I received an email from a PR rep a couple of days ago in which she took some issue with a recent review (I consider email private, and she hasn't yet responded to my request to use her name, so I'll just say it was regarding a review in which I gave a game a low score.) During our exchange, she stated that there were a couple of problems with the writers for the major magazines. The major accusation was that we can't relate to their target market. She stated that reviewers don't play the same game for any length of time after a review, due to the need to play lots of games for writing purposes, and that we therefore cannot have a "normal" perspective.

There were other points that I'll mention at another time - however, for those here that know me and how much I love to debate, you can imagine how much fun I've had going back and forth with her. However, I wonder if she may not have at least a kernal of truth in the above mentioned statement. I'll reserve my thoughts on this and throw the question out: do writers who go through several games a month and have piles of games that show up every week or so have a skewed perspective, relative to the readers for which we write?

-Jeff

"She stated that reviewers don't play the same game for any length of time after a review, due to the need to play lots of games for writing purposes, and that we therefore cannot have a 'normal' perspective."

And when we give a game a positive review, the PR folks/developers/publishers are silent or will even praise us for our even-handed treatment of their title, but the gamers that didn't like the game will say the same things the publisher people (or the people who do like a game) will say when we give it a negative (not all the time, of course). I'm always suspicious of most PR folks and their complaints, as it's their job to make certain their product gets seen in the best light. (I once had the PR guy for a small wargame company post a very harsh statement about a review of mine, only to e-mail me later and confess much of the vitriol was at the behest of the developer, who was quite upset.) PR folks, especially, will do this even when the milk is spilt, because they hope to influence your feelings in future coverage (Steve Bauman can relate the tale of how a Sierra rep told him very somberly that he made Roberta Williams cry with a review of one of her games. This was long after the fact, so why to you suppose she even brought it up?)


"do writers who go through several games a month and have piles of games that show up every week or so have a skewed perspective, relative to the readers for which we write?"

Now, to address the actual question (instead of the reason for your PR contact insisting on its truth)... mayhap we do. Then again, many of the readers I write for buy/play at least as many games as I do, so maybe our perspective isn't so out of touch with our primary audience?

There's no doubt that having to play and evaluate a game in a week isn't a good thing. It doesn't lead to a thorough analysis.

OTOH, gamers tend to play and discard a game after a session or two if they don't like it. They're being just as quick to judgement, if not quicker.

It's too bad reviewers simply won't say how long they've played a game and how far into they got. I think we all know that the majority of reviews are written without having finished the game. I just reviewed Dune for Gamespy, and while I did play through the Atreides campaign, I didn't finish the other two campaigns. Maybe those are fantastic or horrible -- I don't know, because I only played a couple of missions in each. I also played some multiplayer games, about 6 as I recall, but that experience won't match that of players in a few weeks who will have had dozens of multiplayer games under their belts. Whereas I suspect some unit imbalances, they'll find them and exploit them.

It's just a matter of time. Who has time to be exhaustive with 80 hour games? No one, unless the publications are willing to give reviews a couple of months to thoroughly play a game, and compensate them accordingly. Until then game reviews in the majority of cases are going to be based on an incomplete experience with the game.

And I know some mags and sites have a policy that says that reviewers must finish the game, but that policy isn't really policed. It's not policed because it's unreasonable. It's a policy for an ideal situation, one where reviewers have copious amounts of free time and can play a game from start to finish, play skirmish missions against the AI, and play enough multiplayer to evaluate that as well. That rarely happens.

When I was into reading car magazines in high schools (if you think gaming companies get po'd about reviews think how bazillion dollar car companies respond to bad reviews), a couple (Car & Driver and I think Motor Trend) would also do occasional long term updates on reviewed cars.

On the rare occasion, a car that seemed awful during the short-term testing done for review actually proved a good car in the long haul; in a lot of occasions, cars that seemed great in the short-term testing for review just fell apart in a year or two due to poor workmanship, bad electrical switches (British cars especially) and the like.

I dunno if that would apply to gaming, but I know some recent games that everyone raved about initially didn't, as it turns out, have "legs". I'll keep the games anonymous. :)

Black and White shall not be named in the above post.

- The Management

Heh - Black and White is still selling well, which surprises me. I didn't think it would tap into the mainstream market, but perhaps it has.

Of course it doesn't always take a lot of sales to make the top ten lists these days, so who knows how it's really selling?

"It's too bad reviewers simply won't say how long they've played a game and how far into they got."

Yes, exactly, my whole beef with Counter-Strike and a Man Who Shall Remain Nameless. Just be honest with your audience about how much you participate.

Speaking of which, Legends of Might and Magic is about to be released. I'll give you three guesses as to which game this title most resembles. Hint: it's not a game, it's a mod. And it's clearly not influencing the FPS industry at all.

