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[Graven]

Ok, last post from me because my exam the day after tomorrow won't be passing itself

Nenjin, I appreciate you having inside knowledge, but you should consider this - video game journalism has little to nothing to do with writing video game reviews. Journalistic integrity is because journalists are supposed to bring us the truth about events. Video game criticism *should* be dealing with stuff like systematic approach and disassembling video games for our convenience, but it's not. It's about blasting an exclusive review of new stuff before the competition in order to gain traffic to the website and profit from ads.

I'm actually inclined to consider almost all reviews of "art" as pointless, because I'll be damned before I let some moron tell me whether or not I should like a movie, but then along comes stuff as Red Letter Media's utter and total deconstruction of the Star Wars prequels and that has so much "insider" info - like camera work, character development and stuff that it proves me dead wrong. But that's a rather rare occurrence, sadly.

Gamespot could take the time to play the game seriously but it won't be of any help at all, because any one of us can do that. We probably have even greater competency on the subject. The only thing they can do is save us the time to personally wade through every single game out there. Sure, we all hope to get at least some useful insight from reviews, but whereas, say, video card reviews get into the design of the hardware, the limitations of said design, the used technologies - all stuff most of us either know from reading a lot about, or work. Compare an average review of a video game - there's nothing exclusive about the review, in fact, after playing most of us probably prove the reviews we've read wrong on a number of points. We read them to get a general idea of the game, and I think a lot of people file the games they've read about in four or so categories - "shit I won't like", "shit I might like", "good game I might like", "good game I might not like".

Come to think of it, though, it might be because I'm writing from the point of view of a nerd. But, hey, we're on the DWARF FORTRESS forums. If a nerd remains misunderstood here, what's the world come to

Oh and I disagree - facts aren't subjective. They wouldn't be "facts" if they were Consider a fact like "XXX game has better graphics than YYY game". There's nothing subjective about that. Or "XXX is better optimized than YYY". Again, nothing subjective.

And about Yahtzee - there's no way he says "fuck it" to professionalism, since there IS no professionalism in video game criticism You're contradicting yourself - if everything about games is subjective, even facts, then there's no way his opinions are wrong, and thus - a big punch in the face. And I personally have said numerous times why I consider him the best in current video game criticism.

Oh, and I like reading too! And writing, too, but I haven't had time for it lately

[Akhier the Dragon hearted]

Sorry, no game has been in constant development for 10 years at the scope of DF. Not WoW, not any MMO, no epic rogue-like. It's simply not the kind of game reviewers will probably ever be confronted with reviewing. (Although I know just about all of them are aware of DF.) It's just not relevant to this discussion, until we start seeing an entirely different kind of game become popular. At most, 40 hours will tell you everything you need to know about a game coming out today by mainstream publishers. And you don't even need 1/10th of that in most cases.

Hell, I reviewed DF for another site, and I think after 20 hours and 4 pages, I'd still barely scratched the surface. If there were more games like that coming out now, I'd say you have point. But there aren't. There's just DF.

Yes it has been in developement for longer then any game a reviewer will see so you win, all games except for DF are uncomplex cakewalks where you see all of the content on one play through.

[nenjin]

Compare an average review of a video game - there's nothing exclusive about the review, in fact, after playing most of us probably prove the reviews we've read wrong on a number of points. We read them to get a general idea of the game, and I think a lot of people file the games they've read about in four or so categories - "shit I won't like", "shit I might like", "good game I might like", "good game I might not like".

That's my point. There's nothing exclusive. These review sites are built entirely on ad dollar, it's debatable whether or not they bring anything else to the table for us as consumers. Ex: Dungeons is coming out. There are a fuck ton of previews for it, on sites beneath Gamespy, Gamespot, IGN, Kotaku ect...all of them saying the same thing. "We loved Dungeon Keeper. Something like it is coming out! Here's the feature list they said! WOOT!"

There are literally hundreds of these reviews sites out there, some probably operated by volunteers, each trying to carve out their own niche in a flooded market. Hell, I even did some freelance video game journalism for a while.

When the market is that saturated, they need to start looking at what they're offering if they want to stay in business. In the mainstream and gaming media, the idea is make it more "fun" and "irreverent." That's how they plan to stay in business. Rather than, I dunno, providing a better fucking product that makes your analysis seem invaluable to consumers.

I'm actually inclined to consider almost all reviews of "art" as pointless, because I'll be damned before I let some moron tell me whether or not I should like a movie, but then along comes stuff as Red Letter Media's utter and total deconstruction of the Star Wars prequels and that has so much "insider" info - like camera work, character development and stuff that it proves me dead wrong. But that's a rather rare occurrence, sadly.

This is a great example of better journalism that serves both reader interest and "the truth."

Oh and I disagree - facts aren't subjective. They wouldn't be "facts" if they were Consider a fact like "XXX game has better graphics than YYY game". There's nothing subjective about that. Or "XXX is better optimized than YYY". Again, nothing subjective.

But do you actually know it's better optimized? Why is it better optimized? Why are the graphics better? As the gap between comparisons closes, so does the value of those "objective" statements. Sure, if we want to compare Super Mario Bros. to WoW: Cataclysm, yeah, there are some facts you could state. So could a 4-year-old. Which begs the question why you're even needed in the first place. Saavy? No one cares about self-evident facts. If you ran your news outlet on facts like "President Obama is a black man" you'd be out of business pretty quick. People care about facts that aren't self-evident, and if they aren't self-evident, guess what, someone can and will argue their validity. Being factual for a living isn't as easy as it sounds.

And about Yahtzee - there's no way he says "fuck it" to professionalism, since there IS no professionalism in video game criticism You're contradicting yourself - if everything about games is subjective, even facts, then there's no way his opinions are wrong, and thus - a big punch in the face. And I personally have said numerous times why I consider him the best in current video game criticism.

I don't have a problem with him having an opinion. I have a problem with his opinion being seen as anything resembling journalism. Yahtzee has a front row seat to most new releases, because he's got the public's attention, and some devs practically crawl up his ass. If you subtract all the long-winded BS from Yahtzee's rants, you can reduce his review down to about 5 sentences. The bulk of what he's doing is not informing you.

Which is fine. There's a place for humorists. But I don't see him as quite doing us the same square as say.....John Stewart on the Daily Show. I feel like he's playing the game, and stops to say "this fucking blows" because his success allows him to.

all games except for DF are uncomplex cakewalks where you see all of the content on one play through.

DF is the only game I've ever felt I NEEDED a wiki to explain how it worked to me. So yes, I guess that's true in my view.