31.10.06
A perfunctory note regarding my review structure and ratings
Part the First.
This is a work in progress. I'm convinced it's not the best way to do things, but I'm equally certain it'll have to do for now.
That said, I approach games with a peculiar hierarchy of concerns:
1. Story comes first in my book. This doesn't mean a game needs a strong central story; it could, like the original Fallout, feature strong storytelling without presenting a complex story. Alternatively, you may encounter games like Morrowind, where a potentially intriguing story is compromised by poor pacing and delivery, or the original Gothic, where the gameworld is brought to vivid life despite a weak central story. The game's setting or gameplay mechanics may even be so richly realized that players create their own compelling narratives of their experience, as in Half-Life 2. In all of these contexts, Story or Narrative is my first criterion for a game's success.
In weaker moments, I may attempt to justify this orientation with resort to pseudoscientific babble about humans being narrative creatures. I don't really believe this, however.
Narrative isn't universal in games. Many prominent games succeed despite lacking any narrative bent - e.g., Nintendo's classic platformers, fighting games like Soul Calibur, or online titles like Unreal Tournament. Great gameplay creates its own structured experience (which may even mirror or create narrative structures, but that's another discussion for another time). But I'm most interested in digital entertainment which bundles storytelling as some part of the package.
2. To me, Gameplay comprises everything from user interface to character system. How's the inventory? Is that heaven-hyped radial menu even marginally usable? Does the character development process offer flexibility and multiple solutions? Are different skills actually useful? Is the game balanced, and what does that even mean? Does the game make sense? Depending on the "genre" in question (momentarily leaving aside the significant problem with using "genre" to refer to formal distinctions such as "role-playing game", "first-person shooter", etc.), this is pretty broad territory and is likely to account for most of any review.
3. Lowest on the hierarchy of empirical judgment is Art, Graphics and Sound. Nothing to see here - move along.
4. Finally, technical Stability is a vitally important concern, but I place it last for a few reasons. First, I make no attempt to test any games on a range of hardware; I have exactly one (1) gaming computer, so my technical experience with the game is extremely narrow. Second, this can change dramatically over the lifetime of the game, and I don't expect to re-evaluate old reviews based on newer patches. In other words: Caveat emptor.
Part the Second.
Game review ratings are total bunk. Internets forum superstar aweigh nicely summed up our current catastrophe in a post at RPG Codex: "The general rule of thumb when using reviews to evaluate a modern game is: If it scores 95% or higher, it is closer to a 70%; if it scores anywhere between 80% to 95% then it's closer to an actual 75-80%. If it scores 65-75%, BUT the review mainly criticizes bugs or lack of flashy graphics, then it's actually a 90%+ title and should be played immediately." And never mind the steady bastardization of any serious gaming journalism these days; there's also the fact that ratings are, at bottom, an attempt to quantify a fundamentally subjective reaction.
Yet we seem to be stuck with them. How many of you really care to read a review without being given, up front, the convenient narrative frame provided by an overall rating? In attempt to more effectively address the teeming masses who purchased Oblivion and still (against all available evidence) believe it to be an acceptable product of human industry, I provide you, dear readers, with a minimalist ratings system of four wacky Soviet-era Cosmonauts.
Why four Cosmonauts, exactly? Mostly for just enough granularity to reflect large differences between games, but not so much that I'm tempted into the delusion of mathematical exactness. And I don't want the luxury of cowering behind a non-committal rating like "3 out of 5".
Without further ado:
This game is bad - like really, RILLY bad. It is, in point of fact, the basest imaginable perversion of modern experiential technologies and their almost limitless liberatory potential.
This game possesses redeeming features; I may even discuss them in my review. On balance, however, I'd rather have watched re-runs of "Arrested Development" (which isn't necessarily that bad, because I really like "Arrested Development").
This game offers more good than bad. It may be a deeply-flawed masterpiece or a well-executed workaday genre piece. Most likely, it's a mix of positive and negative which nevertheless, at the end of the day, is judged to have been well worth this humble reviewer's time.
Nothing's perfect in these latter days of the law, but such titles are the creme de la creme, the empyrean echelon of videogame design. Their achievement may be contextual, remarkable partly for their time and place, but it's equally likely to be timeless. These are your proverbial "desert island" games . . . assuming your particular island also offers a sufficiently powerful computer and abundant non-metered electricity.
Of course, all of these judgments are simply that: judgments. More to the point, they're my judgments, which means they might not be your judgments. In fact, they will not be your judgments; I forbid it, and share them with you solely to provide fair warning of precisely that which you may not believe.