"OTOH, gamers tend to play and discard a game after a session or two if they don't like it. They're being just as quick to judgement, if not quicker."

You can't reasonably expect someone to play a game they don't like. That said, what is the minimum amount of play time to write a competent review? For a terrible game? For a mediocre game? For a great game? I'm willing to let reviewers bail on titles they think truly suck, but other than that, they have to at least COMPLETE the game on NORMAL difficulty. None of this "I'll play it through really fast on easy" bullshit.

And as we saw with Kohan, multiplayer is a whole different story. Things that work in SP really do tend to break down in MP. Happens all the time, and it takes a lot of play time (and maybe even a couple patches) to deal with it.

"On the rare occasion, a car that seemed awful during the short-term testing done for review actually proved a good car in the long haul; in a lot of occasions, cars that seemed great in the short-term testing for review just fell apart in a year or two due to poor workmanship, bad electrical switches (British cars especially) and the like."

Yeah, I think CGM (or is it CGW? Or is it just CG? Oh no, I've gone crosseyed) has a column exactly like this now. Good call by whomever.

wumpus

"Yes, exactly, my whole beef with Counter-Strike and a Man Who Shall Remain Nameless. Just be honest with your audience about how much you participate."

That's your "beef" with me? That I've been dishonest to my audience about how much I participate?

Since you're calling me a liar, and since you're so keen on providing links, please give us one where I claim anything other than having occasionally played Counter-Strike over the last two years.

And when you can't find any such claim, please have the decency to apologize and then finally give it a rest.

-Tom

I'm just wondering what game this PR rep was repping. was it LOMM? if it was... well, they should just stick with homm and mm games! Do we REALLY need a fantasy counter-strike? they should have made a diablo rip-off instead, i would have bought that. anyway, rambling.

etc

>>It's too bad reviewers simply won't say how long they've played a game and how far into they got.

When relevant it should be mentioned. Most will say, "There's only 5 hours of gameplay" when it's noteworthy.

But when you say, "All reviews should have X, Y, Z," they get very formulaic.

>>I think we all know that the majority of reviews are written without having finished the game.

The majority? Hmm, maybe but consider the majority of games ARE easily finishable in a week or even a few days. The majority of games are incredibly simple and short. And what about race games, sports games, games like the Sims... some games have no finish/end in the traditional sense.

>>It's just a matter of time. Who has time to be exhaustive with 80 hour games?

How many 80 hour games are there? Very few. A few RPGs, and that's about it.

>>And I know some mags and sites have a policy that says that reviewers must finish the game, but that policy isn't really policed.

Well, if reviewers don't finish a game then they're matching 95% of the players (or some other arbitrary number, though Sierra used to use that about the completion rate for their adventure games).

Any reviewer worth a damn should ask for an extension if they do not feel comfortable writing a review. And any publication that rejects that request risks getting the reputation hit they deserve. Missing an issue or posting a review a day/week late isn't the end of the world. It's better to be last and "right" then first and totally off-base.

We give about two weeks for most games because, well, the majority of games can be played to completion in two weeks, whether it's completing all campaigns in a solo game and trying some multiplayer or getting a feel for an open-ended system. Our experiences will never perfectly match those of our players because, well... we all play games entirely differently. But we should strive to experience as much of the game as possible within a reasonable amount of time.

We don't state a "you must complete the game" policy because, well, DUH, of course you should complete the game; how else can you evaluate it properly? And if you can't, there should be a good reason for it, and that reason should be in your review. It can be, "The game goes on forever and gets so boring it's not worth completing," or "it's too freaking hard." Not, "I couldn't be bothered" or "my deadline hit."

>>I'll give you three guesses as to which game this title most resembles.

A fantasy online version of Rainbow Six without the planning?

>>Hint: it's not a game, it's a mod. And it's clearly not influencing the FPS industry at all.

Wow, one game! It's a virtual flood! Oh, and the original Capture the Flag for Quake is still the most influential mod of all time.

Here's a hint: you know what really influenced the game industry? Rainbow Six selling a million copies. That got everyone greenlighting tactical shooters.

Oh, and the Urban Terror mod for Quake III rocks.

"The majority? Hmm, maybe but consider the majority of games ARE easily finishable in a week or even a few days. The majority of games are incredibly simple and short. And what about race games, sports games, games like the Sims... some games have no finish/end in the traditional sense."

That's why I've always avoided reviewing RPGs. I enjoy them, but the way I like to play is to leisurely wander my way through the game. I can't imagine getting Baldur's Gate 2 and having to review it in two weeks.

There is a danger in not completing a game when writing about it. Let's say you complete two of three campaigns in a flight sim or strategy game, and then find out after you've turned in the article that there is a horrible problem in the third campaign.

