Reviewing based on principles needs to stop
By: Jeff Rivera
Somewhere along the line, the Internet masses decided that it fell within their job description to play vigilante. It happens any time something happens that gains the Internet's collective eye. Groups of roaming gamers hit up Amazon.com, Metacritic, IGN, and other sites that allow users to post reviews, and they tank the game's score with the lowest possible score, and leave some comment to voice their frustration about whatever offended their principles; yet they speak nothing of the actual quality of the product.
On one hand it's good that the Internet users out there are aware of things that might affect or offend others, but on the other hand, their actions far too often punish the wrong people.
Many times when you see a game heavy-laden with DRM, a controversial online pass integration, or with regional release restrictions, it's not typically the developer that that is deciding to integrate these things into the final product. Publishers often times won't make an agreement on a development contract unless there's some sort of DRM in place for PC games and for console multiplayer games some sort of online pass. Also as part of those development contracts, there are bonuses built in for sales performances.
When gamers get annoyed by the presence of DRM, such as they did with Spore, they need to realize that they're upset with EA, not Will Wright and Maxis. By sabotaging the game's user review score on Amazon, they're hoping to send a message that they're unhappy over the DRM. Well, all they do is decrease sales from casual shoppers who see a low rating and pass on the game. But despite their protesting, they buy the game anyway. The proper message would be to completely boycott the game, refuse to talk about it online, and wait until the publisher offered a more acceptable version of the game. Protestors make it look as if the game itself is bad, because that speaks to the developer's efforts.
Sales speak to the publisher, reviews speak to the developer.
Let's stop punishing developers for the mistakes made by publishers. And while an all out boycott will hurt developers in the short run, it at least begins to fix the problem. When publishers start seeing games that receive 8 to 10 out of 10 review scores, but they sell poorly, it becomes obvious product quality is not an issue. They'll need to re-evaluate the effectiveness of their DRM approach and decide on more consumer friendly ways of combating piracy. As it stands now, they're seeing healthy sales despite low user scores, so there's little reason to change.
And lastly, it's just flat out disingenuous to score a game 1/10 when the score has nothing to do with the actual quality of the game. Reviews should be an honest opinion of how fun the game is to play, not whether or not you have some objection to the publisher's handling of the product. Let's keep reviews pure of protest, and let our wallets speak. It's the only way publishers will ever actually hear our voice.
