73 réponses à ce sujet

[Melca36]

If anyone else has read the review, I think its a fair assessment of the expansion.

They pointed out what was good and not so good and hopefully mistakes will be corrected in the future.

[Dark Lilith]

I read it and agree with parts of it.Salt always makes some things more enjoyable to swallow.

[kelsjet]

If we are to be completely honest here (a proposition that is hard to accept on DA:O's own forums, especially given the rabid fanbois about) I think we will all agree that if we really looked at Awakenings we would all say that it should not get any more than 75/100 at best.

Most review sites are giving it an extra (read: 'free') 10 or so points due to the "Bioware" splash-screen that we see when we load up the game.

An accurate way to look at the reviews is to normalize for the "splash-screen effect", which, in the case of Awakenings is to take whatever score you see and subtract anywhere between 5-10 points from it to get the 'real' score.

Remember, a name can carry A LOT of weight, especially in the somewhat unprofessional (due to its relative youth) 'games review' industry. After all, who would want to be the single reviewer giving a bad game with a big name a bad review when you know it would just end up out-casting you. Take that sentiment and multiply it across all the noteworthy review sites and you see why you get the kind of scores that you do.
Its the common fear of the conformist.

[worksa8]

I would give it a 6/10

The game IS there, but the fact it has all this new stuff- but is too short for you to use it/you'll never use it beyond that expansion is a let down.

Also these glitches that STILL have not been addressed- not small glitches, but massive "How did you not catch this" kinda glitches.

The game IS there, but these two factors are too big to ignore- like I find the reviewers seem to.

[Realmzmaster]

@kelsjet,



So you are saying it is a Halo effect? So the PC Gamer reviewers are giving Awakenings the extra bump because they are wowed by the BIoWare name? So you are saying the reviewers are not giving their honest opinion? Therefore by your logic anything that has the name Monte Cristo or Dreamcatcher on it should have 10-20 points immediately deducted, then review the game.

So you are now in the mind of the reviewer and know what he/she is thinking? I do not think so. Again you have given your opinion. I can only take the review at face value until the reviewer tells me otherwise.

[Murphys_Law]

kelsjet wrote...

If we are to be completely honest here (a proposition that is hard to accept on DA:O's own forums, especially given the rabid fanbois about) I think we will all agree that if we really looked at Awakenings we would all say that it should not get any more than 75/100 at best.

Most review sites are giving it an extra (read: 'free') 10 or so points due to the "Bioware" splash-screen that we see when we load up the game.

An accurate way to look at the reviews is to normalize for the "splash-screen effect", which, in the case of Awakenings is to take whatever score you see and subtract anywhere between 5-10 points from it to get the 'real' score.

Remember, a name can carry A LOT of weight, especially in the somewhat unprofessional (due to its relative youth) 'games review' industry. After all, who would want to be the single reviewer giving a bad game with a big name a bad review when you know it would just end up out-casting you. Take that sentiment and multiply it across all the noteworthy review sites and you see why you get the kind of scores that you do.
Its the common fear of the conformist.

81/100 is a pretty low score for a major expansion pack in PC Gamer standards.  I would factor in that I think they do love Dragon Age for the most part based on the original game's review (94% I think) and other comments they have made.  81/100 tells me that didn't really like it much, but it is more Dragon Age content that they love so it's not terrible.  If I was Bioware, I shouldn't be happy about a 81/100 considering the same maganize gave the original game a 94/100 (basically that score means "zomg best RPG in recent memory").  That is a signal of quite a large drop in quality.  But then again it is just a number and I will read the review myself to see what the pros/cons are.

[kelsjet]

Realmzmaster wrote...

@kelsjet,

So you are saying it is a Halo effect? So the PC Gamer reviewers are giving Awakenings the extra bump because they are wowed by the BIoWare name? So you are saying the reviewers are not giving their honest opinion? Therefore by your logic anything that has the name Monte Cristo or Dreamcatcher on it should have 10-20 points immediately deducted, then review the game.
So you are now in the mind of the reviewer and know what he/she is thinking? I do not think so. Again you have given your opinion. I can only take the review at face value until the reviewer tells me otherwise.

Unfortunately for you, the skeptics argument has little chance of working here, since precedence as well as apriori information already exists (see: Kane and Lynch review scandal as well as many more).

Furthermore, the idea is not to formulate a general law which we can easy apply to all games with our eyes closed, since the very nature of the review process is a subjective one. All we can do is identify trends and form models on how review sites (and through extension, reviewers themselves) arrive at the conclusion that they do.

