Negative Reviews - As Bad as Piracy?

Haha, another one! I consider it my duty to the game to aid its ascent into the realms of Sleeper Hit/Cult Classic. That way, five years down the road, somebody might haul out the Alpha Protocol IP and decide to make a new game or spiritual sequel.

( That I will then proceed to lambast for betraying the essence of the game in order to appeal to the lowest common casual denominator. )

I used to play WRP Gs almost exclusively, with only a few JRP Gs like Chrono Trigger and some of the early FF games catching my eye. Then I played Persona 3, which introduced me to the greater SMT series. And those games kick ass, and I'll never say a word against JRP Gs again.

Aren't JRPGs just a divergent evolution of WRPGs anyway? What's the big hangup regarding the two?

I wouldn't say they are a divergent evolution, because the originating titles, like Wizardry, barely have any resemblance to *either* JRP Gs or WRP Gs, in the contemporary sense. They were basically pure stat-based dungeon crawls, lacking in plot or characterization or meaningful choice.

From this common origin, designers went in different directions. Japanese designers kept the linear dungeon focus, but added progressively more and more characterization and plot, until they arrived at the modern form. Western designers, meanwhile, expanded upon character creation such that you could build your own character meaningfully, and then have them take different routes through the world ( literal or figurative ); thus, the non-linear WRPG with the branching paths.

As long as we're comparing RPG cred, my first ever one was the original Eye Of The Beholder, which is probably why AD&D games hold a special place in my heart =)

Another contributor to WRPG elitism is that until the 2000s very few of them were of the pick-up-and-play variety, even the dungeon crawlers. You'd have to at least read the manual, or do trial and error until you achieve the equivalent of having done so - "intuitive controls" weren't so intuitive when Diablo came out, I still facepalm when I remember how it took me a week to figure out how to learn and cast spells in the demo. Granted, I was ten, and my grasp of English was still poor, but that was my third year of being a True PC Gamer, I was supposed to know better. These days, you can't take a step in any game, RPG especially, without the game trying to hold your hand even against your will. Dragon Age, you and your needless penchant to restart the tutorials from scratch for EVERY DLC CAMPAIGN is maddening.

Bumping with this tidbit.

http://multiplayerblog.mtv.com/2008/05/29/low-metacritic-costs-developers/

Apparently developers lose money if reviews are low...

Why do they even put up with this garbage?

Personally, I don't really see this as a problem between reviewers and developers as much as a problem between developers and the people who pay them. I'd say it's a pretty undesireable practice, since it increases the pressure on reviewers to inflate scores, but you simply cannot hold a reviewer responsible for someone else holding back a developer's pay. Reviewers have a responsibility to tell it like it is, and if that leads to a developer losing some money, well, that's unfortunate, but making sure the public has accurate information is more important.

I think the true fact of the problem is, most reviewers (in our part of the internet) are white, raised among the environment of Western games. To expect them altruistically review any game without flaw is baseless.

It takes a certain kind of person who's about 4 parts gamer, 4 parts writer, and 2 parts experience, to make a reviewer that doesn't just either swat or sway the afterthoughts of any single game

. . . wait, what? Is that some kind of satire, or are you just horribly racist?

HAHA. RACIST. THAT'S A GOOD ONE. We all know that you can't be racist against white people, Metaphysician.

Seriously, though. Look at her(?) avatar. That gives away the fact that she's completely serious.

edited 16th Mar '11 8:39:13 AM by Pyroninja42

I thought the moral of the post was that non-white reviewers are less likely to take bribes from publishers, and are therefore more trustworthy...

Which is still pretty racist... >.<

Er. Well, I agree that the statistical probability is that most reviewers are white. I'm not sure what you mean by the "environment of Western games," so I'll skip that bit. As to that last sentence, are you saying that white, Western reviewers are inherently untrustworthy, or am I missing something here? And what does that have to do with the whole developer pay thing? I'm not seeing the connection there.

edited 17th Mar '11 3:21:11 AM by CactuarJoe

I wonder how much it costs to buy a review. I would only sell my integrity for cold hard cash, none of this free stuff bullshit.

Sorry for 'seeming' like a racist, but you don't see any Asians appear to write reviews as widely available as westerners. My point of the post was, reviewers (which I implied, mostly white) are likely to judge western game genres in a more positive light, while bias against oriental games. I won't say that there aren't ones who judge them fairly, but with the point being that major game review sites like to slam on them (oriental games) all the same, it brings up the problematic fact that there's gaming descrimination

As for how it affects sales, and about whether or not reviewers were bribed in the process, I don't have conclusive proof. It does prove by itself that reviewers of the type that I speak of affect the sales of No Export for You games, complicating the opinions towards them. It's also a display of idiocy when some games which were influenced by Japanese game elements, mixed and improved, were reviewed as unplayable. Laughable reviewers...

edited 17th Mar '11 9:07:44 AM by Cassie

I have to say, I haven't seen the same thing. Yes, there are reviewers with a bias against games made outside of the western hemisphere, but there are at least as many with a bias in the opposite direction. Major review sites like 1Up, Gamespot and IGN have a lot of problems, but I don't think widespread bias against eastern developers is one of them.