Although we’ve found Metacritic a userful resource for game reviews, many folks have gone on a user submission rampage to discredit games that haven’t even launched yet. Their first attack was on LittleBigPlanet followed by Resistance 2, now their hitting Gears of War 2.
While Gears of War 2 has a Metacritic score of 94/100 the user’s have reviewed it to be a 3.5 out of 10, with a bright red box around the user review due to its low nature we’re sure. Although users are free to give their own honest representation of the game from their perspective, Gears of War 2, as of the review dates, hasn’t been released yet – these reviews are bogus.
This style of attack was popularized in Spore, when Amazon got nailed with poor reviews of the game because Spore’s “Draconic” DRM made people angry. However, it’s more reasonable for people to voice their opinion on a known issue with a game; Gears of War 2 review spamming is just mean.
We use Metacritic as guidance when we do our gaming podcast to understand what games are rated in the industry, but we don’t use user reviews as our main guide. There are plenty of folks out there that may utilize these reviews in more seriousness because they may feel journalists reviews are tainted by advertisers or “the man” and want the common gamers opinion.
The common gamer cannot possibility be reviewing Gears of War 2 before the title has arrived. This is bogus. Metacritic has this to say:
“My advice for our faithful users is to focus your attention on the Metascore for this game and not the thousands of user votes, most of which have been submitted before said users have played the game. This is a gaming community, and if people want to stuff the ballot box, there’s not much I can do at this point. When we upgrade the registration requirements for participation on the site in the near future, this type of thing won’t happen. We’ll post the full legitimate user reviews upon the game’s release. As always, thanks for using the site.” (1up)
So, to those looking for holiday gaming gifts, keep this in mind while you start hunting down games you’ll want to buy.
Hi Guys.
As usual: thanks for your effort in this episode, i highly aprecciate this!
Regarding the topics:
I did not play that much atm, its too hot 😀
I played a little bit God of War on the PS5, a little bit Magic Arena and a little bit Life is strange: true colors.
Turtles: I will buy the game as well, games like these are so much fun with friends and the price is totally fair imho.
Starfield: i watched the short clips, which have been shown during the Microsoft Bethesda showcase event some days ago. But i am not very interested in that game, because its too huge. I sadly dont have the time to play such big games where you have to spent so many time 🙁
Silksong: cant wait to be released!
Hot Wheels: Yes i am excited as well. Looks funny and interesting, even if am not so much into racing games 🙂
Regarding all the other games, i dont know them, so cant say anything about it 🙁
Thanks again and please stay healthy!
Greetings from germany,
Ralf
Dragon’s Dogma 2 might be great if they expand choices with the collaboration features. Maybe have tactical party settings like Dragon Age 2 had, so you can direct collaborative battles without tediously micro-managing.
Great show!