Reviewing Reviews

 The Review

The democratic world is based on the unshakable belief that the voice of everyone has power, the worth of the individual is paramount if only the seize the right to wield it- from the lowly peasant to the prominent magistrate. Of course, even in the mythical birthplace of Democracy, ancient Athens, the intellectual class had their reservations about such an ideal, hang-ups about giving power to those who don't understand the responsibility of wielding it or some such elitist sounding drivel, but regardless the basic model of Democracy has been replicated and shared the world over and generally regarded as 'positive' until the finale of Game of Thrones Season 8 where their little flippant joke repulsed the world so much I think we'd all rather live in a dictatorship just to spite that awfully written line. But if there's one thing which makes me personally surrender all hope for the world back to the mind of the philosophers of ancient Greece and their generally shared belief that 'rulers were the one's meant to rule', it's the free market of entertainment reviews.

Don't get me wrong, I'm not going to sit here and tell you that professional reviewers are some higher echelon of being built and bred for the art of critical examination, in fact our standards in the games industry specifically have dropped off so much that game reviewers are typically no more than loudly opinionated, and sometimes maybe a little opiated, gossipers with a paycheck. Just look at my own work whilst subtracting the paycheck! Still- at least the idea of a reviewer is someone who fairly reviews a piece of art based on it's merits and the standards of the time, weighing it's pros and cons to provide a balanced guide for consumers to decide how to spend their money and time. That's- I mean that's how it starts, right? That's the minimum critical bar we expect people to clear and we hold the world accountable to. But then we have User reviews.

Because the everyman has an opinion too, correct? Why should the stuffy suited professionals be the only one's to share their heavily biased and jaded viewpoint, maybe people are best served hearing from their fellow casual enthusiast as well! And you know what, I've always liked that idea. It's true, casual observers of entertainment have different fresh-holds of taste compared to professional reviewers who are more commonly bombarded by oversaturation, cliché trends and genre pieces- professional reviewers typically prefer to be challenged and surprised, whilst casual enjoyers like to be entertained and satisfied. It's a fine balancing act, one slightly done a disservice by review aggregate sites on the Internet but what can really be done about that? We live in an age of instant gratification, no one wants to sit down and read hundreds of reviews by every Tom, Dick and Harry in the world to figure who's tastes best align with your own and thus who's opinion to trust. Round it all up with a number of 'like' versus 'didn't like' and call it a day!

Yet you know how the adage goes, 'power corrupts'; and nowhere is that more true than for people not used to it. How many times have you spotted a review from a non-professional source who clearly has no idea what they're talking about throwing around lofty accusations about how a tiny factor of the work, be it a game mechanic or a certain character, justifies a 10 out of 10 or a 0 out of 10? Do you really think nuance and balancing really went into that evaluation? Of course not, they don't care about the impact of their reviews, they're driven by spurs of emotional outbursts, they aren't even slightly concerned with effusing into cold-hard sense. And those are the 'earnest reviews'. Recently I've noticed an uptick in the amount of amateur review stock who seem emboldened by the promise of a score decision with a comparable value of the masses around them to promote nonsense vendettas. 

Much has it been lauded how often a games reviewer will throw their professionalism at the wall in order to rant about some perceived slight on their person; throwing the Harry Potter game in front of a bus because of the views of the franchise creator who had no hand in the game itself, tutting about the PC port of Spiderman for being... cop-aganda (which is genuinely nonsensical to me, there's so much police corruption in that narrative it isn't even funny) or harping on Days Gone because the protagonist is... well... a biker who acts like  a biker in ways that the author found uncomfortable. But such flights of silliness are not exclusive to the professionals, no you'll plenty of irrational takes powering decisions from the public too- including some so wild you'd never see a professional reviewer going for it!

I've seen games get 0/10 from a member of the public because they see the game is reviewing well and they want to knock the average down. Sometimes it's literally from people who like the game, but just don't think it's as good as other people do, so they give it a 0/10 to skewer the average. That alone is so adverse to the spirit of public discourse you feel a person like that needs to be taken aside and explained how special the gift of freewill is, because they're wasting it! You'll get vice versa situations too. As well as people who watch gameplay of a game and don't like it so then think it entirely within their prerogative to review the game they haven't personally played, kind of missing the point of the 'interactive' part of this medium a little. All these transgressions whittle down the special artistry of the review and what we can learn about consumers and their relationship with modern trends when everything runs smoothly.

And, of course, as I've mentioned the last time I touched on this topic: these people don't really seem cognisant of the effect their reviews have. Knocking down the average of a game might seem 'fair' in the ethical deluge that is the average consumer's mind, but development studios base their sales targets not only on figures sold, but on review scores as well. It's a potential kick at the livelihood of developers to go for the review score, all for what- internet brownie points that exist only in your head? That bizarre popularity contest is what has started skewering development too, where the pursuit of high audience scores can lead development to fan-service style features that might spark infantile backlash if left out. "Does the game have fishing?" "Can I pet the dog?" Et cetera.

The reviewing process is an inherently important aspect of any entertainment industry outlet. Playwrites have been know to threaten people's lives over reviews in the past, it's serious business. (Why is it always playwrites too? Weird people.) The way to grow as an artform is by examining our work and those around us, seeing what works and what doesn't and, most importantly, identifying directions that haven't been taken before and daring to be brave. When we whittle down that process with inanities and pettiness, we rob the nurturing food of our industry, that's what it needs to consume in order to grow stronger and more firm. With every new aggregate site, the standards become muddier and people lose sight of exactly what a responsibility it once was to offer your collected and reasoned thoughts to another. But by all means keep it up with the silly Steam reviews, those are funny.