Tom Mcshea and Carolyn no longer work for gamespot.

So ignoring how you felt about the game is being honest? I would have thought that saying a game you like is good and saying a game you hated is bad would be being honest. To me it seems that you want them to be dishonest.

I've already explained how a well written review can tell you about whether you will like a game or not even if your tastes are completely different to the reviewers. The first review I read for Gone Home was very negative, however I could tell that I would like the game based on that review. An objective analysis of a game will tell you very little on whether it will be enjoyable or not. All it would be is a list of what features the game has.

Yes sites are trying to get views. However I'm not talking just about Gamespot. All game review sites are like this, every single review is nothing more than a personal opinion. If reviews worked the way you think they do then how highly a book gets rated should depend entirely on it's spelling and grammar. The fact is you don't like reviews at all, what you're asking for is for something completely different.

I haven't been reading reviews here either, but that was specifically because of those two. I might just bother doing that again now.

Dude no one cares about a reviewers personal feelings. They want to know if the game is worth playing. A good reviewer does in fact take themselves out of the equation and talks about the game. Perhaps you are willing to settle for less. Most people are not. They want to know how the game works.

Like the example I gave you with the FPS genre. I don't have fun playing them. If I had to review one and I allowed my feelings on the subject into the review....I'd score it lower. I'm not having fun with it. But that is NOT fair to the game. If it's well made the fact that I don't like the genre should have NOTHING to do with the review.

It's not fair to the reader. The fact that I don't like the game does NOT mean they will not. I should talk about.....THE GAME ITSELF.

And we're back to your Gone Home game. Dude...congrats on liking a bad game. Enjoy it. Love it. Tell everyone you meet how great a time you had playing the game. But that fact that you already told me it had terrible game play means a good review should state just that. That doesn't mean YOU can't still pick up the game and play it. It doesn't mean you can't create a shrine to it in your bedroom if you desire. What it DOES mean is the reviewer should mention it to readers.

I'm not talking about GS only either....whether it's a site or a publication....consumers are important. And of course a review is a personal opinion. No one said otherwise. However, there is a difference in a professional opinion and a personal opinion. One is obviously going to happen. No two people will exactly review the same. The second is avoidable and should be in the professional realm. Now...we're not going to agree about this. We're going around and around. So we should probably agree to disagree. I do hope you give some thought though to the two different types of opinion.

Anyway.....in future if you could cut the quote chain a bit I'd be much appreciative. Ciao

Do you even read what you write? "no one cares about a reviewers personal feelings. They want to know if the game is worth playing." Whether a game is worth playing or not is a personal opinion. How do you not understand this incredibly simple concept?

And no once again you misread. Is it personal opinion if a game has poor graphics? Problematic game play? Lack of story? Etc?

Art is subjective, what looks good to some people looks bad to others. Problematic gameplay is also subjective, repetition can be seen as problematic, to some not. Story is also subjective, some care about it some don't, some like romance some hate it, some want action others want drama.

However none of that says whether the game is worth buying or not. So have you gone back on your claim that reviews are supposed to tell you whether a game is worth it or not, or are you just rambling?

Why don't you give an example of a review that is entirely devoid of opinion? Seeing how that's the way reviews are supposed to be it should be easy.

If a game doesn't perform the way it is intended to perform, like having severe lag input, that is not subjective. You can objectively look at a game like, for instance, Big Rigs, and plainly see that the game is objectively not functioning properly and thus has problematic gameplay.

So then how is something like Gone Home a bad game if it performs exactly as intended?

Technical problems are objective, but how negatively they effect a game is subjective. Should all games at 30fps be docked points?

I think that GameSpot wanted to get rid of Carolyn because she's transgender and merely used the mass layoff as a cover for their discrimination. I must admit, however, that my theory is baseless.

I have no comment on Gone Home. Was just zeroing in on that one comment that really caught my eye. Just a guess, but Gone Home's problem with some people looks to be more of an almost complete absence of gameplay, as opposed to problematic gameplay. GH looks more like one of those games that can be a great "experience" more than anything else. Like Shenmue, if I hadn't experienced the game in it's prime, I would probably think it was a stupid game. That game stands out to me for pretty much everything but it's gameplay. It's likely the same for GH and people who like it.

But I just wanted to say that I thought problematic gameplay is definitely not subjective, thats all.

