Old school reviews that were way off

[Anonymous No.10534769]

We get a lot of magazine threads on /vr/ but here's something more specific - what are some old reviews that are WAY off base either with praise or criticism? Gamefan, despite it's weeby reputation LOVED Cybermorph for some reason. Supposedly the editor was tripping on acid when he wrote the review because he really oversells it and makes it sound like a transcendent experience...but the all the editors loved it because it got some insanely high scores. It beat fucking Rondo of Blood which was reviewed in the same issue. Full coverage of the game linked below.

https://forums.atariage.com/topic/159286-diehard-gamefan-magazine-praises-the-jag-big-time-in-1993/

[Anonymous No.10534814]

>Noooo you're not allowed to like anything other than Mario, Zelda, Castlevania and Resident Evil!!!

[Anonymous No.10534817]

>>10534769
Lots. My fav gaming magazine was "Gambler", unless you're Polish you probably never heard of it though. Anyway, they organized a small (when compared to E3 etc., for Poland back in the day it was huge) local computer and vidya expo in Warsaw called "Gambleriada". Well, turns out they had a lot of sponsors, both to organize the event, buy the prizes for tournaments etc. Software houses and hardware manufacturers both. All of the sponsor products got crazy good scores constantly. As a kid I didn't notice, reading the reviews years later it's painfully obvious. Kind shameful too - vidya "journalists".

[Anonymous No.10534825]

>>10534769
Which game is supposed to be "way off"? They all look pretty on-point.

[Anonymous No.10534885]

>>10534825
Cybermorph, which is steaming pile. If you just read the damn post...

[Anonymous No.10534887]

all game journos were bribed. still are.

[Anonymous No.10534890]

heed their words and learn something interesting. because you already approach the text in a closed off manner is is of course worthless. there is perspective to be gained.

[Anonymous No.10534907]

>>10534769
This review is so chock-full of typical fake praises and just below 100% scoring that the stench of atari's grubby claws still seeps from it.

[Anonymous No.10534910]

>>10534887
Most likely. I "worked" (didn't make shit end of the day) for a gaming web portal years back, some publishers would get butthurt (MUH METACRITIC!!1) and stop sending you press release disc if you'd give their games a bad score, so then you'd be stuck having to buy the games in order to review them unless they were easily cracked.

[Anonymous No.10534917]

>>10534910
Having to buy your own games for review you poor thing.

[Anonymous No.10535056]

>>10534910
>>10534917
I never understood why free video games would be an incentive to give good reviews. Games were inherently worthless, you're advertising the product for them for free, and you have to invest hours into the product on a deadline.

[Anonymous No.10535063]

>>10535056
Most reviewers only play around 3 to 4 hours of a game before they give their review anyway.

[Anonymous No.10535073]

its funny to read the seethe over 2d ps1 games at the time

[Anonymous No.10535078]

>>10535073
Gamefan being the big exception here. Insane praise for stuff like Hermie Hopperhead

[Anonymous No.10535121]

>>10535078
The head guy for most of GF's run was infamous for going nuts over stuff ordinary people shrugged at. He devoted a huge multi-page article to Battle Monsters on Saturn, for instance.

[Anonymous No.10535124]

>>10534917
>t. daddy bought me all the newest releases for all systems
Good for you IDORT.

[Anonymous No.10535134]

>>10534769
Yeah they're way off about Mad Dog McCree. I don't know why that game is so hated, it's a fun little thing, very enjoyable even today. Must be a price issue, 3DO was expensive as shit

[Anonymous No.10535145]

>>10534917
>>10535056
>they don't realize that publishers send early copies to reviewers
Yeah that's a huge leverage actually. If you don't get that copy, your review comes out later than everyone else's, in an online world it means that you've missed the short 2 day window when people gave a shit. And in the world of magazines it could be a difference between the review being in the same issue with your rival magazines or being a whole month late. Yeah people giving out those early copies had a lot of say in what you print, they could ruin you
But most of the leverage just came from publishers not selling you any ads. And if you're a really good boy they will buy you all expenses paid trips to international events.

[Anonymous No.10535150]

>>10535145
Oh and lets not forget that if you're a really extra good special little boy you will get to know people at the publishers on a personal bases and by sucking up to them (networking it's called) you will be able to later lend a job on the publisher side. Many journalists did that, lots of them moved on to work in marketing departments for game publishers. And each one of those people was an extra special good boy who sucked up to that publisher extra hard

[Anonymous No.10535176]

>>10535145
>>10535150
This anon knows what's up. Toxic fucking industry.

[Anonymous No.10535186]

>>10535121
Yeah that’s one of the reasons Gamefan was so fun to read. They would get really excited about games like this and give them really elaborate layouts containing some of the best screenshots in the industry, always highlighting cool animation frames. There’s a lot of genuine love for games of all kinds in that mag

>>10535145
EGM famously had publishers threaten to pull ads a few times (they loved talking about this). In honesty the only old school game mags I felt were really bad about score inflation were Gamepro and Gamefan and the latter was probably due to them running their own game shops. Even Nintendo Power could be surprisingly harsh if you read the actual scores they gave out.

