#2 is not a good thing when it is used as an excuse to not do your due diligence and review the actual product people will be playing. Updating review scores should be used in cases of games like TF2 or Burnout Paradise receiving excellent post release support, not to cover up the reviewer's mistake to review a game on pre-release servers.
Polygon gives high scores to games despite their anti-consumer aspects / DRM strategy
- Thread starter Vire
- Start date
#2 is not a good thing when it is used as an excuse to not do your due diligence and review the actual product people will be playing. Updating review scores should be used in cases of games like TF2 or Burnout Paradise receiving excellent post release support, not to cover up the reviewer's mistake to review a game on pre-release servers.
Delusibeta
Banned
By Polygon's review system, all games with always on DRM should have a maximum score of 7. There is no way in hell "your game will be interrupted if your internet drops out or our servers fall over" isn't at the very least a big "but". The scores of Sim City (which is especially hilarious, considering the reviewer had to replace his router and had the servers crap out on him even during the press beta when EA knew exactly how many people could play the game, and he still gave it a 9.5) and Diablo 3 is evidence that they ignore their review scoring policy, which puts in question every other policy.
RedNumberFive
Banned
Ice cold, but fair.
SictorVullivan
Member
It's part of Metacritic's terms or whatever saying they will only accept the first score a publication gives the game and so wont update it if the reviewer changes it on their own site.
OT: Polygon is such a joke of a site. Why review the game at all if they knew that they were going to change the review in the first place. And why also change their score only to have to change it yet again when the servers are fixed. By that notion they should the score back to the original 9.5 if the servers are fixed tomorrow (hypothetically).
They perceive themselves to be a different entity and a objection to the rule when it comes to game journalism yet they pull stunts like this, basically showing how they despite everything they say are no different at all to other sites.
Kind of like some Japanese company did with a certain popular fighting game series...... and is the only company thus far that has been lambasted across the board for such DLC practices while other companies get by without any criticism...
Hmm.....
Vire
Member
He's definitely reducing it to mud shit flinging level.
Shame, because the gist of what he is saying is correct.
Ding ding ding.
A separate review, maybe. But the MUST change the score if they deem so. Reviews are supposed to represent the current state of a game and the reader is expected make decision based on how the game is now.
When it comes to always-online drm games they should only post a review after the game launched and it should be written based on time spent playing in these real-world conditions. That's where Polygon erred.
Riposte
Member
The character part of it was to some extent in that you could hex edit the character into your party and it would work with complete graphics, abilities and sound. The mission and FMV sequences included would not have been in the game because they take significant space: you do download something more than an unlock key with the DLC.
The problem shouldn't be how much of the character is still on the disc but rather that it is easy to tell by script leaks and leaks in general that the character played a huge part in the game's story until he was cut, and then turned into day 1 DLC instead.
Vire
Member
RedNumberFive
Banned
Mr. Bogost is on fire today!
Well, Ian picked up a fan today. Adjusting a review score because of a rocky server on launch day is fucking stupid when we all know it'll be fine a day from now... you know, like every online game's launch ever. Try separating people's EA angst and the internet chaff from the actual game for a moment.
njean777
Member
Umm you must be new EA, Capcom, and any company that has done this has been blasted on this board.
This is an interesting situation though, I have noticed that Polygon reviewers have been known to swarm and team up with each other if they get called out.
ChosenPredator
Banned
That bogot guy is like Nas to JayZing polygon
Riposte
Member
What specific examples am I suppose to be impressed by? Game academia is a joke.
Definitely agree with this.
I haven't been following this whole polygon catastrophe, but if those anti-consumerists exist in a game that's totally okay on its own I just don't care. As long as stuff is mentioned/warned about in the review, then I could not care less about the review score, a number is not what I'm there to read.
Clear
CliffyB's Cock Holster
animlboogy said:
You know there's this thing called inflation, that causes costs to rise over time. There's also the fact that expectations for content in a $60 full-price retail title are now somewhat higher than they were at the start of the gen. Shit gets more expensive as time goes by.
I know people don't want to accept this, but its the truth. As is the fact that Gamestop and their ilk have pretty much forced the publishers into this with their relentless leveraging of used sales.
The loss of revenue caused by used sales is a REAL thing, it absolutely isn't the hypothetical losses caused by piracy. The difference is simple and obvious: used sales occupy retail space that would otherwise be given over to new product, they take money from the same consumers visiting the same outlets where new product is sold - a used game is undeniably a competitive product against its "new" equivalent and other similar "new" titles.
