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[hlhbk]

Actually, he considers World of Warcraft to be one of the best games of all time. You know, the MMO that doesn't feature any of the hand-holding, casual friendly and streamlining he just hates, which is a 'cancer to the industry'.

So, 6 things. No, 11. Wait, 3? I'm confused.

Wow is terrible, so if that is true it explains a lot.

 

[solarus]

There are 5 things Derrick likes.
Obsidian, Obsidian, Obsidian Obsidian and Obsidian.

Yup. Still, he won't mind shitting on every other big game before release and then going ahead and buying it at launch for full price and of course hating it anyway.

 

[Guevara]

Here's the thoughts of someone playing it in the ot -

Looks incredible(!!), sounds incredible but it's Bioshock in the sky. Don't expect any revolutionary things. It's Bioshock. The combat is fine but nothing special, the powers are kinda the same but fun to use, even the turrets are pretty much ripped right out of Rapture. It has a very Bioshock 1 style intro too.

- this is literally all I'd need from a review. I know everything I'm getting in the game.

This is, and I'm not kidding, the most helpful review in this thread.

 

[Uthred]

Wanting reviews to be devoid of any proficient literacy or more accomplished use of the English language is anti-intellectualism.

Bullshit, reviews arent purely creative writing exercises. They (should) serve a purpose - to inform the reader about a product or experience. If theyre well written but fail to achieve this objective then theyre poor reviews, calling them out on that isnt anti-intellectualism.

 

[Artemisia]

I see that this game has snatched Fire Emblem's Metacritic crown.

 

[spirity]

Don't speak for me. I lazily put it on a top 5 list I threw together late one night in the essential RPG thread. I put so little effort into that that I didn't even come up with a top 10 or bother describing my selections more than a sentence or two.

Haha, ok man.

 

[ThaiGrocer]

Actually, he considers World of Warcraft to be one of the best games of all time. You know, the MMO that doesn't feature any of the hand-holding, casual friendly and streamlining he just hates, which is a 'cancer to the industry'.

So, 6 things. No, 11. Wait, 3? I'm confused.

I really, really want to see him make a game of his ideal. Not to challenge him or anything for arguing. I just want to play it and see what he's thinking.

 

[I'm an expert]

This is, and I'm not kidding, the most helpful review in this thread.

That's exactly the fuckin point I'm trying to make. Those two lines tell me EVERYTHING I need to know as a gamer about this game. I don't get how people put so much credence into the shit that's in the op.

 

[BobTheSpy]

Honestly, for Bioshock, I think the gameplay is less important than the story. If the shooting sucks... who cares? I certainly don't. The shooting isn't why I'm playing this game. It's for the experience.

 

[Sane_Man]

Intellectualism vs pseudo-intellectualism.

I could accept that if people were actually citing specific examples, instead of just saying that reviews shouldn't use big words or be longer than 2 paragraphs.

 

[SlowRevolution]

That's exactly the fuckin point I'm trying to make. Those two lines tell me EVERYTHING I need to know as a gamer about this game. I don't get how people put so much credence into the shit that's in the op.

I don't get why people think reviews would ever be like that. Obviously sites aren't going to be putting out two line reviews.

 

[I'm an expert]

Honestly, for Bioshock, I think the gameplay is less important than the story. If the shooting sucks... who cares? I certainly don't. The shooting isn't why I'm playing this game. It's for the experience.

I certainly can't tell anyone how to play or enjoy a game. But I definitely remember reading the exact same thing in the Tomb Raider thread. I dunno..I guess..gamers have changed in their perspective of things. That's cool.

 

[nckillthegrimace]

Honestly, for Bioshock, I think the gameplay is less important than the story. If the shooting sucks... who cares? I certainly don't. The shooting isn't why I'm playing this game. It's for the experience.

Well, if 90% of the game is shooting, that's kind of a problem.

 

[Peterthumpa]

Any console impressions?

