MasterDex

I agree that a game may not lack in quality because of an optional feature but I think there's a difference between standard features and optional features. If I was to buy a multiplayer console game, I'd hope it had dedicated servers but I'd be willing to settle with the P2P because that's the standard there. On the PC however, dedicated servers had been a standard for FPS games for a long time, they were better than P2P connections so they were the best thing to use for large multiplayer games. When you go against that standard, I believe you lower the actual quality of the game. It would be like releasing a PSX game unchanged and charging a triple-A price. Games have generally grown in quality as time went on. We got better graphics, better AI, more advanced games, better multiplayer. The quality has become inherently greater thanks to things like new shader models, more memory and dedicated servers so on PC, at least, I think it's justifiable to say that a game may be of lower quality due to the lack of dedicated servers or LAN support, at least on PC. Going back on topic, the back and forth between Yantelope and myself is a good example of why I think that negative scores are as valid as positive and moderate scores. We all have our own opinion and rate games our own way. If the majority of people have the drive to post negative comments, that could say something about the game that a reader may want to consider.

Mainly, yeah but I think the aspects of a game that Yantelope and I consider to determine overall quality differs a bit as well.

With the power windows analogy. Is that not the same as reviewing a game based on different aspects? The power windows are just one aspect of the car up for review. If there were two identical models except that one had power windows, would the one with power windows not be considered the better car by most people? I think I'd consider power windows if I was in the market for a car, I'd be weighing it up along with other aspects, yeah, but I'd still like to hear of it. I don't consider that to be on the same level as dedicated servers and LAN support. It may not be the case on consoles but these are important aspects to a PC gamer, more important than the equivalent of power windows (which I imagine being something along the lines of having split-screen, still something I'd give a plus for and would like to know but not something I'm going to cry over). You don't need a spammer to tell you if a game doesn't have dedicated servers and you may need a reviewer to tell you if the game is enjoyable, etc but no-one is telling you to heed the words of the spammer and the score they give or even the score and opinions the professional critics give but they're there. The user score is a cumulative score with comments attached. There's some overly postive comments and scores and there are some nasty comments and undeservedly negative scores too. Taken as a whole however, I believe they tend to reflect, more often than not, the general consensus of gamers. There's one problem, I suppose, with that. It's the general consensus of gamers and that means that certain aspects that wouldn't bother your average ignorant consumer will be brought up and be weighed up in the total tally. All I'm saying is that I believe that as far as the user scores on Metacritic are concerned, the negative comments are as valid, regardless of the reason, as the positive and moderate ones. You just have to look at them for what they are and go to the critics for the general reviewing.

I couldn't disagree more. The lack of dedicated servers or LAN support don't speak to the quality of the game. If you're into those features then surly go and look and see if it has those but ratings spamming it because you're mad they cut a feature you like is silly and unproductive. If you look there are people already spamming the Harry Potter 8 movie box set on Amazon because "this set doesn't include the extended editions nor all the other bouns features". That has nothing to do with the quality of the set and any rational person should look at what is or isn't included before buying it without having to read negative spam reviews. Here's another way of saying it. "The Honda LX sucks because it's not the Honda EX. 1/10" Likewise, I couldn't disagree more with your assertion that dedicated servers and LAN support don't speak to the quality of the game. I believe they do. Sure, they may not be an issue for your average console player but the standard on PC is higher* and thus the quality expected is higher. Compared side-by-side, a theoretical version of MW2 with LAN support and dedicated servers would most certainly be considered of better quality than the version of MW2 that was released, by the majority of PC gamers. Once you determine that dedicated servers and LAN support don't speak to the quality of the game, then you also bring into question the validity of rating games on other aspects of a game. If the absence of co-op or a short campaign can be grounds for scoring a game down, why then can't the exclusion of dedicated servers and LAN support (seen as standard for a long time on PC). When scoring games, we don't just look at the quality of the build (i.e. how buggy it is, how well the control scheme works, etc) but also look at all the other aspects of a game and ask some questions such as: How does it compare to competitors? How does it match up to the standard? How does it compare to its predecessor? You mention the Harry Potter 8 movie box and the negative reviews it's getting. Perhaps those negative reviews are somewhat justifiable? Is it not showing that some people are unhappy that it doesn't include certain things that they may expect as standard? I think this discussion feeds into something I may have mentioned on these forums before - the idea that complaining is something bad. If it's fine to give a game a score of 10, why then is it wrong to score a game 0? I can't speak to the validity of the Honda comparison as I don't know the difference between the LX and the EX but perhaps the LX does suck because it's not the EX, I don't know. *Please don't make this out to be elitist. The standard for networked gaming on consoles is P2P, the standard on PC is dedicated servers. Dedicated servers provide a higher standard for networked gaming than P2P does.