The other issue, that I just suppose is a part of the business, is how a game "wears." I know of one of the FIFAs that I liked a lot when I was playing it for review, even though I realized that the pace of the game was a bit too fast and mentioned it. After playing the game a couple of months, that overly fast pace grew from a slight annoyance to a true irritation. I do like the idea of revisiting games in a magazine, but I imagine EICs like Steve would remind us that most readers don't want to read about a game that is months old (i.e., "yesterday's news.") Perhaps a "mea culpa" feature would be more fun: writers telling about a relatively recent review that they now feel that they blew. Hopefully that wouldn't be a feature that had a long queu of writers. ;)

"The other issue, that I just suppose is a part of the business, is how a game "wears.""

Great point. Sometimes your opinion of a game is modified not by playing the game more but from simply getting a little distance from it.

> Oh, and the Urban Terror mod for Quake III rocks.

I've been meaning to check that out.

I think a reviewer does not have any obligation to what a publisher percieves as the audience for their title. A publisher cannot dictate what their audience will be--they can only hope that people who like certain things like their game. They claim that a game is for a certain audience, but if it should break out of that audience, you won't see them complaining.

A reviewer's obligation is to the audience of their publication, NOT the game. The words you write are meant for the people who read it, not simply the people who play that game.

You should keep the intended audience in mind, of course--a review of a football game shouldn't slam it for not being fun because you don't like football--but you're writing that review for all who read it, not just sports fans.

How much should a reviewer play a game? That's a tough one. They should at least see all the game has to offer--which means finishing it if the game has a beginning and end and playing all the multiplayer maps and modes in actual real multiplayer environments (not just loading up the maps and running around solo). Several difficulty options should be explored if available. You have to know if the game is too hard or too easy, after all, and whipping through it on "easy mode" just to get to the end doesn't tell you much. Especially since, in many modern games, AI actually gets dumber on easier settings.

The tough games are things like Maxis titles. They have no end, and some have no difficulty settings. In the case of The Sims or SimCity, the reviewer has to play until they've experienced all the game has to offer, and it's hard to know exactly when that is.

What about Rollercoaster Tycoon? There's a finite number of scenarios, but to play through them all would take a LONG time. There's no way you could do them all and get a timely review out. I noticed an awful lot of reviews out there which featured screenshots only from the first three scenarios, though (the only ones unlocked from the start). That's just plain wrong.

Since this is sorta work related, I should say that all that is just my opinion, not the official editorial directive of CGM or anything like that.

I just installed Urban Terror today and it is fun. It took me a while to get used to it having played a lot of CS but after I figured it out it was good. There are a few minor issues with it:

1) If someone is connecting to the server and one team finishes off the other, the round doesn't end. The new spawn pops in and you have to kill him too.

2) Team spawn points are random for each side of the map. Some background: you start from different sides of the map every two rounds or so. In these two sides there are multiple places for your team to spawn. Sometimes you can literally be in contact with enemies in under 2 seconds. They have got to fix this, you can die before you figure out what happened.

The good points are, great graphics, smooth control, nice weapon models, good to excellent maps, and fun gameplay. My one tip is move carefully, you are almost always exposed from two or more sides and until you learn the maps you are going to be bitching up a storm when you get whacked and never see it coming. It took me 2 maps and about 40 minutes to get comfortable and I am a very competant CS player so don't get discouraged if you don't do well right off.

"We don't state a "you must complete the game" policy because, well, DUH, of course you should complete the game; how else can you evaluate it properly?"

Not so DUH after all-- I don't feel completing the game on 'easy' counts. It's not representative of how most people will play the game. And I know more than one review where this happened.

"Here's a hint: you know what really influenced the game industry? Rainbow Six selling a million copies. That got everyone greenlighting tactical shooters."

http://www.gamespy.com/stats

The connection between counter-strike and Rainbow 6 is illusory. I dislike R6, for one thing, and I have since the first time I installed the game in 1998. The gameplay is only superficially similar and in practical terms, it's radically different. The real magic is in the gameplay formula, not something pedestrian like the milieu. This is like arguing that all football games are the same.

As for the claim that CS is based on R6, this has already been debunked-- gooseman's first military themed mod, Navy Seals for Quake, predates R6 by over a year. I provided an URL in a previous discussion on this, so go look it up if you're bored. And if you're reading this, that's pretty much a given.

"That's your "beef" with me? That I've been dishonest to my audience about how much I participate?"

That's half of it; claiming to be a fan of the FPS genre, while refusing to recognize the impact of CS as de-facto most popular online FPS game ever is the other half.

I feel a large part of the delay in Team Fortress 2 is because Valve knows they can't release it until it offers a better multiplayer experience than Counter-Strike. Quite a tall order if you ask me.