That competition hurts the publishers bottom-line significantly due to the ephemeral shelf-life of videogames compared with their increasingly onerous production cost.
That lost revenue needs to come from somewhere, and as Gamestop aren't up with sharing their deep margins (58% profit off of 38% volume - nice), guess who gets to carry that burden?
I mean more by "gaming journalists".
The same dude who yelled at me on Twitter for suggesting that Halo 4 be re-reviewed due to the poor and buggy multiplayer (which now has consistent online population of under 100,000 players when there were 400,000 at launch). Yelled at me and accused me of being a fanboy instead discussing it with me. After that experience, I basically wrote off Arthur Gies and Polygon entirely. I suggest everyone do the same.
Skyrim and yes.
SneakyStephan
Banned
It would help if you'd all stop giving those fuckers clicks.... Or rather it would be a start at least.
With every click you give to polygon or kotaku or IGN you contribute to the problem.
With every click you give to polygon or kotaku or IGN you contribute to the problem.
I agree but Bogost is actually pretty good, in part because he doesn't write like someone trying to sound like how they think an academic should sound.
As a designer:
- A Slow Year
- Cow Clicker
- News games (September 12th)
As a scholar
- Persuasive games / Unit Operations
- Alien Phenomenology
You're short-sighted and not very well-read if you think all of game academia is a joke. Especially Ian Bogost.
Polygon ether'd.
Are you seriously trying to downplay Bogost's contribution to not only the games industry, but also academia? Read up on him before you post shit like that.
Dude, it's Justin McElroy. If it's not something about or in service of himself then he couldn't care less.
Yep. That's probably the most hilarious part to me. "People can't play the game, so let's lower the score from 'great' to 'very good'". Scores, how do they work? (No one really knows lol)
Sites that are in the "let's get our clicks by being the first review out there"-business are going to be pretty fucked in the foreseeable future when always-on DRM will become more common while others who take their time with reviews are arguably in the best position to deal with these issues. Rough times for publishers and their covert PR henchmen called game reviewers.
Gonzo The Great
Banned
Delusibeta
Banned
Please take your used game ranting to a thread about a console game, please. Also, take your astroturf with you.
And my current reaction is:
Keep it coming, Ian! ...Even if it's just throwing poo at them at this point. :x
Treythalomew
Member
He makes a really good point about Polygon spending most of their time on twitter fighting anyone who dares to disrespect their name. Number one thing that turns me off is seeing Arthur or Justin going at people who say anything bad about anything Polygon.
Can Crusher
Banned
So mister scholar is acting like an internet troll and being foul mouthed because:
a) he feels like the review was shit
b) the re scoring was shit
c) the polygon site is shit
d) polygon is reviewing a game as a service and not as (?)
Can anybody clear this up? Because some people are supporting his comments based on their hate for Polygon, others for their hate for the review, etc
What exactly seems to be the point? The specific point.
a) he feels like the review was shit
b) the re scoring was shit
c) the polygon site is shit
d) polygon is reviewing a game as a service and not as (?)
Can anybody clear this up? Because some people are supporting his comments based on their hate for Polygon, others for their hate for the review, etc
What exactly seems to be the point? The specific point.
I'm paraphrasing but he mentioned that HUD elements and all that would ruin the immersion.
Then one of the guys mentioned that Dead Space 3 has an integrated HUD but he still didn't seem convinced that gameplay screenshots would look any good or represent the game.
They have to be good at something.
^Pretty well sums up my thoughts on the matter.
EDIT:
See the above quotes.
MrNyarlathotep
Banned
Maybe why that's why they softball big publisher games so much.
criticism huuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuurts
darkside31337
Tomodachi wa Mahou
So Polygon won?
Why an 8 anyway? Is a great game that doesn't work an 8? Surely it should be a 0. Or why not just put a big red banner at the top of the review that says "This game doesn't work right now. Check back later, we'll let you know when it's safe."
Polygon really need to institute a "no twitter rebuttals" policy for their editors.
Polygon really need to institute a "no twitter rebuttals" policy for their editors.
At this exact moment:
- He doesn't like Polygon
- He took extreme offense to their usage of the phrase "an anecdotally large portion of our readership"
Pachterballs
Banned
Pachterballs
Banned
OMFG wtf 2
lol
"Your product is shit, your website is shit" is not criticism, it's critical, and insulting.