After being somewhat shaken in my confidence in GameSpot's reviews for a while, with a start point of about the Metroid Prime Hunters debacle, I've grown more and more impressed by IGN's more personal approach to reviews.

And that leads to the present day where Baten Kaitos Origins caps off my disagreement. I'll never go into "this deserves at least a ___" or about how they underrated it, or overrated something, as reviews are highly subjective to what one has played previously, and I have certainly not played what the GameSpot editors have.

However, I have played Baten Kaitos: Eternal Wings and the Lost Ocean and so did the reviewer of Baten Kaitos Origins, and there are a few things that are simply indisputable -- Baten Kaitos Origins has better audio and visuals that are of equal or better quality than Eternal Wings and the Lost Ocean. And to a lesser degree, it is longer and has more to do (I can't affirmatively state this, as I did not complete EVERYTHING in each game).

Baten Kaitos: Eternal Wings and the Lost Ocean
Gameplay: 8
Graphics: 9
Sound: 8
Value: 8
Tilt: 9

Baten Kaitos Origins
Gameplay: 7
Graphics: 7
Sound: 7
Value: 8
Tilt: 8

That's sounds righ--wait, what? Let's try this again.

Baten Kaitos: Eternal Wings and the Lost Ocean
The Bad: Battle system has so much going on it can leave you behind.; nasal-sounding voices distract rather than immerse.; you can level up only at save points..

Baten Kaitos Origins
The Bad: Brutal boss fights with lots of level-grinding required; level design encourages backtracking and introduces confusion into some puzzles; lots of deck micromanagement required.

I see audio in "The Bad" for Eternal Wings and not for Origins, and it manages to score more highly.

IGN ranked the visuals equal. And while also giving lesser points to audio, it stated voices as a negative in Origins and not in Eternal Wings (how he could think that, I don't know) and he JUSTIFIES his opinion because of it. And more importantly, IGN doesn't use a weighted rating system, so it doesn't really matter in the end, anyway.

I probably wouldn't care nearly as much if I didn't think so highly of Baten Kaitos Origins, but I do and I believe I have a point here. What is the weighted system for if there's no consistency? Without consistency, it becomes detrimental to the entire process.

I'll again state that I do not agree with berating reviewers over their score versus your own with regard to individual games, but when a trend of inconsistency or unfairness emerges, then questions need to arise of competency.

Ultimately when my third-favourite game I have on GameCube out of 50 titles on top of games I've played and don't own or formerly owned, well, that goes to tell me that reviews are losing any value to me. All that's left is to tell me whether a game is completely worthless, but I think I can figure that out myself.