You can't spell ignorance without...

[Erik_Twice]

Welcome to game criticism! Prepare your eyeballs for the most wonderful spectacle known to man: The IGN and friends show!

In this thread we mock, laugh and cry with the misadventures of our favourite self-proclaimed journalists. Bonus points for panning shmups and remember, it doesn't ned to be only IGN, anything goes!

Let's start with Ben Bigss' Sonic CD review for Nowgamer

http://www.nowgamer.com/xbox-360/xbox-l ... eview.html

With a 5.1 rating, Ben Biggs apparently hates his childhood, as evident by his obssesion with smashing rose-tinted glasses. He also seems to hateslevel design given his complaints about spikes, springs and other obstacles runing his "run-ups" by requiring actual platforming.

Highlights includes deriding the bonus stages as jumping on the Mario Kart/Mode 7 bandwagon, something Sega was really good at with, they even invented a time machine just to copy Nintendo with Power Drift several years before the SNES was even released.

But this is the real gem of the article, a marvel of criticism that will change my life forever :

, the only reason to buy Sonic CD is to remind yourself just how much this series has evolved for the better over the last two decades.

Thanks for the review, Ben! I can see your 27 years of gaming have really worked to your advantage!

Post your own here! Don't just post it and let everyone cry, point exactly how terribly wrong they are!

[Lodestar]

Strangely enough, I was playing this game earlier tonight, and well, I was never a big fan of Sonic CD. I think out of all the 16-bit games, it's the worst one. It was a very ambitious game, but I think the execution fell short. I don't like the time travel element of it because I feel like it halts the pace of the game. I did think the level design was a bit of a cluster-fuck, too...not to the extent that this guy seems to think, the game isn't hard, but there's too much platforming and not enough running. The spin dash doesn't work like in the later games, so if you've played those first, the controls for it and the screen panning are off-putting to say the least (it also looks kind of lame with the regular spin sprite, but that's a minor complaint). The level design is more akin to a fan game than an in-house project; I've never seen so many spikes and springs in seemingly random locations. Pretty much everything seems like it was thrown together without a specific purpose, the other Sonic games were much better about balancing the platforming and running sections and not confusing the player with an abundance of convoluted routes and time travel - which adds nothing substantial to the game. Sure, you could say that there are 4 possible levels in each zone, but it irks me how it halts the flow of the game - most of the time I ended up time traveling when I didn't want to.

Sonic CD would have benefited from some good ol' fashioned subtractive design and better conveyance, because it was trying to be too much, IMO. I do like the music, but that's the most I can say about the game.

Doubt anyone will agree with that, but that's how I feel, I own all the 16-bit Genesis games and Sonic CD is the only one I don't go back to.

[ZeroAX]

there's too much platforming and not enough running.

And how is that bad exactly?

[AmishSamurai]

I've never been one for Sonic games, but hasn't their layout traditionally been "careful platforming sequences rewarded by high-speed segments" and not the "GOTTA GO FAST!" that the modern games are?

[Incognito D]

Sound 5.5/10

okay, what the fuck? Fair enough he thinks the level design is a bit of a clusterfuck, but Sonic CD has one of the best soundtracks in any Sonic game! That was the great thing about it being on the Sega CD - the music was so far ahead of the other 16-bit Sonic games. I'm gonna shut up now and post some reasons why the reviewer is wrong.









Now someone tell me again that this is 5.5/10 music

[noiseredux]

someone tell me why anyone still thinks scores are anything more than arbitrary numbers.

[Luke]

someone tell me why anyone still thinks scores are anything more than arbitrary numbers.

Achievements are the new High Score.

I still have trouble identifying my favorite song from Sonic CD, but it's definitely from a future or past level. It has a very "jungle + techno" theme to it, with synth reeds and such. Starts off with a basic 4/4 tempo, but speeds up and includes a rapid note progression of C, B, Bflat, A, A flat.

I believe the level also looks like a jungle, but not the dark jungle with swinging vines.

[Erik_Twice]

someone tell me why anyone still thinks scores are anything more than arbitrary numbers.

Note that being arbitrary doesn't make something invalid or less important! I agree that scores are treated like the gospel when they are barely useful and people distilling quality into a number is just silly*

<--- Stuying Algebra right now


*For the record, the scoring system I use is mainly for tracking puporses and to better get a hold of the tone not a result. I should totally put an explanation there ASAP but I can't get it made right.

[Incognito D]

someone tell me why anyone still thinks scores are anything more than arbitrary numbers.

Achievements are the new High Score.

I still have trouble identifying my favorite song from Sonic CD, but it's definitely from a future or past level. It has a very "jungle + techno" theme to it, with synth reeds and such. Starts off with a basic 4/4 tempo, but speeds up and includes a rapid note progression of C, B, Bflat, A, A flat.

I believe the level also looks like a jungle, but not the dark jungle with swinging vines.

I know nothing about how music is constructed, but is this the track you're looking for?

[noiseredux]

Achievements are the new High Score.

whatever. This is exactly why I think scores/ratings are really stupid. Maybe you think a game is a "6" and I think it's a "7.5" -- what does that mean anyway? We both think it's "above average"? So what? The number is meaningless. It's just what some editor thought matched up with the review. But that number is just an abstraction. It doesn't say ANYTHING aobut the game. Does "6" mean "horrible controls"? Does it mean "buggy programming?" What does it mean? Nothing. Well nothing except "you don't have to read this review if you're too lazy."

In the case of giving Sonic CD's music a 5.5 -- what does 5.5 mean? Did the reviewer mention what he did or didn't like about the music? Is the emulation of the original hardware's soundchip in question? Is it the style/instrumentation? Is it the music chosen (Japanese vs American soundtrack)? That's the sort of thing I want to read and consider about a game. Not the arbitrary number that some guy decided to attach to the review's heading.