Jeff,

I haven't enjoyed whatever your agenda is against me, but it's been easy enough to take in stride or ignore. However, your baseless accusations that I'm a liar aren't easy to ignore and they aren't welcome here.

I'm not joking when I say I hope you'll consider frequenting another message board instead of this one.

-Tom

"As for the claim that CS is based on R6, this has already been debunked-- gooseman's first military themed mod, Navy Seals for Quake, predates R6 by over a year. "

That has nothing to do with Steve's comment that R6 got the game industry to take notice of tactical shooters. R6 is the game that jumpstarted that genre, not CS. When Gooseman first started making shooter mods is meaningless. It was the sales success of R6 that got the industry's attention.

Good lord, how did this turn into ANOTHER thread about CS?

Even I wouldn't beat a dead horse for THAT long.

*wanders off, mumbling*

Where is that anonymous fellow when you need him.

Here I am!

I think wumpus's common sense died a long time ago, right about the moment when he realized he preferred arguing ceaselessly about software over self pleasure. Thus, he had a LOT of time to kill, a lot of holes in his day to fill that would otherwise have been spent satisfying himself ... ergo, the I Hate Tom Chick Crusade, which is a mental sort of what he was doing all along.

Mark Asher: Ban him! It's not censorship, it's self-preservation! It's no different from asking the guy urinating on your stoop to take his act on the road.

Man, you get around.

>>I don't feel completing the game on 'easy' counts. It's not representative of how most people will play the game. And I know more than one review where this happened.

Oh, most people play on "hard?" Most people don't finish games, as high as 95% in the old days according to Sierra. If that's true, using your logic reviewers shouldn't finish the game either.

I tend to play most FPS games on easy because, well, that's level I like to play. If it's too easy I ramp up the difficulty, and if a game is hard on easy, it's TOO HARD, period. So yes, that alone is a perfectly good reason to play on easy, one that's considerably more important to more people than if you can beat the game on the hardest skill level (which says more about the reviewer's skill).

I suspect the majority of players, the folks who don't post 20-30 messages/day, play on easy skill levels and still never finish the games.

>>The connection between counter-strike and Rainbow 6 is illusory.

Okay, read. "Influenced the industry." Sales influence the industry. Rainbow Six's sales influenced other people to fund "realistic" team-based 3D games. Counter-strike will influence gameplay for individual games.

>>I feel a large part of the delay in Team Fortress 2 is because Valve knows they can't release it until it offers a better multiplayer experience than Counter-Strike. Quite a tall order if you ask me.

It doesn't need to offer a better multiplayer experience, it just needs to offer better graphics to get people to switch. If it took a significantly better multiplayer experience, everyone would still be playing Quake II instead of Quake III. The multiplayer isn't that much better, but the graphics are.

I think adding a solo game is the problem... doing AI that works as a team seems beyond the grasp of most. SWAT 3 is probably the best, and it still does wonky things.

A relevant question on this topic (the original topic, not CS) is whether gamers are influenced by reviews at all when they make their purchase, and, if so, how many reviews they wait for before they buy a game.

Considering that most magazines publish reviews a couple of weeks after the initial release, the absence of print reviews and the pace of sales upon initial release can be tracked by those who have the data. The presence of a couple of hundred game review websites (mostly amateur) complicates this a little more.

As a gamer, I can only think of one game that I bought in the first week of its release in the last ten years - Europa Universalis - largely based on its reception in Europe where it had a long lead time to develop a following. Usually, I wait to see how the game is received in the general community before sinking my bucks in. Of course there is a large gaming population that does buy early - otherwise I couldn't follow their advice. I would wager, though, that most sales of computer and video games take place after the title has "sunk in" to the gaming consciousness and its merits can be properly evaluated.

As for me, I can spot a skunk in two screenshots. :-) Well, actually I consider the company releasing it and what their track record is. Also, if it's got any sort of licensing deal (Star Trek, Die Hard) I usually assume stink. Take for example Dune. Strike #1 is it's Westwood, who've been publishing the same RTS with graphical updates for 5 years now. Then throw in that it's a license deal. My wallet is safe.

If I want an opinion on a game, I wait until it's been on the shelf for about 4 days and then head to usenet. Then, if I see a lot of "AAAARG!" posts, I wait another week and check back. This is also beautiful for finding out if you're going to have a hardware bug issue... assuming you're running mainstream equipment in your box. When I write a review, I hit usenet for exactly this reason - because I can't have every config in the world and might miss that it doesn't work on any computer but mine or whatever.

Now... about that Counterstrike thing...