In short, the industry savvy have always known that many review sites and publications have a heavy interest in showing a particular brand in a specific light. Believing otherwise is just naivety at best, and ignorance at worst. After all, who would want to risk getting fired (especially in this economy) for telling the truth when the obvious safe choice is to go with the flow. Unfortunately, game reviewers are the risk averse type and not the paragons of virtue, truth and justice that we all wish they were.

This will not remain like this forever though. Eventually, both the games and game review industries will mature (after a lot of study has been done) and we will start getting game reviews that are at least on par (as far as professionalism goes) to what we have in the movie industry today (not saying that the movie review industry is faultless, its just leagues ahead of game reviews as far as credibility is concerned).

All this however does not preclude the fact that good games can get good reviews, that will never change. All it means is that many times bad or 'average' games may get good reviews too, which is why the final decision of whether a game is good, bad or just average still rests squarely on the players themselves.

DA:O Awakening is an average expansion at best.

Modifié par kelsjet, 31 mars 2010 - 12:00 .

[Realmzmaster]

Again your opinion, you have not told me how you read the mind of the reviewer. Are you stating that the reviewer is lying because he/she does not agree with your assessment? Given that the very fact of reviewing a product is subjective. So you are saying that PC Gamer which gave DA:Origins a 94/100 is being kind to Bioware by giving Awakenings a 81/100. 81/100 is not a great score.

What about GameInformer that gave it 7.75/10 which is closer to your number? So everyone who gives it a higher rating is therefore wrong?

[Axekix]

Realmzmaster wrote...

What about GameInformer that gave it 7.75/10 which is closer to your number? So everyone who gives it a higher rating is therefore wrong?

Yes.

[kelsjet]

Realmzmaster wrote...

Again your opinion, you have not told me how you read the mind of the reviewer.

I addressed this in the first line of my post. The "you don't know because you haven't seen the inside of his brain and read his thoughts" is generally considered, in educated circles as "The Skeptics Argument", as well as a well documented logical fallacy. This is not 'opinion', it is a fact born from education. Please spend some time with google since I do not think the scope of this discussion is extended to me furthering your education and understanding of matters beyond Dragon Age: Origins Awakening.

In an effort to push you in the right direction (consider it a freebie) please note that what the reviewer is actually thinking during the writing of his review is somewhat irrelevant to the discussion at hand.

[JBurke]

I loved the Awakening expansion, simply loved it! However, this expansion was missing so much that at best I'd go with a 6.5-7.5/10. Romance was gone (until you beat the game and if you had a relationship in Origins), the map in its entirety was a little larger than the size of Denerim and Orzammar, quests felt shallow (Seriously, saving that guys' daughter was crossing a bridge... I've seen bigger player made DLC) and the number of new items was hardly something I'd brag about (just enough for each class to upgrade maybe twice during the process from tier 7-9).

The new classes were creative and fun, I liked the new characters, the story was brilliant and it kept the atmosphere. I also loved the level cap going up since it added for some new fun. Unfortunately, it was just too short and too lacking of the original Origins charm. As it is, I'm playing Origins again to enjoy the better of the two before I go for the 96/96 achievements goal I have (currently sitting on 95).

The fact that this expansion got a 81/100 is a bloody miracle if you ask me.

Modifié par JBurke, 31 mars 2010 - 12:38 .

[Terror_K]

I didn't realise the community was so down on Awakenings until just now. I personally thought it was brilliant and don't really have any issues with it at all (romances would be nice, but its no big deal). For an expansion that came out so quickly and gave me 20 hours of solid entertainment that's mostly the quality of the original game, I'm more than happy with it. Particularly when so many full-priced full games don't even offer half a much these days, ala Modern Warfare 2's "epic" 4 hour SP campaign. Heck, I thought this was of higher quality than Mass Effect 2 was... it even did the import stuff better, IMO.

Modifié par Terror_K, 31 mars 2010 - 12:54 .

[AlanC9]

kelsjet wrote...

In an effort to push you in the right direction (consider it a freebie) please note that what the reviewer is actually thinking during the writing of his review is somewhat irrelevant to the discussion at hand.

Ummm.. didn't you actually put that on the table by suggesting that reviews are influenced by concerns besides the merits of the product?

[SuperMedbh]

Terror_K wrote...

