It's official - reviews don't matter

[LastPisTolman]

http://www.gamespot.com/articles/the-division-breaks-more-sales-records-passes-dest/1100-6435683/

 

The Division becomes the fastest selling new IP, pushing Destiny out of the way.

 

With that said, there’s a couple of things to consider with this;

 

·         Destiny paved the way for a shared world loot shooter.  People now know what it is, and that they like it.

·         Due to the media constant desire to always mention Destiny and Division in the same breath, anyone interested in Destiny is exposed to Division.  That’s marketing 101 in action – riding on coattails for free

·         Calling the Division a new franchise is a little disingenuous, it does bear the Tom Clancy moniker – and considering he’s dead and buried and had no creative input to this title at all, his name being an included article must count for something, at least to Ubisoft’s marketing department.  Calling Destiny “Halo’s Destiny” would have been questionable.  Agreed it’s a separate branch and it bears angles of his creativity – but I think this is cheating.

·         It’s a statement released by Ubisoft which leads me into;

·         It’s a $5 million advantage – slightly creative bookkeeping could easily be in play here.

 

With all of that said, I think it bears mentioning that Division’s doom was heralded when it was announced reviews won’t be available prior to release.  The market has responded with a resounding “I don’t care about reviews” and Ubisoft has walked away with a win.

 

This is the first of many bullets into the current media cycle corpse we have going, and now watch the marketing engine start to change gears.  AAA games will move away from the “critical” and into community, the shape of that beast being Betas, Twitch, YouTube and personalities.

Edited March 16, 2016 by LastPisTolman

[Re-LoreLink]

The Division is an MMO, it's only normal that there were no reviews at launch.... I don't think this will evolve or anything infact there's only a minor part of buyers that actually read reviews, either for The Division or other games. I  don't particularly care about what will Ubisoft do in the future...they're ridiculous imo.

Edited March 16, 2016 by Re-LoreLink

[damon8r351]

Doesn't really mean that reviews don't matter, now and forever. What it does mean is that it's a smug little "I told you so" for the Chicken Littles crying that the sky was falling, thinking that the embargo on pre-release reviews was a bad sign.

Edited March 16, 2016 by damon8r351

[Daniel_Shadow170]

Two game's selling good and reviews don't matter? Let me know when it happen's to a thousand then i might agree review's are going nowhere anytime soon.                       

[Sir_Bee]

Reviews will always matter to those who want to take the time to seek them out.  Many people buy games because of commercials, or their friends tell them to.  Only a fraction of the people who are buying games have actually read a review, and that has always been the case.  I am not sure where "reviews don't matter" is coming from, nothing has changed?

 

As for there being no reviews of an MMO before release, that makes perfect sense does it not?  A large part of an mmo's strength comes from the community and how they react to the world.  Before the community has a chance to develop, you can't really do an in-depth review.  Same reason that most Call of Duty reviews do not come out until after the game releases.  Sure, they can review the story, but a large part of that game is the multiplayer, and without the people to play with (and test the servers and progression and all that) there is no real way to write a review.

[Happy]

Reviews are still an important factor to myself personally. They aren't to many people though and they definetly aren't for the demographic that made Destiny and now this game sell so well.

I think most people just want to know what they're getting themselves into when buying a game. Reviews are a good way to find that out, but with all the betas etc. before the games launch i'd say people had enough of a chance to get a good impression.

[awf9495]

Unless a game is a complete turd, I would say that reviews really don't matter for me personally.  I know what kinds of games I like, and over the years it seems that the general reviewer consensus and I have drifted further and further apart.

 

I would argue that it is a good thing that The Division sold well despite the reviews not being released until post launch.  Ideally, those that purchased the game did so because they enjoyed the Beta or saw enough watching a stream of the Beta to warrant a purchase.  While I doubt that such an informed opinion is the impetus for many a purchase, this was the case for my friends that are playing.

[StrickenBiged]

It's been known for years that marketing is much more effective at shifting games than review scores. Unfortunately the reports into this are behind paywalls, but the media articles about this are widely available. 

 

Each consumer can make up their own mind about what to do with this information but this tidbit makes review scores even more relevant and important to me and consumers like me who don't want to get taken in by advertising puff. I now wait for a review before trying a new IP or a game that I'm on the fence about, and I'm confident that many others do the same. Knowing that marketing spend has more influence than review scores cuts both ways.

 

I don't think The Division's doom was being heralded - rather, those of us who like to wait for a review said we were going to do just that, and expressed skepticism about the game's quality given the above, as it had been heavily marketed. 

 

I'm glad the game turns out to have been a success for those that enjoy this type of thing. Personally, I find it hard to get excited about military shooters with this level of realism but if that's your bag I'm glad you've got a good game to play. 

 

I'm also glad that many of the reviews seem to be taking their time and trickling out slowly, rather than rushing for the clicks as I had feared. Happy to have been wrong on that front.

[DrBloodmoney]

How do you mean "It's Official"?

What office do you speak for? Or are you saying that some official source said this?

Or are you just operating under the assumption that your own conclusions count as 'Official' news?