ALL OF YUO SMARTAE PANTS AMOOCHAR GAME REVIEWARZ KISS MY BUTT RIHGT IN TEH CRACK. I AM NOT LIKING TO HEAR THE BITCHING TAHT YOU BITCHEZ ARE BITCHING. STOP WITH TEH BITCHING, BITCHEZ. WUMPUS, YUOR NAEM SOUND LIKE WOOPASS, WHICH SI EGGSAKLY WHAT YOU ABOUT TO GET FROM ME - TEH ASS WOOPTED. I LIEK TOM CHICK (NOT IN A MAN-SEX0R WAY) AND THINK HE IS THE FUNNEY. YUO NOT TEH FUNNEY, YUO ARE THE GOATSE.

"A relevant question on this topic (the original topic, not CS) is whether gamers are influenced by reviews at all when they make their purchase, and, if so, how many reviews they wait for before they buy a game."

My guess is that reviews don't influence sales all that much. A game that's on track to sell 50,000 copies isn't going to see an increase and sell 250,000 copies because it gets good reviews.

OTOH, good reviews and good word-of-mouth will help. That 50,000 unit game might climb to 75,000 units.

From what I've seen, sales are influenced by the following factors in declining order of importance:

- brand recognition (EA Sports, Blizzard, etc.)
- market penetration (can't find, can't buy)
- game genre (flight sims lose, for example)
- marketing efforts
- word-of-mouth
- reviews

Negative word-of-mouth is probably a more powerful sales suppressant than a lot of other items.

Anon: "From what I've seen, sales are influenced by the following factors in declining order of importance..."

Where have you seen this? I'd be interested in having some context for this list. My experience as a reviewer, editor, and as a consumer was quite different.

"- brand recognition (EA Sports, Blizzard, etc.)"

Definitely true, but in very few cases. The two you list are prominent. I'd include id, Bullfrog (until recently), LucasArts (ditto), and that's about it. Valve has a chance at this type of immediate success. Beyond these few, though, the company making a game has little influence on how well a game sells. If it did, then every game would be a big seller considering there are only four or five major game publishers anymore. And probably even fewer recognizable developers.

"- market penetration (can't find, can't buy)"

I don't see how this affects someone's decision to buy a game, other than the obvious. Moreover, have you ever had trouble finding a game you wanted to buy? You can buy almost anything off the internet.

"- game genre"

Sure. But say someone wants a good FPS. How do they decide which one they want?

"- marketing efforts"

I can only speak from personal experience, but I've only once ever bought a game based on any sort of marketing, and that was Out of this World. Which was a good buy, admittedly, and I picked it up solely based on the quotes on the box. If you're specifically referring to an overall awareness of a game, then I'd agree. But...

"- word of mouth"

Should be at the top of your list. Big selling games are almost, entirely, because of word of mouth. Awareness makes people interested, but word of mouth sells 'em.

"- reviews"

I'd place this second, but only from personal experience. I still buy games based on reviews, and have only really been let down once (I Have No Mouth and I Must Scream, CGW's review, and I'll never forgive them).

-Ron

---

Quote:

I'd place this second, but only from personal experience. I still buy games based on reviews, and have only really been let down once (I Have No Mouth and I Must Scream, CGW's review, and I'll never forgive them).

---

Thing about reviews is that there seems to be no correlation between reviews and sales. If great reviews made a game sell, Freespace 2 wouldn't have tanked so badly. Earth 2150 is another game that got fine reviews and didn't sell diddly.

Then you can look at games like C&C 2 that got mediocre to poor reviews and still sold like gangbusters.

Gee, what a varied topic!

"The major accusation was that we can't relate to their target market. "
Isn't this a correct statement? Didn't we determine in another topic that you guys see yourselves writing for the "Whiners," "obsessives" and "hardcore?" If that is true, but the target market of a product is the casual (or mainstream) gamer, then it sounds like truth to me...

"Heh - Black and White is still selling well, which surprises me. I didn't think it would tap into the mainstream market, but perhaps it has. "
I thought so too--until I thought about the great list that everyone assembled on an old topic here about what would make a great mainstream game. B&W fills those criteria. It is non-violent, does not put time pressure on the player, features opportunities to build and manipulate, but doesn't hurt you if your choices are less than stellar. Really, it's a very forgiving game, and the monsters have huge "child" appeal. See? We already called it, but we forgot about it! Woo! Now, how do we make money off of our gestalt genius?


"The other issue, that I just suppose is a part of the business, is how a game "wears.""
This is brilliant. Instead of another "10 games we'd like to see" list, I'd love to see a few "games we still play six months (or a year or two) later." Not hall-of-famers, either. Those are great for nostalgia, but they don't help me TODAY. CGW used to have a great "Dumpster Diving" sidebar, and "Homegrown Gaming," but both went away right after I renewed. Come to think of it, I still haven't gotten any CDs from them, either... Anyhoos, Letting me know about games with replay value, or great old games that have had updates for newer OS, that would be fabulous, IMO.

