I think the American grading system that puts F to - what, below 70? - plays a big part into these game ratings getting really crammed into the 70 - 90 segment.
Really, if 60 means an F, you pretty much leave a huge part of the rating scale to the "failing games" and little space for all the games that are supposed to be "better than a failure" but still nothing close to perfection (let's assume 90+ means close to perfection).
This stuff's always been a bit funny to me, because I'm used to a grading system from 1-10 in which a 5 is a passing grade. Really, we even "round up" a 4.5 to a 5 and pass that too!
So, me, when I see a 70, just out of habit I still think "Hey, so they found it good!". On the scale I'm used to, a "better than average" game would be getting a 6 - or rather, 60. A 70 would be good and solid, not average. An 80 exceptional. And a 90+ absolute brilliance.
I recommend it. It's much more usable.
Actually the 60 to 69 range would be a D....which is a passing college grade as long as it isnt a core class. heh
I look at 70(or 7 out of 10) as average(basically a "C" ). This is the way Game Informer Magazine does their reviews, and they can be quite brutal. Even at a 7.0, it typically is something that isnt very good. I look for games that are 8.0 or higher. An 8 would be a pretty decent console/PC, and the better games take around 9 or higher. Very rarely see 10s.
This yr Batman got a 10, and last yr God of War got 1 also. Mass Effect 2, Uncharted 3, and Skyrim all got 9.5s. This yrs Madden got like a 7.5, so to say they sell out is rather foolish. LoTR:War in the North got like a 6, as well as a number of Super Hero games.
They seem to judge games on how buggy they are, and I suppose a bit on the "addiction" factor. They noted a number of bugs in Minecraft, and yet still gave it a 9. The same with Skyrim's 9.5.....they stressed bugs in that one as well.
These folks crying that TOR is anything less than a 7 arent grading on anything except their preference in gaming.
Asking Devs to make AAA sandbox titles is like trying to get fine dining on a McDonalds dollar menu budget.
Professional reviewers are either sold or have an agenda making it impossible for them to be impartial.
The only trustworthy reviews out there are the ones made by amateur gamers.
How do we know which of those have an agenda?
I think its pretty clear from all the metacritic reviews listed that you can generally judge how good a game is when you compare it to its peers. SWTOR got higher scores than it deserved, but so did every other game. I think that with the exception of WAR the quality (and retention level) of the games is fairly consistent with the scores given.
WoW - highest rated, best retention
Lotro second best reviewed, only game since WoW to show growth its first 2 years
CoH is next and its hovered around the same number of players for most of its lifetime
The fact that they score ToR higher than Rift makes me think theyre a load of dung...lol
I think more people that played both games would say SWTOR > Rift than the other way around.
I disagree.
I think Rift is a more well oiled machine than ToR.Even when Rift first launched.
Id rather have the better machine than the better oiled one. Easier to add oil than to upgrade the machine.
Rift is pretty much better in any way. Haven't seen TOR's endgame, but I know in every other respect Rift is hands down better and a more 'complete' experience.
The fact that they score ToR higher than Rift makes me think theyre a load of dung...lol
I think more people that played both games would say SWTOR > Rift than the other way around.
I disagree.
I think Rift is a more well oiled machine than ToR.Even when Rift first launched.
Id rather have the better machine than the better oiled one. Easier to add oil than to upgrade the machine.
Rift is pretty much better in any way. Haven't seen TOR's endgame, but I know in every other respect Rift is hands down better and a more 'complete' experience.
"
How many articles are you going to post about the same thing?
How many opportunities are you going to give clueless people to post their opinions on this?
Please for the love of god stop. "
"
You remember your post from the WOW forums? You didnt like folks continually posting a bunch of BS about what you enjoy, and yet you appear to be camped out here.
Funny how that works eh?
Asking Devs to make AAA sandbox titles is like trying to get fine dining on a McDonalds dollar menu budget.
I'm not a huge fan of SWTOR...but it's better than WAR. Come on.