 

[Papercuts]

Honestly, for Bioshock, I think the gameplay is less important than the story. If the shooting sucks... who cares? I certainly don't. The shooting isn't why I'm playing this game. It's for the experience.

If you are spending the vast majority of the game shooting, it will obviously be a problem.

 

[Symphonic]

While I'm with you in general... Talking about and collecting the various reviews is kind of the objective of this thread.

That is true. I just want mom and dad to stop fighting

 

[SneakyStephan]

This is, and I'm not kidding, the most helpful review in this thread.

This should be in the OP along with any impressions (and bandaids to half fix it to the point where it's usable) of the mouse acceleration issue.

Those two combined would let everyone know what to expect and leave no nasty surprises.



Maybe there needs to be a gaming site dedicated to this... concise information, all your questions answered without having to wade through a thousand ads disguised as reviews hoping ONE of them will have the benevolence of mentioning such frivolities as gameplay and controls.

Seems like a niche that is wide open for the grabbing right now...

 

[Guevara]

Any console impressions?

Reviewers are too delicate to discuss such vulgarities as "console performance" or "control schemes"

 

[BruceLeeRoy]

Damn you AMD where is my steam code!!!

 

[benny_a]

If the alleged gameplay playing is like BioShock does the person actually claim it plays like BioShock or does it play like his memory of BioShock but had quite some iteration? BioShock 1 was quite some time ago.

Reviewers are too delicate to discuss such vulgarities as "console performance" or "control schemes"

Man reviewers failed me so hard with Uncharted 3 and its aiming issue that was patched post-launch.
I bought it day 1 but only played it after it was patched. (Which was cool enough of ND.)

 

[Derrick01]

I certainly can't tell anyone how to play or enjoy a game. But I definitely remember reading the exact same thing in the Tomb Raider thread. I dunno..I guess..gamers have changed in their perspective of things. That's cool.

What they're trying to say is they just want their movie experiences with direct to DVD-quality stories and dialogue.

 

[ViewtifulJC]

What they're trying to say is they just want their movie experiences with direct to DVD-quality stories and dialogue.

Tells people not to put words in his mouth, does it for other people

 

[Derrick01]

Tells people not to put words in his mouth, does it for other people

He said he's just in it for the experience, not the gameplay.

 

[SlasherJPC]

I will admit I find it funny all these big words used in these reviews. Like where is this vocab in the really shitty reviews? Big game released... time to whip out the english major hiding within. Anways, I'm totally hyped for the game, but find all this talk interesting.

 

[BobTheSpy]

I certainly can't tell anyone how to play or enjoy a game. But I definitely remember reading the exact same thing in the Tomb Raider thread. I dunno..I guess..gamers have changed in their perspective of things. That's cool.

Let me elaborate. Half Life 2 is one of my favorite games of all time, but it's not because of the shooting. By all accounts, the shooting in Half Life 2 sucks. But I don't care. The reason is because Half Life 2 had a fantastically imagined world, and a compelling narrative. I see games more as "experiences" rather than games. Does that make sense? This is also why I like games like Deus Ex: Human Revolution and Skyrim - I like being immersed.

 

[ViewtifulJC]

Well, apparently the gameplay part is pretty fun too, so yay everybody wins

or something

 

[hawk2025]

Don't speak for me. I lazily put it on a top 5 list I threw together late one night in the essential RPG thread. I put so little effort into that that I didn't even come up with a top 10 or bother describing my selections more than a sentence or two.

It says something about your tastes, though, that it came to mind as a top 5 RPG, no?

I think people would like to know what your favorite games are, though, to understand when and if they should follow your opinions, and that holds true for any given poster, really. The whole point of having consistent personas in forums is to get to know people's tastes and know who you line up frequently with, so that you can trust their recommendations more than any review. Trouble is -- at least in my limited time here -- I've yet to hear you speak fondly of any videogame, and thus most people just wonder what it is exactly that you like.

