Gravy Boat
Member
Why not give your attention to reviews that do that, and leave more personal ones for people who enjoy reading those? There's plenty of room for both to exist so I'm really not sure what you're discussing.
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Yooka-Laylee- Review Thread
- Thread starter FireSol
- Start date
Why not give your attention to reviews that do that, and leave more personal ones for people who enjoy reading those? There's plenty of room for both to exist so I'm really not sure what you're discussing.
JayWood2010
Member
I suppose you arent going to drop the meaning of objective.
I will ask you a question, and you answer it truthfully. Do not answer based off opinion. Just answer.
Is Lebron James a good basketball player? Yes, or no?
Am I allowed to elaborate beyond answering with just "yes" or "no"?
JayWood2010
Member
No. Just answer it, yes or no
Gravy Boat
Member
I don't watch basketball so I don't know his record or anything.
But let's pretend I said yes.
A speed runner is entitled to say that. It might not necessarily agree with how you play the game and some nuances may be missed but if that's made clear I don't see how you could have a problem with the review simply existing. Instead of getting angry at the lower score you should recognise it comes from a completely different angle.
For some an inconsistent dodge move will be a game breaker. For others it might not even merit a mention. This is literally personal perspective. That is what a review is. It's not "journalism" as such - it's critique. This comes from a person's point of view.
Scores range from perfect to about as bad as they could possibly be... Hooray. I guess the fact that quite a few people actually enjoyed it is enough to keep me interested in a purchase.
From what I've seen of the game, I'd agree 100%. Not a lot of room to go down from 2/10 so, if we're just going by scores, I'm assuming this is "worst game I've ever played" territory for the reviewer. Seems like hyperbole, given how hard some reviews swing in the complete opposite direction, but whatevs. They're entitled to their opinions (no duh, why do people always say that), and others are entitled to disagree/question those opinions.
From what I've seen of the game, I'd agree 100%. Not a lot of room to go down from 2/10 so, if we're just going by scores, I'm assuming this is "worst game I've ever played" territory for the reviewer. Seems like hyperbole, given how hard some reviews swing in the complete opposite direction, but whatevs. They're entitled to their opinions (no duh, why do people always say that), and others are entitled to disagree/question those opinions.
While games are unique in being partially mechanical and thus having some level of objectivity apply, you really shouldn't be going to Jim Sterling at all if you want objectivity. He's who you go to when you want to go "fuck trying to be objective."
Boy Wander
Member
Surely people dont take Sterling seriously as a reviewer. He's more of a parody / satire / circus attraction. I hope.
Meaning that having worked on the game in question would legitimize outrage to some degree in your eyes?
Maybe the people of NeoGaf are just exceptionally empathic to those poor devs that worked hard for years only to have their best efforts meet such informed and level headed analysis and not at all cynical clickbait material inspired by a deep set hatred towards a particular genre as Jim Sterling's 'review'.
Who knows, I hear that some gaffers are themselves game developers, which would conceivably make it hard for them not to sympathize with their fellow game devs at Playtonic, but don't quote me on that
I'm not sure why you wouldn't take him seriously. Because of his review I can expect the following on consoles.
-Good music
-Poor framerate
-Bad camera
-Clunky controls
-Bland combat
-Questionable level design
-Dialog is not funny more often than not
-Poorly designed pace breakers(mini games)
-The game hasn't bothered to innovate on its predecessors
How much of this affects the enjoyment of the game is completely on each person.
Gravy Boat
Member
I'm not sure, but 2 people answered yes and he hasn't responded so we mustn't have activated his trap card.
I'll change my answer to No. Maybe then he'll let us know where he was going with that.
Robert at Zeboyd Games
Banned
Meaning that having worked on the game in question would legitimize outrage to some degree in your eyes?
Maybe the people of NeoGaf are just exceptionally empathic to those poor devs that worked hard for years only to have their best efforts meet such informed and level headed analysis and not at all cynical clickbait material inspired by a deep set hatred towards a particular genre as Jim Sterling's 'review'.
Who knows, I hear that some gaffers are themselves game developers, which would conceivably make it hard for them not to sympathize with their fellow game devs at Playtonic, but don't quote me on that
If you work on a game and you get a negative review, it can be painful. But unless the reviewer is outright lying about features, there's no point in getting outraged. I've seen reviews of our games that boil down to "I don't really like these kinds of RPGs but um, I got assigned to play it by my site so here's a list of features and a 60% score." You have to learn to shrug such things off.
