Online reviews, and why they are almost worthless.

Ubiquitous · Post by **Ubiquitous** » 2005-11-14 09:44am

I have only bought two games in recent times and both have them have been buggy: Civ 4 and Football Manager 2006. Both are massive hits with huge followings [with Civ being more international than FM of course]. Both games, however, suffer from show-stopping bugs [chronic slowdown due to Python in Civ 4 as well as initial incompatability with many ATI cards; the 'Spanish problem' in FM]. But does this stop the online reviewing community from giving the games huge scores? Civfanatics.com lists most of the new reviews and not one of them is below 80%, with the majority around 90%. One fanwhore gave the game a 9.9/10 score! Similar scores have been given for FM.

However, as people who play the game will know, the games are riddled with bugs - some small, some annoying, some show-stopping. Yet, online reviews tend to ignore such matters. There is very little mention of the crippling Python slowdown in Civ 4. There has been NO mention of the Spanish bug in FM. Surely for one reviewer to miss this would be OK, but for almost ALL of the internet to miss it ... what is going on here? Do these people actually play the games they review, or do they just copy the established sites such as IGN and Gamespot in their reviews?

Ubiquitous · Post by **Ubiquitous** » 2005-11-14 09:45am

In fact, I definantly learned more about civ 4 in sd.net modest thread on the subject compared to the 500 word generic essays posted at most review sites on the game.

Bounty · Post by **Bounty** » 2005-11-14 09:47am

Perhaps they expect these bugs to be patched shortly, and don't consider them a true problem ?

Either that or fanboyism/conformism.

SAMAS · Post by **SAMAS** » 2005-11-14 09:55am

Or maybe their hardware was different, and thus didn't encounter those problems.

Ubiquitous · Post by **Ubiquitous** » 2005-11-14 10:02am

SAMAS wrote:Or maybe their hardware was different, and thus didn't encounter those problems.

That still doesn't explain in-game bugs such as the Spanish bug in FM, for example. As for the patch issue - to review for prosterity is surely inheriently flawed? It's akin to reviewing the situation of the Palestinians as 'fine' because one day they will surely get their own state, right? Just like the late game slowdown will be sorted, right?

brianeyci · Post by **brianeyci** » 2005-11-14 10:11am

ALI_G wrote:
SAMAS wrote:Or maybe their hardware was different, and thus didn't encounter those problems.
That still doesn't explain in-game bugs such as the Spanish bug in FM, for example. As for the patch issue - to review for prosterity is surely inheriently flawed? It's akin to reviewing the situation of the Palestinians as 'fine' because one day they will surely get their own state, right? Just like the late game slowdown will be sorted, right?

no it's really not. You know that patches will come out, quite soon after the game is released. You have no idea whether Palestinians will ever get their own stae. Not to mention that people get killed in real life and not in games so the degree of harm is nowhere near...

Patches are a part of computers. It's not possible to get it perfect as soon as it comes out.. see Windows. I don't think it's possible for game reviewers to review the game on every possible system configuration. If the game slows down for you and not for them... good reviews mention bugs too.

<edit>Oh yeah I don't buy games pre-ordering or pre-release or bullshit like that, I'm willing to wait a month or two after release for stability. I don't buy games often anyway.</edit>

Brian

Jawawithagun · Post by **Jawawithagun** » 2005-11-14 10:26am

I can't talk about FM but having run Civ4 on a PC barely making the required specs I encountered no bugs or problems, Python-related or otherwise.
And frankly, the magazines give it the same high scores.

Ubiquitous · Post by **Ubiquitous** » 2005-11-14 10:44am

Jawawithagun wrote:I can't talk about FM but having run Civ4 on a PC barely making the required specs I encountered no bugs or problems, Python-related or otherwise.
And frankly, the magazines give it the same high scores.

Well not everyone will have the same bugs although I bet you was not playing a Huge map with 15 civs in that particular game?

brianeyci - I chose an extreme situation in my example, I could have picked an other example which would perhaps have been more obscure to illustrate my point [and for the record the Palestinians will definantly have their own state one day, you heard it first from me.

]

The fact of the matter is that I can't see how all these reviewers have not had the same problems that thousands of civ fans on the forums have suffered from [I will drop the FM example as its obvious most of your guys don't own this game]. How can the massive slow down that at least 25% of users suffer from not be reported in any review [that I have read]? Just because a patch 'should' fix the problem should not get the developers off the hook, IMO. A game should be reviewed on its initial release state, not on what it might be like. If a game is suitably fixed in future releases then maybe it should be re-reviewed. By ignoring the bugs, the producers get let off the hook with their overly-tight timetables and also it continues to allow this stupid brainbug in computer games that we should expect to need a patch before we can properly play the game.

Keevan_Colton · Post by **Keevan_Colton** » 2005-11-14 11:23am

Minor note on magazine reviews:

Magazines have a long lead time, that is the articles are written way before when they're printed and released. This means that most of the reviewing is done at the beta level of the game, basically, you have to take the developers word on it that bugs will be gone in two months when the game and your review of it hit the stands...basically, bugs dont get mentioned because you dont know which will make it through those two months, therefor you cant really mention any you just have to reveiw what the game itself is like.

Online however is a completely different matter and they ought to be jumping all over the game as it is in its released form.

Instant Sunrise · Post by **Instant Sunrise** » 2005-11-14 11:26am

I know that EGM will wait until they get the final version of a game in their hands before reviewing it. They make sure that it is the same one that goes out onto the streets.

I don't know of any other magazines that do that.

wautd · Post by **wautd** » 2005-11-14 12:09pm

Civ 4 has bugs and it shouldnt be brought on the market with that many bugs and they damn well should put a decent patch up soon

That said, even with bugs, Civ 4 kept me playing for hours in a row

Ubiquitous · Post by **Ubiquitous** » 2005-11-14 12:24pm

wautd wrote:Civ 4 has bugs and it shouldnt be brought on the market with that many bugs and they damn well should put a decent patch up soon

That said, even with bugs, Civ 4 kept me playing for hours in a row

Same here but I have stopped playing it now that the novelty factor has worn off due to the slowdown problem.

Stark · Post by **Stark** » 2005-11-14 06:39pm

Game reviews are useless because reviewers - particularly online ones - have no fucking integrity. It's so rare to read anything that ISN'T calling every new game the second coming of Jesus: back from the C64->4Mb PC era, new, hyped games got panned all the time. Can we say 'paid-for reviews'? EDGE is a fascinating look at this phenomena, since at one point they were respected for their independence, and then in a few high-profile paid-for reviews (I'm thinking Halo, but I'm sure there was another one before that) lost it all and now they're as useless as anything else.

Check the health of the industry: how many reviews say anything bad about new, hyped games like FEAR? FEAR is good and bad, but reviews couldn't gush over it more if they tried. The mentioning of bugs is something of a bugbear of mine: most games have bugs, and no-one minds, and it's to be expected. But noone mentions them, because that'd hurt the critical first few weeks of sales as people wait for the first patch.