I actually appreciate (part of) the overly critical position, but without a baseline of "this is what I actually consider to be great", it means close to nothing.

 

[Knux-Future]

....

The reviews do explain why they think the game is good.

If the review was just

It's good and it is fun. Buy it.

People would complain that they didn't go into detail as to why it is good and fun.

It's like writing a thesis or a paper and having it be one paragraph that barely scrapes the surface of the question. You'd fucking fail that paper.

and if it does bother you..then wait for the one word reviews from gaffers.

This is fucking mindblowing that people are really having this issue. As much shit as the gaming press gets, it's ridiculous that people are actually advocating two sentence reviews and shit.

I get it if it was just "this game represents my heart and my childhood and blah blah blah" but it's not. Sessler's review went in depth as fuck about the story, teh world, and yes the goddam gameplay. GT's review did as well. Gamespot too(what little I saw of it...shitty ass video player there).

This is such weird issue to bring up...like wow.

I guess I'm used to the "only a 8.8? wtf is this shit" part of review threads not the "it's too wordy" part.

Sweet Jesus...are we really this jaded?

 

[Tummi Gummi]

In film criticism it's usually the shittiest films that get the "best" reviews

 

[lantus]

The narcissism in this thread is on another level. Suddenly everyone's credibility is being questioned because they liked the game that much. I don't see the point in getting worked up when 99% of the people in here haven't played it yet, I don't see how anyone is really in a position to refuge anyone's opinion of the game.

 

[Ithil]

If you hate game reviewing, and 100% expect to disagree with them, and have low expectations...why are you in the review thread, reading every review that comes out and arguing about it?

It's a baffling use of time to me.

 

[Fletcher]

I'm so excited to play this game. Bioshock was probably my favorite game of this generation and to see that this game seems to go in a different direction, while maintaining what I liked about I liked so much about Bioshock is great. So excited.

 

[SlowRevolution]

In film criticism it's usually the shittiest films that get the "best" reviews

Not really.

 

[Knux-Future]

If you hate game reviewing, and 100% expect to disagree with them, and have low expectations...why are you in the review thread, reading every review that comes out and arguing about it?

It's a baffling use of time to me.

This is the Internet in a nutshell it seems.

"I hate this...so I'm going to spend a lot of my time telling other people why and that they should too".

Too much work for so much negativity

 

[Tummi Gummi]

Not really.

Eh? Film reviews that rip apart a bad film tend to be infinitely more entertaining than measured, positive ones.

 

[Derrick01]

It says something about your tastes, though, that it came to mind as a top 5 RPG, no?

I think people would like to know what your favorite games are, though, to understand when and if they should follow your opinions, and that holds true for any given poster, really. The whole point of having consistent personas in forums is to get to know people's tastes and know who you line up frequently with, so that you can trust their recommendations more than any review. Trouble is -- at least in my limited time here -- this is not possible with your tastes, and thus most people just wonder what it is exactly that you like.

I actually appreciate (part of) the overly critical position, but without a baseline of "this is what I actually consider to be great", it means close to nothing.

His actions are precisely why I always refuse to give a best games list or something similar when people ask me. They're only asking so they scan for something they can say gotcha and throw back in my face to expose me as a hypocrite, or whatever they think they're accomplishing.

 

[Hot Coldman]

I was gonna watch Sessler's review but that I remembered I don't want to see ANYTHING more about this game until I play it.

 

[Uno Venova]

....

The reviews do explain why they think the game is good.

If the review was just

It's good and it is fun. Buy it.

People would complain that they didn't go into detail as to why it is good and fun.

It's like writing a thesis or a paper and having it be one paragraph that barely scrapes the surface of the question. You'd fucking fail that paper.

and if it does bother you..then wait for the one word reviews from gaffers.

This is fucking mindblowing that people are really having this issue. As much shit as the gaming press gets, it's ridiculous that people are actually advocating two sentence reviews and shit.