Jim Sterling's review was much more useful to me than most reviews of this game. He listed the problems he found with the game in detail - poor controls, bad camera, level design that gets worse as the game goes on, lots of filler, inane combat, unfunny jokes, lack of innovation, etc. He also listed what he liked about the game - the music. You may disagree that some of the problems he found are problems (or the severity) and you may disagree that a "bad" game should get a 2/10 score, but he was nothing if not thorough. As someone who loved Banjo-Kazooie when it was new & was disappointed when I went back to replay it on XBLA and feel that it's aged very poorly, his review told me that Yooka-Laylee probably isn't for me.
I'm more confused at how we appear to have simply ended there. Like I can picture it at that moment.
JayWood2010: Answer "yes" or "no"!
Synth: Yes...
Gravy Boat: Yea...
JayWood2010:
A Joe Berreta gif...hells yeahI'm more confused at how we appear to have simply ended there. Like I can picture it at that moment.
JayWood2010: Answer "yes" or "no"!
Synth: Yes...
Gravy Boat: Yea...
JayWood2010:
Absolutely, and I'm not angry. The existence doesn't bother me. What bothers me is that some people don't understand what objectivity means and shrugs it off as nonsense -- this is what I'm debating against. Why do you think it's called Giant Bomb's GOTY "deliberations" and not "voting"? They argue their way to reach a common consensus everybody can be happy with, that's the way to do it. A goty list as a result of personal votes is garbage.
The audience of your review, i.e. people who come to your site to see if the game is for them, decide which details are relevant to bring up by voting with their clicks and providing feedback in the comments section. If I don't have control in which content you write about, and the ability to shape the content according to my interests, then it's a blog where you state your personal opinions which is fine but I'm not into that.
joecanada
Member
holy shit . fucking lol.
To elaborate, we can, if we want to only answer objectively, say that Lebron James is in the top ten in scoring, assists, rebounds, whatever, and then say well we say if he is in the top 99 percent of players then yes he's definitely good. even objectively good. as in he has objectively good statistics. of course we could still argue what "good" is but at least there's measures in there.
in video games the equivalent would be (as I already posted earlier)
Game X has 125 collectibles
Game X is 1440p
Game X has 3 characters
Game X has 5 million colors
Game X has 15 customizable guns
Game X has Dolby Digital 5.1 sound
Do you want to buy game X?
Jawbreaker
Member
Haha.
plagiarize
Banned
Answer objectively.
Is a comedian still telling the same jokes that people thought were hilarious 20 years ago funny or not?
Answer yes or no.
BravesCountry
Banned
Wait are you saying you think Lebron James is good at basketball? I could have misread your post but just making sure...
plagiarize
Banned
Is OJ Simpson a good football player? Yes or no?
Can we close this thread now? It's clearly not going to get any better than this.
JayWood2010
Member
Technically that is an opinion correct? Its also a fact. Sure, sure there will be people that say Lebron James sucks. They would also be wrong. ( I dont even like Lebron James.) Is there a way you could ever say he is objectively bad, even though it isnt true?
Facts itself can be subjective at times, but when things are universally looked upon as being true it's hard to say its not a fact, even though technically its an opinion.
Gravy Boat
Member
No. The facts are 'Here is his track record. Wins vs Lost, points scored' etc. I can still hold the opinion he is a bad player.
Settle this once and for all. Provide a link to a single video game review that you feel meets your criteria of being objective.
JayWood2010
Member
Sure you can hold that opinion. I nor anybody else will ever try to take your opinion away. Doesnt make it any more true.
joecanada
Member
Well only if you agree that someone with stats in the top 99 percent of all pro players is good ? So... Maybe ?
Btw I think he " sucks " because I don't like his team lol
with leaps like this, you sure you arent an unlockable character this game?
maybe if you posted a score for your post...
JayWood2010
Member
haha Im not really talking about the game or the reviews. They want to talk about being objective, and the meaning of it
When people want reviewers to be objective. They want them to be fair. Having opinions are fine which is also a part of a review.
If we collectively define that "the dodge in Okami Wii should not impact the score, no matter how much it personally affects you" then that's easy to adhere to. You as a speedrunner take a step back and try your best to judge the game based on how a non speedrunner would experience the game and score it accordingly. The reviewers who excell at this are people with great association skills who can understand and assess something from a completely different perspective than your own. They are skilled in predicting what most of the people who click on the article will think of a certain feature, this comes from experience.