I didn't realise the community was so down on Awakenings until just now. I personally thought it was brilliant and don't really have any issues with it at all (romances would be nice, but its no big deal). For an expansion that came out so quickly and gave me 20 hours of solid entertainment that's mostly the quality of the original game, I'm more than happy with it. Particularly when so many full-priced full games don't even offer half a much these days, ala Modern Warfare 2's "epic" 4 hour SP campaign. Heck, I thought this was of higher quality than Mass Effect 2 was... it even did the import stuff better, IMO.

I'm glad I didn't read the forums until I finished Awakenings, or I would have known I was supposed to be disappointed.   Sure, I wanted another DA:O length game, but I wouldn't have felt that way if I wasn't having such a great time playing Awakenings.  The new characters were fun, and the story was intriguing and creative.  But to be fair, DA:O was a massive game.  In a way, Bioware set the bar impossibly high in terms of game length--  but I'd rather have the tight and fun shorter game than a sprawling sequel with less coherence.

At the end of the day, it's an expansion, not a full fledged new game (as ME2 was to ME1, for example).  At $40, it was probably a tad overpriced, but you can get it for $20 now, which is more than worth it.

[kelsjet]

AlanC9 wrote...
Ummm.. didn't you actually put that on the table by suggesting that reviews are influenced by concerns besides the merits of the product?

Non sequitur.
Again, I will emphasize that knowing what the reviewer is personally thinking is irrelevant to the process of interpreting the review, since the outcome for a whether the review will show the game as being 'good' or 'bad' was already decided before the reviewer even got his mitts on it, especially with games developed by the 'big names'.

Hence, what the reviewer is personally thinking (heck he could be thinking about PB and J sammiches for all we know) at the time of writing the review is not relevant to the review itself.

The only thing that IS relevant however, is understanding the external factors (external to the reviewer himself) that influence this pre-decided outcome that I described above. Factors such as "most games from the 'big' names and 'big' backing, will be given favorable reviews since the review publications are too heavily influenced by said 'big names', hence forcing the reader to perform a normalization of the review score", like I did above.

It really isn't very hard or complicated to understand really.

[sarx8172]

kelsjet wrote...

Non sequitur.
Again, I will emphasize that knowing what the reviewer is personally thinking is irrelevant to the process of interpreting the review, since the outcome for a whether the review will show the game as being 'good' or 'bad' was already decided before the reviewer even got his mitts on it, especially with games developed by the 'big names'.

Hence, what the reviewer is personally thinking (heck he could be thinking about PB and J sammiches for all we know) at the time of writing the review is not relevant to the review itself.

The only thing that IS relevant however, is understanding the external factors (external to the reviewer himself) that influence this pre-decided outcome that I described above. Factors such as "most games from the 'big' names and 'big' backing, will be given favorable reviews since the review publications are too heavily influenced by said 'big names', hence forcing the reader to perform a normalization of the review score", like I did above.

It really isn't very hard or complicated to understand really.

Wouldn't what a reviewer is thinking while interpretting a review be very important? If they were inclined toward giving it a sparkling review just because it's a big name company, wouldn't that be something to consider? According to your logic, you should take several points off the given scores of reviews due to the companies' influence. But what about the smaller companies that can't exert that same influence? Should their scores have points added to them?

You say that games from 'big' names (lol that rhymes) will be given favorable reviews. EVE online was ranked MMO of the year by PC Gamer, dethroning World of Warcraft, which happens to be headed by Blizzard, a company well known by its reputation for well developed games. EVE online was ranked at a 55% by its initial review by PC Gamer.

So, no. I don't think you should be subtracting or adding points from scores given by reviews. Rather, I think those should only be minutely considered, in favor of the actual written review that details the basic contents of the game. The end score, in my opinion, is only a pretty detail.

[Querne]

I think that kelsjet is right. The german PCGames f.e. critizied very many points, spoke about disappointment and still gave 87%. The reviewer introduced his final opinion by something like:

"Don´call me crazy because the points i give are that low but..".



Honestly the only thing that is crazy is, that he feels the need to excuse for critizing that product (!).

Customers at Amazon in Germany give Awakening averaged 3 of 5 stars.

[sarx8172]

Querne wrote...

I think that kelsjet is right. The german PCGames f.e. critizied very many points, spoke about disappointment and still gave 87%. The reviewer introduced his final opinion by something like:
"Don´call me crazy because the points i give are that low but..".

Honestly the only thing that is crazy is, that he feels the need to excuse for critizing that product (!).
Customers at Amazon in Germany give Awakening averaged 3 of 5 stars.

Which is why I usually don't account for actual scores given by reviews for games, because they are almost never accurate from my point of view. Text just tells so much more. So I guess you could say I also agree with kelsjet on that matter. I'm sure what the reviewer said about the game during his/her review was accurate, but the score was aschew, like so many others.