It's great that some people enjoyed it, but I'm not sure giving such a thing such high praise isn't misleading. If I gave Shenmue a 10/10, it would be super misleading. It's definitely NOT a 10/10, yet it's my favorite game ever. I mean, I do recognize Shenmue has outright bad gameplay, so wouldn't a 10/10 be unjustified? Yet I doubt I could give it anything less.

*Shrugs*

I have plenty of problems with how Caro reviewed games, most recently the insanely gross double standard she showcased in claiming Joel was incapable of love because he killed so many people, while in her Tomb Raider review she vocalized no problems with Lara Croft doing the exact same thing, but in greater numbers, and frequently in a more vicious way. (some of the execution moves she could pull off were a little gruesome, hell she was mowing down men twenty or thirty in a single sequence and even screaming "I WILL KILL YOU ALL") The message was clear there, and it rustled my jimmies.

Any time a man defends himself or those they love they are abusive and evil. Anytime a woman does the same thing she is always automatically justified because the men she killed must have done something to trigger her. You can ignore Gone Home altogether and still have plenty of reasons Carolyn was an absolutely dreadful reviewer who actively chased away customers of this site.

Yes art is subjective. But technical failures are not. Games are also technical.

And they are also art. Did I ever say the technical parts don't matter?

So where's your example of a review devoid of opinion?

Why is this off-topic? Isn't this games-related?

Either way, I just hope that they get replaced by reviewers who are just as critical of AAA games and aren't afraid to harshly diss down AAA games no matter how popular they are among whiny fanboys. Most of the fanboy (and advertiser) pleasing high scores handed out by most other game reviewers make the game industry look like a complete joke. The average game industry score should be 5/10 (like it is for movies and books), not 8/10.

I don't think so....I'm sure there's some bigots out there no doubt but most of the issues I see people posting about him/her relate directly with his/her reviews. I didn't think most of her reviews were bad, but her GTA 5 review certainly was. It was over the top preachy and felt like it was reviewed by a ********.

It was an unprofessional review to say the least and she should have left her political/social views out of it.

Yeah it is. Especially seeing as how GS is located in San Francisco, probably the gayest city in the world, and how Kevin Vanord used to work for the GS and he is gay (or at least that's what I heard anyway). Don't know, don't care, point is I think playing the "homophobe/bigot card" is disingenuous.

I was going to reply to toast burner but I just give up...He still fails to see the difference between an opinion on game mechanics, and letting your social and political views affect the score of a GAME. It's extremely unprofessional. I love Dodge cars and in the past I wrote impressions about some new Charger models and even there I admitted that Mustangs were better. Same shit can happen with games if you're a good reviewer. Carolyn wasn't, because she kept on mixing her views on things that had nothing to do with videogames with her job. I don't know why Toast burner doesn't seems to understand that.

This is what fanboys today fail to recognized. They demand that games be taken seriously as art, and for video game stories to be taken seriously. And yet when a story-driven game is criticized for its story, fanboys start crying foul. If it's okay for games like The Walking Dead and The Last of Us to be given high scores for their stories, then it's also okay for GTA5 to be given a less-than-perfect score for its not-so-great story. And if we're going to judge the story, then it rightfully deserves to be criticized for misogyny. Why even bother lobbying for video games to be recognized as art if you can't handle games being reviewed as art? You can't have your cake and eat it too.

If a reviewer is afraid to criticize a game out of fear of offending over-sensitive fanboys, then that's a terrible reviewer not doing his/her job properly. If a reviewer did not enjoy the game himself/herself, then it would be mind-bogglingly stupid to give the game a perfect score just because others might enjoy it, as some fanboys seem to be suggesting. Why bother recommending something that you yourself don't enjoy? That defeats the whole point of a review. This fear of offending over-sensitive fanboys is exactly what makes so many video game critics look like jokes compared to actual critics in other industries. Back in the days before fanboys raged on the internet, the average game industry score was around 5-6 out of 10. Nowadays, the average game industry score is almost 8 out of 10, making the the 10-point scale completely worthless.

I disagree that their reviews were good, and it seems that I'm not the only person. Also, the entire part of about personal opinions on games not affecting how I enjoy games is wasted. It's not that I disagree with their conclusions (although I sometimes do) it's that the writing is sometimes impossible to take seriously. I don't want reviewers trying to push their own agenda or trying to create controversy to get more views. I also don't want reviewers to get facts about the game wrong. That's just bad writing. I want to read a reviewer's thought on the game as well as what the game entails. In other words, I want to know what they liked, what they didn't like, and what the game has content wise.

