@mikefasnyc To be honest, I would like to think that I've outgrown the 'fan-boy' stage of playing first person shooters. Trust me, I love the easy, casual method formula of 'jump in, jump out' that the CoD franchise has mastered, the problems I have with it is that through all the mechanics that work, there are times I think that the publisher calls too many shots and it results in a game that appears to have been developed by people with their heads shoved firmly up their asses. It holds to the formula too text-book. It needs to expand, and alter our perceptions of what to expect of a shooter. The problem is the mechanics are always the same, they're always dumbed down. Same thing happens with BF3, and I'm sure BF4 won't be much better. You find something that works and you go for that because it makes money, but there is always room to push the limits, and CoD and BF3 are failing that in a few ways.
I also agree that the only way to truly evaluate a game is to actually play it, thus, spending $60 on the damn thing. This is largely the problem I have with the pay first play later model of game development, and why free to play seems to be dominating the marketplace. It allows you to 'play, then if you like, feel free to support the devs'. The problem that plagues free to play is 'pay to win' balancing issues. But with intellect applied, this can also be eliminated.
Additionally I have issues with metacritic, because that score is aggregate. This means it's basically a combined average, and isn't really a good measure of real critical review. And like you said, reviewers can seem to be on the take.
How I judge a game is both by connections to people that have taken the plunge, or my gut instincts based on what I see of game play reviews. I let my eyes and ears judge what I'm watching, based on previous experience, as well as what I'm hoping to see out of the game (looking for innovations or changes). I also listen to the features explained in the game, from reviewers and player reviews. Sometimes, I just like a franchise so I support it. The original black-ops didn't offer much in the way of innovation, but I loved the individual character customization, the face paint, gillie suits, etc. The addition of a peek function was a big surprise that I loved in the game. I've always liked the MW armament model in regards to choice, but feel it could really go much, much further in customization. Anyway, I guess I can't help but think about this, as I'm getting into game development soon and am currently in graphic design. I tend to study what I play. Well met and nice chatting to you too.
The only way to objectively measure anything is with a critical view. This requires a bit of detachment and a fair bit of knowledge about the genre of what it is that you're judging. OF course one's preferences might well come into play, but more often, the 'preferences' you might be referring to are going to have to do with game-play mechanics, level design, character design, story, environments, graphics quality...
Yet those same qualities that you may have preferences about are qualities which you can evaluate critically and objectively. There are lots of ways to gauge a game without 'personal preferences' coming into it, or without allowing them to cloud your judgment.
The clouding, and the lack of objectivity comes from allowing the marketing to psyche you out, which is what marketing does. It gets you excited all on its own, and you haven't even had a chance to see the game in action or get a feel for it yourself.
And for the record, Activision spends millions... Tens of millions, on marketing these games. And that produces a significant amount of success, because the people they target don't have the critical evaluation skills to see through the bullshit. By 'people they target', I mean people in the 12 - 18 range, though there are a fair amount of us that are older than that, that still play this series.
Ultimately I agree, one should not attempt to judge a game by it's sales, or it's marketing. Because they are both part of the same process, and one feeds the other. If someone judges a game to be good because "oh, it sold so many millions of copies in 2 weeks!' then they're an idiot. All that says is that the marketing was successful and the marketing succeeded in securing those sales. It says nothing about the actual qualities of the game.
And this brings me to why I'm really irked about Activision at the moment and that is that they spend all this advertising money selling a repackaged and regurgitated and ultimately recycled game platform and calling it new because the devs updated the game engine a bit. And have the gall to call it a 'new game'. No, it's not new. It hasn't been new since 20005. And we as gamers need to stop being the tools publishers take us for and stop buying into the hype. I guarantee you this game isn't going to offer anything different except story. There's nothing innovative here, and really, it's not that great looking either. I've seen better looking free to play games, tell ya the truth. And there are some F2P games that are by far more innovative.
Ultimately with the CoD track record what do you think keeps driving its successes? It's certainly nothing more than the advertising/marketing. Because it sure as hell isn't innovative game-play, unique or epic story arcs, fascinating characters or deep and interesting multi-player, or even cutting edge graphics. It's a tired franchise powered by a juggernaut marketing division. That's all it is.
@mikefasnyc No, that's how you objectively rate marketing. The only way to objectively rate a game is playing it yourself and weighing what it does right, versus what it does wrong. Of course, that objectivity is subjective to the viewer.
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