Idea for getting journalists to play the whole game.

[J7.]

I've read a number of reviews by game 'journalists' who clearly did not play the entire game before reviewing it. This is a serious problem. So how can you fix it... One idea I think is to have a certain phrase or # that shows up when you beat the game or reach a analagous milestone, before the review can be posted the reviewer is required to email this phrase to the publisher. Or just have the game automatically send an email out when they reach the milestone. What ideas do you guys have to help alleviate this problem?

[Kendal]

There really is no good way. Certain months you could review every game coming out. Other months you couldn't finish all the games in one life time. It sucks, but that is how it goes.

[cochesecochese]

Kendal's right. I don't really see the point in forcing game reviewers to complete games. Irregardless of revenue video games are going to be seen as the lowest form of entertainment until something more banal comes along so there's really no point in attempting to give game journalists credibility. As far as we hobbyists go there's plenty of info on blogs and forums.

[Halo05]

I don't think someone needs to play the whole game to decide if it's quality or not. I mean, something like Final Fantasy XII could easily take someone's whole, 40-hour work week or more to finish. Yet within the first five or six hours, you've pretty much seen what the game has to offer in the form of pseudo-MMO battles, the unique character growth system, and some spectacular cinemas.

That being said, in most cases, playing a game for under half an hour doesn't cut it.

[lordxixor101]

Well, in fairness then, where is the line drawn? I agree that people should play a game for more than a half hour (though, if you aren't interested in a game like Space Giraffe, a half hour gives you a good idea of what your going to see the rest of the time).

Also, what about a game like Oblivion? If you want them to complete the whole main task, and get a flavor for other stuff, that can easily hit 100 hours of play?

At some level, I think it falls on the developers/producers to make a package of gameplay videos and other materials that show off the portions of the game that a developer may miss, and do it in an accurate manner that a reviewer can trust what they are seeing (I know, a pipe dream).

Still, this is something the industry will have to wrestle with, since these aren't 2 hour movies. For a 2 hour movie, you go and watch it, and then leave. With a game, 2 hours might not be anything, but in November and December, it's rediculous to expect every game to get 10+ hours.

[J7.]

Wow, so you guys condone reviews being written about games that have either not been played, barely been played, or been played through only 10-75% etc. That is why we get inaccurate reviews... Games getting bad reviews because the reviewer missed out on the good parts, or games getting great reviews because they only played part of the game.

And it's not just a case of how many games come out. Some "journalists" are just lazy or don't do their job correctly. And you cannot stop them because there is no accountability! That is how my suggestion helps, by making them accountable. They should freelance some reviews out during times when tons of games come out if they need to, rather than give inaccurate information.

How games are seen by greater society has nothing to do with whether or not the public, especially target consumers i.e. gamers should be entitled to accurate or inaccurate information! Because the greater population sees games as banal we are supposed to use this as a reason for real gamers to get screwed over by bad journalism?!?!?!

And a review of FF 12 after only 6-7 hours of play is entirely justified? But then the journalist would've given it an inflated score not knowing that the game continues on with the story getting weaker as your progress and how tedious the game gets because it is longer than it was meant to be, etc.

Where is it fair to draw the line? It is only fair to draw the line where the game ends, and ending is reached. You wouldn't ever see anyone review a movie or a novel without finishing the end of it. Why should gaming get by with lazy journalism...

Take the longest games out there, say Oblivion took a review 100 hours of play. They would still be able to finish the game in 12 days, or even less than 9 days with a little play on the weekends and/or after work. I think its certainly reasonable to expect reviewers to finish games if we are supposed to use their opinion to know how good a game may be. If a game only takes 12 hours to beat, they can beat it in 1-2 days. But still we get reviews of games much shorter than 50 hours that are based on play time where they did not play the whole game. And you guys are defending them, I cannot believe it!

