Are Critics Killing The Traditional RPG?

Couldn't agree more.

You shouldn't be shocked over it though Highlander. Reviews have killed more then one game.

It's why I believe that there should be a governing body over the review system and the individual reviews.

Reviewers, as professionals, must have accountability. For example, If I, as a designer release an incomplete set construction documents, I will have to answer for it with State and Local officials. If the review industry already has something similar in place, please Ben, correct me on this.

I don't look at reviews or scores for a game,

(Mind you I do read them, but that isn't my main focus point of purchasing a game whether or not the author liked it or didn't like it and what score they gave it)

I look at video's and if it catches my eye's and I like what I'm seeing I will do more research on it, if it hits home I will buy it. I do that with all of my games. I didn't buy any of my games because of review scores.

Last edited by Clamedeus on 7/7/2011 4:45:02 PM

Max, I'm not talking about a single game, and neither was Ben, they're killing a genre.

Jimmy, I'm not sure what is up with your reply, I made no mention of politics so let's keep the government creep paranoia elsewhere please.

Nlayer,

OK, I wish he'd have included who that was directed at since it was a reply under my original comment. But I see that, thanks.

jimmyhandsome –

You either failed to read what I posted or didn't understand it. Only reasons I can think of to explain your "communistic" comments.

I am a professional designer of light commercial and residential projects. I am currently taking steps to earn my Architect Seal. My point? As a professional, I am bound by laws through various local and federal organizations (btr dot com). It is my opinion, that reviewers and websites who offer reviews should be bound by something similar to this. As professionals, it should be something they embrace, for it would separate those are serious from those who blog.

Highlander –

I know. But my point was that how many reviews have trashed a game (some deserving) and as result cost someone's job? A closure of company? I am all for reviewers and critics informing the consumers of low quality titles, but considering that reviews for any given title are usually all over the place, all that shows that there isn't a standard in place.

Eventually, I see some governing body in place to separate the tabloids (Destructiod)from the professional (PSXE) sites. This business is getting big enough, wouldn't you agree?

Oh no, these agencies don't control everything, but for example, what the BTR does for architects and engineers is provide guidelines for each professional to follow while creating construction documents. Now while it's up to the individual first and foremost to provide a service to the best of their abilities and do what's "right", there have been cases in which that doesn't happen.

Another example I want to point out is to take a look at the Association of Food Journalists. It's set in place not to tell food critics what to do, but it offers a standard for ethical conduct and credibility. All agencies whether they are associations or state jurisdictions are very similar in that regard. In my opinion, this is very similar to the video game reviews and reviewers.

Yes, I understand the reviews are opinions, but in some cases, some of what's covered in the review is factual such as graphical and frame-rate issues. But most reviews have statements such as "boring" (for example) in place, which in all likelihood, it may be isolated to the reviewer himself due to their dislike of the genre. You or I may find the game-play very fulfilling.

When it comes to what separates a tabloid from a serious site, it's pretty obvious to most of us since we come here. I know it's why I do! I don't have to navigate through the attention grabbing articles or reviews that are heavily biased. In my eyes, PSXE is cut above the rest for this very reason.

Last edited by maxpontiac on 7/8/2011 12:23:15 PM

Excellent point Highlander, and thanks for discussing this with me (as with the others too).

Well, the reviewers and authors can easily create an Association. The small firm I am currently with is a charter member with a local building association. It is an entity that has help separate the license contractors who are serious from those who fly by night.

Right now, video game review sites are a dime a dozen. Why? Tons of intelligent people out there play video games, and have access to internet. It's not a bad thing, but separates one critic from another? What do you think it would take for a governing body to come into effect?

Last edited by maxpontiac on 7/8/2011 3:12:00 PM

Critics are killing more then RPG genre, and it's nothing new. It's why certain games get reviews that ignore issues while other games get faulted for it. For the record, PSXE does not do this.

On topic, and I speak only as a new person to the RPG genre, I am glad traditional RPG's are becoming a thing of the past. Why? My favorite games to play are Fallout and Dragon Age.