[LastPisTolman]

The Division is an MMO, it's only normal that there were no reviews at launch.... I don't think this will evolve or anything infact there's only a minor part of buyers that actually read reviews, either for The Division or other games. I  don't particularly care about what will Ubisoft do in the future...they're ridiculous imo.

 

It isn’t really an MMO – the Division is playable back to front without any interaction with a human at all.  The only time you’re exposed to a human is when you go into a Safe House.

 

I was a believer of Ubisoft’s statement that a review environment would not accurately replicate retail, but now that is nonsense.

 

The Dark Zone would have presented a different experience, but that is 10-15% of the overall product really.

 

Doesn't really mean that reviews don't matter, now and forever. What it does mean is that it's a smug little "I told you so" for the Chicken Littles crying that the sky was falling, thinking that the embargo on pre-release reviews was a bad sign.

Not quite yet, but is another feather in the cap of marketing being much more important.

 

The fact that the Division turned out to be good is the outcome that I was hoping for too – a current, extremely prominent example of Day 1 review embargo =/= bad game.

 

Two game's selling good and reviews don't matter? Let me know when it happen's to a thousand then i might agree review's are going nowhere anytime soon.                       

 

There are plenty of examples of where reviews don’t factor into final sales.  Homefront is my favourite game to reference in this area, but there are an inordinate amount of well-reviewed selling  nothing as well.  Beyond Good and Evil was the first to pop up.  Psychonauts another.

 

Reviews will always matter to those who want to take the time to seek them out.  Many people buy games because of commercials, or their friends tell them to.  Only a fraction of the people who are buying games have actually read a review, and that has always been the case.  I am not sure where "reviews don't matter" is coming from, nothing has changed?

 

As for there being no reviews of an MMO before release, that makes perfect sense does it not?  A large part of an mmo's strength comes from the community and how they react to the world.  Before the community has a chance to develop, you can't really do an in-depth review.  Same reason that most Call of Duty reviews do not come out until after the game releases.  Sure, they can review the story, but a large part of that game is the multiplayer, and without the people to play with (and test the servers and progression and all that) there is no real way to write a review.

 

The target is the furore encircling the embargo Ubisoft placed. I’ve always maintained that on the grandscale, talking millions of people, reviews are not worth what the entrenched community like to think they are worth.

 

Looking at the traffic of any given site and comparing it with the amount of consoles in circulation you would think would be proof enough – but times like this are a nice reminder of the fact.

 

This isn’t an MMO at all – it is even less so than Destiny and that was slammed for its label.  It is an exploded co-operative game with adversarial integrated into it.  Instead of a menu there is a door. Instead of a lobby there is a matchmaking.  Gneius implementation, don’t mistake me, but not an MMO make

 

This game could have easily have been reviewed prior to release.  I am glad that it wasn’t however, it is a massive trend bucker of “uh oh no review before release” and I hope many more continue to come.

 

It is often confused that review copies of games being synonymous with quality, but it has and has only ever been a marketing ploy.  Ubisoft marketed this game to high hell and its proven effective yet again.  

[Brawler]

I've never put too much faith in to reviews. It's interesting to hear another persons take on it but I won't base my decision off of it. If I'm really curious I'll wait until the game is out and check it out on twitch or something.

[Sir_Bee]

I am not sure that I agree with your conclusions here.  I can only think of one motivation to have a review embargo that isn't negative, and that is to keep something about the game a secret until it is released.  Now I understand that doesn't mean that there aren't more reasons, and I would be happy to discuss them, but typically, when a company doesn't want a review of a game out before it is released, it means that they do not have faith that the reviews will be good, and they want to bring in as much money right away as they can before people realize what they bought.

 

Just because it isn't strictly speaking an MMO, a large part of the game involves multiplayer and a community.  If the community isn't there, the game will not live up to the standards it could.  A pre-release review would not be able to tell you any of that, as the community hasn't had time to develop.  Same with Call of Duty again, a pre-release review would be missing a large chunk of what could make the game good or bad.

 

It is a pretty large generalization to assume that a review copy of the game means quality (I understand you didn't make that assumption), but what I would argue is that a review copy of a game either shows confidence in the game, or indifference towards reviews.  Neither necessarily translate to quality, but they do say something.  And if you look at general human psychology for a second, if someone refuses to tell you something, people tend to assume that they have something to hide.  On top of that, how many people who bought the game do you think even knew there was a review embargo?  Probably not too many.

 

We agree on most points, just disagree on the conclusion. Reviews aren't useless, and they aren't dead.  They are very valuable to those who want to use them, and easily dismissed by those who do not.

Edited March 16, 2016 by Sir_Bee

[NotAFoxAnymore]

I guess it's entirely subjective. Some people do and always will rely on reviews from trusted sources, and some will blindly go into games that interest them. Neither is exactly wrong. However, enough people (I don't know well enough to say the majority) fall into the latter category so games still sell well without pre-release reviews. However I think as a whole reviews do aid game sales and as a result do matter. Just not to everyone.

