Not really the point I'm making. I can totally understand and appreciate fans not liking the direction of the story in Part 2, but after playing the game for 12 hours how anyone can rate this game a 0/10 is nothing but trolling. The game is amazing from a technical standpoint, even if you hate the story.
It's just a mob mentality of review bombing a game. It's happened before and it'll happen again. It just seems so strange to me that people would want to dedicate time to that. You don't really see fans do that to movies or books or anything- just a strange, weird thing about gaming culture.
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Not really the point I'm making. I can totally understand and appreciate fans not liking the direction of the story in Part 2, but after playing the game for 12 hours how anyone can rate this game a 0/10 is nothing but trolling. The game is amazing from a technical standpoint, even if you hate the story.
It's just a mob mentality of review bombing a game. It's happened before and it'll happen again. It just seems so strange to me that people would want to dedicate time to that. You don't really see fans do that to movies or books or anything- just a strange, weird thing about gaming culture.
You most definitely see that happen with fans of movies, books, and generally any other "thing" that drives profit from fandom - I'd argue that you maybe just don't pay as much attention to those other "things".
Art is subjective, and it can be off-putting while pissing people off - and those people can slam it negatively or can spend their time carrying it to the top of the mountain all they want. It's not toxicity, it's the simple reality of art. There's no governing body that deems THIS is good and THAT is bad - and all opinions are valid. Some may be better reasoned than others, but that is also for you to determine individually.
Something that has bothered me for a while about gaming culture (not this thread) but just in general is how fickle and disgruntled the people seem to be. Fanboys, console wars, downvoting something they don't agree with etc. It seems like if something doesn't fit their pre conceived idea of what that thing should be they go ballistic- even if they haven't played a game or know all of the facts yet.
Stumbled into a huge example of this today. On metacritic The Last of Us Part 2 has an average critic rating of 9.5 and an average user rating of 4.4. There are tons of reviews giving this game a 0/10 because the story isn't what they expected. I would put money on many of these reviews coming from people who haven't even played the game.
On the flip side the new Spongebob remaster has an average critic rating of 6.7 and an average user rating of 9.1.
What a strange culture.
I know a big deal is being made about the user score mobbing of Last of US 2 but this has been going on for ages. Pretty well every COD release gets bombed with 0/10 scores at Metacritic by people that never played it. IMO while some of this is gaming culture a lot of it is more internet culture. I'm a member of various automotive, music forums, etc and there is massive, massive negative attitude towards anything introduced that's new or different. Some of these people don't even know why they hate it and it's more because other people don't like something they feel they have to because something must be wrong with it. It's kind of sad and ruining the internet in general IMO.
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You most definitely see that happen with fans of movies, books, and generally any other "thing" that drives profit from fandom - I'd argue that you maybe just don't pay as much attention to those other "things".
Art is subjective, and it can be off-putting while pissing people off - and those people can slam it negatively or can spend their time carrying it to the top of the mountain all they want. It's not toxicity, it's the simple reality of art. There's no governing body that deems THIS is good and THAT is bad - and all opinions are valid. Some may be better reasoned than others, but that is also for you to determine individually.
I agree with the first paragraph but I question the validity of the opinions of the internet mob. There's little doubt the majority of the 0/10 scores for The Last of Us 2 have not even played the game therefore their opinions are invalid and yet are influencing others. As I said in my last post most people are followers and don't even know what they are condemning on the internet regardless of it being art, politics, electronics, cars, etc.
An automaker could design most objectively beautiful car ever made and I guarantee if a very small handful of people started flooding the internet saying it was ugly that it would spread and influence the masses to the point where this beautiful design would be considered ugly. If you asked the people why it was ugly they would probably not even be able to answer why, it's just that other people think it's ugly so it must be so. It's sad.
Last edited by Erick Estrada; 06-25-2020 at 07:13 AM.
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You most definitely see that happen with fans of movies, books, and generally any other "thing" that drives profit from fandom - I'd argue that you maybe just don't pay as much attention to those other "things".