I agree but is the spamming of 10 ratings for fanboys who can't view the games in question objectively any worse than the spamming of negative ratings? With both extremes spamming against one another, I think it does balance out. It may not balance out numerically, but it balances out towards a general attitude towards the game. Let's look at MW2 for the PC. The user reviews work out as follows: Positive: 309 Moderate: 89 Negative: 796 User Score: 3.9 - Generally Unfavourable. Now, as a thinking man, the first question I'll ask myself is "Why so many negative reviews?" and upon doing some digging, I'd discover the reason why and personally, I'd come to the conclusion that the score of 3.9 and the generally unfavourable view of the users was somewhat justified. On the other side, the critic score is 86 out of 100 which I couldn't agree with. Now let's look at Mass Effect 2. The user reviews work out as follows: Positive: 237 Moderate: 26 Negative: 26 User Score: 8.7 - Generally Favourable. While there were many people that had bad things to say about Mass Effect 2, the drive to vote down the user score on Metacritic wasn't so great as it was in the case of MW2. The end result, the user score, is still much more in line with my own thoughts of the game having played it than the critics score of 94 out fo 100. Finally, let's take a look at Dragon Age II. The user reviews work out as follows: Positive: 403 Moderate: 166 Negative: 910 User Score: 4.2 - Generally Unfavourable. I still find myself agreeing more with the user score than I do the critic score of 82 out of 100, and I'm sure many others would as it tells a greater truth, in my opinion, than the critics score. Whatever our opinions on the user scores, surely we can give them credit for one thing - the ability to easily use the full scale rather than just a quarter of it.

As irrelevant as I believe Metacritic is, I do believe that negative scores, even in great number, are as relevant as any critic score, even more so. In the user reviews, you've got the honest-to-goodness moderates who'll rate games as objectively as they can and then you've got the extremes who are jut as likely to score a game a 10 as they are a 0. In the end, I think it balances out well enough. If there are overly negative scores been thrown at a game, there's often a source to the negativity and while it may be just blind hate, it can point to a reader something that they may take issue with - such as MW2 getting a bunch of negatives because of the PC version.

That'd be your opinion of it. Personally, I feel it's fine in its own thread as it would help to keep the discussion on the topic (The leaked code). I've had a strong suspicion that the time between Episode 2 and Episode 3 was because Valve were going to just release Half-Life 3 along with a new engine but this leaked code seems to throw a spanner in that idea. The Weapon_Ice.cpp file makes sense to anyone that finished episode 2 so that lends credence to the relation of these files to Half-Life and the timing seems to make some sense too as after DotA 2, Valve have no other games announced as in development. Considering that DotA 2 may not grab too large of an audience, Valve may be hoping to get Episode 3 out by the end of next year to keep profits up.

Watched The Guard the other night. Fantastic movie. Ireland's Lethal Weapon.