[Kendal]

I don't condone shit. I said it just isn't possible to play every game that comes out to completion. Hell I don't even read reviews. I play the games myself. I look at previews and game footage to see if the game interests me and then if they look good I buy/rent the game. Also demos of games for me have helped me make my decisions before spending a dime on a game. I just don't see the reason why someone should tell me if a game is good or not or if I would like it. That and CAG has a good group of gamers that I can relate to and have similar tastes with. So if some of them are enjoying a game, chances are I might like it and will check it out.

[msdmoney]

Wow, so you guys condone reviews being written about games that have either not been played, barely been played, or been played through only 10-75% etc. That is why we get inaccurate reviews... Games getting bad reviews because the reviewer missed out on the good parts, or games getting great reviews because they only played part of the game.

And it's not just a case of how many games come out. Some "journalists" are just lazy or don't do their job correctly. And you cannot stop them because there is no accountability! That is how my suggestion helps, by making them accountable. They should freelance some reviews out during times when tons of games come out if they need to, rather than give inaccurate information.

How games are seen by greater society has nothing to do with whether or not the public, especially target consumers i.e. gamers should be entitled to accurate or inaccurate information! Because the greater population sees games as banal we are supposed to use this as a reason for real gamers to get screwed over by bad journalism?!?!?!

And a review of FF 12 after only 6-7 hours of play is entirely justified? But then the journalist would've given it an inflated score not knowing that the game continues on with the story getting weaker as your progress and how tedious the game gets because it is longer than it was meant to be, etc.

Where is it fair to draw the line? It is only fair to draw the line where the game ends, and ending is reached. You wouldn't ever see anyone review a movie or a novel without finishing the end of it. Why should gaming get by with lazy journalism...

Take the longest games out there, say Oblivion took a review 100 hours of play. They would still be able to finish the game in 12 days, or even less than 9 days with a little play on the weekends and/or after work. I think its certainly reasonable to expect reviewers to finish games if we are supposed to use their opinion to know how good a game may be. If a game only takes 12 hours to beat, they can beat it in 1-2 days. But still we get reviews of games much shorter than 50 hours that are based on play time where they did not play the whole game. And you guys are defending them, I cannot believe it!

You have to also consider that often the reason for somebody not playing the entire game is that they didn't enjoy the game. I don't expect reviewers to force themselves through a game just to complete it, or get to the good parts. A game that fails to grab the gamer from the start has significant problems and I would appreciate a review that stated, I couldn't bring myself to keep going, just as much as the reviewer that keeps going for "accuracy". I would imagine plenty of movie reviewers have walked out of the theater, and plent of book reviewers have stopped reading.

But we have different perceptions of what a review is. I don't look at a game review as "accurate" or "inaccurate", becaues we aren't talking about facts, we are talking about opinions. I don't care that they can cite insignificant facts about what item you recieve in Act 10 Chapter 1 in the review, that's not journalism. I know the reviewers I trust, because their tastes generally coincide with mine, I don't need them to prove to me with their gamerscore that they finished a game.

I think you've also mistakenly summed up games journalism with games reviews. If we really want games journalism to reach the next level, we need to stop only defining it by game reviews.

[daschrier]

RPGfan plays every game until the end before a review is written, and it shows in their reviews.

[vherub]

a review should be honest, if the reviewer is duplicitous in the level of completeness, they and their site should be avoided.
If a game was too terrible to finish, the reviewer should note this in the review.

Part of the problem is the journalists doing the reviewing haven't had proper training in the review process nor have the editors had proper training regarding their responsibility.

[ratzombie]

I think what you're asking is very unrealistic.

And can you please link to me some of these reviews?

[blueshinra]

RPGfan plays every game until the end before a review is written, and it shows in their reviews.
I believe RPGamer does the same thing. That site's the first place I go to whenever a new RPG I'm interested in is coming/has come out.

For reviews of RPGs and other genres that lend themselves to long play-times, nothing beats specialty sites.

