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Ten Ton Hammer review biased?
Rydeson
Member UncommonPosts: 3,852
WoW.. interesting.. After reading this review www.tentonhammer.com/sto/features/reviews/fullreview I was like.. WTF, is this the same game that all the other major reviewers played? The scores I thought were very questionable, especially the content scores.. Music wise? WHO GIVES a shit.. NONE of that music was created by them, all they had to do was borrow all the music already out there.. It's not like they hired a songwriter composer and orchestra and start from scratch.. Player creation scores? Again.. Who really gives a shit.. How much weight did they give that A rating.. 25%? 30%.. As far as I'm concerned, player creation deserves about 10% of the overall rating.. IMO..
Then I come to find out the author is this person www.linkedin.com/in/dalmarus .. Take a look at what he's hired to do since January 2010.. Can you honestly say he's not biased.. OMG.. Good job Ten Ton for showing me your reviews can be extremely biased and skewed .. Next time why don't you have someone that isn't pushing an agenda do the game review..
Comments
Finally a review where they are not trying to turn STO into EVE, WOW, LoTR or EQ2. Some people want more of the same in MMOs and some of us find STO a refreshing change.
Considering Ten Ton Hammer were the first site to jump on the current STO debacle, it's doubtful.
So.....he likes the game, must be something wrong with him. As has been stated about every other review, all reviews are biased. This guy just happens to like the game. And since I like the game, I must have some nefarious ulterior motive as well, right?
He did say: Star Trek Online, like many an MMOG before it, is not complete. Things that need to be addressed the soonest to appease the masses would be more PvE content for the Klingon Empire, the ability to join fleet actions as a fleet, the ability to know at a glance what skills affect what, more ship customization, and (like every other game in the world) more content. So it's not like he's trying to hide the fact that he found the game lacking. He also gave a warning: The hardcore MMOG player that is hoping Star Trek Online will be that game that allows them to live the adventure of a lifetime for 4 to 8 hours a day is going to be sorely disappointed. Seems to me, he's not exactly pulling punches.
Did he score it rather high IMO? Yes. Although I somewhat agreed with his scoring breakdowns, I personally don't rate the overall score very high due to it being rushed and unfinished at launch. But that's my opinion.
Edit: And being the community lead for STO on the Ten Ton Hammer site means what, exactly? It means he is in charge of STO information on a third party web site. The linkedin profile doesn't show what you think it does.
I want a mmorpg where people have gone through misery, have gone through school stuff and actually have had sex even. -sagil
His job is to promote the STO name on Ten Ton.. That in itself is a conflict of interest.. We all understand that reviewers will shortly either like a game or dislike it and that can spin into a biased review to a degree.. What I'm talking about is the PROFESSIONAL separation that should exist.. If you fail to see the appearance of impropriety here, then there is nothing anyone can say to change your thinking.. However, if you ever get a divorce, and the judge is your soon to be x-wife's brother.. Good Luck.. lmao
Yes, it very much would be a conflict of interest if Cryptic was paying him to promote STO, but they are not, TTH is. As for the analogy, try again.
I want a mmorpg where people have gone through misery, have gone through school stuff and actually have had sex even. -sagil
As others have said all reviews are biased but honestly I don't remember TTH ever not give good scores to any AAA title.Only reviews I remember that they gave low scores to are obscure f2p titles that they don't have news/guide/database pages dedicated too 9P.
So you are telling me had he scored STO lower than any other review to date and said, "it's junk, it's a con, steer clear" and he happened to have a conflict of interest you would have posted the same thing? lol.
Again you fail to see it.. his position at TTH as the STO liaison is based up on the success or failure of STO .. IMO he shouldn't have given a review period.. good or bad.. He has a direct interest in the outcome of the review and game.. It's simple professional ethics..
In that scenario the OP would have said he was a professional.
Currently Playing: World of Warcraft
Heaven forbid that the reviewer actually likes the game. So he has a different opinion of the game then you, his review is still as valid as yours.
As for music, some people take stock in that. I personally could care less, but have friends that enjoy music scores in games and will not play a game if the music or ambient sounds suck.
Only thing wrong that I could see was his final score. Besides that in the review he does mention that things need work. It seems that you have a personal vendetta against STO. How about instead of spending all your time hating on something you cant change you try to find something enjoyable instead. I personally don't mind because your posts continue to humor myself and many other users here.
+1 for the entertainment.
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In that scenario the OP would have said he was a professional.
Read much? What part of my post above you where I said, "he should NOT of given a review, good or bad, period" didn't you see? Anymore I wonder about you Kt.. I used to respect your post, but lately,.... oh well
Ummm, there is no such thing as an unbiased review. This is why more than one person review the game and we read multiple reviews when researching a game.
Everyone have different perspective and everyone look at the same subject with different focus.
If anyone believe their opinion is totally unbiased and correct, then they need to get off their high horses and look at reality.
So, TTH has a guy on staff who they have tasked with getting to know STO intimately. But this is not the guy we want reviewing it? Instead, we want a review from the guy who's job is knowing LOTR intimately? Or maybe the intern who gets coffee and has played the game for a week? You are correct, I don't follow the logic.