I get it if it was just "this game represents my heart and my childhood and blah blah blah" but it's not. Sessler's review went in depth as fuck about the story, teh world, and yes the goddam gameplay. GT's review did as well. Gamespot too(what little I saw of it...shitty ass video player there).

This is such weird issue to bring up...like wow.

I guess I'm used to the "only a 8.8? wtf is this shit" part of review threads not the "it's too wordy" part.

Sweet Jesus...are we really this jaded?

I didn't like that the reviews spent 80% of the time talking about the story and not enough about the gameplay which is supposed to be important. I found a few reviews after that went into more detail though.

 

[nckillthegrimace]

Well, apparently the gameplay part is pretty fun too, so yay everybody wins

or something

I've had the joy and novelty of shooting people in the face beaten out of me by a console generation rife with games about shooting people in the face, so please forgive my skepticism regarding the alleged fun factor of a game that largely consists of shooting people in the face.

 

[stktt]

Well, if 90% of the game is shooting, that's kind of a problem.

Well, if 90% of reviews say the shooting is fine, that's kind of irrelevant.

 

[NullPointer]

Holy bajeezus at those review scores. Was already mostly dark on this game but now I'm fully cloaked.

Will pick it up sometime soon. Great to hear that it's worked out after all the development woes.

 

[captainnapalm]

- this is literally all I'd need from a review. I know everything I'm getting in the game. Great production but nothing new when it comes to.. brace yourself.. the game part.

Your view of what constitutes gameplay is limiting. It's not just the shooting bits in Bioshock that qualifies as gameplay. Everything else does too - the exploring, the character interaction, being an active participant in allowing the narrative to unfold - all of that is interactive too and requires your active participation. You're acting like every non-shooting part is the equivalent of a cutscene as far as you're concerned.

I think some people - like you - are just very specific about what kinds of gameplay they enjoy and don't like games that take their favoured kind of gameplay and marry it with other gameplay styles.

 

[Tummi Gummi]

This is the Internet in a nutshell it seems.

"I hate this...so I'm going to spend a lot of my time telling other people why and that they should too".

Too much work for so much negativity

Because as seen in this thread, amidst the dross is the odd nugget of information regarding controls, frame rate, vsync issues and so on?

 

[ThaiGrocer]

His actions are precisely why I always refuse to give a best games list or something similar when people ask me. They're only asking so they scan for something they can say gotcha and throw back in my face to expose me as a hypocrite, or whatever they think they're accomplishing.

I actually want to play the games on your list. No gotchas. Even if you're found being a hypocrite, there's too much going in people to use it against you. This is NeoGAF.

I also think GabeN is thinking of giving people money for making lists of games on the store or something along that line in the future. You might make a good curator.

 

[benny_a]

Let me elaborate. Half Life 2 is one of my favorite games of all time, but it's not because of the shooting. By all accounts, the shooting in Half Life 2 sucks. But I don't care. The reason is because Half Life 2 had a fantastically imagined world, and a compelling narrative. I see games more as "experiences" rather than games. Does that make sense? This is also why I like games like Deus Ex: Human Revolution and Skyrim - I like being immersed.

Yes. It's fine that you like what you like for the reasons you named.

Hang in there and reach for the stars!

 

[Ithil]

I've had the joy and novelty of shooting people in the face beaten out of me by a console generation rife with games about shooting people in the face, so please forgive my skepticism regarding the alleged fun factor of a game that largely consists of shooting people in the face.

Summing it up like that is pointless. FPS, it's literally the name of the genre.

 

[SlowRevolution]

Eh? Film reviews that rip apart a bad film tend to be infinitely more entertaining than measured, positive ones.

My bad, missed the quotation marks around "best"

I don't really see what that has to do with this game, though, unless I'm missing something. That's why I wasn't getting what you were saying.

 

[billy beane]

His actions are precisely why I always refuse to give a best games list or something similar when people ask me. They're only asking so they scan for something they can say gotcha and throw back in my face to expose me as a hypocrite, or whatever they think they're accomplishing.

