Did Sega screw up AGAIN!?

[Flak Beard]

He makes some interesting points, but has gone about it in entirely the wrong way - firstly by needlesly insulting his peers and secondly by not taking into account that a review, while presenting the reviewers opinion, should also represent the games worth to the reviews audience as a whole. For instance, I freaking love Dynasty Warriors games, but if I were to review one I certainly wouldn't score it a 9, more like a 6 because while I can look past the bland graphics, the repetative gameplay, the idiotic AI and the total whoring of the franchise to find and enjoyable experience I can sink hours of gaming time into; 90% of the gaming public can't and I certainly wouldn't attempt to mislead them by forcing home my personal opinion with a high score and a gushing review professing my love for all things Koei like Dave has done here with Golden Axe & SEGA.

That's a really good point. Dave does tend to gush about almost every game like it's the second coming. Still, I tend to turn to them, Game Informer and Giant Bomb these days for insight. I feel like they are the last great resources in the ever declining face of game journalism. The whole business in general constantly gets me down. It seems like many journalistic game sites try to perpetuate the fanboy wars and the mud slinging between companies.

Maybe that's why I hang out here more than any other site. When it comes to retro gaming, none of that stuff matters anymore... negative reviews, system wars, exclusivity, etc. What's done is done, and now we can just enjoy the fruits of generations past.

[Pulsar_t]

I think the fanboy wars are unavoidable as long as adolescents continue to form a majority of gamers, and those websites only add fuel to the fire. Heck even supposedly mature individuals can't conduct a proper conversation when it comes to matters that they perceive to be of major importance. But to call most mainstream gaming websites "journalism" is an insult to the profession, even though I hardly respect it tbh. But as I said every media outlet caters to its constituency.

I think all the flak Sega are getting is quite nasty. They do publish good and bad games, but they're far from being the 00s Gametek! They're on the right track thanks to acquiring small studios with quality output (Creative Assembly and Platinum Games to name two).

[RackGaki]

Play does rate a little high I admit, but they sure beat all the other publications who are constantly trying to be snarky about everything.

Play doesn't rate anything any longer... yet another reason why I love that magazine. It's the only one I subscribe to.

The state of game coverage and reviews is a sorry one indeed. I attended a panel at PAX this year that talked about it, and they talked of thousands of gamers that will place their dollars on the Metacritic score. The meta-review sites have made most game journalist's opinions obsolete, reducing complex dissertations into a simple number. The biggest reviewer is now Metacritic, giving the collective parts that make it whole the shaft.

The elephant in the room was the second two biggest review sites that don't even bother with numbers. Penny Arcade and Zero Punctuation. Gabe, Tycho and Yahtzee now provide more meaningful insight than any other reviewer, for better or worse. Penny Arcade opens with their blog, not their webcomic, which is telling in and of itself! Every comic on Penny Arcade serves as a mini-review, though with commentary provided by their front-page blog. Yahtzee has taken the internet hate machine into an entertaining four-minutes of hilarity every week. Don't take my word on the influence of these two people, just look at the traffic their sites generate. IGN, 1up, and Gamestop don't compare.

Reviewing a game with an arbitrary numerical score represents the innate desire of gamers to compare and contrast their favored content. Apples, oranges, you get it. There should be a system, maybe divided by genre, but probably not, that could more accurately represent a game to it's audience. Perhaps a Buy It, Rent It, or Pass on a specific genre (I'm trying to think of something similar to Play's Parting Shot, but more effective). As it stands, scoring a game on a 100 point scale is futile at best.

So does Golden Axe suck or not? I've got it on my Gamefly account, so I will soon find out. One man's garbage is another man's treasure.

[thejamessea]

The bottom line is that game journalists should be held to higher standards. Sadly, this will never happen, as gaming sites and magazines will never hire anyone but the lowest rung of the graduating class of "State" University.

Let's face it, Columbia grads aren't sending their resumes to IGN.

[ScreamingPixel]

If reviews are right that's another series destroyed by sega.

[elph]

I think the fanboy wars are unavoidable as long as adolescents continue to form a majority of gamers

The average video gamer is not an adolescent. This isn't the most recent article, but here it is anyway: http://www.usatoday.com/tech/news/2004- ... hics_x.htm