Pro reviewers who finish games before reviewing them

Who are some professional game reviewers (professionals are people who get paid) who actually finish a game (get the"real" ending and see the end credits) before they write a review? And if the game doesn't have an ending, such as sports and other non-narrative games, the reviewer puts in enough time to get a good idea of what the game has to offer and its quality.

hum k ? I think the only one that could be called a reviewer and complete game is the Completionist on youtube

Have you got some proof? Pretty pointless thread without some evidence of it happening (I obviously believe it does in some cases, but seriously).

I think he meant it as a question but he forgot the question mark.

@psx2514: Most review sites have a policy of "beat the game" if the game is finite. Yahtzee of Zero Punctuation doesn't always beat the games he reviews, but his reviews are also more satire than reviews. I don't have a list of what reviewers or review sites do not enforce such a policy, although you are more likely to encounter this with independent reviewers than those affiliated with the larger gaming websites.

-Byshop

@Byshop: To my knowledge, major online gaming sites such as Gamespot and IGN don't only play a fraction of the games they write reviews for because they wouldn't have time to finish every game to review to meet deadlines. Unfortunately, this could lead to inaccurate reviews that leave out parts of the game which could affect the review if the reviewer had played those parts before they wrote the review.

I also believe Game Critics finishes games before they review them.

@Coco_pierrot: I didn't say complete. I said finish. Work on your reading comprehension. (What the hell are they teaching kids in English class these days? Does the education system really suck this bad?)

Most reviewers would finish the game before writing a review, I'm pretty sure that's the policy for places like Gamespot. They typically get a review copy of the game sent to them before a game's release so that they can do a review in time. Sometimes they have to get a copy of the game when it comes out which is why some reviews come out later.

one thing I can tell you is that Jim Sterling is not one of them. The guy's a liar. He told people he beat FFXIII but then someone took a look at his trophy/achievements and noticed that he doesn't finish most of the games he reviews. He never even apologized for lying, instead he went on full damage control and wrote some stuff about how being fully objective is impossible and that you don't have to finish games to know how good or bad they are... Of-course his fandom ate that sht up.

http://www.dualshockers.com/2010/03/17/what-exactly-is-jim-sterling-reviewing-not-much-apparently/

But to be honest, I don't care much about reviews. I just use scores to have fun on System Wars but with the experience I have with games reviews are kinda pointless to me. Video games are still extremely systematic, so from watching some videos I believe I can tell if I'm interested in playing something or not. Especially with fighting games where most of these reviewers don't know what a cancel even is let alone option/select, bnb's, otg's, frames and stuff. But I do like one reviewer and that's Angry Joe. He mixes in a bit of comedy to make it entertaining but he goes very in depth with games, much more than Gamespot or IGN at least. And he finish the games, or at least I trust that he does.

Are you basing that on some information you have or is that an assumption based on how you think it probably works. Gamespot (to my knowledge) does beat games prior to submitting reviews. Bear in mind that reviewers often (but not always) get games prior to the retail release. Also, Gamespot doesn't always get a review in for a game prior to its release. In the case of Witcher 3, early copies were sent to the big sites. I was listening to an IGN podcast and they talked about how their guy who reviewer Witcher 3 put like 100 hours into the game in a week so he could finish the review prior to the game's release.

-Byshop

That's a topic for a different thread. Lets stick to the question I asked in my OP.

Well, you forgot to ask a question initially but I'm trying to answer it anyway. You seem to be making an assumption that Gamespot doesn't "beat" games prior to reviewing them but unless you know something I don't (which is why I asked) then I'd say you're wrong on that so the answer to your question is Gamespot's reviewers.

According to the review description, Kevin VanOrd put 100 hours into Witcher 3 for the review. Jeremy Signor put 40 hours into Talos. Why are you assuming they aren't beating these games?

-Byshop

@Byshop: If you want me to answer your off topic questions, make a new thread about it, and call me out in there.

OP FIXED

This is directly related to what you were asking. I'm trying to answer your question, not "call you out". You don't have to answer my question if you don't want but if you continue to act adversarily then I will lock the thread.

-Byshop

To clarify. Yes. We (GameSpot) "finish" games before putting the review up for them. And if they're open ended (MOBA, MMO, etc.) a significant amount of time is put into them before putting the review up. I can personally vouch for all the in house reviews from 2011 till present day (Sat near KVO while he had to play Watch Dogs on the Wii U, so much swearing).

As for Byshop, he's not going off-topic. He said "Are you basing that on some information you have or is that an assumption based on how you think it probably works. GameSpot (to my knowledge) does beat games prior to submitting reviews...." or TL;DR "Cite your source," which is perfectly in line with the thread in question.

Hmm, ok

Not sure what you are wanting to debate here but good luck :)

You are correct that major gaming sites do not only play a small amount of a game, they usually play it until the finish, Do they do 100% no. But that is also not needed to former a opinion on the game.

If you meant that they do only play a fraction of a game, then you are mistaken and clearly have a unfounded bias against review sites.

Im sure reviewers would finish the game or else what is the point, for games without an ending they might just try to play all the modes or get to a level cap to rack up enough play time to form an opinion

Could a mod lock and delete this. I want to start over.

@psx2514:

1 - English isn't my first language
2- You don't know me and you don't know my age either so you should think twice before speaking
3 - I talked about the Completionist because not only does he play the whole story mode, he gets every trophy/acheivement, unlock secrets and do easteregg before doing a review/video, you can't have a more complete idea of a game.

Locked.

-Byshop