Basically I want to know what I will think about the game once I get it in my hands on it, in your review.
JayWood2010
Member
Couldnt have said it better myself.
He's more Daily Show than Weekly World News in that regard (or Yahtzee rather than Angry Video Game Nerd?). Yes, he aims to entertain, but he really is delivering his honest opinions and views here, so if what he's saying seems relevant to you then it's worth taking to heart rather than laughing it off.
joecanada
Member
Everything you stated is still an opinion. It's just based on a collective or using others tastes as perspective
Gravy Boat
Member
Right, which is why you go to reviewers who have a history of giving you that. It's not the other way around, reviewers don't tailor their reviews to you, you find the ones you get value from and ignore the ones you don't.
Except if you're on GAF, where seemingly you attempt to discredit the ones you don't get value from and say that they're wrong.
Of course it's not true, it's an opinion. It's neither true or false, it's a subjective assessment.
themagicalkitsune
Member
Why isn't Jim's review up on metacritic yet?
Petrae
Member
Apparently so, which is equal parts sad and ridiculous. The fact that people so aggressively defend games from evil pre-release review scores is mind-boggling to me. No ground to stand on. If you haven't played it yourself, how the hell can you know?
It's a review score. A fair number of consumers already know if they're buying a game before the review scores hit. Publishers and developers don't need a volunteer internet militia to defend their honor, if a review score isn't a 10. And yet legions of these people-- many of whom are active right here on GAF-- jump to the task.
Negative/scathing reviews are gonna happen, unless we're content to sanitize reviews and eliminate criticism (as some folks in this thread have suggested). Not every reviewer is going to have the same glowing opinion of or experience with every game. It's good to have differing points of view. Scathing reviews happen in other forms of entertainment, in movies and music. Food critics can be harsh, too.
We don't have to agree with reviews we read or watch, but the epic meltdowns over lower-than-expected review scores in instances like Breath of the Wild and Yooka-Laylee-- among others-- are just awful.
Robert at Zeboyd Games
Banned
And there are plenty of reviewers who try to figure out what a composite amalgam of a gamer will think of a game and write reviews accordingly. Read their reviews.
I want to read a review of somebody's actual opinion. Even if that opinion differs from my own, I can learn more from an actual opinion than what somebody else thinks my opinion should be.
It's there, look under Xbox One scores. He's not showing for PS4 or PC.
In this case it would actually be very hard to argue convincingly that Lebron James is a bad player. Sure, as you said, it is technically an opinion... but the rigid goals of basketball will cause nearly everyone's opinions to converge at either extreme (great players or terrible players). This is a case where the objective metrics effectively drive the subjective opinion almost directly, because at the end of the day everyone wants the same things from the player in any given position. Even this however becomes murky once you start talking about players that don't sit at either extreme, where two different coaches can look at the same player, and only one consider them worth drafting.
None of this applies to gaming however, because their are no concrete metrics that everyone can agree make a game good. There is no goal that a game can keep hitting ad-nauseam where the game will be better the more it does so. Batman Arkham Knight didn't become better by having more Riddler trophies to collect than previous entries... it's not something that's simply quantitive, making the comparison fruitless. It's very easy to argue any game as not being factually good, regardless of how popular it is... we see this all the time with stuff like Uncharted, where many people find the games to be a boring slog, despite how lauded they each were critically upon release. Hell, if we assume that many of the same reviewers remain in the field for numerous years, then we even see that they won't even necessarily agree with themselves over time.
And this is with the games having objective elements increased over the original versions (resolution, framerate, etc).
If you're doing a published review of a racing game, but hate racing games, the game shouldn't be knocked because you don't like racing games.
There's subjectivity in reviewing something but it ought to incorporate some objectivity.
Linkstrikesback
Member
It is. But because they've fragmented the reviews almost randomly, it's under the Xbox one version.
BravesCountry
Banned
Just messing with you of course he is good.
Gravy Boat
Member
The game can be knocked for whatever reason I want, but you're free to disregard my review.
In this exact instance, my review would be beneficial to someone who also doesn't regularly play racing games but is thinking about trying this particular one.
Isn't that because he reviewed the Xbox version? Or atleast so it says in the review.