Is Metacritic Damaging the Games Industry?

[mindcycle]

It?s fair to say that the founders of Metacritic never foresaw it generating the attention it has attracted.? ?Intended as a way of seeing at a glance whether a game was worth buying,? ?it?s now used as a measure of game quality by the largest publishers,? ?developers and retailers.?

John Riccitiello has used its scores to define EA?s business strategy to analysts?; ?Steam prominently displays them on its product pages?; ?developer Frontier uses them for sales forecasting.?

And this simple set of numbers is deemed responsible for many industry ills,? ?from over-examination of review scores to influencing developer royalties.? ??I?ve heard that publishers will try to put a step in royalty levels depending on Metacritic scores,? ?or some sort of Metacritic-related compensation structure to a deal,?? ?says Andy Eades,? ?development director at Relentless.?

Metacritic is still edited by just one man,? ?Marc Doyle.? ?But his focus remains very much on the reason why it was established in the first place.? ??I really see myself as a kind of gatekeeper to tell people that these are the games you should be paying attention to,?? ?he declares.? ?His role is to gather scores and comments for every game released in the? ?US,? ?choosing which publications are included and concocting the formula that? ?combines them into a single number.?

Read the rest here: http://www.edge-online.com/fea...umbers-game?page=0%2C0

 

[videogames101]

Fail article is fail. See, metacritic can more accurately rate a game than any single game review site, and the thing is, it's still just reviews, and any gamer knows just going by reviews is not a good way to buy games. Instead of combing a bunch of review sites, I just check out metacritic.

Funny thing is, if you look at the top 10 games, we see that metacritic usually judges quality fairly well.

 

[coloumb]

I don't see anything wrong with it - basically he's just taking the average rating for the game from various sources:

"Both work on the same principle,? ?however:? ?consistently include enough reviews from enough? ?publications across enough games and the results will smooth out.? ??A big game? ? ?one of the GTAs? ? ?I know Edge is going to review it,? ?and I know an? ?easy grader will too,? ?and so the big games will get the same treatment,?? ?Doyle explains.? ?If I include all your reviews and all theirs,? ?it all works out.?? ?"

And hey - if companies want to determine the type of bonus the devs get based on review scores - more power to them. Compare it to 2 kids who want to shovel your driveway - one does a sub-par job while the other does a premium job - which one would I give an extra $5 too? The kid who does the better job.

 

[chizow]

Metacritic is still edited by just one man,? ?Marc Doyle.? ?But his focus remains very much on the reason why it was established in the first place.? ??I really see myself as a kind of gatekeeper to tell people that these are the games you should be paying attention to,?? ?he declares.? ?His role is to gather scores and comments for every game released in the? ?US,? ?choosing which publications are included and concocting the formula that? ?combines them into a single number.?

I don't have a problem with Metacritic itself, as its a composite score and certainly a better than any single review.

The quoted portion above is a bit concerning and something I've heard before, where there is some subjectivity from the editor in cases the original review/sites do not use numeric ratings or percentages. In those cases I've read he assigns a somewhat arbitrary valuation based on the comments of the review. Even in a case like 5/5 or 4/5, you wouldn't get 100% or 80%, you'd get something somewhere inbetween based on the editing of a single person.

I'd say the editor should come up with some kind of committee or ask the original sites to assign actual values themselves so that one individual isn't the only "gatekeeper" in compiling the composite scores.

 

[mindcycle]

I agree with you guys. I don't think there is really anything wrong with metacritic itself or how he comes up with the overall score. It's just another review in a way. It's really up to the gamer to decide for themselves. One of the problems addressed in the article is when companies start using it to gauge success or failure of a game instead of using hard data like sales figures. That can can lead to internal problems like cut bonuses, the publisher not picking up a sequel, etc.. Now, no one but the publisher would know if they are actually using it for that, but it hints at the fact that companies like EA might be.

Remember awhile back when Edios hired a firm to help keep the metacritic score for Tomb Raider Underworld up during the first few days? They encouraged review sites that were going to publish low scoring reviews to hold it back a few days. That's obviously taking it a bit too far, but you can't blame them for thinking it may effect sales. People are fickle after all, and many will just believe whatever they read.

 

[Hacp]

Originally posted by: videogames101
Fail article is fail.

That phrase is so annoying.

 

[shingletingle]

Originally posted by: Hacp

Originally posted by: videogames101
Fail article is fail.

That phrase is so annoying.

Agreed. And so is when people say "This."

 

[lozina]

Yes, it is.

It is damaging the lousy games industry who have enjoyed being able to influence all the bigtime PC Game reviewers into awarding them high remarks.

But hopefully it will result in more quality games which people will love and won't need so much BS hype and fabricated reviews to sell. Sort of like how games were in the mid 90's.

 

[Fenixgoon]

Originally posted by: lozina
Yes, it is.

It is damaging the lousy games industry who have enjoyed being able to influence all the bigtime PC Game reviewers into awarding them high remarks.

But hopefully it will result in more quality games which people will love and won't need so much BS hype and fabricated reviews to sell. Sort of like how games were in the mid 90's.

john romero is going to make you his bitch

 

[Dkcode]

Originally posted by: lozina
Yes, it is.

It is damaging the lousy games industry who have enjoyed being able to influence all the bigtime PC Game reviewers into awarding them high remarks.

But hopefully it will result in more quality games which people will love and won't need so much BS hype and fabricated reviews to sell. Sort of like how games were in the mid 90's.

^

 

[BladeVenom]

"Is Metacritic Damaging the Games Industry? " No, shitty games are. Metacritic is just keeping score.

 

[Daverino]

It's not damaging the game industry any more than rottentomatoes.com is damaging Hollywood.

 

[ViviTheMage]

Originally posted by: videogames101
Fail article is fail. See, metacritic can more accurately rate a game than any single game review site, and the thing is, it's still just reviews, and any gamer knows just going by reviews is not a good way to buy games. Instead of combing a bunch of review sites, I just check out metacritic.

Funny thing is, if you look at the top 10 games, we see that metacritic usually judges quality fairly well.

end of thread...that is the point. I will see movies think are crappy and I will love it. I will play games people think suck and I will love it.

personal preference, that is all a review is.