Art is subjective, and it can be off-putting while pissing people off - and those people can slam it negatively or can spend their time carrying it to the top of the mountain all they want. It's not toxicity, it's the simple reality of art. There's no governing body that deems THIS is good and THAT is bad - and all opinions are valid. Some may be better reasoned than others, but that is also for you to determine individually.
That might be true, I don't really pay too much attention to reviews in general so maybe this is more of an internet thing than a gamer thing.
Disagree strongly on your second paragraph though. Art is subjective- once you've played it, read it, watched it, or whatever you are more than welcome to have an opinion on it and even if it's the opposite opinion of mine it is still valid.
That isn't the case here though, this is toxicity. These "reviews" are coming from people who haven't played the game. They probably read the leaks and made up their mind then. If you haven't played the game, then I don't think your review is valid.
Just for comparison sake the original game was released 7 years ago and has 10, 205 user reviews. The sequel was released less than a week ago and has already amassed 81,693 user reviews. I think it's pretty clear this just a mob mentality from people who haven't played the game.
You can find the gameplay boring, hate the story, dislike the characters, etc, but at the end of the day it's next to impossible to argue that this game isn't one of the best in industry in terms of visuals, animation, acting, etc. You don't need to think it's a masterpiece, but any score of a 0 is just trolling.
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Not really the point I'm making. I can totally understand and appreciate fans not liking the direction of the story in Part 2, but after playing the game for 12 hours how anyone can rate this game a 0/10 is nothing but trolling. The game is amazing from a technical standpoint, even if you hate the story.
It's just a mob mentality of review bombing a game. It's happened before and it'll happen again. It just seems so strange to me that people would want to dedicate time to that. You don't really see fans do that to movies or books or anything- just a strange, weird thing about gaming culture.
As has been mentioned, review bombing has been going on for quite a while across really anything you can sell, this is not gaming-specific.
That said, I think the idea that this is just "toxicity" or "mob mentality" is pretty dismissive of the point. On what Psyche said, review bombing generally happens when fans disagree with the scores or are upset with the publisher. So, if TLOU2 is getting 9.5s and 10s across the board, a lot of fans may think exactly like you, and think reviewers are just trapped in a "mob mentality" or whatever, so a game that they actually believe is maybe a 5 or a 6 or a 7, gets rated 0 to balance what they feel are excessively positive reviews.
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Originally Posted by bax
You can find the gameplay boring, hate the story, dislike the characters, etc, but at the end of the day, it's next to impossible to argue that this game isn't one of the best in industry in terms of visuals, animation, acting, etc. You don't need to think it's a masterpiece, but any score of a 0 is just trolling.
This is sort of the problem, because you're wrong. You can rate the game whatever you want. There are plenty of 10/10 reviews that have a substantial list of flaws, so what's the difference if a 0/10 review happens despite "best in the industry visuals"? Why are 10/10 reviews ok despite the faults, but 0/10 reviews are not because of the accomplishments?
User reviews, specifically, are completely subjective. They also do well to combat the false-pretence of objectivity that the major review websites have. 10/10 from IGN doesn't mean anything.
The secret, as it always has been, is to just stop giving a #### about reviews. Read them to get a sense of the game if you want, but the number ratings are meaningless no matter who they come from, or how positive or negative they are. Me? I've played about the same amount as you, and I would say 0/10 and 10/10 both seem equally trollish to me, if either had to be. You love the game, and that's great, but there's no sense in getting upset because some people don't.
The secret, as it always has been, is to just stop giving a #### about reviews. Read them to get a sense of the game if you want, but the number ratings are meaningless no matter who they come from, or how positive or negative they are.
My problem is that I only have time to play a few games each year, so I sort of rely on the reviews to give me a sense of which ones are the "essential" titles to go for. Granted, I don't take the numerical assignments as gospel, but if I didn't rely on reviews I would never have played Nier Automata, for example, or Horizon.
It's fine if they give 10s and 9s to games that should actually be 8.5s if they're still really good. The issue is if they're giving out 9s to a game that should actually be a 5 - or vice versa - because of external factors. I need to be able to trust the reviews somewhat for my purposes.
