I actually agree with both of you, weirdly enough.
People are always quick to rubbish gaming journalists, but I don't think the criticisms they face are often particularly fair. I think there are good ones and good outlets that I trust, and then there are ones I don't trust so much (or maybe I should just say that my opinions don't really align with).
I think people take less than stellar scores and criticisms of games they enjoy too personally and don't look at it objectively. Just because a game gets 5 out 10 for example and that a lot of flaws are identified, does not mean the review is inaccurate if you enjoy it.
People just need to learn to read or watch reviews fully, read between the lines and assess whether they feel they will enjoy the game based on what that reviewer says. If you can work with the issues a game has and feel that what it does well will really appeal to you on a greater scale than a game that is, objectively speaking, a better game, then that's fine. It doesn't mean the review or the critic are bad.
That said, I can agree with ShenSun that a lot of people will not even play a game, but will regurgitate the general rhetoric of negative (or positive) reviews and then emphasise the points that reinforces their own biases. Shenmue is obviously a classic example of this. Hell, I even met someone like that in real life when I traded in one of my copies of Shenmue 3 a week or two after it came out to a store. The person who served me said "Oh Shenmue 3, what did you think?" Before I could even respond to say that I liked it he came out with all this stuff about how it was a scam, a cash in, how he had seen reviews and it looks terrible, janky and looks like a complete joke and that it doesn't even finish the story etc.
Ngl, I was trying to highlight how broken video game journalism is by pointing out that IGN is more than happy to promote a game if the developer / publisher pays them enough money, even if their own reviewer thinks that said game is terrible and that the site’s readers should steer clear of it. I suppose it
is good to know that IGN’s review scores are not for sale though, even if everything else they do is.
I too agree with ShenSun when they say that people shouldn’t put too much stock in what one person on the internet says, though, despite the sarcasm in my last post, I really do think that there is a lot of value in the collective thoughts of video game journalists; certainly a lot more so than the thoughts and opinions of any one ‘influencer’, anyway.
These guys play video games for a living and generally have a pretty good idea of the kind of games their site’s readers are going to like (I personally put a lot of stock in what Destructoid has to say, for example, especially if it’s written by Chris Carter). What’s more, having multiple reviewers on staff allows them to assign somebody who is likely to really ‘get’ the game that’s up for review, which I think is where larger sites really do have a massive edge over smaller ones and ‘influencers’ (though I suppose they too are able to cater to a specific audience, albeit a much more niche one).
Ultimately, when looking at average scores, I think that video game journalists tend to get things right a lot more often than they get them wrong. They’re certainly a lot more reliable than Metacritic user scores, which are far too easily manipulated, and they can’t be bought off in the same way that a single ‘influencer’ can. Steam reviews are a little better, as people actually need to have played a game before they can critique it, though being able to refund a game if you play for under two hours does allow for some abuse here (also, devs can give out free keys and have people leave positive ratings).
I understand that not everybody will see things the same way as me and am under no illusion that it’s a perfect system, but what exactly are the alternatives? $60/$70 is way too much to spend on a game that may or may not be awful and most developers/publishers don’t bother releasing demos anymore. Most trailers aren’t at all reflective of how the games they’re used to promote actually end up playing either, and a lot of ‘influencers’ are happy to sell out their fans for a quick buck without giving it a second thought.
Sadly, video game journalists are a necessary evil.