The action RPG is the way to go.

Last edited by maxpontiac on 7/7/2011 11:35:39 AM

Max, Coverton nailed you with his post, and he's 100% correct in his post.

Coverton – Well, for one, if Dragon Age and Fallout played like a traditional turn based game, I would have never bought it, nor gotten to enjoy two of my favorite series.

I stand corrected. Perhaps I should have said I am glad "action" RPG's seem to be replacing the traditional ones.

"I wish WRPGs would die" is what I would be saying since I prefer traditional turn based RPGs, but I've learned to accept it and I actually enjoyed Mass Effect 2.

coverton341 –

You are making an assumption. I am not glad traditional RPG's are shrinking in popularity. I am however glad the action RPG's are becoming the norm.

I absolutely love the characters and stories from Dragon Age (for example), but I am glad I can still play it in real time, and with two, I can press the button manually.

Jawknee –

Yeah, well, we can't always see eye to eye! I believe if the trend continues with "action RPG's" fans such as yourself will continue to be in the minority.

I don't think Max was trying to say that he wants the old RPGs to die out. I think he was trying to say he enjoyed developers making the western style of RPGs instead of making the older style of them. There's nothing wrong with that view.

My view: I'm a big fan of Final Fantasy 7 since it released, but I enjoy Mass Effect 2 a whole lot more nowadays. I love to see new Mass Effect style of games currently. Not as much as I do with FF7 style of games. Why? Well, the old RPGs were great back in the day, but now I think the western style is what's good right now. In another ten years I'll probably not be looking forward to any Western style RPGs, but instead whatever else is popular/good at the time in the future. This is my view, however, and you certainly do not have to own it. I just think that everything evolves. I like the old RPG style because of the nostalgia it gives me(But an entirely new game with old RPG elements doesn't do much to me nowadays).

Please don't let nostalgia blind your view when talking with others.

I don't really follow what critics are scoring games anymore. I read too many that just seem off. I think most critics have completely lost touch of what makes a game fun anymore and just based their reviews in current trends and being over objective. I played too many games that were deemed either awful or mediocre but had a blast playing.

The thing is, that gamers on the fence read reviews and when a game gets abused by the critics, it does have an impact. If you want to see the disparity between review scores and game quality, you can look at the difference between the critical apprasal at somewhere like Metacritic, and then compare it against the kind of user reviews at Amazon or Metacritic.

Beamboom, that's why you have to look at the user reviews. On amazon I look at the pattern of scores and then sample the reviews to gauge whether it's a fanboy reaction or honest reviews. I mentioned the metacritic user reviews because I'd already mentioned Metacritc for critics reviews. However their user reviews are very prone to the fanboy voting. YOu can read the posted reviews there to make your own mind up, but Metacritic is very vulnerable to skewed voting. Amazon is far less vulnerable to that.

However if you do go look, you can see what I am referring to, and in the majority of cases it's actually valid. Sufficiently to make the general case that for RPGs critical reviews are overly harsh and perhaps even biased – in my opinion.

High, I see what you mean and indeed there have been times where the user reviews have been *good* too.
Good user reviews do exist. And when used carefully they may be of good value.

However I put *far* more trust into the professional reviews. I simply find the typical pro review to be *way* more balanced, objective and fair than the typical user review. So when a difference is found, I'd say almost always the pro review score is closest to the objective truth (to the degree such a thing can even exist).

Last edited by Beamboom on 7/7/2011 1:56:43 PM

WKC2 had good reviews and loads better user feedback in Japan.

Here in Europe, the message board in-game on WKC2 is full of people saying this is what FF13 should of been or how much they're loving it

Looking_glass,

Indeed. That is a charming game and very solid and enjoyable at that. Of course my opinion is laid out in my user review.

One of the majors also gave HyperDimension Neptunia 2/10, and whatever that games issues are, it's at least playable, absolutely not a 2/10. But the criticisms are generally culturally based (not biased, *based*). What I mean is that the harsh criticism leveled at the games is rooted in cultural difference and a lack of understanding. It's not about whether the game is any good, it's often about belittling the art style or the character archetypes. Sometimes it borders on xenophobic.