__________________ "The great promise of the Internet was that more information would automatically yield better decisions. The great disappointment is that more information actually yields more possibilities to confirm what you already believed anyway." - Brian Eno
You also have to take into account that some people might feel the game deserves a 4 or 5 but give it a 0 to "balance" out all the "fanboy" scores.
Basically user reviews are useless.
Yeah, I don't get how so many people out there think they are being fair by balancing things out by lobbing out zeros to average things out. It's a stupid thing people do and it's not restricted to video games and is especially bad on Amazon at times. People often literally don't know at all what they are supposed to be identifying for good and bad reviews at times.
That's why I read content rather than rely on numbers. A full value review of "GREAT!" is just as useless as a zero value review of, "SUCKS!". A decent low review with content will mention things in a manner that is relatable and also identified in a high value review with content. The difference generally due to differing weightings of the same things.
I mean, that's the part that irks me. Everyone is playing the same game, but so many people are pointing fingers as if those that don't agree with their opinion are fanboys/haters or playing a totally different game. No. It's the same damn game or medium and a totally different experience. Both opinions can be true.
I don't think most people realize this anymore, but blind faith isn't restricted solely to religion anymore and has not been restricted to religion for a very long time. People will literally convince themselves something that sucks is great without questioning if everyone else is saying so. The opposite is also true.
I am probably around 60% through TLOU2 so far. I really like the game. I think the critic review that said he didn't enjoy the game at all has very valid points. I have played the game myself though and I can identify what he was concerned about, but I ended up with a different experience/annoyance/enjoyment than he did with the same issues/concerns. In hindsight, I would still perceive I gleaned far more from that review than any other review out there. I like the way he laid things out and I am more willing to watch more of his reviews going forward.
Last edited by DoubleF; 06-25-2020 at 09:58 AM.
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As has been mentioned, review bombing has been going on for quite a while across really anything you can sell, this is not gaming-specific.
That said, I think the idea that this is just "toxicity" or "mob mentality" is pretty dismissive of the point. On what Psyche said, review bombing generally happens when fans disagree with the scores or are upset with the publisher. So, if TLOU2 is getting 9.5s and 10s across the board, a lot of fans may think exactly like you, and think reviewers are just trapped in a "mob mentality" or whatever, so a game that they actually believe is maybe a 5 or a 6 or a 7, gets rated 0 to balance what they feel are excessively positive reviews.
This is sort of the problem, because you're wrong. You can rate the game whatever you want. There are plenty of 10/10 reviews that have a substantial list of flaws, so what's the difference if a 0/10 review happens despite "best in the industry visuals"? Why are 10/10 reviews ok despite the faults, but 0/10 reviews are not because of the accomplishments?
User reviews, specifically, are completely subjective. They also do well to combat the false-pretence of objectivity that the major review websites have. 10/10 from IGN doesn't mean anything.
The secret, as it always has been, is to just stop giving a #### about reviews. Read them to get a sense of the game if you want, but the number ratings are meaningless no matter who they come from, or how positive or negative they are. Me? I've played about the same amount as you, and I would say 0/10 and 10/10 both seem equally trollish to me, if either had to be. You love the game, and that's great, but there's no sense in getting upset because some people don't.
I think the difference between high scores vs low scores in this "mob mentality" scenario is credibility. The high scores are coming from journalists that are paid to give their opinion and have their credibility on the line. The low scores are coming from random internet people hiding behind fake avatars. Like I said before, people who likely haven't even played the game.
To me a 0/10 indicates one of the worst video games of all time and I can't see any realistic argument for that in regards to this game.
I am really enjoying the game, but I'm not upset about the review bombing or anything. I was just commenting on the fact that gaming culture seems to be so fickle when it comes to things like this. You are right that at the end of the day review scores really don't mean anything. The insightful and well written reviews will always rise to the top.
I also think a lot of this stems from the fact the protagonist is a queer 20 year girl. I've seen a long list of comments from people claiming to love the first game, but hate this one despite the tone, setting, and gameplay being extremely similar.