[Azumangaman]

A Message from Chacrana:

Asking a reviewer to finish the entire damn game is completely ridiculous. Honestly, anyone who can't determine what a game's good points and bad points after 10-15 hours (depending on the genre, of course) really has no business reviewing games in the first place. I mean, what could somebody miss after devoting that much time to the game? I guess you could mention a plot twist or startling revelation that was good or bad and spoil the game for whoever's reading, but I kinda thought that was frowned upon.
And RPGFan's reviews being like 50 pages doesn't indicate that the reviewer played through the entire game-merely that most of the reviewers can't finish a simple thought in under three paragraphs.




^
He knows whats up.

[Halo05]

Poor temp-banned Chac. (hopefully still just temp-banned)

[blueshinra]

RPGFan's reviews are indeed much longer than they need to be. Chac does know what's up!

[Renaissance 2K]

Journalists have editors.

Editor: "I need you to review Final Fantasy XIX for me."
Journalist: "No problem."
Editor: "I need that review to be posted by midnight the day of release."
Journalist: "Uh..."
Editor: "Oh, and it looks like Square's not sending us a preview copy. Something about our reviews only reflecting the first three hours of the game."
Journalist: "Sir..."
Editor: "That's the spirit. Can't wait to read it."

[lordxixor101]

Ok J7, you have a fair point. In a perfect world, you would play 100% of the game. But, you have some other considerations.

First off, take Oblivion, guess what, I put 100 hours into it, and i'm not all the way through it (I still have quests to do). The game can clock in at 200 hours, where is a fair ending? Does just doing the main quest really show all of Oblivion? Do you want 100% completetion?

Yet, as a gamer, I want a timely review. I don't want a complete review 6 months from now, I want one when I'm making a buying decision. A review can be perfect, but if it's so far out that it's irrelevant, then I don't see where it's helpful.

There is also costs. Do you want a site putting 2-3 journalists on a game? Sure, for Oblivion, it may make sense, but what about other large games that aren't as good, nor as wanted, do you want them putting all their resources into reviewing those?

There are real world issues here. It's great to say that gamers shouldn't take it. But, offer up some fair options then to fix it, not just that gamers shouldn't take it anymore.

[dmaul1114]

Asking a reviewer to finish the entire damn game is completely ridiculous. Honestly, anyone who can't determine what a game's good points and bad points after 10-15 hours (depending on the genre, of course) really has no business reviewing games in the first place. I mean, what could somebody miss after devoting that much time to the game? I guess you could mention a plot twist or startling revelation that was good or bad and spoil the game for whoever's reading, but I kinda thought that was frowned upon.
And RPGFan's reviews being like 50 pages doesn't indicate that the reviewer played through the entire game-merely that most of the reviewers can't finish a simple thought in under three paragraphs.


Yeah, that's definitely spot on. You don't have to play all of a game to know if it's good or not, especially for long games. Gameplay is pretty consistent from start to finish in the vast majority of games. Put in 5-10 hours with a game and you should have a fair opinion on it.

[Redeema]

So, for example I'm reviewing NBA 2K9 for my site right now, do I have to complete an entire season (or Heaven forbid, Association Mode) to give you an accurate review? Couldn't I play it for a few days, do the tutorials, extra modes, etc. and be able to give you a fair and "accurate" review?

I like the idea of holding people accountable, but you have to understand for most people, myself included, this is an unpaid "job". I do this in my spare time and I don't have a deadline, but we want to get this up and online as quick as possible. We don't get advance copies, we don't get paid, and yet you want me to spend countless hours on a game that I could play for basically two or three days to be able to give you a decent review for? We have real jobs, we have families, and it's not that we don't want to play the game all the way through, but we do as much as we can before we think we've got an idea of how good or bad the game is. Music reviewers probably work the same way. They give a listen once or twice and then write up an article. Is that fair?