"My guess is that reviews don't influence sales all that much. A game that's on track to sell 50,000 copies isn't going to see an increase and sell 250,000 copies because it gets good reviews. "
A good point. Do you think, though, that part of it might have to do with WHERE the review sees daylight? Gaming magazines (or "Nichy little gaming magazines," as new CGW editorial Grand Poobah Jeff Green had them described to him once)have hardcore audiences. Time, Maxim, Newsweek, Harper's, etc. have much broader impact, and much more timely reporting. I can get a short hit from, say, People, a few weeks after a "hot" new game hits, versus a full review in a game mag a few MONTHS later. It's not the message, methinks, but the strength of the voice, that is at issue here. I don't know how to help it, and don't blame the magazines for their distribution models, but there it is.

>Mark Asher: Ban him! It's not censorship, it's self-preservation!

You would think that someone posting anonymously here would realize that this particular forum software can't ban anyone. Because, you know, they can just post anonymously.

---

Quote:

This is brilliant. Instead of another "10 games we'd like to see" list, I'd love to see a few "games we still play six months (or a year or two) later."

---

Mainly due to my wife, we play a lot of the Sims and RCT. Caesar 3 is still one of my favories, and Warcraft 2 will likely never be uninstalled, just because we play it over the LAN so often.

TA, 4 years running, still on my hard drive. SMAC will probably be there at least that long. And The Ardennes Offensive, although I'm not sure offhand if the updated version is now more than 6 months old.

I've been playing a lot of my old Dreamcast games... Striker Pro 2000, Virtua Tennis, MDK2, etc. As for PC games, I've got too many new ones right now to play old ones. I've got this German Bundesliga Manager game from ca. 1991 that I still play quite a bit. I wish EA would implement some management features in its games. Premier League Manager isn't even as in-depth as this game.

MOM hold the record for time on hard drive for me. Gary Grigsby's Pacific War lived there for a long time, as did Command HQ and Silent Service 2. Civ 2 had a lot of staying power, and might get re-installed soon. And Dungeon Keeper 2, because sometimes it just feels good to be bad. AOE2 is still giving me hard battles at something around middle difficulty, and still looks great.

Master of Orion, the original, here.

It's been on hard drives (since the original drives have long since given up the ghost) here continually since release day in 1993. My wife still just refers to it as "that game".

--Dave

Man, I really like MOO much more than MOO2. I hope I don't end up saying that about MOO vs. MOO3.

I agree with Mark. MOO is far better to me than MOO2.

-- Xaroc

"I tend to play most FPS games on easy because, well, that's level I like to play. If it's too easy I ramp up the difficulty, and if a game is hard on easy, it's TOO HARD, period. So yes, that alone is a perfectly good reason to play on easy, one that's considerably more important to more people than if you can beat the game on the hardest skill level (which says more about the reviewer's skill)."

Still, I don't buy it. Why not play on "medium"? I'm not advocating everyone should play on "hard"-- I certainly don't-- it just doesn't seem logical to me that the majority of players would pick "easy" right out of the box. Most games default to medium.. wouldn't it be logical to play the game on the default difficulty setting? I think you could make a stronger case that most people don't adjust these settings, rather than explicitly picking "easy". And don't underestimate the implicit blow to the gamer's ego.

I think reviewers pick "easy" because they want to finish the game quickly for the review. That feels sorta like cheating to me. Shouldn't the reviewer be a bit like everyman gamer? Eg, play on the average, "standard" setting?

"Should be at the top of your list. Big selling games are almost, entirely, because of word of mouth. Awareness makes people interested, but word of mouth sells 'em."

True, but word of mouth only goes so far. Undying had strong word of mouth but still underperformed. Ditto for Battlezone which should be a poster child for this. (Don't get fooled by the execrable Battlezone II, though)

"It was the sales success of R6 that got the industry's attention."

And what do you think drives sales of Half-Life even today? We need that CD-key to play. They badly need to move to a monthly subscription fee for these keys, though.

"Sales influence the industry."

See above, plus CS retail, which outsold Sacrifice for the record. I'm going off # of appearances in the PC data top 10 lists here for my data.

"However, your baseless accusations that I'm a liar aren't easy to ignore and they aren't welcome here."

Perceived. And when have I called you a liar? Besides, you always lie. Can you cut that out already?

"You would think that someone posting anonymously here would realize that this particular forum software can't ban anyone. Because, you know, they can just post anonymously."

If anonymous has an issue with me, I encourage him to e-mail me directly.