Beamboom, I disagree with what you're saying about needing to have an affection for the artistic style or cultural context of the game to see it in a more positive light. Yes professional reviewers typically write a better – asn in more sound – review of a game. But, let's face it, not every review written and published on every major site is written by a professional. There are a lot of jumped up bloggers pretending to be journalists out there now, and they are no better than you or I.

However with regard specifically to RPGs (and games of any genre), I understand what you're talking about with respect to having an affection for a culture. However, the job of a critic or a reviewer is to be more objective and analyze the game without cultural bias. When I see reviews that actively belittle the culture, art style or character archetypes inferring that they are some how inferior, or too simplistic or simply distasteful, then I know I am not dealing with an objective review or reviewer.

As I said; "What I mean is that the harsh criticism leveled at the games is rooted in cultural difference and a lack of understanding. It's not about whether the game is any good, it's often about belittling the art style or the character archetypes. " Just as you're saying that in your opinion you have to have an affection for particular things to see them in a more positive light. I can also point out that the opposite is true, if you have antipathy towards something, you will see it in a more negative light. When reviews contain what amounts to cultural superiority, there is not doubt about the negativity on display. As I said though, reviewers are supposed to be objective, and personally I feel that when reviewing a game you have three possible options, a reviewer that is completley and professionally objective, a reviewer with a cultural bias for the aesthetic and genre in the game, and a reviewer with a cultural bias against the aesthetic and genre in the game being reviewed. Why would you get the reviewer with the cultural bias against the aesthetic or genre to review the game?

Obviously you want the objective reviewer in an ideal situation. However if you cant' have that, at least with the positive spin on the culture and aesthetic you are giving the game the benefit of the doubt. The reviewer who dislikes the aesthetic or genre (or culture) will certainly produce a more negative review. It's not really sufficient to have a RPG reviewer review games that are within the JRPG either. Just in this article's comments alone you can see at least three subsets of bias, action RPGs, western RPGs and JRPGs. Reviewers have to be objective, and if anything they neet to be actively open to other cultures and understanding that whether they like the style or not, they still have to assess the game for what it is.

Look at Ben's Mass Effect 2 review. He freely admits that the setting and style of the game is not his cup of tea and then proceeds to fairly review the game without detectible bias. That is what I expect from reviews, and that is what I so very rarely see in reviews.

Last edited by TheHighlander on 7/8/2011 9:10:42 AM

@Beamboom

True, some customer reviews tend to be unhelpful in one way or another and for one reason on another. Others on the other hand are different and may be helpful for one reason or another.

But it's the same with professional reviews. Professional reviewers have their own flaws and biases too. That's one of the reasons why it's not very wise to rely too heavily on them. And that's not even taking into account the issue of conflicts of interests involving publishers and/or developers (Can you say Jeff Gerstmann?)

Customer reviews, for all their flaws, are written from the point of view of average ordinary people, people who are just like the ones reading the reviews. And they tend to understand things that professional reviewers may not, such as the appeal of niche games and JRPGs among other things. And this sometimes rings true for other games as well. A good example would be The Fight: Lights Out. That game was largely drubbed by critics but on Amazon it currently, as of the time of this writing, has a 4.5 out of 5 rating based on 155 customer reviews. Professionals tend to fault games for things that may not matter all that much to ordinary consumers and their expectations and desires tend to be different from ordinary consumers. They may simply want different things than the consumers. Or simply put professionals are not always on the same page as the average, ordinary consumers. One of the best examples of this would probably be with the movie Transformers: Revenge of the Fallen. On Rottentomatoes that movie has a critic rating of 20% but an audience rating of 76% and was a huge box office success.