I get what you're saying and in a perfect world it'd be great, but that's not how it works. You've got to understand that when we get a game, we have an obligation to whoever it is that sent it to us to get that review back to them as soon as we can. In our case it's already delayed because they take time to send it to us, my editor takes time to send it to me, then I have to play it, write it, send it in and wait for it to get edited and posted. By the time it gets online if we're lucky it's two weeks after it came out. Is that relevant to most people? Probably not, but that's the way it works for us. It's the nature of the beast. You can't expect every reviewer to finish every game. I can't guarantee you, but I think that the people who work at the bigger sites probably have dev. kits (or whatever they're called, I'm drawing a blank)that they play preview builds on and therefore have codes that take them to various sections of the game so that they can get a good sampling of it and therefore "put in" 40-50 hours of work without actually doing it like most gamers would.

Some games don't have endings and some games don't necessarily need to be played all the way through to be able to give you what I would deem a fair review. Going back to my music analogy, I've never really liked a Coldplay album on my first or second listen-through, but after a few times I have found them to grow on me and become stellar for whatever reason.

I've gone on long enough about this, I'm sure there are other writers/reviewers here who could chime in on this topic.

[J7.]

I don't condone shit. I said it just isn't possible to play every game that comes out to completion. Hell I don't even read reviews. I play the games myself. I look at previews and game footage to see if the game interests me and then if they look good I buy/rent the game. Also demos of games for me have helped me make my decisions before spending a dime on a game. I just don't see the reason why someone should tell me if a game is good or not or if I would like it. That and CAG has a good group of gamers that I can relate to and have similar tastes with. So if some of them are enjoying a game, chances are I might like it and will check it out.
So you don't see a reason why someone should tell you if a game is good, so do you think reviews of games, movies, anything really is unneeded?

You have to also consider that often the reason for somebody not playing the entire game is that they didn't enjoy the game. I don't expect reviewers to force themselves through a game just to complete it, or get to the good parts. A game that fails to grab the gamer from the start has significant problems and I would appreciate a review that stated, I couldn't bring myself to keep going, just as much as the reviewer that keeps going for "accuracy". I would imagine plenty of movie reviewers have walked out of the theater, and plent of book reviewers have stopped reading.

But we have different perceptions of what a review is. I don't look at a game review as "accurate" or "inaccurate", becaues we aren't talking about facts, we are talking about opinions. I don't care that they can cite insignificant facts about what item you recieve in Act 10 Chapter 1 in the review, that's not journalism. I know the reviewers I trust, because their tastes generally coincide with mine, I don't need them to prove to me with their gamerscore that they finished a game.

I think you've also mistakenly summed up games journalism with games reviews. If we really want games journalism to reach the next level, we need to stop only defining it by game reviews.
Yes, we are talking about opinions, but opinions should not be based on a fraction of the experience. What reviewers do you trust, just out of curisousity because as time goes by I trust less and less reviewers to the point where there is not much to trust at all. Right now I trust Gametrailers, and really not much else. I am not defining games journalism only by reviews, but I am trying to point out a problem with the reviews being published with no accountability.

Yeah, that's definitely spot on. You don't have to play all of a game to know if it's good or not, especially for long games. Gameplay is pretty consistent from start to finish in the vast majority of games. Put in 5-10 hours with a game and you should have a fair opinion on it.
You see I disagree, sure not all games require a full play through to see how good it is, but some do. For instance the end of Indigo Prophecy certainly hurt that game overall. Or the tediousness and extended length of FF XII certainly hurt that game as well. But if a reviewer only played part of the games or the first 1/4, 1/2, etc of those games they would have no idea how they ultimately turned out.

I also see you guys make a good point about its tough in the real world to aspire to perfect reviews. So maybe each site or mag should review a few fewer games, or indicate how much of the game they played if they did not finish it, I don't know.

So, for example I'm reviewing NBA 2K9 for my site right now, do I have to complete an entire season (or Heaven forbid, Association Mode) to give you an accurate review? Couldn't I play it for a few days, do the tutorials, extra modes, etc. and be able to give you a fair and "accurate" review?