Hell, just recently we had a "fantastic" piece by Tom that tried to make Rainbow Six Siege look sexist, with no evidence other than how females hostages act. Basically just trying to create a controversy to get more page views and comment. After all, they get paid more by advertisers for page views. We don't need that crap.

Yeah, it sucks they lost their jobs, but I won't say I'll miss them.

Thank the Lord those two troll left, but their damage is already done. GS is a pretty crappy games site, their staff was always weak and an uninteresting bunch.

McShea and the Tranny (you cant mod me mods, the rules are i cant make insulting comments about users and staff members, that he/she is no longer a staff member) were awful at whatever they were assigned to do and it was obvious half the time they were making click bait and purposeful controversial content to get people's attention, only to then fight with the GS community on Twitter.

Hoepfully we get some decent reviewers this time around that know what they are doing and dont bitch about feminism and "well I didnt like the main character so I just hated to whole game and made no effort to see the game for hat it really is, instead in just gonna complain for months about how i didnt like that one character and how i didnt want to play it"

How was it over the top? Did you even read it?

Also she's a she.

I miss the golden era of this site. What I would give to have a reviewer like Greg Kasavin here again. He was the best writer and game reviewer Gamespot ever had. But the days of print game journalism are dying because of YouTube. It won't be long before CBS Interactive shuts down this site completely, folks. Giant Bomb will take over as the replacement, and all Gamespot staffers wil be out of jobs. Wouldn't surprise me a bit if it happens next year.

Actually the use of the term art is subjective as well.

And I stated clearly there is TWO uses of opinion in reviews. I never said a review wasn't an opinion. I clearly said it was posts ago. You are being dishonest now. HOWEVER, there is a difference between a reviewer giving his impressions on how the game handles and going on a social commentary rant. I also said that posts ago. Really is frustrating trying to have a conversation with someone that just don't pay attention.

Indeed. that is why I'm going to end this here. You have no intention on listening to others. Or even reading the reviews you criticise.

LOL I tried to end it yesterday and you kept on. I read the reviews. f also read your posts. It seems you didn't read mine or clearly have a reading problem.

So can anyone give an example of Carolyn ranting on about social issues rather than reviewing the game? I've heard a few people say this but I have never seen a single example.

She did it in the GTA review and has loads of articles about it

The one most people cite is the GTA V review, and her "rant" in it is just one paragraph in a big review.

Where? Give a quote from her review.

I have a feeling you haven't read her GTA5 review. Go do so now. There is no rant.

Relevant quotes:

"Or perhaps you dive right into the game’s story problems, or its serious issues with women. GTA V is a complicated and fascinating game, one that fumbles here and there and has an unnecessary strain of misogynistic nastiness running through it."

"GTA V has little room for women except to portray them as strippers, prostitutes, long-suffering wives, humorless girlfriends and goofy, new-age feminists we’re meant to laugh at."

^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^Those were written on a bigger font to standout. No doubt they wanted to emphasize that quote.

"On a less positive note, it’s deeply frustrating that, while its central and supporting male characters are flawed and complex characters, with a few extremely minor exceptions (such as the aforementioned optional getaway driver), GTA V has little room for women except to portray them as strippers, prostitutes, long-suffering wives, humorless girlfriends and goofy, new-age feminists we’re meant to laugh at."

"Characters constantly spout lines that glorify male sexuality while demeaning women, and the billboards and radio stations of the world reinforce this misogyny, with ads that equate manhood with sleek sports cars while encouraging women to purchase a fragrance that will make them “smell like a bitch.” Yes, these are exaggerations of misogynistic undercurrents in our own society, but not satirical ones. With nothing in the narrative to underscore how insane and wrong this is, all the game does is reinforce and celebrate sexism. The beauty of cruising in the sun-kissed Los Santos hills while listening to “Higher Love” by Steve Winwood turns sour really quick when a voice comes on the radio that talks about using a woman as a urinal."

"GTA V is an imperfect yet astounding game that has great characters and an innovative and exciting narrative structure, even if the story it uses that structure to tell is hobbled at times by inconsistent character behavior, muddled political messages and rampant misogyny."

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

I don't give a shit about Carolyn Petit either way. I haven't played GTA 5 but watched the review when it came out since I'm a big fan of the series and thought it was peculiar and bold (I knew she would get killed) to bring the subject up.

She spent quite amount of copy on the subject so it was a deliberate act to shine a light on the topic. Whether that was necessary or not is up to you.

So now everyone has the quotes. Duke it out. Anyone wanna place a bet on odds on whether the next Gamespot' GTA 6 review brings the subject of misogyny up?

