Fallout 3

[Galactus]

That's really stupid. Find me any cultural artifact that is "instantly loved by anyone who touches it." Anything in all of human history. I'd like to see it.

That's the point though. To recieve a perfect score the game should indeed be, y'know, perfect.

That'll never happen of course, but to give a game that is imperfect a perfect core is just wrong.

[Shryke]

That's assuming 10/10 means "Absolutely Perfect in every way" and not "The hightest level of awesomeness a game can be".

Something like, say, Half-Life isn't perfect, but it certainly deserves 10/10 for being an incredibly great game.

[Galactus]

.

That's assuming 10/10 means "Absolutely Perfect in every way" and not "The hightest level of awesomeness a game can be".

Something like, say, Half-Life isn't perfect, but it certainly deserves 10/10 for being an incredibly great game.

No, it doesen't. It might, might (actually I totally disagree but then I don't like Half-Life that much) rate as "the best FPS" but even there it isn't the best in every category (Quake was more fun in multiplayer, mods like Counter-Strike notwithstanding)

How can it be "as awesome as a game can be" when it is not even scoring the highest *in every category that a game of its type can contend in*?

Very rarely should a gave go over 9.0. Those that do should be the kind of epic-genre-redefining games that people talk about for years. A perfect score should mean a perfect game. The kind what makes you fall down on your knees and weep for the pleasure of having been graced by it's existence.

[davos]

Very rarely should a gave go over 9.0. Those that do should be the kind of epic-genre-redefining games that people talk about for years. A perfect score should mean a perfect game. The kind what makes you fall down on your knees and weep for the pleasure of having been graced by it's existence.

Um. No. The score given as well as the content of the review is the opinion of the reviewer. Nothing more. Nothing less. Now the reviewer should have a considerable depth of knowledge of the media that he is reviewing as well as a certain level of decernment and refinement in regards to what makes a quality and worthwhile game/movie/book ect. One can reasonably expect a game review to not just be a personal reaction to the game but be supported by well thought out rationale and evidence from the actual game play. It should not just tell one that this is good or bad but why. It should also be grounded in the history of game development and by how the game in question compares to other recent releases that fall within the same general genre. In the end though its one person's opinion, an educated and well thought out and supported opinion, but an opinion nonetheless.

So if a reviewer gives a score that you don't feel is justified please keep in mind that is his/her opinion, not some final judgement from on high about how good a game it is. Maybe a particular reviewer does feel that Fallout 3 is a game worthy of getting a extraordinary score such as a 9.6 out of 10. That's the reviewers informed reaction to the game. Maybe you disagree with it. Hell, you might find that the game sucks ass. That's your opinion, which you are certainly entitled to. We've all read books/ watched movies/ played games that got great reviewers and were left wondering what the hell the reviewers were thinking. I think most of us have also had the opposite experience as well. If you strongly disagree with the reviewer that is fine. If you find that you disagree most of the time with a particular reviewer/review site maybe you shouldn't use them to help you select what games to pick up.

[Galactus]

My problem is not with reviewers liking games I don't, but with giving out these kinds of high scores *period*.

[Ser Greguh]

That's the point though. To recieve a perfect score the game should indeed be, y'know, perfect.

That'll never happen of course, but to give a game that is imperfect a perfect core is just wrong.

Then how the hell is that any different from a scale of 1 to 9?

[Arakasi]

I agree that game reviews have gotten too high across the board. Imo only the really great games should be above 9s. And while I do think there are some 10s out there, I think they are few and far between (Starcraft, Planescape Torment, BG2, Half Life, Portal, etc) Too often games get really high scores just because they're pretty and they run well. From what I've read of these Fallout 3 reviews, there is a lot of negatives for a game that is getting 95% or higher from a bunch of reviewers. If FO3 is what I think it is (pretty game, runs well, decent but mostly bland story, good but inconsistent gameplay, not terribly long, boring side missions) than that to me suggests something in the 8-9 range.

Compare that to BG2. Great story, pretty game (for its time), runs well, has SP and MP, lots of side stuff, replayability. If FO3 is getting 95s or higher, than what should BG2 get? 120%? Unless we're going on the weird star trek warp scale idea. Where the difference between 9.0 and 9.5 is bigger than the difference between 1 and 9. Which to me is a really stupid way to do reviews. If it is an average but pretty game that is basically Oblivion with guns in no way should it get a 95%.

Edit: To clarify, I think only 2 types of games should get perfect scores. Games that just hit the nail in every respect, even if not original. You could say WoW might qualify here. They aren't doing anything terribly new, but they do it all so well. The other case is the game that gets a few things not so right, but really advance originality. You could put Braid or Portal here.

[Shryke]

My problem is not with reviewers liking games I don't, but with giving out these kinds of high scores *period*.

Suck it up then?

Reviews are based on more of a Grade Scale, like in school.

A 7 counts as ok, and a 5 is downright shitty. Any good game is gonna be 8, 9 or 10 (B and up).

[Cuellar]

They should use a normal distribution when giving scores. only the top games get a 10... with most receiving 5s.

Then again, game reviews are mostly based on rimjobs by video game companies...

[Arakasi]

Which means that they do end up going a bit of the Star Trek way with logarithmic scale. Where a 7 is solid, 8 is good, 9 is really good and 10 is awesome. But then you have to figure out the difference between a 9 and a 9.5 is much bigger than an 8 and 9. Plus they lose money out on advertisements on game boxes and such.