"True, but word of mouth only goes so far. Undying had strong word of mouth but still underperformed. Ditto for Battlezone which should be a poster child for this."

There's a difference between word of mouth among hardcore gamers (i.e. the Usenet, which probably reaches a lot fewer potential people than you'd think), and the sort of word of mouth that, say, Black & White has been getting. Or the kind of word of mouth that the Sims has been getting.

>>it just doesn't seem logical to me that the majority of players would pick "easy" right out of the box.

What's your basis for knowing what the majority of players do? I don't know if games default to "easy" or medium: many give an option when you start a new game and you have to click on one of them.

But my point is really that to truly judge a game's difficulty play on easy. If it's anything but a cakewalk it's not an easy game and therefore likely too hard. (And if it is a cakewalk, I'll usually up the difficulty.)

>>I think reviewers pick "easy" because they want to finish the game quickly for the review. That feels sorta like cheating to me. Shouldn't the reviewer be a bit like everyman gamer? Eg, play on the average, "standard" setting?

Again, if we're trying to be like the everyman gamer, we probably wouldn't finish the game at all. I'm not really trying to be like everyman gamer since I don't know everyman gamer. I only know me. And generally when judging a game's difficulty, which is incredibly hard (if not impossible) to do, I find that if a game is hard on easy, it's too hard.

>>True, but word of mouth only goes so far. Undying had strong word of mouth but still underperformed. Ditto for Battlezone which should be a poster child for this.

You need critical mass to go into the mainstream, and that's where those titles failed.

>>And what do you think drives sales of Half-Life even today? We need that CD-key to play.

You betcha it's the CD-kay, absolutely.

>>See above, plus CS retail, which outsold Sacrifice for the record. I'm going off # of appearances in the PC data top 10 lists here for my data.

Appearances in PC Data aren't particularly meaningful, but I'd guess Countter-strike outsold Sacrifice. And your point is? Sacrifice is highly unlikely to influence the industry. Counter-strike will, sure. But it's not the most influential mod--Zoid's Capture the Flag is/was, as it's been adopted as a standard "mod" (or multiplayer type) in almost every game made today, or at least variations thereof. Including Counter-strike.

>>Again, if we're trying to be like the everyman gamer, we probably wouldn't finish the game at all. I'm not really trying to be like everyman gamer since I don't know everyman gamer. I only know me. And generally when judging a game's difficulty, which is incredibly hard (if not impossible) to do, I find that if a game is hard on easy, it's too hard.

I consider myself an "everyman gamer" and whoever designed the EASY setting for Aliens vs Predator is a complete and utter sadist. I gave it a few tries and haven't loaded it sense.

-DavidCPA

David,
You really should try again (and keep trying). It's an excellent, excellent game (pre-save patch or post).

-Andrew

"What's your basis for knowing what the majority of players do? I don't know if games default to "easy" or medium: many give an option when you start a new game and you have to click on one of them."

Sure we do. Game designers shoot for the median, right? In PC system requirements as well as difficulty. They develop for medium difficulty and expect that most people will experience the game this way (it is the default, after all). The tweaks for 'easy' and 'hard' are somewhat artificial in comparison and certainly don't receive the same level of design or testing as the default difficulty.

"But my point is really that to truly judge a game's difficulty play on easy. If it's anything but a cakewalk it's not an easy game and therefore likely too hard. (And if it is a cakewalk, I'll usually up the difficulty.)"

It seems odd to start at the low end of the spectrum here. Why not just play on the default difficulty, and only mention it if you actually do have to move to "easy" or "difficult" to get an acceptable game experience?

Isn't it fair to say that your magazine audience consists of seasoned gamers who will pick the average difficulty? (some may even pick hard, though I typically don't). Now if you were writing for FamilyPC or what have you, picking easy would make more sense.

"Sure we do. Game designers shoot for the median, right?"

Oversimplification error: "Game designers" are not a homogeneous lot. These guys are as idiosynchratic as musicians or artists, and to try to generalize their intentions is to fall into an assumption trap. Spend some time chatting with game designers and you'll find some who want their games to be accessible to everyone, and some who feel that you should be a gaming stud to enjoy their product. Some who think you should be able to play the game in any way you choose, and others who don't want you to be able to save in the middle of a session or who feel that you should be forced to prove yourself by completing certain levels at a high difficulty level before accessing other parts of the game.

Personally I've always defaulted on Medium difficulty for Shooters and Strategy Games. But I don't object to Steve's reasoning for playing on Easy. This one I mean:

"And generally when judging a game's difficulty, which is incredibly hard (if not impossible) to do, I find that if a game is hard on easy, it's too hard."

This policy would work, and be applicable to almost every game out there. But you'd have to be careful about not knocking the AI unfairly (if difficulty influences AI) or the length (if difficulty makes the game feel short). If Difficulty = Fewer Monsters or Less Damage, then you're fine.