[Anonymous No.10535382]

8.8

[Anonymous No.10535392]

the industry has always been in the pocket of publishers. its a major conflict of interest that invites the question of what game history actually means when you understand it was paid for and executed by the victors.

[Anonymous No.10535401]

>>10534885
Not that anon, but the part about the control being the best they had ever felt;etc all but confirmed to me that the reviews for it are satire.

[Anonymous No.10535412]

>>10535392
>its a major conflict of interest that invites the question of what game history actually means when you understand it was paid for and executed by the victors.
*sigh You're gonna start ranting over those darn Gerudos again aren't you....

[Anonymous No.10535446]

>>10534769
>Cybermorph is a 3D, texture mapped tour-de-force
Is this a joke review? How can you just lie like that? The game isn't textured at all

[Anonymous No.10535448]

>>10535446
>Is this a joke review? How can you just lie like that? The game isn't textured at all
>>>10535401

[Anonymous No.10535483]

>>10535446
>>10535448
You have to remember, this game released in 1993, the same year that Doom released and was still using sprites heavily in the game. Cybermorph was a fully 3D console game. It was literally a case of all flash, no substance at the time, and people gave it forgiving reviews because of it.

[Anonymous No.10535494]

>>10535483
No, dude. No. They were giving the full satire treatment because they know virtually all of their consumer base would never buy or even play the game in person, ever. They knew it was trash.
-t. was a spoiled brat who had EVERY system except the Neo fuckin Geo

[Anonymous No.10535497]

>>10535494
*and the Jaguar of course
Shit, I still haven't played that game. The bitch shows up in the AVGN game, dough.

[Anonymous No.10535507]

>>10535494
>>10535497
That makes absolutely no sense considering they gave Mad Dog Mccree middling to bad reviews. It's just a case of you inventing logic when the logic for why they rated it highly is already there.

[Anonymous No.10535512]

Look at the revolving door between big banks/big pharma and the government agencies responsible for monitoring those institutions. We're in a wicked broken world.

[Anonymous No.10535517]

>>10535507
>they gave Mad Dog Mccree middling to bad reviews
That makes perfect sense since those guys usually hated light gun games/LaserDisc games.

>It's just a case of you inventing logic when the logic for why they rated it highly is already there.
Can I have some of what you're smoking?

[Anonymous No.10535594]

Game journos were, are, and always will be bad and progressively get worse, at least back then it was people who played games who happen to have shit taste, versus now where they don't even really play games, they just got a communications degree but CNN/Huffpost turned them down, so they joined some game site.

[Anonymous No.10535635]

[Anonymous No.10535640]

Honestly, the tastes of game journos aren’t any worse than some of the takes I’ve seen here. There’s anons honestly convinced that the CD-ii Zeldas are good games.

[Anonymous No.10535659]

>>10534769
Their opinions not lining up with yours doesn't mean they were off. Just off what your opinion is. Gamefan was always hyperbolic though, it's what made them fun.

[Anonymous No.10535675]

[Anonymous No.10535684]

>>10535675
>rubbish
Is that a British mag?

[Anonymous No.10535695]

>>10535675
This is the kind of stuff I always have to remind people of or explain to kids. Being 3D was an automatic pass for a while with reviewers. People viewed 2D as a failure at launch for an embarrassingly long time.

[Anonymous No.10535697]

>>10535684
Like 80% of the worst game reviews ever made are british my man

[Anonymous No.10535718]

Next time, let's have a game magazine thread that specifies it's only about North American published magazines. Because otherwise it's always going to be shitposting the worst takes from British lad magazines masquerading as gaming press. (The developing countries get their turn in the thread after that).

[Anonymous No.10535776]

>>10535697
It's kind of funny isn't it? Reading the blurb it was hard to imagine it being real and then I saw the word rubbish and it all made sense.

[Anonymous No.10535784]

>>10534769
the Suikodens had low scores.
so did a lot of shoot-em-up games that were decent.
magazine critics just aren't motivated to give high scores unless ad money. FF games consistently had high scores, even if it's yet another low-effort remake or some collection.

[Anonymous No.10537585]

>>10535784
>zoomers reimagining a fake history

[Anonymous No.10537596]

>>10535697
Its a preview in a pro (likely official) nintendo mag. There were a lot of great UK mags. I've read US mags, they are shockingly bad in comparison and embarrassing to read

[Anonymous No.10537607]

Game magazines/media always towed the line between "consumer advocacy" and "enthusiast press" and I feel like everyone with half a brain inherently understood this until like 2014

[Anonymous No.10537617]

All old magazine reviews were complete shit.
Always.

[Anonymous No.10537734]

>>10537585
>zoomers
im older than your mom. probably. and you can factcheck it with EGM mags on archive dot org,everyone is a zoomer poster.

[Anonymous No.10537736]

>>10537607
>"consumer advocacy" and "enthusiast press"
where's the paid shills part? AFAIK as i knew east-euros gaming mags were very openly being bribed.

