We live in interesting times. Perhaps even desperate ones considering the general state of the US economy. There are plenty of people standing in line for too few jobs and too many people sitting on the butts at home because they were laid off and they can't do anything else. Back in the day(about a year or so ago), there were probably a handful of really incredible titles. These days, at least according to Metacritic, a lot of games seem to be far better than the average. In the last few months each console has scored 48 games combined that scored 80 or higher(that's just PS3 and XBOX360). Which is by all scales WAY better than average.
IS this the truth? Are all these games wonderful? Perhaps they are? But in my brief experience with some of these titles, there are issues that call into question the universal marks of quality of that reviewers bestowed upon them. For instance, Halo ODST is a great game but selling it for $59.99 to people who by and large all ready own Halo 3 seems a bit much. But everyone universally gave the game at least an 8.0, some even more the average on Metacritic sits at around an 84. Really guys? For what boils down to an expansion pack for a two year old game? Maybe the press should not be constrained in thinking about value when doing game reviews. But in this economy and with most video game sites advertising the heck out of the game. I think maybe some extra care could have been used. At the very least, the appearance of impropriety should have been enough.
But this is not the only example of this. How about Beatles Rock Band? This game with an average score of 89. Even higher than Halo 3 ODST. But this game dropped with a smaller than normal set list and a big box of expensive instruments. Even though all the instruments have basically the same technology in them as the Rock Band 2 instruments. Now they want to sell us the rest of a set list that should have been on the disc to begin with. Considering historically for Rock Band, Rock Band 2, and all the Guitar Hero games this was one of the shortest set lists of all. Also, they have stated that they are NOT in fact going to use new art assets for each song or album to make it easier to download new songs? I'm sorry, no matter how positively they try and spin this; there is no excuse for this kind of thing. The actual game itself which is usually the only thing that is reviewed certainly doesn't have anything to do with the their DLC model. However, at the time most these reviews were done the reviewers were well aware that the rest of the Beatles catalog would be sold to players as DLC rather than included as part of the game. The game also does not allow players to play the songs they have on their hard drives from other Rock Band games. This has been defended, by saying that it is a package unto itself and therefore the other content does not belong there. I see, so we get a game we can ONLY play Beatles songs in and you won't even give us all the Beatles songs unless we pay extra. So why isn't the game cheaper than the regular full price Rock Band 2 game was when it came out? And why isn't the game itself cheaper than $60 if all we can play using said game are Beatles songs. This should have been taken into account before giving the game a 9.0!
Perhaps the worst sin against the public as a whole is the utter lack of responsibility most reviewers seem to have when it comes to high profile games. These games are many times sold as pre-orders to people based on reviews. So when some reviewer writes that this or that game is THE BEST SINGLE PLAYER GAME they have EVER played it smacks immediately of hyperbole that should never appear in a serious review. Especially when the game is certainly above average but the BEST SINGLE PLAYER ever. Perhaps you should play more games or try and calm down before you write a review next time. Everyone gets excited after playing a good game or a good demo. But people who are supposedly professional are supposed to be able to separate themselves from this and write an unbiased and critical review. In fact, in the game I will not mention that the reviewer said was the best single player game ever there are QUITE a few things that could have been pointed out as negative about the game to balance all the positive. I.E. A balanced review, rather than a fanboy lovefest.
I also really enjoy reading a magazine where 5 out 7 games in their monthly reviews section get perfect scores. It starts to make all their ratings useless. This is why I don't give ratings. I just give explanations about why games are good or bad and tell you if you should buy it. I completely agree with all reviewers who refuse to give refuse and only give detailed explanations. Ratings or scoring games are too similar to scoring movies. And I think anyone who has watched a summer action movie knows how accurate those scores and ratings usually are.
In closing I would like to say that I have every respect for the people who write about video games for a living. I have even more respect for those who make video games for a living. Video games of late have been better than they ever have before. If we are going to criticize them we will need to look beyond what we did in the past and take a more critical look at them. We also may need to consider removing ratings for good. Nothing is easy when comes to change and this will not be an easy change for people to except either. Don't judge the future in the terms of the past when it comes to media. It doesn't help anyone. Least of all the people who are supposedly being served by these reviews; the gamers...
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