I want a mmorpg where people have gone through misery, have gone through school stuff and actually have had sex even. -sagil
Actually, they did hire Michael Henry to compose Star Trek-like music for the game. My understanding is they don't have permission to use music from the movies or series, only some sound effects.
So, TTH has a guy on staff who they have tasked with getting to know STO intimately. But this is not the guy we want reviewing it? Instead, we want a review from the guy who's job is knowing LOTR intimately? Or maybe the intern who gets coffee and has played the game for a week? You are correct, I don't follow the logic.
Because in so doing the "getting to know STO" intimately part, the guy has to develop a relationship with Cryptic in order to get "access" for the information he needs. Often these relationships, between a company and a "friendly journalist" or other writer, lead to more favorable coverage based on a good relationship with the writer.
In financial circles, this is HEAVILY frowned upon. When journalists and analysts need to make nice with the companies in order to get information, it comes at a cost.... objectivity, overly favorable reading of the facts, ignoring or minimizing the negative bits, etc.
That is what we may have here: the guy got to know people at Cryptic, on some level, and it colored his review.
In that scenario the OP would have said he was a professional.
Read much? What part of my post above you where I said, "he should NOT of given a review, good or bad, period" didn't you see? Anymore I wonder about you Kt.. I used to respect your post, but lately,.... oh well
If he had slated the game Rydeson would probably have posted a topic along the lines of "See even TTH say it's crap, this game is a rip off".
There is no way I can believe you would have posted anything regarding his professionalism in that circumstance.
So, TTH has a guy on staff who they have tasked with getting to know STO intimately. But this is not the guy we want reviewing it? Instead, we want a review from the guy who's job is knowing LOTR intimately? Or maybe the intern who gets coffee and has played the game for a week? You are correct, I don't follow the logic.
Because in so doing the "getting to know STO" intimately part, the guy has to develop a relationship with Cryptic in order to get "access" for the information he needs. Often these relationships, between a company and a "friendly journalist" or other writer, lead to more favorable coverage based on a good relationship with the writer.
Proof? If you conspiracy nuts don't have any, kindly put away your tin hats.
Alltern8 Blog | Star Wars Space Combat and The Old Republic | Cryptic Studios - A Pre Post-Mortem | Klingon Preview, STO's Monster Play
Thank you BurnVet for understanding the original post and what "appearance of impropriety" means .. or conflict of interest..
Dalmarus has worked for TTH since 2005, and lists that he is/was the "MAIN SITE WRITER" for TTH. He also lists that he is the "Site Lead" for STO, in which he creates content, manages the community, forums, etc.
If you're familiar with TTH at all, you'll know that they create Sub-pages for almost every MMO. Dalmarus's job includes a heck of a lot more than just the STO section. If the game fails, he will have many other jobs at TTH to keep him busy. The conspiracy theory is bunk.
In the end, everybody is entitled to their own opinion. Your opinion of the review, or your opinion of TTH, or even Dalmarus's opinion of STO. If you don't agree, fine, since that is your opinion.
There should be reviews for reviews. I would give this review a D-
Pretty much what I suspected.
Currently Playing: World of Warcraft
To be fair I think its an OK review. Its enough for me to look at the gameplay score and see its the lowest of the bunch. That means its not really "a game".
But... value is ofc a questionable score - considering that part of the game is sub and part is payed for extra... I would give the game C at best for not releaseing a true Sub based game. Instead they are charging ppl extra for content that really should be in the box price...
So, TTH has a guy on staff who they have tasked with getting to know STO intimately. But this is not the guy we want reviewing it? Instead, we want a review from the guy who's job is knowing LOTR intimately? Or maybe the intern who gets coffee and has played the game for a week? You are correct, I don't follow the logic.
Because in so doing the "getting to know STO" intimately part, the guy has to develop a relationship with Cryptic in order to get "access" for the information he needs. Often these relationships, between a company and a "friendly journalist" or other writer, lead to more favorable coverage based on a good relationship with the writer.
Proof? If you conspiracy nuts don't have any, kindly put away your tin hats.
In other circles, the mere perception of impropriety would be enough. No proof is required. Because this is the video press and not the financial press, the industry standards for conflict of interest are more or less non-existent.
It is not a conspiracy theory to say that researchers/analysts/reporters do a quid pro quo with companies every day for exclusive access, information, product previews, samples, and everything else under the sun. It happens everyday. As someone who has done research on various companies myself, I am often prohibited from doing the equivalent of a review or purchase recommendation or other ratings, if I gain certain company sponsored access, products or time with company officials. I do my thing, and then hand it off to a coworker, who uses my research and other research to make a recommendation or report to a client. Solely to minimize the perception of bias. Could I do a review or recommendation faster? Yup. Is it worth more than the reputation of the company? No.
The fact that the guy was the head PR community guy at a major game site, and put out all kinds of stuff from the company in the run up to the game, by definition, colors his judgment. Period.
No way should he have done a review, when he could have handed it off to anyone else.
Of course it's biased toward the reviewers interests or preferences, much like your posts and mine are biased toward our own.
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