Part the First.
This is a work in progress. I'm convinced it's not the best way to do things, but I'm equally certain it'll have to do for now.
That said, I approach games with a peculiar hierarchy of concerns:
1. Story comes first in my book. This doesn't mean a game needs a strong central story; it could, like the original Fallout, feature strong storytelling without presenting a complex story. Alternatively, you may encounter games like Morrowind, where a potentially intriguing story is compromised by poor pacing and delivery, or the original Gothic, where the gameworld is brought to vivid life despite a weak central story. The game's setting or gameplay mechanics may even be so richly realized that players create their own compelling narratives of their experience, as in Half-Life 2. In all of these contexts, Story or Narrative is my first criterion for a game's success.
In weaker moments, I may attempt to justify this orientation with resort to pseudoscientific babble about humans being narrative creatures. I don't really believe this, however.
Narrative isn't universal in games. Many prominent games succeed despite lacking any narrative bent - e.g., Nintendo's classic platformers, fighting games like Soul Calibur, or online titles like Unreal Tournament. Great gameplay creates its own structured experience (which may even mirror or create narrative structures, but that's another discussion for another time). But I'm most interested in digital entertainment which bundles storytelling as some part of the package.
2. To me, Gameplay comprises everything from user interface to character system. How's the inventory? Is that heaven-hyped radial menu even marginally usable? Does the character development process offer flexibility and multiple solutions? Are different skills actually useful? Is the game balanced, and what does that even mean? Does the game make sense? Depending on the "genre" in question (momentarily leaving aside the significant problem with using "genre" to refer to formal distinctions such as "role-playing game", "first-person shooter", etc.), this is pretty broad territory and is likely to account for most of any review.
3. Lowest on the hierarchy of empirical judgment is Art, Graphics and Sound. Nothing to see here - move along.
4. Finally, technical Stability is a vitally important concern, but I place it last for a few reasons. First, I make no attempt to test any games on a range of hardware; I have exactly one (1) gaming computer, so my technical experience with the game is extremely narrow. Second, this can change dramatically over the lifetime of the game, and I don't expect to re-evaluate old reviews based on newer patches. In other words: Caveat emptor.
Part the Second.
Game review ratings are total bunk. Internets forum superstar aweigh nicely summed up our current catastrophe in a post at RPG Codex: "The general rule of thumb when using reviews to evaluate a modern game is: If it scores 95% or higher, it is closer to a 70%; if it scores anywhere between 80% to 95% then it's closer to an actual 75-80%. If it scores 65-75%, BUT the review mainly criticizes bugs or lack of flashy graphics, then it's actually a 90%+ title and should be played immediately." And never mind the steady bastardization of any serious gaming journalism these days; there's also the fact that ratings are, at bottom, an attempt to quantify a fundamentally subjective reaction.
Yet we seem to be stuck with them. How many of you really care to read a review without being given, up front, the convenient narrative frame provided by an overall rating? In attempt to more effectively address the teeming masses who purchased Oblivion and still (against all available evidence) believe it to be an acceptable product of human industry, I provide you, dear readers, with a minimalist ratings system of four wacky Soviet-era Cosmonauts.
Why four Cosmonauts, exactly? Mostly for just enough granularity to reflect large differences between games, but not so much that I'm tempted into the delusion of mathematical exactness. And I don't want the luxury of cowering behind a non-committal rating like "3 out of 5".
Without further ado:
This game is bad - like really, RILLY bad. It is, in point of fact, the basest imaginable perversion of modern experiential technologies and their almost limitless liberatory potential.
This game possesses redeeming features; I may even discuss them in my review. On balance, however, I'd rather have watched re-runs of "Arrested Development" (which isn't necessarily that bad, because I really like "Arrested Development").
This game offers more good than bad. It may be a deeply-flawed masterpiece or a well-executed workaday genre piece. Most likely, it's a mix of positive and negative which nevertheless, at the end of the day, is judged to have been well worth this humble reviewer's time.
Nothing's perfect in these latter days of the law, but such titles are the creme de la creme, the empyrean echelon of videogame design. Their achievement may be contextual, remarkable partly for their time and place, but it's equally likely to be timeless. These are your proverbial "desert island" games . . . assuming your particular island also offers a sufficiently powerful computer and abundant non-metered electricity.
Of course, all of these judgments are simply that: judgments. More to the point, they're my judgments, which means they might not be your judgments. In fact, they will not be your judgments; I forbid it, and share them with you solely to provide fair warning of precisely that which you may not believe.
Labels: review
¶ 19:31