If I were to put it more harshly and bluntly I might say something like "Professional reviews tend to be written by stuck up know-it-all types who are generally out of touch with the feelings and desires of average, ordinary people" (some people supposedly even pay for things like movie showings at least partially to spite critics/reviewers). Although I believe I should also note that I think Ben would be an exception to this. I don't always agree with him but he by all accounts seems to be more open-minded. And PSXE seems to be more consumer oriented than other review sites, which is one of the reasons I like it.

So the thing is while some customer reviews are more worthwhile than others there generally seems to be something more honest and open and certainly more relatable about them (and additionally I like the fact that Amazon gives consumers the option to rate individual customer reviews as either helpful or unhelpful). And of course, as is the case with the professional reviews and perhaps reviews in general, it's probably the wisest course of action to take in all of the customer reviews, or at least as many of them as you feel you need to, rather than limiting your scope too much.

But ultimately the best course of action for any person deciding whether or not to try and/or pay for a video game (or something else) would probably be to gather as much simple raw information about a game as possible (you don't necessary have to read a review to do this as there's always stuff like wikipedia and promotional materials and the like) and decide for his or herself whether or not it is right for him/her or at least whether or not it's worth a try. Listening to other people's opinions (both the positive and negative ones) is fine but it ultimately all comes down to the person and what he/she likes and/or wants.

Last edited by Looking Glass on 7/8/2011 9:47:43 AM

@Beamboom

So it seems that you don't consider any factual information included in a user review to be part of a review. That seems to be a point open to debate right there but never mind that. In any case by that logic the same would also be true for the professional reviews and any factual information they contain. And in professional reviews (and perhaps reviews in general) it doesn't seem to always be a simple matter to separate the fact from the opinion.

As for the rest of the stuff you just said: fair enough. Professional reviewers are not always on the same page as average, ordinary consumers but sometimes they are.

But my point is that it's not particularly wise to rely too heavily on them because professional reviewers have their own flaws and biases too (that's of course not only reason). This is especially obvious with how they tend to treat certain kinds of games. And just because you may do something unwise repeatedly with no resulting negative outcome, like driving without buckling your seatbelt, that doesn't make doing it any less unwise. And just because you personally have not really been burned (or at least been at odds with) all that much by these flaws and biases of professional reviewers that doesn't mean that they're not there and that also doesn't make my point any less valid.

Last edited by Looking Glass on 7/8/2011 11:11:37 AM

I forgot to add the words "in my opinion" above but of course, these are all just my views on this topic. Hastily written too.
I'd like to add one thing to the "facts vs review" topic: Facts tell nothing about the *quality* of the product. "Norwegian subtitles" say nothing about how good the movie is. "Dubstep" tells nothing about how good that album is. That's what you want to know when you read a review.

Regarding to rely too heavily on the reviews: No of course not, there we agree 100%. They are just guidelines, a source of inputs. I have deliberately bought games that are rated below my general limit (80%) quite a few times (ref: Marvel games), and will do so again with Madness Returns, for instance. I do however not expect my personal rating of that game to be radically higher than the meta-score of 73%. Maybe I'll go as high as 76% (I dunno yet) but that's still what I consider to be within the range of the metascore.

Last edited by Beamboom on 7/8/2011 12:29:27 PM

Regarding game reviews. I am honestly more likely to pay attention to a reviewer who I know likes RPGs when it comes to reviews of RPGS. I mean, if you have a reviewer that doesn't like or is not familiar with the genre, then they will review the game from a point of view that already starts in unfamiliar and uncomfortable (out of their comfort zone) territory. A reviewer who likes the genre and/or is familiar with the genre will give a fairer appraisal (in my opinion) of a game in that genre.

So if you have a reviewer that really doesn't care for JRPGs and normally plays shooters and you have a second reviewer who plays lots of RPGs and is OK with JRPGs (not their preference, but they are familiar with them). If you look at those two reviewers, which is likely to give a fairer review of an RPG or a JRPG? I'm going to trust that RPG reviewer – unless of course I already know that they have a specific bias against JRPG style.

Objectivity is fine, but you also have to have someone who knows and likes the genre to get a truly fair review. Just as has been said about other games – GT5 comes to mind.