That's a problem though, isn't it? If your job was to review the latest Beethoven piece, would you give it 5 stars just because you know he's an accomplished composer and a lot of people love his music, even though you personally do not? If that was the case, then what's the point of having reviewers in the first place? Anybody can find something to love in practically anything in this world, so should everything just be 5 stars because hey SOMEONE out there probably likes it? Anyway, like I keep saying, Carter's opinion of the game does not and should not diminish your own opinion or enjoyment of the game. It sure as hell isn't affecting mine
I respectfully disagree. In the case of our using Bethooven as an example, it should be clear that we can determine that his music is objectively brilliant, my subjective opinion of how it sounds has no bearing on that. We would have to ask ourselves what are the qualities that constitute exceptional classical music? Is there a consensus? If so, do my feelings about it have any real value? Perhaps the scholars should take my opinion into account, and Beethoven will not be held in such high esteem. My point is, that a review should be objective, making an accounting of the features that constitute a good game, and what it is that game aims to achieve.
I think this is a mis-characterization of Carter's criticism. In his review he wasn't just saying it was hard. He was saying he found it frustrating that you had to 3-star levels in order to progress. That's a specific complaint about the balance of the game which seems pretty legitimate to me. I'm personally not bothered by this because I find replaying the levels fun enough that it doesn't feel tedious to me, but I can respect Carter finding that to be enough of a downer to dock the game a star. I also don't think that the only alternative would be to make the game easy. I've played plenty of games which manage to provide just as much of a challenge as this game does to those who want it, while also providing an easier path for people who like their games a little more relaxed. Leo's Fortune and Wind-Up Knight 2 are two platformers that come to mind. They both have generous checkpoint systems which make it possible to muddle your way through the game, but you can only 3 star the levels by making it through without using any checkpoints, which can be quite challenging. In any case, I thought Carter's review was mostly very positive anyway, and also accurate in all the factual parts of the review. The only time I'd ever say a review was bad is if the reviewer's opinions seem to be based on incorrect or missing facts about the game, or if the reviewer seems to just not like or understand the type of game being reviewed. I don't think either of those problems applied to this review. He seemed to totally get what the game was about, and just didn't like one aspect of it.
Oh no, no no no no no. I vehemently disagree with this. And just to be clear, TouchArcade will never, EVER be this. If you expect that we should be, you should absolutely find yourself another website to visit. Video games are not blenders. We are not Consumer Reports. There are only so many elements of a video game that can be objectively reviewed, everything else is entirely subjective. It has X many levels, it has X many characters, the gameplay is this, it takes X amount of time to complete. Even then, you might consider a 6 hour game a decent length, others might consider it short or even too long. Who is right? There is no objective answer to that. So talking about this game as an example. It seems like everyone pretty much agrees how high the production values are, and love the animation and characters. But "pretty much everyone" is not everyone. I forget if it was in the front page comments, or the upcoming thread, or maybe even this thread, but someone thought the game looked washed out and wasn't very taken with the animation or characters. They thought the game looked blah. Is that person's opinion wrong? If they reviewed this game, and had no issue with the difficulty but hated the aesthetics, would you tell them they were wrong for pointing that out and rating the game as such? I guess I should stop harping on this as I continue to derail this thread a bit, but I just want to reiterate, TA will never rate games objectively like that nor will we only rate games based on the expectations of others. We expect our writers to adequately explain what the components of a game are (the number of levels, what you do in the game, features, things like that) and then give their opinion of what they thought about that particular game as a whole. The reviews will absolutely be flavored with that specific writer's tastes and experiences. We expect our reviews to be one of many, and if you're using them to gauge whether or not to make a purchase, I strongly suggest reading a variety of reviews from different reviewers before making that decision. That's not just good advice for games, but for anything. I mean, I didn't buy my last car based on one person's review. I did a load of research, both of the objective variety where I could get solid factual details about the car, but also of the subjective variety where people talked about the things they liked about the car and how it made them feel. Sorry again for off topic, but just want to make it very clear that we will never objectively review games like that. I don't even personally believe that's possible. As a final note, this classic Jim Sterling piece says everything there is to say about objective reviews http://www.destructoid.com/100-objective-review-final-fantasy-xiii-179178.phtml
Points taken, I'm not really emotionally invested in it, those are just my thoughts on the subject. This is a larger discussion, so I think it's fair to agree to disagree and move on. I respect your views, and love Touch Arcade, even when I don't share the same opinions.