It seems like all professional reviews do is get a good "first impression" of an MMORPG and roll with it. There seems to be hardly any correlation between an MMORPGs metascore and its ultimate success.
There were some things about WAR that I really liked, but SWTOR is a much better game. In my opinion WAR's score there is overinflated and SWTOR's is about right.
You folks complain that MMORPG is biased....yes it is. You sandbox gamers get away with a bunch of BS. Any respectable board, on the net, would of perma banned you guys long ago. What is even sadder, is a number of ya bait, then report when folks tell ya to "Fuck off".
The reviews I keep seeing match up with what I am experiencing in game. I got my 3rd character their ship tonight. Hopefully when BW switches the UI up, they also add something in to change font size. TOR hasnt given me that "first" feeling like I got in EQ back in 01, but that doesnt mean I am not enjoying the shit out of it.
Dude. R U Srs? I post a lot about TOR because it's what I'm currently playing. I also love the MMO genre, so I tend to post about whatever MMO is making the biggest waves, lately. Sorry criticism upsets you so much.. but I don't know where you come up with this sandbox bit.
When I want a single-player story, I'll play a single-player game. When I play an MMO, I want a massively multiplayer world.
These folks crying that TOR is anything less than a 7 arent grading on anything except their preference in gaming.
You are right, SWTOR isn't less than a 7.0 but it also isn't anything more than 7.8-8.0.
It's got a good story components but aside from that it's the definition of mediocre. The major exploits(i.e. /getdown, credit and comm duping, etc), lack of features (i.e. no LFG chat, lack of guild functionality, etc), and bugs/general lack of polish prevent the game from being anything more than a B, B+ if you are really into story.
All these "official" reviews giving the game 8.5+ turn a blind eye to many of the flaws in the game as an MMO and focus mainly on how good the story is.
P.S. "Official" reviews for other games such as Gears 3, Skyrim, etc also suffer from 'inflated score syndrome'. It's rampant throughout the video game industry. It's gotten to the point that a 6 score is considered "terrible" when it should really be "average" or "sub-par"
I'm not a huge fan of SWTOR...but it's better than WAR. Come on.
It seems like all professional reviews do is get a good "first impression" of an MMORPG and roll with it. There seems to be hardly any correlation between an MMORPGs metascore and its ultimate success.
Even with all the problems WAR, i had way more fun playing it then i did with SWTOR.
I would rate SWTOR higher because it's way more polished and has less problems, but WAR had much more to offer then SWTOR has.
I'm not a huge fan of SWTOR...but it's better than WAR. Come on.
It seems like all professional reviews do is get a good "first impression" of an MMORPG and roll with it. There seems to be hardly any correlation between an MMORPGs metascore and its ultimate success.
not to mention these sites ignore seriously obvious flaws. Case in point, STO reviews when it launched were all glowing.
I'm not a huge fan of SWTOR...but it's better than WAR. Come on.
It seems like all professional reviews do is get a good "first impression" of an MMORPG and roll with it. There seems to be hardly any correlation between an MMORPGs metascore and its ultimate success.
I thought it was common knowledge that scores shouldn't be taken seriously to evaluate a certain game nowdays, particularly MMO's... atleast that's what i've been doing for many years now. The only time i used scores more seriously was from the time i had only magazine reviews available, when i didn't have the huge information resource called internet.
These days you can read plenty of reviews about good and bads of a certain game, you can see gameplay videos, you can play CB's, you can visit said game forums and check it's activity on issues and whatnot - all it takes is a bit of research and time. This means holding on to first day releases and research before buying.
The best assessment you can have about a game is your own. All the others are simply "guidelines".
But one thing i do agree with some, that MMO "critical" reviews shouldn't be made without spending a reasonable time (1-2 months) playing it, atleast past the "honeymoon" phase like some of you call it. MMO's are supposed to be a different breed than the typical single/multi player games.
Okay someone there is getting a biiiiig check from Lucas Arts. Let's be more objective when it comes to reviews please.