I like the idea of holding people accountable, but you have to understand for most people, myself included, this is an unpaid "job". I do this in my spare time and I don't have a deadline, but we want to get this up and online as quick as possible. We don't get advance copies, we don't get paid, and yet you want me to spend countless hours on a game that I could play for basically two or three days to be able to give you a decent review for? We have real jobs, we have families, and it's not that we don't want to play the game all the way through, but we do as much as we can before we think we've got an idea of how good or bad the game is. Music reviewers probably work the same way. They give a listen once or twice and then write up an article. Is that fair?

I get what you're saying and in a perfect world it'd be great, but that's not how it works. You've got to understand that when we get a game, we have an obligation to whoever it is that sent it to us to get that review back to them as soon as we can. In our case it's already delayed because they take time to send it to us, my editor takes time to send it to me, then I have to play it, write it, send it in and wait for it to get edited and posted. By the time it gets online if we're lucky it's two weeks after it came out. Is that relevant to most people? Probably not, but that's the way it works for us. It's the nature of the beast. You can't expect every reviewer to finish every game. I can't guarantee you, but I think that the people who work at the bigger sites probably have dev. kits (or whatever they're called, I'm drawing a blank)that they play preview builds on and therefore have codes that take them to various sections of the game so that they can get a good sampling of it and therefore "put in" 40-50 hours of work without actually doing it like most gamers would.

Some games don't have endings and some games don't necessarily need to be played all the way through to be able to give you what I would deem a fair review. Going back to my music analogy, I've never really liked a Coldplay album on my first or second listen-through, but after a few times I have found them to grow on me and become stellar for whatever reason.

I've gone on long enough about this, I'm sure there are other writers/reviewers here who could chime in on this topic.
No not for a sports game because those games will not change based on playing a full season vs playing a large # of games. That is completely different from other genres such as rpg or action.

The problem I have is with professional game journalists, i.e. those who are paid for their opinion, an opinion which determines very significantly how many people will buy a game...

But for unpaid reviewers, if you have so many priorities in your life that prevent you from playing a game enough to fully cover the game's merits then you should question whether you should be providing reviews or not, for the sake of the industry.

Yes, some games do not require a full play through, but some do, and its usually apparent at the start which do or do not.

[option.iv]

Shouldn't a better game provide most of the great stuff right off the bat? Sure there are usually hidden options/modes/etc. provided as a reward for completing a game, but at least the main skeleton (how the game is structured and presented overall) of the game should be provided from square one. No one should be forced to play through an entire game to uncover key game engine aspects. A reviewer should be able to get the gist of how the rest of the game will play by playing a section of it.

Though I'm sure one part of a game can be better or worse than another. But, it really isn't efficient to play entire games (especially for reviewers of all game genres). If that was the case, reviewers would just be payed to play games and not as much reviewing could be done.

Reviewers should be given access to any part of the game, I'd say. Essentially be given a gameshark or dev type access.

[Kendal]

I don't read reviews. Maybe I am weird. But I don't let others tell me what is good and what isn't. SO i think reviews are unneeded. But that is just me. I don't read them for any media I use.

[Redeema]

I'm not saying that you don't raise good points. Should games be played thoroughly before being written about? Yes. Should a game be able to satisfy any gamer from minute one, though? Again, yes. I think what should be more frowned upon is a comparison to other games. Wii games, I'm sure are scored half a point to a point lower on principle alone because they don't feature high definition graphics like the 360 version or whatever game closely resembles it.

And by the way, if you don't trust reviews, then just hit up a site like gamerankings, which compiles scores from several sites and gives you a single score. I think we're adult enough to figure out what we like or dislike by now. If you can't figure it out on your own or with the help from friends, forums, etc, well then I just don't know what to tell you. What you want is super thorough reviews in which case you most likely will be SOL because this is entertainment unlike anything else, maybe the closest thing to a game review is a book review, only because of sheer length. Good luck with getting a system in place. Maybe there's a market for it? Maybe you can create a site for said reviews. I don't know.