[Wouter]

The PC version of this game is apparently a SECUROM mess without precedent? It seems it may not even install until such widespread programs as Nero (besides, of course, Daemon Tools and the like) are de-installed. It's a bad day when some game distributer decides what programs my computer may or may not run, or even have installed. And even after uninstalling Nero, in some cases the game apparently didn't work.

In addition, there is an online check and a limited number of installs. You are simply "hiring" the game for an unspecified amount of time (of course the distributor can pull the plug when he wants to). The pirated versions of games, even now as they become so bandwith intensive buying is often more attractive, are becoming ever more tempting as distributors do everything possible to piss off the paying customer. Pirates have far less chance on problems and often get a good working game, that they actually own instead of lease, and it's free except for the time and bandwith needed. If this is how PC games are going to be distributed from now on (even the STEAM version has the same SECUROM issues, so it seems), they could better stop with PC games alltogether. At least that leaves the remains of that market open to companies who actually want their customers to have a good experience, even if it may be low budget affairs.

[Shryke]

They should use a normal distribution when giving scores. only the top games get a 10... with most receiving 5s.

Then again, game reviews are mostly based on rimjobs by video game companies...

Not gonna work. 5/10 sounds like a shitty shitty ANYTHING to most people.

[Werthead]

That's pretty outrageous. Bethesda said a couple of months back the game wouldn't use any form of DRM, and then it ships with SECUROM (the Steam version doesn't, apparently).

A bit of googling reveals a tremendous backlash building against this already.

* waits to see FO3's Amazon review rating plummet *

[Shryke]

I was about to say "It's not their fault, blame EA or something", but from I can figure, they are their own Publisher, so it actually IS there fault.

[Werthead]

Correct. I thought they were still using Take 2 Games as their distributor, but apparently FO3 is a 100% independent Bethesda production.

However, the version of SecuROM they are using is purely a disk-checker, not a limited install thing (unlike Spore and Mass Effect), so it's not quite as outrageous as the previous scandals have been. Bethesda are taking a lot of flak for leading people to believe that SecuROM would not be present though.

[Wouter]

Correct. I thought they were still using Take 2 Games as their distributor, but apparently FO3 is a 100% independent Bethesda production.

However, the version of SecuROM they are using is purely a disk-checker, not a limited install thing (unlike Spore and Mass Effect), so it's not quite as outrageous as the previous scandals have been.

http://tweakers.net/nieuws/56469/fallout-3...ing-update.html

The above Dutch site reported differently, talking about version 7.36.0006 of Securom which, according to them, limits the numbers of installs and requires online activation - the same version would be used by Far Cry 2, apparently.

Now Bethesda says that they do not actually use this "functionality" of Securom. I hope it's true and tweakers.net is wrong, but then, EA also lied about exact effect of the DRM on Mass Effect (is there a DRM-free version of that, yet?) and Bethesda previously denied they would even use Securom, so we'll see.

[Inigima]

Looks like the game turned out awesome. I'm currently resisting buying the 360 version -- I don't have time for it right now, and I should probably hang on to the money, but it looks so good....

[Werthead]

http://tweakers.net/nieuws/56469/fallout-3...ing-update.html

The above Dutch site reported differently, talking about version 7.36.0006 of Securom which, according to them, limits the numbers of installs and requires online activation - the same version would be used by Far Cry 2, apparently.

Now Bethesda says that they do not actually use this "functionality" of Securom. I hope it's true and tweakers.net is wrong, but then, EA also lied about exact effect of the DRM on Mass Effect (is there a DRM-free version of that, yet?) and Bethesda previously denied they would even use Securom, so we'll see.

There's no official DRM-free version of ME. However, allegedly there are things you can manually change in the .ini files that deactivates the DRM. I'm not sure how reliable that is.

For my part, I just bought ME and have left it installed permanantly, even thought it takes up a ton of space. I'm not too worried about it for now, but since apparently RA3 and GTA4 both use DRM and they're the two games I wanted to get for Christmas, it's going to become more of an issue as my hard disk space rapidly shrinks.

[Durckad]

This is a bad sign because I thought NPC's in Morrowind (haven't played Oblivion) were horrifically bland and repetitive.

Agreed, although Oblivion suffered from this a bit too.

Very rarely should a gave go over 9.0. Those that do should be the kind of epic-genre-redefining games that people talk about for years. A perfect score should mean a perfect game. The kind what makes you fall down on your knees and weep for the pleasure of having been graced by it's existence.

That's way too draconian.

Besides, it's just a review. Maybe if the scales went up to 11, it would be better?

My problem is not with reviewers liking games I don't, but with giving out these kinds of high scores *period*.

Obviously someone disagrees with about what constitutes 'genre-defining.'

There's no official DRM-free version of ME. However, allegedly there are things you can manually change in the .ini files that deactivates the DRM. I'm not sure how reliable that is.

For my part, I just bought ME and have left it installed permanantly, even thought it takes up a ton of space. I'm not too worried about it for now, but since apparently RA3 and GTA4 both use DRM and they're the two games I wanted to get for Christmas, it's going to become more of an issue as my hard disk space rapidly shrinks.

As DRM becomes more prevalent, I've started moving my purchases over to the 360. Less hassle overall.

[Mackaxx]

Stupid Thursday night late night shopping and your 20% off sales on fallout 3.

Picked it up last night and played it into the wee hours. So far so reasonably good. The characters are a touch lifeless but their chatting is much better than in oblivion.

After a good 5 hours of play I'm still not sure what to think but it is keeping me reasonably interested so far. Some isn't quite there in terms of atmosphere though, and I can't quite put my finger on it so it might just be my mood.

Bit busy right now so will jot down some impressions later.