[Murphys_Law]

Yeah I mean I wouldn't put much weight into the numbers. I always liked the pros/cons section more for a "quick" peek at what the game is like. Of course, reading the whole thing gives a much better idea. The DA:A pros and cons I am seeing on the forums are clearly not making me want to buy this for the full price of $40.

[kelsjet]

sarx8172 wrote...
But what about the smaller companies that can't exert that same influence?Should their scores have points added to them?

Most definitely.
The door does swing both ways, and it is because of this that I stated that the real final 'score' will be defined by the players, and not the reviewers. There are many very good games which are given 'bad' reviews, sometimes due to big name pressure but most of the time due to sheer incompetence or inability of a reviewer to really gauge the merits of a game (remember, one of my primary points is that the game reviewing industry as a whole is still far to unprofessional to be reliable).

sarx8172 wrote...
You say that games from 'big' names (lol that rhymes) will be given favorable reviews. EVE online was ranked MMO of the year by PC Gamer, dethroning World of Warcraft, which happens to be headed by Blizzard, a company well known by its reputation for well developed games. EVE online was ranked at a 55% by its initial review by PC Gamer.

MMOs are a different beast given the fact that their very nature is amorphic over time.
I played EVE when it first came out and I would give it an average score. I played EVE online after the plethora of updates made to the game and would seriously consider it as one of the better MMOs out there right now as well (as an example of how massive the updates were, they pretty much rewrote the game's graphics engine from scratch and redid almost all of its mechanics).
So yea, MMOs by their very nature change over time, hence, using them as an example of inconsistency amongst the game review community would cause issues, since review scores are rarely updated.

sarx8172 wrote...
So, no. I don't think you should be subtracting or adding points from scores given by reviews. Rather, I think those should only be minutely considered, in favor of the actual written review that details the basic contents of the game. The end score, in my opinion, is only a pretty detail.

Unfortunately, while you and I may understand the meaningless of the numerical 'score' given by reviewers, the vast majority of both players and industry pundits do consider 'the number' as a very important factor. As a point to note, Metacritic, an organization which most definitely serves as an important 'go to' place for both players and game companies, places very heavy emphasis on the number in their collation process of the final score.
As a side point, take note that it is because of the emphasis on 'the number' that many inconsistencies between what is written a review and the final given score can actually exist. A phenomena which is described by Querne a few posts up as well as being noted by you.

sarx8172 wrote...
I'm sure what the reviewer said about the game during his/her review was accurate, but the score was aschew, like so many others

Querne wrote...
I think that kelsjet is right. The german PCGames f.e. critizied very many points, spoke about disappointment and still gave 87%.

Showing that you can basically bash a game but as long as 'the number' is good, your boss wont get an earful from the 'big names' backing the game. Hence we really do need to give way to the idea that 'the number' while in reality should not mean much, actually does.

All these things are part of a superset of indicators that show us the lack of professionalism that still exists in the 'game review' industry. Something which will, we hope, fade with time, as it did in the movie review industry a while back.

[AlanC9]

kelsjet wrote...

Non sequitur.

I keep seeing this card played on message boards, and I'm never quite sure what the poster's trying to prove. Name-dropping a fallacy doesn't help advance the argument, since the following paragraphs have to do all the real work anyway. And as pure rhetoric, it's counterproductive.

Back to the actual point. I'm not quite sure how a system of external pressure on review content would operate without the reviewers being aware of it. But if you want to say that  we shouldn't talk about such things since we can't measure them... whatever. Fine with me.

As for normalizing the scores, does PC Gamer actually review anything that isn't from a major company? (I truly don't know -- I don't read the mag). 81% doesn't have any meaning at all outside of the context of other PC Gamer reviews, does it?

[darkshadow136]

I would have scored Awakenings at around 70/100. I wont type it all out but for anyone interested I wrote a review in my Bioware blog.

[Murphys_Law]

SuperMedbh wrote...

Terror_K wrote...

I didn't realise the community was so down on Awakenings until just now. I personally thought it was brilliant and don't really have any issues with it at all (romances would be nice, but its no big deal). For an expansion that came out so quickly and gave me 20 hours of solid entertainment that's mostly the quality of the original game, I'm more than happy with it. Particularly when so many full-priced full games don't even offer half a much these days, ala Modern Warfare 2's "epic" 4 hour SP campaign. Heck, I thought this was of higher quality than Mass Effect 2 was... it even did the import stuff better, IMO.