1: Aesthetics: It definitely takes alot more then just pretty painted walls to impress the rest of us. The characters are static and hardly move until a cinematic sequence, there is NO life on the planets (no critters running around), the character customization is laughable as you will most likely look exactly the same end game as every other class of your type. No dyes to speak of. Non-essential NPC's are statues, never walking anywhere and when you click on they they say pretty much nothing. The only saving grace this game has is it's cut scenes.
2: Gameplay: they did a warcraft style combat system with a global cooldown, that's boring. People have seen that a million times. There is no real home instance to speak of accept a limited and laughable ship, no consequential open world pvp, the auction house doesn't work, and they used the Trinity, their crafting system is entirely too expensive for below standard items, armor that's more like WoW's heirlooms doesn't cut it when you do end game raiding, the issues that every mmo has had ever with GCD abilities that don't fire at all when clicked or hotkeyed. Why would i play this game again? Oh yeah the light sabers. Zero space combat to speak of, even tho the title has always had it throughout their movies.
3: Innovation: This should have been a 2. There was nothing new accept choices that gave the character story a different path at each story point. Nothing was done end game to make the character's story aspect of the game continue beyond level 50 and the story really only effected the companions and not the environment. There were no worldly events, no random events, nothing to play accept a strict line of events to choose from and nothing more. It was simply a themepark style questing system with voice overs. Not even the ship changes in any significant way after you've made choices. The ui was the same as all others I've seen in other mmos. It's missing many features we've all want as standard or expected in mmos.
4: Polish: While it can be said they didn't have much crashes let's look at the whole picture shall we. They had serious server population issues from the start that could have been fixed via making sure that there were servers waiting for what the makers of the game knew would happen on launch day, instead they booted people kept people from signing up and generally did alot of appologizing. Surely someone there is an mmo gamer and someone could have told the executives that launch day is a serious challenge for any company so they could have been much more prepared. Not to mention, a recent rash of multiple obvious bugs in their game should have been caught long before launch day that were basically completely ignored for which the players are now having to suffer for. Invincibility anyone? Just dance.
5: Longevity: You are kidding me?! an 8? Riiiight. They are definitely going to have to release more then a single instance to keep fans from leaving this thing. Really the only end game content is pvp, and raiding. We've all seen that multiple times before. Not to mention the age old and failed system of gear treadmill. Getting onto a game just to have to grind out gear is no longer fun, that style of mmo was really just a boring in game work now and people haven't enjoyed that since the year 2000. Seriously it was dead five minutes ago. The least they could have done is made it more like RIFT however i get it that they didn't really have time to put out new currencies and dynamic world events, they only had 4 years.
6: Value: Definitely NOT a ten when you look at all it's end game problems. It's not worth the $15 a month to play because it pretty much halts end game. There isn't enough content to fool with after level 50 and adding a single instance really isn't going to make it worth the time. They told the fans what "We'll release it when it's ready" well part of being ready is having enough content when players hit end game level.
7: Social: Typical set of communication tools nothing new. However most of the quests in the game do not support multiple players. They are simply solo dialog questing without groups. Not much to do together as you do most of your quests as a solo player, which as an avid solo player i do like, however this is an mmo and you should be able to group up with other players and do the regular quests.
8: finally calling this game great is just a farce and the public should be told the truth minus the fanboi response or the paid to make it look better response of the websites like these.
Thread title should be: why numerical scores to rank games are crap and people should stop paying attention to them and start reading the f*cking review.
Comments
Actually the 60 to 69 range would be a D....which is a passing college grade as long as it isnt a core class. heh
I look at 70(or 7 out of 10) as average(basically a "C" ). This is the way Game Informer Magazine does their reviews, and they can be quite brutal. Even at a 7.0, it typically is something that isnt very good. I look for games that are 8.0 or higher. An 8 would be a pretty decent console/PC, and the better games take around 9 or higher. Very rarely see 10s.