I remember reading a review that said "Serious Sam" was too short and easy. Short, maybe. But it's a freaking arcade game. Don't whine if you completed it on Easy in 6 hours. I guarantee it'll take you longer on Hard.

But Steve is --easily-- talented & experienced enough to spot incidents like those. I'd warn novice reviewers from doing it though, it can be a trap. I'd tell them to play on Medium, to more accurately (safely) judge the game.

-Andrew

Wow lots to talk about in this one. I don't think reviews amount to much when looking at the PC Data top ten. I think a review of a game created by an ind. developer or a small publishing house has a lot more impact than a review of an EA game.

I still believe that most people that read reviews are doing so to justify their own opinion. I seriously doubt that out of all the games I've reviewed that many people have said, "Wow man..Abner loved it..I gotta get this!" I think a lot more have said, "Wow man that Abner guy is an idiot, NHL 2000 rocks!" Gaming mags and websites cater to hardcore gamers, and prolly always will. And hardcore gamers do not = big sales. The list of games that the press drools over but the masses are lukewarm towards is long and varied. (Kohan, Sacrifice, System Shock..you could literally fill a book with them). And, just like the music biz, most (not all) of the really popular stuff I think is complete garbage.

As for how much of a game needs to be played in order for a critic to review it--well I think that depends entirely on the type of game you are evaluating. It doesn't take as long to review a baseball game that it does a 5-CD RPG. I also don't feel that every game that has an "ending" needs to be 100% finished in order for a review to be written by an experienced writer/gamer. Let's say that the campaign in a strategy game has 25 missions. If I get through 20 missions and the game just flat out stinks..I feel I have the savvy to stop playing and give countless reasons as to why said game stinks and if it took 20 missions for it to get "good" then it's not worth the effort in the first place. And if the game is so good that it makes me as a gamer WANT to finish it that should be made clear in the text.

As for Jeff's original message..most reviewers are out of touch a bit. I think that is impossible to avoid when you play almost EVERYTHING on the market. How many "joe gamers" play as many different types of games than an active freelance writer? Not many, I'd wager. When you get to play everything and test a wide variety of games, I think it's only natural to lose touch a bit with how the average person looks at games. But, and this is why that PR lady is a doofus, that's not out job. The job is to evaluate software, not be sociologists. And I think a lot of writers continue to play games after a review--but only the good ones. I stop playing most games after the review is over mainly because I think most games are fairly average and I'm not gonna contimue to play something if I'm not having a good time. But there are games that have been on my HD for years. So nuts to her.

"Why not just play on the default difficulty, and only mention it if you actually do have to move to "easy" or "difficult" to get an acceptable game experience?"

That's another way to do it. Is it better? Everyone plays games (and evaluates them) differently.

"Isn't it fair to say that your magazine audience consists of seasoned gamers who will pick the average difficulty? (some may even pick hard, though I typically don't)."

I dunno, is it? I think it's a misperception (especially among game developers) that hardcore gamer = enjoys really difficult games. There's this idea, and it's probably a holdover from the days of the unbeatable arcade game, that people play games for the challenge.

I think most people probably play games for the experience first, and only care about how difficult or easy a game is if it affects the experience one way or the other. Many of my favorite games of all time are actually really easy games (Wishbringer, Full Throttle, et al), but that barely enters into whether and why I like them.

I try to play on the default difficulty level, with the assumption that it's the setting used by the testers to balance the game. However, two games immediately come to mind as exceptions to this rule: Goldeneye and Thief. These games offered a different experience by way of making me play differently. It's such a shame that many too many developers automatically associate "harder" with "more enemies."

- Alan

"It's such a shame that many too many developers automatically associate "harder" with "more enemies."

Another small indicator of how far ahead of its time Goldeneye really was. Even today, I'm amazed-- and I remember being totally floored in 1997.

Do they have a time machine over there at RARE, or what?

"I dunno, is it? I think it's a misperception (especially among game developers) that hardcore gamer = enjoys really difficult games. There's this idea, and it's probably a holdover from the days of the unbeatable arcade game, that people play games for the challenge."

We've discussed this before, and I think I agree with Steve on this point. What we actually want is the _perception_ of difficulty; eg, we are challenged enough to make the game interesting while never crossing that fine line into frustration.

Ideally, the game would auto-adjust difficulty so that our character was always in danger but never overwhelmed. A good example of how not to do this is in Unreal Tournament. Ever played a UT game with the bots set to "auto adjust" skill level? When I tried it a few times, the bots always ended up on godlike skill level... and getting creamed by robotic aim precision is no fun at all.

However, I don't think this logic maps to choosing the "easy" skill level.