Just some observations I've gathered from following this release. Like I mentioned before it seems I was off base by calling this a gaming issue and it's more of an internet issue in general that I've been ignorant of. It doesn't really matter much at the end of the day! Just surprising that despite this game bring very similar to the first one which was beloved by critics and users this one seems to be only loved by critics and not users.
Last edited by bax; 06-25-2020 at 11:45 AM.
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You also have to take into account that some people might feel the game deserves a 4 or 5 but give it a 0 to "balance" out all the "fanboy" scores.
Basically user reviews are useless.
I will say that fan reviews can be pretty handy for less popular games where the bombers don't care and the fanboys that have months/years of pent up expectations where they are willing to blindly give the game a 10 just for existing are few and far between. You end up with just a bunch of gamers that actually played the game and describe what they liked/didn't. For the big releases unfortunately they are largely useless but I find if you filter out the 0/10 and 10/10 and focus on reading only the 5-9 range you can find balanced gamer reviews.
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I think the difference between high scores vs low scores in this "mob mentality" scenario is credibility. The high scores are coming from journalists that are paid to give their opinion and have their credibility on the line. The low scores are coming from random internet people hiding behind fake avatars. Like I said before, people who likely haven't even played the game.
First off, the review embargo itself is quite strict. While most video game embargoes contain some kind of restrictions on what you can talk about or use in video footage, this one forbids any discussion of the second half of the game and limits video footage to just three scenes.
Access Journalism
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absence of demanding accountability towards the questioned respondent
avoiding controversial topics so as to maintain access to the respondent
pre-approved questions, no gotcha questions, softball questions
sometimes even respondent's control over how the interview will be edited and which parts will be aired
Also no complaint about Joker's Metacritic score? that would also provide a lot of ammunition that Journalists are correct.
However it doesn't matter. Continue to believe what is being told, critical thought should be reserved for a particular tribe and deviation from that is verboten.
Also no complaint about Joker's Metacritic score? that would also provide a lot of ammunition that Journalists are correct.
However it doesn't matter. Continue to believe what is being told, critical thought should be reserved for a particular tribe and deviation from that is verboten.
Lol a bit dramatic, no? We're talking about internet reviews of a video game.
That Forbes article is written by somebody who didn't even play the game. He is literally forming an opinion on what he has heard from others. I'm all for thinking critically, but should you not actually consume the media before critiquing it? Heck, even the negative reviews he cite's have plenty of positive things to say.
Restrictions in reviews are nothing new- this one seems a bit excessive, but after reaching a certain point in the game it makes perfect sense why the developer wouldn't want anything like that spoiled in pre-release reviews.
So funny how from review to review the length of the game varies wildly. Some 30 hours, some 25, some 20. Ten hours is the length of some games so I wonder if some reviewers are just taking the straightest path to the credits. I'm playing the game now and while I don't agree with the direction they chose for the story I'm enjoying it.
Steam's Summer Sale has started. I was hoping it would be the launch of their rumoured loyalty program but I guess not.
Bought Foundation and Oxygen Not Included last night. Spent half an hour with Foundation, fun sim building game. Still in early access however so some things to work out.
Playstation question for the experts. Is the PS5 backwards compatible? Put a PS4 disc in and it plays? Thinking about a PS4 for the exclusives that were missed over the years, BestBuy is having some great deals now. If the Playstation 5 plays all those will wait.
I mean what's five or six more games on the purchased but mean to play pile?
Bought Foundation and Oxygen Not Included last night. Spent half an hour with Foundation, fun sim building game. Still in early access however so some things to work out.
I haven't bought anything yet. I considered getting WWE 2K20 Deluxe for $18 but according to alot of people it's still a trainwreck so I might just hold off and stick to 2K19.
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Playstation question for the experts. Is the PS5 backwards compatible? Put a PS4 disc in and it plays? Thinking about a PS4 for the exclusives that were missed over the years, BestBuy is having some great deals now. If the Playstation 5 plays all those will wait.
I mean what's five or six more games on the purchased but mean to play pile?
Nearly all of the top 100 games based on playtime are supposed to be backwards compatible at launch.
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