[PS3] Ratchet & Clank Future: A Crack in Time

If EDGE gives it a lower score, please don't burst a blood vessel.

<edit>Ah well you're safe, Edge apparently gave it an 8.<edit> In other news they gave EOJ a 4 and the orange box a 10.

 

I don't think I ever saw anyone complain about gameplay variety before.

 

One review just convinced people not to buy the game.

So how many ppl actually got the game today?

 

It is a matter of personal tastes. Looks like gamespot prefer a tighter pace instead of getting bogged down/distracted by the mini-games. If the others did not complain about it, then it should be fine.

Would be great if one can start with any difficulty level.

 

When a game is averaging 9's or better almost universally and suddenly GS hits it with 7.5 then even I start scratching my head. I'm not accusing GS of being anti-PS3 or bias, but it's pretty shocking that they are worlds apart compared to the general minds.

Sure GS is probably notoriously known for giving games lower scores then other places. But when you get 9's from like 15 other places out of 17 reviews you would think a credential website like GS would give the game a 8.5. GS has a history of giving previous R&C games uppers 8's and now they would suddenly bombard it with Insomniac latest efforts. Insomniac is known to stick to the tried but true formula while trying a few new things.

I'll see how his review stacks up to my review when I get the game.

 

Ther person who did the Gamespot reviews has reviewed over 100+ games and has only given a score higher than 8.5 once. That was Call of Duty 3 . The only other "low" review score was 8.5 by 1up. They picked the 8.5 score out of the 9.5 9.0 and 8.5 reviews in EGM.

 

I'm not too familiar with EGM reviews. EGM has 3 different ppl review the game. I read at GAF that one of the people that gave the score for EGM also did 1up review.

 

it all boils down to taste.
tried the demo its damn nice! this game looks and plays fun. and insomiac have always made quality games and this one is no exception by the looks of the demo.

reviews are good at pointing you in a direction but trying/renting the game/demo out and make your verdict on it then. im gonna rent it as soon as possible.

 

Why do I feel like GS is prety much biased...?
I haven't seen one high profile game for the 360 with a low score, yet HS and R&C get 7s...
I'm waiting for the reviews for Uncharted. I have a feeling though that the story will be the same.
I used to think that GS was one of the best sites when it came down to reviews, but lately I can't even read their news...

 

to me Gamespot's credential is up there with IGN, the former gave this game a 7.5 while the latter gave it a 9.4, now how come no one is discussing the IGN review score?

 

Because your tinfoil hat is on too tight.

 

I... don't know what that means...

 

IGN is widely considered to be a waste of space in comparison to its peers. Its core audience is the kind even the GAF crowd look down on. I certainly wouldn't rank them with Gamespot.


The EGM scores are generally a big deal though, so it's good to see R+C get props there. There's also been heaps of pushing on recent EGM Live Podcasts for those interested.

 

Its a reference to conspiracy theories.

Everytime a somewhat hyped game comes out and is reviewed lower than the average by one or two sites it spawns a hail of posts suggesting bias. Two months ago a gamespot review spawned something like 1000 posts because they reviewed Bioshock somewhat lower than the average.

Every review is subjective, you can read the reviewers reasons for disliking the game, you're free to disagree, you can even tell people why you disagree (it'd be nice if you actually play and complete the game before you do so) you're even free to write your own review, but running around suggesting bias everytime a review is not within a standard deviation of the mean doesn't really accomplish anything.

 

Oh!
Tinfoil hat too high! I'll try to remember that!

You are right... I'm just saying my opinion which by the way is not even a final one...
But we can certainly agree that some sites are biased or that some have forgotten what journalism is all about.

Anyway, I’m not into conspiracy theories either. I think that even if GS is giving lower scores on PS3 games, (and I’m reserving my judgement on that until a few more high profile games actually come out) it’s more of a trend than anything else.

By the way, the demo was actually quite good. I didn’t think that I’d like it. I wouldn’t buy the game to be honest, mostly because I don’t care much for the cartoon style or the genre. But the graphics and the production values are very good.

 

As mentioned, it's not GameSpot, it's the reviewer.

1. He normally reviews sportsgames
2. 8.2 is pretty much his highest score (see for yourself at: http://www.gamespot.com/users/AaronThomas/contributions?mode=reviews). So in some respects, you could see this score as a 7.5/8.2 which is about in line with the rest of gamerankings.

If you were really, really trying hard to find some bias, then it would have to be that GameSpot doesn't consider the game important enough to be reviewed by someone more suitable. It would have been more interesting in that respect to see Jeff Gerstwin review the game, because he did the last PS2 review and he's still with GameSpot. This also shows in the fact that he also got the Heavenly Sword review, though ironically, he seemed to have really liked it, as he gave it an 8 which as we know is just about the highest praise he has given games in his already considerable GameSpot career.

Which leads me to

3. He's clearly personally not biased against Sony. First of all he'd have reviewed Heavenly Sword lower than his 8-out-of-8.2, and second his reviews of PS3 sports games are rarely lower than their 360 counterparts, unlike with some other reviewers (irrespective of whether or not that is justified, as clearly it sometimes has been).

Most important thing to take away from this is that reviewers differ. There's a slighly interesting idea in determining bias towards a certain platform from which games get which reviewers, but it's at the very least not suited for this thread.

Lately the whole reviewing bias thing has been getting a little out of hand, so I propose we do the following things:

1. Keep the game's main thread reserved for mentioning and linking to reviews, and discussing the actual review content. If you disagree, preferably wait until you've played the game yourself and come with your own impressions.
2. If you must discuss review bias (as it's not a totally useless subject of discussion) then:
a: do so in a different thread (which at the very least has the advantage that the mods can then just lock that thread, and it doesn't affect the main thread)
b: do your homework. Look at the reviewer's history, the website, how previous games in a series did on the website, and so on.

 

Sign of different tastes. Reviews come down to personal preference, and you can't expect everyone to love or hate a game in equal measure. Check out Metacritic or GameRankings breakdown's and you see scores can vary wildly across contributors. Heck, if there weren't any low scores at all that'd make me even more suspicious!

 

Agreed.
I was just thinking out loud. I was certainly not expecting this to be taken so seriously although given the recent bias thingy (lair thread comes to mind) perhaps I should have.

 

Gamepro (USA) 5/5
GamerNode 9.5/10
PlayStation Magazine 95/100
IGN 9.4/10
Gamezone 9.3/10
PSM3 93/100
Gaming-Age A-
EGM 9.5, 9.0, 8.5
Pro-G 9/10
PSX Extreme 9.0/10
Gametrailers 9.0/10
GamesRadar 9/10
1up 8.5/10

Taken from consolewars, that posts scanned images so no linky

 

Well for me I did read the GS review.

Come on, 1 page only?