So why do you have to have a number score? I know it has something to do meta scores or some nonsense, but they do seem to just muddle things up. When I saw this game received 4 stars I thought to myself "awesome, the game got a really good rating". When I saw it was Carter who reviewed it, I thought "holly crap, this game impressed 3.5 star Dotson". Love you Carter. Then I read the review and was confused about the rating. The whole thing was, this game is super good and crazy awesome and hard and frustrating and still really f'ing awesome. I didn't get that the hardness of the game really weighed into the rating, I just thought it was matter of fact. Had I not seen the rating, on the merits of the review alone I would have thought this was a 5 star game by my own standards. But with the rating, it seems to be hurting people's feelings. Just stop looking at the stars people. Read the reviews and let that tell you what the reviewer thinks the game is worth.
Yeah, part of it is due to Metacritic and part of it is because the scores are built into so much backend stuff on the website and app. We secretly flirted with removing them not long ago and it didn't work out too well.
Absolutely agree with you, if I hadn't bought the game already, I'd have done instantly after reading the review's first paragraph. I think the issue is exactly that the review feels like it's 5 star worthy, but then gives it four stars. But you're right, too much focus on the rating, and not enough on the review itself, which is very well written and should appeal to most gamers who will appreciate the game for what it is. But I guess you can't argue with results, as Nerf Games have already stated they will adjust the game accordingly, and hopefully that'll help it reach a wider audience. If it does happen because of Carter's review, then what looked like a minor issue will actually become the catalyst for more sales, and more games from the developers for us to enjoy!
Haven't played this game my device can't run it. But I played a difficult game last week called Warpath 3000. It was so hard, I wanted to smash my iPad screen. Would take something like 40 attempts to pass the level. I thought a good quality game but that difficulty ruined it. It didn't necessarily have to lower that difficulty but a choice of difficulty level might have been good...
Pocket Gamer gave Lost Socks 7/10, and downgraded it PURELY because of its difficulty. I felt that was stupidly harsh. However, I thought Carter's review was thorough and the score was fair on every count. ***runs and hides***
Honestly, this is the problem with review scores – sometimes they can be a useful shorthand, but in this case, it really isn't. And it's amusing but also disappointing that this kind of shitstorm happens on a regular basis now with my reviews in particular where a whole bunch of people go mad because they don't like a review score. And if it was a different number or the number didn't exist at all, well, it wouldn't be much of a problem at all.
What? Weird conclusion. I offered my opinion; the game is GOTY material. TA didn't agree, they gave it 4 stars, but for the first time I didn't quite understand why.. Honest reviews are most welcome; they are just another persons opinion, structured and expressed in more detail. But when a review fails to clearly support its conclusion, I feel it has failed to deliver. This - in my opinion obviously - was the case for the review of this game, it didn't deliver, which is why I commented on it here. Maybe someone could help me understand why it "only" got 4 stars.
Let's try keeping this thread for discussing the game itself. The mods moved the discussion about the review to another thread, here: http://forums.toucharcade.com/showthread.php?t=283572
Yup, right on! The problem with a summary (stars, percentage, score or whatever metric is used) is that it often gets used or referenced without any context or details. This is something TA does as well; they offer a Top Reviews listing sorted by stars. The player won't know that the game even exists unless they go to the second-best category on the site or in the app. And to say LSNB isn't even in the same league as ANY of the current 5-star games is just not right. Maybe I've gotten TA all wrong, maybe they write all of their reviews as they do pick of the week? Cause in general a review should assess and rate the quality of the work - and only comment on the experience. In other words if the reviewer considers the game to be too hard, not for everyone, too slow, not slow enough, dumb, too cryptic or complex, it should be mentioned and discussed in the review - but not affect the score unless it can be reasonably considered to be a flaw. To say that LSNB's punishing hard-core no-checkpoint scripted auto-run and gun gameplay is flawed just isn't justifiable: the levels are all possible to finish, the difficulty curve is reasonable, the progress appears planned, and all unlockables support my progress in a very satisfying way. Everything I see when I launch the game indicates that it was very deliberately created exactly like it is. And that is without even considering the stunning and harmonizing visuals that clearly indicates that the game is hand crafted with love and passion, polished to perfection, and offered as a one-time purchase (which states that we have everything we need to complete the game). What should affect the score are the aspects and qualities that constitutes the game experience and gameplay - in the eyes of the beholder. For example - does the game deliver what it claims to or should deliver; are there any glitches or bugs affecting the gameplay; how does it compare to similar games; how is the quality of the work overall; do the game assets harmonize; how does the UI support the flow and affect the UX. I'm not a hard core gamer at all, I prefer the casual games as I don't have a lot of time to play - and I like to see some progress whenever I play. Which is why I love Rayman on iOS; I believe Fiesta got 5 stars and Jungle 4.5. I cannot find any good reason why LSNB isn't considered as good as either of these gems. Where is the flaw in LSNB?
