Comments on: The EDGE of Reason

By: Maikel De Bakker

Tue, 22 Dec 2009 13:39:30 +0000

A review or preview is always something that is part of some ones personal opinion. If the person is really generous with giving away high scores you might wonder what is experience within the gaming industry is. If you give a game like Bayonetta a high score i seriously wonder if he ever played similar games like the devil may cry series.

To me EDGE magazine has lost his edge a long time ago (ever since RED EYE left) As goes the same for the Famitzu mag

By: Jean Beurskens

Tue, 22 Dec 2009 12:30:20 +0000

Nice lil’ article you got there, Tom. For me, DAO at least deserves a 9. I just love the game.

Oh by the way: “Seriously, what were they thinking?” AVGN anyone?

By: Tom

Tue, 22 Dec 2009 06:39:22 +0000

Oh, I understand your own experience is important to grade a game. Still, I think there are area’s where you can at least consider more objective viewpoints.

1 to 100 system obviously gives SO much more room for nuance, but I thought that would be obvious. If not, here you have it.
In that case you could give Bayonetta a 9,7 if you like, that would cover about the same thing as that 10 without flat-out calling it perfect.
1-10 is to shallow for my tastes, many people might think differently, but that’s how I see it. Why would 1-10 be better? (I’m asking you to give me an example, by the way, not using this as an argument )

I also know and knew then that Bayonetta is from DMC’s creator, though it still is very much alike. Yes, it’s upgraded, but if it wasn’t, why make the game at all? Also very obvious to me.

About Old games not feeling fresh… sure, but I still treasure them. It’s hard to consider them being new or try to judge their quality within their respective time period (you could try if want), but with games that are just released you can still tell other people the state of affairs regarding that specific time period. Would someone read the article much later in time and read: ‘ are bad/good’ they at least know that. If a game had bad graphics for the time, you can’t expect them to be good now. If they were good for that time, you know what to expect most of the time. (Both DA and Bayonetta don’t really have superb graphics, but I see little fault with both of them).

I just disagree with their grades. Both seem extremities that really almost border insanity, although that 5 for DA is infinitely much worse; at least Bayonetta was graded positively (which in itself is just, in my opinion).

By: Leroy Ketelaars

Tue, 22 Dec 2009 04:05:01 +0000

I’d have to disagree, I’ve had this discussion with several well known dutch game journalists and in the end we can’t deny the fact that the rating that a game receives from it’s reviewer is purely a snapshot of the experience that the reviewer has with the game, not the cumulative of the grade for graphics, controls, story, gameplay, extra features, etc. On top of that, these grades, as I’ve just stated, are snapshots of the game experience when it was just released, these grades no longer hold true once the game ages, After all, new developments occur every month in the gaming industry. Even if it’s just improved graphics and motion capture technology, the user experience of a slightly older title will in most cases degrade. You can try this yourself by playing some older titles, they simply aren’t as much fun as they were back in the day when they were still fresh, they just can’t compare to what’s out there right now. Of course there will always be some gems here and there, but for most games, this will be the case.

Anyway, if, at the moment of playing, a reviewer feels that the game he is playing beats everything on the market straight out of the water, like uncharted 2 did with many (it, too received prefect scores by many gaming news outlets), then I find it perfectly acceptable for a game to receive the perfect score. Such a number by it’s very nature will be tied to a person’s preferences, you simply can’t review a game objectively, just like you can’t review a book or film objectively. They are created entertainment that is supposed to influence the player, thrill them, excite them, fascinate and capture the imagination. All of these things are subject to taste and opinion, and as such, an objective review is impossible.

Furthermore, i find your reasoning for using a 1 to 100 score system very weak, it doesn’t hold too much ground. Just read it again yourself, you say that “a grading system from 1 to 100 is infinitely better than any other.”, but only for the following unconstructed, unargumented reason: “I’m just very opposed to the notion that a game could have a perfect score.”

I’m sorry, I’m siding with Edge on this one

Ps. Bayonetta was created by the original creator of DMC, the games we know as DMC today are not, and haven’t been up to the same level as the earlier ones.