Be thankful people care about your opinion.

Nobody ever asks me what my favorite games are.

 

[ExigentContact]

What does this even mean? Storytelling is storytelling. Games are just another venue for it. Unless the mechanics are broken, which any review would assuredly get to (as you can't enjoy a story if the game is getting in your way), I don't see how those things are more important than the overall experience the developers are trying to communicate.

As far as cost, I'm pretty sure that goes into the construction of making this experience interactive. Which is why it's more expensive than going to the movies. I don't know, all this energy gets put into what makes a game worth its asking price. If the devs have taken a concept with massive ambition and scope, and pulled it off successfully, they deserve to be supported at the asking price.

Making the experience interactive may make it more expensive when it reaches the market (it's more about overbloated budgets and pisspoor management, really) but at the end of the day, there are very few modern video games that successfully argue the value of the medium's artistic elements. BioShock's artistic presentation failed because there was a massive disconnect in its narrative branches in comparison to its gameplay system. For a game that preached so much about choice and objectivism, the ultimate payoff was just like any other video game out there -- your choices don't really matter, here's a boss dude and a CG cutscene. For me, the ride wasn't worth the asking price of sixty dollars, not when the gameplay couldn't meet with the art aspects of BioShock. The aesthetic and atmosphere of BioShock made up a huge portion of its value, no doubt, but that value can only carry it so far if its gameplay mechanisms don't support it.

There's nothing wrong with wanting to support games as an art form, but there's also nothing wrong with developers and publishers looking at more cost-effective means to develop their titles. BioShock Infinite is another game in a long parade of AAA development and probably won't be able to communicate any more in an artistic sense than something like Journey or Bastion (not arguing the artistic merit of any of those titles), which was created at a fraction of the cost of development and put on market at a fraction of the price.

Like, I don't get why games are treated differently than movies. No one would expect even highfalutin criticism to go into the lenses and film stock specifically, unless they detract from the cinematic experience.

If devs are going through the trouble of building stories around themes (which is a pretty core tenet of a work of art), treat them as such.

The problem with art is that it's highly subjective. A game reviewer has an inherently different job from a film reviewer because they should cover the objective mechanics more in-depth. With film, you see plenty of reviews cover the mechanical issues, such as special effects, editing, sound design. All of those are mechanical, but are secondary to the movie overall in most cases. With game's the primary interaction with the world is through gameplay, so these mechanics are much more important, to the point where they match or supersede narrative. It's a fine juggling act to get down, balancing artistic assessment with gameplay assessment, and it's one most reviewers fail gloriously.

We have plenty of reviews completely glossing over mechanical strengths and weaknesses in favor of looking at world design, narrative, and theme. And instead of honest, level-headed assessments of these values we have uncomfortable hive-mind fellation like these BioShock Infinite reviews. I would take a review that went in-depth into these areas without out all of the flowery crap that's streaming out the current batch of reviews. But that's generally what I like post-mortems for -- they can cover more intangible aspects of the game after more time has passed for more narrative/artistic/thematic examinations to take hold without hype trains blinding the writer. Reviews published for release should cover the more immediate aspects (gameplay, interface, controls) of the title because they are one of the primary ways of gleaning the potential quality of a title before purchase and play. Let long term examination determine the artistic merit of a title.

Why is the video game industry and fanbase so starved for a game that proves the medium is art? Look at snippets of Sessler's review -- his prose is extremely purple and gets across so little other than to say "BioShock Infinite is a work of art." So what? Anything can be art, from toilets to movies to paintings to games. Save that for the post-mortem. Tell me more about what's good or bad with the design and gameplay first, please.

 

[Ithil]

Because as seen in this thread, amidst the dross is the odd nugget of information regarding controls, frame rate, vsync issues and so on?

Those nuggets are definitely not coming from the ones waiting for every review to come out so they can dismantle them.