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« on: July 07, 2010, 03:50:36 PM »
IGN once had a podcast where they lamented that they have to give scores to games, because people will just skip to the end, read the score, and leave. They put effort (how much effort depends on what you think of IGN) into writing out the reviews and nobody reads them. The words explain where the games work and where they don't, and just offer more substance than a single score does. They also touched upon how people freak out and think a game's bad if it doesn't score at least an 8.0, ignoring that in their system an average game is 5.0 instead of like 7.5.
IGN also said that when a game is identical across platforms, one platform version will get a higher score compared to another based on what other games exist for that platform and how the new game stacks up against its competition.
Most interesting of all, they touched upon how the scores are a product of how impressive a game was when released at the time, and what to do when a game is released years later that is so much better than the previous game given a 9.8 yet doesn't have the same amount of awe as the previous game did at its time. Result: the new game gets a lower score despite technically being better than the old. And how one guy was pressured into just re-doing the Jade Empire review to give it a 10 since 9.9 is so close that it should just go all the way.
But then, IGN was the one that gave 10s to both Grand Theft Auto IV and Metal Gear Solid 4, so... yeah.
I'm guilty of looking at reviews and wanting them to be "good enough" before buying because I can't rely on my local videogame store to stock the games I want to rent and I don't have an account with GameFly. But I did take a chance on "Beyond Good & Evil" and... yeah, I have to say it, "you must buy this game, for the love of God."