This yr Batman got a 10, and last yr God of War got 1 also. Mass Effect 2, Uncharted 3, and Skyrim all got 9.5s. This yrs Madden got like a 7.5, so to say they sell out is rather foolish. LoTR:War in the North got like a 6, as well as a number of Super Hero games.
They seem to judge games on how buggy they are, and I suppose a bit on the "addiction" factor. They noted a number of bugs in Minecraft, and yet still gave it a 9. The same with Skyrim's 9.5.....they stressed bugs in that one as well.
These folks crying that TOR is anything less than a 7 arent grading on anything except their preference in gaming.
Asking Devs to make AAA sandbox titles is like trying to get fine dining on a McDonalds dollar menu budget.
How do we know which of those have an agenda?
I think its pretty clear from all the metacritic reviews listed that you can generally judge how good a game is when you compare it to its peers. SWTOR got higher scores than it deserved, but so did every other game. I think that with the exception of WAR the quality (and retention level) of the games is fairly consistent with the scores given.
WoW - highest rated, best retention
Lotro second best reviewed, only game since WoW to show growth its first 2 years
CoH is next and its hovered around the same number of players for most of its lifetime
Rift had a fairly large decline its first year
EQ2 also showed a similar decline
AoC plummeted
Rift is pretty much better in any way. Haven't seen TOR's endgame, but I know in every other respect Rift is hands down better and a more 'complete' experience.
"
How many articles are you going to post about the same thing?
How many opportunities are you going to give clueless people to post their opinions on this?
Please for the love of god stop. "
"
You remember your post from the WOW forums? You didnt like folks continually posting a bunch of BS about what you enjoy, and yet you appear to be camped out here.
Funny how that works eh?
Asking Devs to make AAA sandbox titles is like trying to get fine dining on a McDonalds dollar menu budget.
two words... HERO ENGINE.... seriously!?
..Cake..
There were some things about WAR that I really liked, but SWTOR is a much better game. In my opinion WAR's score there is overinflated and SWTOR's is about right.
Dude. R U Srs? I post a lot about TOR because it's what I'm currently playing. I also love the MMO genre, so I tend to post about whatever MMO is making the biggest waves, lately. Sorry criticism upsets you so much.. but I don't know where you come up with this sandbox bit.
When I want a single-player story, I'll play a single-player game. When I play an MMO, I want a massively multiplayer world.
You are right, SWTOR isn't less than a 7.0 but it also isn't anything more than 7.8-8.0.
It's got a good story components but aside from that it's the definition of mediocre. The major exploits(i.e. /getdown, credit and comm duping, etc), lack of features (i.e. no LFG chat, lack of guild functionality, etc), and bugs/general lack of polish prevent the game from being anything more than a B, B+ if you are really into story.
All these "official" reviews giving the game 8.5+ turn a blind eye to many of the flaws in the game as an MMO and focus mainly on how good the story is.
P.S. "Official" reviews for other games such as Gears 3, Skyrim, etc also suffer from 'inflated score syndrome'. It's rampant throughout the video game industry. It's gotten to the point that a 6 score is considered "terrible" when it should really be "average" or "sub-par"
Even with all the problems WAR, i had way more fun playing it then i did with SWTOR.
I would rate SWTOR higher because it's way more polished and has less problems, but WAR had much more to offer then SWTOR has.
not to mention these sites ignore seriously obvious flaws. Case in point, STO reviews when it launched were all glowing.
I thought it was common knowledge that scores shouldn't be taken seriously to evaluate a certain game nowdays, particularly MMO's... atleast that's what i've been doing for many years now. The only time i used scores more seriously was from the time i had only magazine reviews available, when i didn't have the huge information resource called internet.
These days you can read plenty of reviews about good and bads of a certain game, you can see gameplay videos, you can play CB's, you can visit said game forums and check it's activity on issues and whatnot - all it takes is a bit of research and time. This means holding on to first day releases and research before buying.
The best assessment you can have about a game is your own. All the others are simply "guidelines".