[Anonymous No.10537760]

>>10537617
Nah. They were at least more entertaining than majority of garbage reviews from last decade.

[Anonymous No.10537765]

The funny thing about this review isn't the opinions themselves, but their comments about difficulty make it clear they played the first level or two then decided they'd seen enough. Implying they played the game for about 10 minutes.

[Anonymous No.10537785]

>>10537765
Some of those issues have dozens of reviews, with 4-5 reviewers on each one. You really wonder how long they actually played each of these games. It gets a bit better in the late 90s when they cut it to 3 reviews per game and have a larger pool of reviewers though.

[Anonymous No.10538007]

>>10537734
Considering that my mother is in her 80's, I doubt that. Also I don't have to use an internet archive to check anything because I still have physical magazines and Suikoden was given too much praise when it came out, if anything.

[Anonymous No.10538019]

>>10537734
>>10538007
Now if you don't mind using your internet archive sites, go find me a glowing review somewhere of one of the Final Fantasy ports you mention.
>FF games consistently had high scores, even if it's yet another low-effort remake or some collection.

[Anonymous No.10538414]

>>10535134
you missed that one
try another!

[Anonymous No.10538550]

>>10534769
I find modern reviews miss the mark far more often.

[Anonymous No.10538559]

>>10538550
Bingo. For whatever reason, modern professional game reviewers are these overly sensitive dorks

[Anonymous No.10538569]

>>10538550
>Review spoils the game
DANIELLE!!!!!!!!

[Anonymous No.10538576]

>>10538550
Holy fuck that devolved into leftist gibberish immediately, kek. I'm surprised he didn't start whining about how there is no black protagonist in re2.

[Anonymous No.10538620]

>>10538550
To be as fair as possible, the second article isn't really a review it's a blog post about why he's offended. I think it comes from the overwhelming amount of content out there about video games and desperate attempts to get noticed. Bullshit complaining gets clicks so just run with it and get offended that a game called RESIDENT EVIL doesn't let you make friends with zombies instead of shooting them. It at least got noticed enough that someone screenshotted it and os npw giving him free advertising.

[Anonymous No.10538638]

>>10538620
>free advertising.
I'm never going to that website, especially after reading that utter nonsense.

[Anonymous No.10538640]

>>10538620
At this point I just assume well over half the articles on standard "legacy internet" websites are just ragebait. Mainly because it seems to actually work.. It's going to get worse as AI starts pumping out these sorts of engagement bait articles en masse.

[Anonymous No.10538660]

>>10535695
No it wasn't, this was 100% just british reviewers being massive shitposters. SOTN got good review scores in basically every mag that actually mattered.

[Anonymous No.10538667]

>>10538638
Yeah but the likelihood of at least a handful of people clicking on it out of curious rage is greater than zero and much greater than a millionth "RE2 is pretty damn good, if blowing away zombies sounds good and you haven't played it... do!"

>>10538640
Yeah I'd put it at 80% at least.

[Anonymous No.10538687]

>>10534910
The auto industry is like this too with car reviews. It shouldn’t surprise me games have done it all along too.

[Anonymous No.10538901]

>>10535150
Nobody will ever know this injustice but shoutout to ANTHONY CHAU who, working under IGN, gave Visual Concepts' Ooga Booga on Dreamcast an inexplicably high 9.4/10. Mere months later, this man was quietly employed as a PR person for that very dev studio.

[Anonymous No.10538953]

what was up with ign giving all those gbc and ngpc games 10/10s. anyone remember that era. was the portable guy just holed up on cocaine?

[Anonymous No.10538959]

>>10538550
for this person its more that they doesnt know how to formerly interact with games/design so their only worldview is bizarre immersion or grandstanding. they fundamentally dont get video games. but this common for most of the modern player base...its all a social ruse. maybe it always was.

[Anonymous No.10539549]

>>10538953
Portable games that weren't almost all garbage were a real novelty back then.

[Anonymous No.10540276]

>>10538953
The GBC had loads of crap shovelware so I can't imagine what was getting perfect scores on that system...but the NGPC had a legitimately great little library and critics seemed to dig it.

[Anonymous No.10541035]

>>10538953
>>10540276
The GBC had a ton of shovelware, but that's because it had a ton of everything. In an age when 2D graphics seemed to be being abandoned and shitty blocky 3D was everywhere, here was a portable NES on steroids with a massive library

[Anonymous No.10541060]

>>10535382
I was one of the tendies who was absolutely incensed at this back then. Now I realize Girthman had been quite fair with that score.

[Anonymous No.10541264]

>>10535697
Cut them some slack, they had to sift through the garbage that were BBC Micro and ZX Spectrum games.

[Anonymous No.10541326]

>>10535697
oof coming from the country that gave us Gamergate.

[Anonymous No.10543230]

>>10541326
I thought gamergate stuff was mostly American

[Anonymous No.10544695]

>>10541060
It's still way too high what the fuck.