[MMDE]

http://psnprofiles.com/forums/topic/35559-the-division-will-have-no-pre-launch-reviews/page-1

 

[dontwaketheKIDS]

I abandoned reviews a long time ago. There's enough media out there to form your own opinion.

[EternalChaos72]

Reviews don't mean anything anyway because everyone has different opinions on the game. 

[daftprophet]

Reviews don't mean anything anyway because everyone has different opinions on the game.

I agree. Some people like reviews, but personally I like forming my own opinions about things.

Most reviewers are annoying anyway. They may hate on a game that I try and en up liking, or vice versa.

[g-bake_1986]

I honestly can't remember the last time I read a review, or made a decision to buy/not to buy based on a review. Must be going back to PS1/2 days. A couple of gameplay videos on Youtube is enough for me to decide.

[Cautious_PS]

I have NEVER let a review dictate whether or not I buy a game.  I would much rather watch gameplay on youtube or twitch and formulate my own opinion before I'll read the opinions of others and let them decide for me.  To say reviews don't matter because of The Division is a little silly, but in my case, reviews have never mattered.

[Gibbo_0113]

Reviews are great when done properly. For instance IGN are terrible reviewers. Angry Joe or Good Game (AUS TV show) are better examples. The score at the end of reviews should definitely be left out entirely. Some people say a 6 or a 7 is bad but i think anything above 5 is good because its above average. Scoring is taken differently from different people and some reviewers dont know how to properly score entirely. 

[Undead Wolf]

Correction: Reviews don't matter to the kinds of people that buy these types of games.

When Destiny came out, I seem to remember a lot of reviewers calling it out for all of its flaws. Most seemed to agree that it was anything but a great game with its many faults. That didn't stop the masses flocking to it though.

There are plenty of us out there though that use reviews to make informed decisions on what games to buy. They aren't the kinds of people to rush out and pre-order a game over some marketing campaign, and to us, reviews certainly do matter.

[Dr_Mayus]

I always like when 1 thing does well so that is the standard bearer for the whole industry.

 

It is like when movies like Avatar or Avengers made a ton of money and people were like "the movie industry is fine...look it made over a billion dollars this year" failing to notice that almost all of that came from 1 or 2 movies and that there are tons of films that don't do well.

[Tao-Sianu]

Ubisoft are monsters at building hype up for a game. Just look at Watchdogs, another game that had 'all the hype' almost entirely through false advertising misleading trailers a great marketing team.

On the other hand, I totally get their review embargo. It's an MMO (argue it isn't all you want) and that sort of game just won't get an accurate review until the game is actually out. On saying that though, the review is more than likely outdated a month or two later when a good amount of early adopters have gone elsewhere. 

So yea, I guess "reviews don't matter" if you're a company capable of lying overselling creating a hype machine like Ubisoft are...Then again, they're mostly selling their games to the type of people accept something is iconic solely because a 'man in a suit' told them it is.




But then again, why are you saying reviews "don't matter"?

Reviews are just some guys/girls opinion. The only difference between me writing a review on 'whatever' and, for example, IGN writing a review is that they get paid for it. It's just somebody's subjective opinion on their experience with the game. The only thing I really expect from a review is that the writer left their bias at the door, otherwise, it's just another source of information to help me decide where money goes (rather than blindly throwing it at the game that had the most buzzwords in its marketing campaign).

People really need to stop looking at reviews and Metacritic scores as some sort of definitive measure of how good a game is.

[Lord_Shadow_Z]

Reviews matter to an extent to people who are tired of being run over by the hype train which is the only thing this game seems to be selling on. The fact that they didn't even give out early review copies regardless of their reasons is a huge red flag which screams "They know it sucks. Avoid at all costs" to me. This is no different than what happened with Destiny, Evolve, Watch_Dogs, etc., over-hyped and extremely mediocre. I don't get how people still trust Ubisoft at this point considering their track record the last couple years.

Edited March 17, 2016 by Lord_Shadow_Z

[DARKB1KE]

 The fact that they didn't even give out early review copies regardless of their reasons is a huge red flag which screams "They know it sucks. Avoid at all costs" to me

Early review copies don't mean crap when it's an online world meant to be played with hundreds of other players.  It's meant to be a social game, not for a solo reviewer.  That would be so pointless for them to be playing and not be able to connect to anybody.  It's not a full product if there's no online connectivity, so thus, they can't review it and give it an accurate representation.  Use some common sense. 

 

 

We've been waiting longer to review games that have a significant amount of online gameplay. We'd prefer to play those games on live retail servers against regular gamers. That can't be done until a game is released. To give one recent example of how we handled this, we waited 13 days after the game's release to review Destiny. We waited because the game's servers only went live a day before release. We also waited because our reviewer wanted to judge the game based on real in-the-wild online interaction. We waited longer when we realized that an end-game co-op Raid would be released a week after the game launched, a Raid that turned out to be one of the best parts of the game. The game has continued to evolve since our review ran, but I'm confident that our reviewer had a better understanding of what Destiny had to offer than if he'd run a pre-Raid review on day one.

http://kotaku.com/how-kotaku-reviews-work-1654470944

Edited October 24, 2016 by DARKB1KE