I'm glad I didn't read the forums until I finished Awakenings, or I would have known I was supposed to be disappointed.   Sure, I wanted another DA:O length game, but I wouldn't have felt that way if I wasn't having such a great time playing Awakenings.  The new characters were fun, and the story was intriguing and creative.  But to be fair, DA:O was a massive game.  In a way, Bioware set the bar impossibly high in terms of game length--  but I'd rather have the tight and fun shorter game than a sprawling sequel with less coherence.

At the end of the day, it's an expansion, not a full fledged new game (as ME2 was to ME1, for example).  At $40, it was probably a tad overpriced, but you can get it for $20 now, which is more than worth it.

I don't think people were expecting a DA:O length game.  They were probably expecting an amazing expansion set like Throne of Bhal, NWN:MotB or other well known RPG expansions (it is Bioware).  20-30 hours for $30 and only a few new features added in (talents, tradeskill etc.).  The main thing is just to add more content and at least keep it on the same level of quality as DA:O (hopefully improve).  From what I have been reading that is not the case, but I will make my own judgment when I buy the game at a lower price.  There are several very serious bugs...quests not even working because they were not done in the "right" order, people losing gear at the mines, and various other ones.  Combat has repeatly said to be too easy, which really has me worried because I thought DA:O was already too easy for my tastes.  The new dialog system replaces the old one, which for a lot of people (including me) is a huge downgrade (couldn't they have compromised the two systems?).  Then there is the big elephant in the room the price...$40, really?  $10 less than DA:O for maybe 1/3 of the content.  Hell if I bought the game at that price, you would better believe that I am expecting something close to DA:O length!  I would bet you my bottom dollar that half of the negativity is really directed at the price more than anything.  I really have to facepalm at EA (someone got a little greedy) for the potential damage they may have caused to the DA franchise.

Modifié par Murphys_Law, 31 mars 2010 - 05:56 .

[kelsjet]

AlanC9 wrote...
I keep seeing this card played on message boards, and I'm never quite sure what the poster's trying to prove. Name-dropping a fallacy doesn't help advance the argument, since the following paragraphs have to do all the real work anyway. And as pure rhetoric, it's counterproductive.

Feel free to take a look at my posting history, both on these forums and any others that you see me on (I use the same handle across the internet), then return here and let me know if you still think I am a person who proposes points and opinions solely on the strength of 'name dropping fallacies'.

AlanC9 wrote...
As for normalizing the scores, does PC Gamer actually review anything that isn't from a major company? (I truly don't know -- I don't read the mag). 81% doesn't have any meaning at all outside of the context of other PC Gamer reviews, does it?

PC Gamer is a subsidiary of Future Publishing, a massive media publishing house based out of the UK. It is probably the single most 'mainstream' gaming publication on the planet in print. It has deep, convoluted ties to pretty much all the major game publishing houses (EA, Activision, Ubisoft, etc). I used to subscribe to PC Gamer, but realized back around the beginning of the decade that they became totally unreliable the bigger they became and have since stopped using them for any kind of gaming based information. Heck, even the 'exclusives' they get on 'new information' from big name game devs are all frosting and no cake.

So yea, for PC Gamer, a serious dose of normalization would need to occur.

[Murphys_Law]

AlanC9 wrote...

kelsjet wrote...

Non sequitur.

I keep seeing this card played on message boards, and I'm never quite sure what the poster's trying to prove. Name-dropping a fallacy doesn't help advance the argument, since the following paragraphs have to do all the real work anyway. And as pure rhetoric, it's counterproductive.

Back to the actual point. I'm not quite sure how a system of external pressure on review content would operate without the reviewers being aware of it. But if you want to say that  we shouldn't talk about such things since we can't measure them... whatever. Fine with me.

As for normalizing the scores, does PC Gamer actually review anything that isn't from a major company? (I truly don't know -- I don't read the mag). 81% doesn't have any meaning at all outside of the context of other PC Gamer reviews, does it?

PC Gamer reviews a lot of different games (everything from FPS to indie games from what I see), so yes some from smaller companies.  They even review flight simulators sometimes .  To your second question, no it does not obviously.  I would point out again though, that in the context of PC Gamer reviews that is really not a good score.  They adored DA:O giving it a 94% (which is pretty much as high as they go) and most expansions get pretty close to what the original game did.  That is quite a drop for a PC Gamer review, as you don't really want to be in or close to the 70%s.  I would regard the 70%s, as only buy if you are a hardcore fan of the game.