But one thing i do agree with some, that MMO "critical" reviews shouldn't be made without spending a reasonable time (1-2 months) playing it, atleast past the "honeymoon" phase like some of you call it. MMO's are supposed to be a different breed than the typical single/multi player games.
Okay someone there is getting a biiiiig check from Lucas Arts. Let's be more objective when it comes to reviews please.
1: Aesthetics: It definitely takes alot more then just pretty painted walls to impress the rest of us. The characters are static and hardly move until a cinematic sequence, there is NO life on the planets (no critters running around), the character customization is laughable as you will most likely look exactly the same end game as every other class of your type. No dyes to speak of. Non-essential NPC's are statues, never walking anywhere and when you click on they they say pretty much nothing. The only saving grace this game has is it's cut scenes.
2: Gameplay: they did a warcraft style combat system with a global cooldown, that's boring. People have seen that a million times. There is no real home instance to speak of accept a limited and laughable ship, no consequential open world pvp, the auction house doesn't work, and they used the Trinity, their crafting system is entirely too expensive for below standard items, armor that's more like WoW's heirlooms doesn't cut it when you do end game raiding, the issues that every mmo has had ever with GCD abilities that don't fire at all when clicked or hotkeyed. Why would i play this game again? Oh yeah the light sabers. Zero space combat to speak of, even tho the title has always had it throughout their movies.
3: Innovation: This should have been a 2. There was nothing new accept choices that gave the character story a different path at each story point. Nothing was done end game to make the character's story aspect of the game continue beyond level 50 and the story really only effected the companions and not the environment. There were no worldly events, no random events, nothing to play accept a strict line of events to choose from and nothing more. It was simply a themepark style questing system with voice overs. Not even the ship changes in any significant way after you've made choices. The ui was the same as all others I've seen in other mmos. It's missing many features we've all want as standard or expected in mmos.
4: Polish: While it can be said they didn't have much crashes let's look at the whole picture shall we. They had serious server population issues from the start that could have been fixed via making sure that there were servers waiting for what the makers of the game knew would happen on launch day, instead they booted people kept people from signing up and generally did alot of appologizing. Surely someone there is an mmo gamer and someone could have told the executives that launch day is a serious challenge for any company so they could have been much more prepared. Not to mention, a recent rash of multiple obvious bugs in their game should have been caught long before launch day that were basically completely ignored for which the players are now having to suffer for. Invincibility anyone? Just dance.
5: Longevity: You are kidding me?! an 8? Riiiight. They are definitely going to have to release more then a single instance to keep fans from leaving this thing. Really the only end game content is pvp, and raiding. We've all seen that multiple times before. Not to mention the age old and failed system of gear treadmill. Getting onto a game just to have to grind out gear is no longer fun, that style of mmo was really just a boring in game work now and people haven't enjoyed that since the year 2000. Seriously it was dead five minutes ago. The least they could have done is made it more like RIFT however i get it that they didn't really have time to put out new currencies and dynamic world events, they only had 4 years.
6: Value: Definitely NOT a ten when you look at all it's end game problems. It's not worth the $15 a month to play because it pretty much halts end game. There isn't enough content to fool with after level 50 and adding a single instance really isn't going to make it worth the time. They told the fans what "We'll release it when it's ready" well part of being ready is having enough content when players hit end game level.
7: Social: Typical set of communication tools nothing new. However most of the quests in the game do not support multiple players. They are simply solo dialog questing without groups. Not much to do together as you do most of your quests as a solo player, which as an avid solo player i do like, however this is an mmo and you should be able to group up with other players and do the regular quests.
8: finally calling this game great is just a farce and the public should be told the truth minus the fanboi response or the paid to make it look better response of the websites like these.
itgrowls: May I ask why are you copy pasting the same text on various threads?
Thread title should be: why numerical scores to rank games are crap and people should stop paying attention to them and start reading the f*cking review.
the title should be ur post count means jack, learn to play.