This is from the review

There’s so much more to say about GTA V. In series tradition, it has an eclectic assortment of radio stations featuring great songs from numerous genres and eras. In a break with series tradition, it also has an excellent ambient score of its own that lends missions more cinematic flavor. On a less positive note, it’s deeply frustrating that, while its central and supporting male characters are flawed and complex characters, with a few extremely minor exceptions (such as the aforementioned optional getaway driver), GTA V has little room for women except to portray them as strippers, prostitutes, long-suffering wives, humorless girlfriends and goofy, new-age feminists we’re meant to laugh at.

Characters constantly spout lines that glorify male sexuality while demeaning women, and the billboards and radio stations of the world reinforce this misogyny, with ads that equate manhood with sleek sports cars while encouraging women to purchase a fragrance that will make them “smell like a bitch.” Yes, these are exaggerations of misogynistic undercurrents in our own society, but not satirical ones. With nothing in the narrative to underscore how insane and wrong this is, all the game does is reinforce and celebrate sexism. The beauty of cruising in the sun-kissed Los Santos hills while listening to “Higher Love” by Steve Winwood turns sour really quick when a voice comes on the radio that talks about using a woman as a urinal.

@The_Last_Ride: What is a video game review to you?

So where's the rant? That's a single paragraph that is entirely about the game.

Do people even have a real clue as to why they were fired? Well, Carolyn walked out, with her co-workers, so says her Twitter. Was any reason really given, or are people just speculating due to unsatisfactory reviews?

She says she was laid off. When she said she walked out I think she meant she is literally walking out.

Since Gamespot has lost a lot of traffic I assume they couldn't afford to have as many employees.

Oh I think they are just giving their opinions in regard to the two individuals. I don't think anyone is alluding to it being because of their reviews.

I havent found a singe review frmo tom i agreed with.

Wow this thread is depressing the crap out of me. People who are happy that these people who been with this site for years are fired is just fucking gross. Would you like it if your friends said to you" Hey I heard you lost your job. which is good cuz you suck at it" And if someone says "cause they weren't good at there jobs" I say to you is this. Who the hell are you? Do you have years of experience working for a game site...anybody?.....no? Then that argument is complete horse shit. I like Tom and Carol cuz there reviews were different. There opinions were different. I was actually happy about the Last of Us review. Since it actually showed that people opinions can differ and not everyone is going to love what the masses are falling over for( which I didn't know a person can be wrong when it comes to a OPINION ON A GODDAM VIDEO GAME!) My heart goes out to those who lost their gigs and I hope that they stay in the industry threw different outlets.

@MethodManFTW: a review is an opinion critiquing a game from the most objective point of view you can possibly make. McShea and Petit made opinion pieces out of their reviews

@toast_burner: It's clearly bias to women mate.

All reviews are biased.

Odd that you've changed your argument from "she went on a rant about non related social issues" to "it's biased"

Here's a challenge for you, find a review that isn't biased.

Exactly, games like all pieces of art are to be viewed subjectively. An objective game review would be incredibly boring and not useful to anyone.. It took me this long to complete the game, it ran at this many frames per second, it has online support, etc.

It's bias to feminism, not journalism or just an opinion on the game.

That's the way most reviews are mate

It is an opinion on the game. Just because you don't see it as big as a problem as she did that doesn't mean it's not valid or has no place in her review.

No.... No reviews are like that. If all you want are facts about a game, just read the back of the box and read DigitalFoundry technical breakdowns. Opinions about gameplay and story are just that. Reviews with only objective statements would be like 5 sentences long.

ob·jec·tive

adjective \əb-ˈjek-tiv, äb-\

: based on facts rather than feelings or opinions : not influenced by feelings

Give an example then.

I bet it has to do something about that survey many users took that got them laid off.

Your trolling is getting pretty old.

FINALLY, SOMEONE GETS IT

Just wanted to add that after Feedbacklua ended, in early May, Gamespot set up the Filters on the articles so the users can't type any negative words like troll, ****, jack, [yeah it's stupid] can't say Xbone [MS said it's okay to say it but not GS] and you can't say WTF. The filter was the last straw to most users and so far, most of the users who post on the news and were on Feedackula left GS and it has been pretty much quite now. When Feedbackula stop, the Filter can right in and chase the users/trolls away. Feedbackula really did bring in more traffic when Friday comes and Eddie always puts in the troll-bait article.

I'm gonna seriously miss them.

Haters can eat a dick.