That's what I really liked about the unlock system in BF2142. Each class could choose anything, really. You didn't have a single, "final" weapon for the class, but rather had two different weapons, and both had a unique purpose. Like the Engineer class could either get an anti-tank rifle, or an anti-air rocket launcher. Could you still use the anti-tank rifle on aircraft, or the anti-air rocket launcher on tanks? Sure, but it wasn't as effective. None of the unlocks were really replaced either - they all had uses. Yeah, 2142 did it right. For Assault, which is what I played most, you had the standard assault rifles (the Scar and the FA-37) then you unlocked the Voss and the Baur. The Voss, though it was often considered overpowered, was a short-range, quick-fire rifle. In practice it was like the P90 in CoD4, useful in a pinch but not the weapon you wanted to carry around in open spaces. The Baur sat on the otherside, being a long-range, heavy assault rifle with a lower RoF and higher recoil but deadly in the hands of anyone that knows how to wield it. Personally, I stuck with the standard weapons which provided good trade-offs between the two unlocked weapons. That was perfect balancing. I don't need 10 different weapons that are more or less the same. Give me weapons that compliment each other and fill different roles. As to the RPG-ification of games, I don't have too much of a problem with it as long as it's done right. I enjoy persistence and progress in games as it helps to keep things feeling fresh but throwing in a bunch of stats that don't really mean all that much when you get down to it is pointless. It's all about finding what works best for your game. Levelling up can work for many games but as Ethan said above, there's many different ways of providing a sense of progression and developers should stop relying on the easiest one.

I've made amends for not picking it up last week and purchased Warhammer 40k: Space Marine. Just installed so I'm off to play it. Look forward to some 40k quotes from me in the future. BLOOD FOR THE BLOOD GOD! *Ahem* Sorry, it's already started. Will my love of 40k ever die?! On a related note, I'm 58% through Dead Island and have really started to see its greatness. If they released mod tools for this game, it could be all kinds of awesome in a couple of years.

This is the problem with studies of videogames and gamers. The majority start the studies from the point of view of "what harm can they do?" rather than any serious studies on their benefits. You end up with shit "studies" like this based on what 42 people said (which is then twisted to the "researcher's" needs) rather than studies based on empirical evidence and balanced viewpoints. Games and the internet are the new TV and rock and roll. They rot our minds and make us evil, lazy, incompetent man-children, incapable of proper social integration...At least that's what the masses are lead to believe. Hell, I've got my father to blame for getting me into gaming before I could even walk and have kept and grown my passion for gaming and the games industry since - yet he still feels just in criticising me for spending so much time doing so, as if it'd be fine if I was a hard-working, manual-labour man like he was. It's not going to go away when we're all in our 40's either as even in our 20's, it's more common to find people that look down on core gamers than not. We need a new evil before we're allowed some modicum of respect by the population at large. Any suggestions?

Fair point. I guess a good few people already saw the Diablo series as an online game.

I can certainly understand their want to do so, even the need to do so, yet I'll always come back to having to look out for my own interests. I'm genuinely frightened by some of the trends of the industry yet I want to enter the industry and live the dream, so to speak so I'm hopeful that certain trends don't stay trendy because it'd be a shame if games as a whole were reduced entirely to some throwaway piece of entertainment. Thankfully it hasn't happened to music or movies yet. What? What's Star Wars? Metalliwho?

I'm definitely going to give them a read. I don't think I could handle not seeing how this story plays out!

We may not see eye to eye on some things, Chewie, but as I'm nearing the end of A Storm of Swords, I find myself (so far) agreeing with your ranking of the series. A Storm of Swords is fantastic. I guess it's all downhill from here now then, eh?

