I expect this will not be a popular post, but:
I feel like I've read a lot of pieces about what role game reviewers have to play in the industry. Should they treat reviews as Consumer Reports-style writeups, i.e. "graphics on level 3 could use tightening up but the anti-aliasing makes it a solid 8.65 out of 10!" or should reviewers treat games less like products and more like pieces of art or literature? Based on all the vitriol sites like IGN get for ridiculously precise review scores and the appreciation for sites like Giant Bomb, where each individual's likes and dislikes are well-known and accepted for the most part, I assumed the trend was towards reviews as opinion piece.
But here's a review where someone gives their opinion on a game--that the grindiness of the game and the depiction of the female characters made the game less enjoyable--and both the reviewer and the site that posted it gets shit upon. Of course you're allowed to disagree with her; maybe you don't think the game is pure adolescent fantasy, or maybe you think she's right but that's totally fine with you. But to basically say her opinion is invalid, or that her review is an outrage ploy to collect clicks is just... man.
"But she had a political/moral/feminist agenda!" I see people write in this thread. Well, guess what? People have political and moral opinions; it's just you tend to notice them more when those opinions disagree with yours. Increasingly people are put off at the number of first-person shooters where you kill indiscriminately; Bioshock Infinite got a lot of flak for this very thing. And I very much disagreed with some of that criticism (mainly that the game's difficulty got in the way of enjoying the story, but also just generally that Bioshock Infinite would've been a better game without any of the violence). But nowhere in that conversation did I see people suggest that the anti-violence discussion wasn't worth having, that clearly it was driven by a political agenda that had no place in games. But that's ridiculous; of COURSE it speaks to a moral stance, that violence is not only unnecessary in games but excessive.
Even when it comes to sexual depictions, people are frustratingly inconsistent. On this very forum, people call out all sorts of Japanese games as stuff they won't ever play because "omg too moe" or "god Japan with its stupid big-boobed anime" or "fuck, I'm not a pedophile, why would I ever play that lolicon bait." But god forbid a reviewer call this out and say, "I did not like this game nearly as much because giant boobs and sexualization," because that would be beyond the pale. It's not even sexualization that's off limits in reviews any more; it's specific types of sexualization that's clearly driven by a moral agenda because it happens to match what appeals to "gamers," as opposed to sexualization that's okay to criticize because most gamers don't like anime chicks or whatever.
(And yes, I'm well aware that Dragon's Crown is a Japanese game, just to get that out of the way.)
I guess I'm not surprised that the Polygon review should be so controversial, but I'm also incredibly disappointed.
