reviews in almost every issue. But I should mention they don't use scores so they won't have to worry about them not being relevant anymore in the future (also they tend to choose smaller early access games, not the most popular titles).

 

[ExoSoul]

Your point?

 

[VexyWexy]

Why does a game not getting professional reviews even matter? Do you base your purchasing decisions on them?

Would IGN saying PUB is a buggy, laggy mess make you feel better about not playing it while everyone else is having a blast?

 

[Wulfram]

RockPaperShotgun does what are effectively reviews,though a little less in depth and not called that.

https://www.rockpapershotgun.com/tag/premature-evaluation/

 

[@MUWANdo]

Games that leave early access struggle to get reviews once they go final, too. Press outlets are only going to give your game so much exposure and launching on early access pretty much kills your chances of high-profile coverage, as far as I can tell.

 

[Eyemus Lutt]

Why does a game not getting professional reviews even matter? Do you base your purchasing decisions on them?

Would IGN saying PUB is a buggy, laggy mess make you feel better about not playing it while everyone else is having a blast?

It just seems that some devs are having their cake and eating it too, by releasing games in early access and 3-4 years later no progress is made.
User reviews can also be very unreliable just go look at metacritic user reviews.

I'm not suggesting they review every early access games, but the ones that sell millions should be reviewed.

 

[ArtHands]

They are sold as early access,not as final product. The developers deemed them incomplete, so there's no reason for the professional review outlets to review an incomplete, WIP game.
People know what they are getting when they purchase an early access title: that there will be bugs, content might be limited and that it is more like a beta prototype. And the developers want its early access buyers to send feedbacks to them to improve it before releasing it as a full product.

This is different from Prey or Destiny which are being sold as a complete product, and then getting fixed later on.

 

[Phamit]

Because they are presented as unfinished and you are warned before you buy the game

I don't think anybody from Bungie or Activision warned me about Vanilla Destiny and told me to wait until the Taken King comes out

 

[NinjamicWZ]

Why aren't they not?

 

[EloKa]

The notification is still not big enough. It should be blinking and Steam should read it out loud everytime someone browses an early access game. Also buyers should confirm 4 times whether or not they understood the message.

Imho Early Access is awesome but large parts of the player bases usually tend to ignore everything that comes with early access and "demand" a full finalized and polished game

 

[Auto-Reply]

Some of them get updated often, the review could already be outdated by the time it's done.

 

[Mechazawa]

Because reviews are written in a very particular and declarative way, and their becoming even less useful as is with fully released games as they start transitioning towards a games service model with frequent post-release changes.

There are also means of finding out whether something is good or not in the moment without having to turn to a professional outlet.

That said, I don't think it would be unfair to review a game like that as long as it came with a disclaimer that it's critique might be subject to change as time goes on.

 

[ArtHands]

There are people who only buy full release, so its not fair to say the devs and their early access games get free passes here, since they are losing the sales of people who avoid early access games.

maybe a chef has a massive private food testing event for a dish he has invented, but a professional food blogger wouldnt judge and review the taste of the dish from that food tasting event. He's going to judge based on what is served to the public in the restaurant

 

[NoblesseOblige]

That would be called a preview, not a review.

 

[MoogleMan]

So am I being reasonable in wanting early access games that charge money to be reviewed?

No, that's not reasonable. It's like putting money towards the development of a new car, and up front you get a car that has a frame, motor and wheels. You can drive it, but it's obviously incomplete. How valid could a "review" of a car in that state of development be?

The only way reviews by major outlets could work for early access games is if they're ongoing reviews, updated every time the game reviewed is updated. But that's extremely unlikely. It would require way too much effort on the part of the reviewer, and on top of that, who would come back to read a review with every update? It would have to hit front page in big bold letters to even get attention.

Take one of my favorite early access games, Ark Survival Evolved; since it's steam launch, it's had 20+ major updates and countless other updates improving things. I highly doubt any publication would be willing to follow a single game for 2 years and update their review after every major update.

 

[Chris_C]

Users do review them, and that's all that matters.

I'll take a trusted, professional reviewers opinion over a user's 99% of the time.

Steam Reviewer:

Hours Played - 999 hrs.
Thumbs Down.

???

 

[Mandoric]

It's a nice sentiment, but the genres early access games tend to be have a hard enough time getting useful reviews even when described as complete packages - and those reviews then become useless in a patch or two.

The inspiration needs to come from sports writing's power rankings more than anything, I think.

 

[GankzyMcfly]

I dont feel games like Ark survival evolved will ever drop the title of early access. Even if they do, it will just be a technicality and the communities for these games will still use the early access argument to defend any issue with the game.

 

[Triggerhappytel]

Speaking of which, did The Forest ever see a final release? I liked the look of that way back when and was very interested when they announced it'd be coming to PS4, but it's been totally quiet for a long time now.

 

[toddhunter]

Games like this are unfinished, buggy, are going to change anyway and are basically being made by people who have no concept of how to make a good game and are just trying to exploit an idiot fanbase.

But enough about AAA games like Mass Effect. Early access games don't get reviewed because a) they are on pc and nobody gives a fuck and b) nobody gives a fuck because these companies don't contribute advertising funds to review sites, there is no central body like Sony or Microsoft to organise marketing deals with publishers and the reviewer just wants to get a job at activision anyway.

 

[Mista Koo]

Because they are sold as early access and not a finished product and consumers are warned about that before they buy.

One and done.

And they aren't being reviewed because they are by their admission incomplete, an alpha build if you will. A review will be useless for something like PUBG that gets updated every week or two. Unless you expect them to review every version lol.
If you are paying millions on marketing something broken you deserve all the reviews you get.