I really don't mean it as an insult but it does seem a tad hypocritical, or at the least inconsistent, to be against always-online DRM when it's Ubisoft while being fine with it when it's Diablo III/Blizzard. You said in that post that you thought it (i.e the always-online form of DRM) was a bad idea and that it would lose Blizzard customers. You gave solid reasons why Blizzard would want to do it but you never gave a reason why they couldn't not do it. It isn't as if it's the only decent DRM solution out there. Honestly, I'm fine with the Auction House. It changes something seen as a negative of online gaming by many while allowing every end-user (and Blizzard) to reap the benefits (If done correctly). I could also live without mods. I'm disappointed with Blizzard and I'm angry with that recent trend in PC gaming but I could live with that. I could even live, unhappily, without LAN support. None of those would have prevented me from getting the game, I believe. So then it's just that one thing and it's the same reason I haven't bought an Ubisoft game since they brought in always-online DRM in their games. But let's get back to the topic at hand. As CyberRat said above, it's a selfish pursuit. We may pursue it with others but it's ultimately because we're not happy with something and we want something different. As a consumer, I have personal principles. Some may be selfish, some may be less than grandiose and some may not be seen as ethical but as a consumer, I want to consume certain things. Thus, I'll choose where I put the money and, as I'm sure most of you are well aware, freely and frequently run my mouth off in hopes of influencing other people with the hope that I can get what I want. I'm not disagreeing that there are advantages for the publishers and developers to have an always-on connection but, personally, as a consumer, there isn't a lot of advantages for me if all I care about is playing a single player game. I believe that an always-on connection is a disadvantage to me in such a case. I don't want to thread ground I've just covered so I'll reference what I wrote to Johnny above for more on my reasons for boycotting. It's not only to prevent cheating. While they may have had that in mind, especially with the Auction House, they also had the Auction House itself in mind. If everyone has to be connected, there's a greater opportunity for capital. Also in mind was piracy, a legitimate problem for a business but a problem that has other solutions. I'm fine with your solution to the problem too and I would likely feel much more inclined to buy the game if such was the case. Sadly, for now, it's not but who knows? Starcraft 2 can now be played offline so maybe they'll change things in the future. Is this in relation to your solution or the game as it stands now? If it's the latter, I'd say they are removing functionality from the game and that while there may be clear benefits to the consumer that wishes to play online, I would argue that there are clear negatives to the consumer that wishes to play offline. TL;DR: ME! ME! ME! ME! ME!

Yet I felt that there was more outrage over Assassin's Creed than there was over Diablo 3. Because Blizzard is the best company EVER! Duh! I honestly believe that's the reason. I certainly can't come up with any other reason...other than perhaps because it's Diablo III. Nostalgia can be a powerful thing.

Yet I felt that there was more outrage over Assassin's Creed than there was over Diablo 3.

That's what they'll be doing by not purchasing the game. Sure, requiring the end-user to always be connected even when playing single-player isn't a big issue for many people but that doesn't mean it's not a major sticking point for some. While I'm not in a situation where stability is a problem I have to worry about very often, I still don't feel I can justify buying a game that I could be locked out of at any point, be it through a problem on my end or the developer's or publisher's end. I also feel it's completely unnecessary for developers and publishers to treat each and every consumer as a potential criminal. It makes sense from a business perspective but then so do a lot of shitty practices. I think many get hung up on the word 'boycott' itself. When most people hear the word boycott, they think of large, organised protests against a product, country or whatever that can only succeed or fail but the truth of the matter is that a boycott can involve no more than one boycotter and isn't required to succeed to be seen as legitimate or anything but a waste of time. The dictionary definition of a boycott is: To abstain from or act together in abstaining from using, buying, or dealing with as an expression of protest or disfavor or as a means of coercion. As long as the boycotter or boycotters stick to their boycott, a boycott can be said to be successful. While a change in policy, etc is desired, it's not required. There's a difference there. A developer not releasing a game in a particular reason is, more often than not, a question of logistics. Asking for an always-online connection when there's really no good reason for it other than to protect the IP of the developers/publishers (despite knowing that the game will be cracked) isn't the same thing. On a related note, what I find funny about the revelation that Diablo III would feature an always-online requirement is the polarisation of general opinion when compared to the always-online requirement that Ubisoft adopted with Assassin's Creed. I'm sure there are people out there that thought the requirement for both games was fine but there's certainly been a shift of opinion for Diablo III with some people.

What's the build quality of the game like right now? It looks like a game I could really sink my teeth into but I've heard mention that it has its fair share of bugs at the moment.

Great! That better be true! I liked the freedom of being able to purchase from any region and the upside of being able to grab region specific titles...which I actually didn't do much, but still! I enjoyed the freedom!

Yeah, I think I have you added. How does it work when you're joining people that are a higher/lower level than you? I've noticed the zombies level up along with you so does it find the average between the players or just go for the higher/lower level?

B) I think Dead Island is growing on me. Yes, there's a long list of things I'd like fixed and changed but the underlying game is quite fun to play, more so, I imagine, with friends. So who has this on Steam and what level are you at? The thing that made me purchase Dead Island over Space Marine was the 4 player co-op (which is coming to Space Marine) so I'm really hoping to take advantage of that.