Reflections on 'Symposium Part One: Review Scores'

Firstly, for anyone avoiding the piece, it's right here and I suggest you read it. Not because this blog won't make sense otherwise, more because it's actually a really fantastic combination of opinions on a specific matter that eventually branches out to cover so much more. It's my favourite type of discussion, the kind that stays true to it's original content whilst branching out whilst still retaining a sense of authenticity and without becoming stale.
I'm not meaning to harp on too much about how well it was written but there really wasn't a null point in there, it was an excellent example of discussion.

Right, now I'll get down to my opinions on the content of the symposium itself.
Review Scores aren't necessarily crucial, but they do seem to hold a secure place within the industry as we know it. It's actually kind of closed-minded to infer that the reviewing side of the industry can't change or expand, but as is proven repeatedly throughout the Symposium, there are a great deal of people within this...culture of ours that aren't ready to give up on scores.

I actually, kind of feel that the debate about review scores on the whole is kind of null and I always seem to groan a bit whenever Tycho from Penny Arcade or Yahtzee from Zero Punctuation exclaims that they don't believe a diverse opinion can be expressed numerically. Seriously, though, I think a part of that is because I'd assumed we all knew that already and had simply moved on with our lives. I've heard some people claiming a review isn't a review without a score, but it is. Although I mentioned the industry isn't ready for change, I rather meant that it's not ready for widespread change all across the board. We have room for variety and there are plenty of reviews scouring the internet (and I'm sure a few physical magazine publications) who feel no need to accompany their text with scores. That's cool. Personally, I am one of the few people who doesn't really mind whether a review has a score or not because if I check the score, then I tend to read the review anyway, and as long as the review is well-written and justifies it's criticisms, I'm content.

Admittedly, I don't read every review out there, it would be impossible. I don't even read every review on Giant Bomb, I tend to reserve the time it takes to read only the reviews for games that have taken my interest. Some may think that prudish, but frankly, the reviews aren't all there written just for me, and I've little doubt that a website with so large a community as ours will have some people out there who are a potential audience who will be ready to read it, The amount of comments each review recieves certainly suggests so.
Yes, I do watch every video review, but that's mostly for Vinny's editing if I'm not interested in the game, so I suppose that that's neither here nor there, although it is interesting to note that the video reviews don't recieve scores and they remain fairly popular (although I suppose those desperate for a score are only two clicks away from finding the written review).

My main train of thought behind my reasoning of Review Score Debate being redundant however, is actually one that I've never heard anybody else express before. Most people don't feel that a complex opinion about a video-game, an interactive experience, can be summed up by a number. Fair enough. But personally, I don't feel that a complex opinion about a video-game, an interactive experience, can be summed up by words either. Don't get me wrong, reviewers tend to do a fine job at approaching their work and even attempting to write a review about a video-game is admirable and can point a person in the right direction. The key word here, though, is Interactive and it's the interactivity that sets video-games apart from any other medium of media, except maybe seeing a live show and even then it's a rare and sketchy argument. I have a great deal of trouble believing that I can sum up all the flavours, all the tiny little...emotions I experience and savour during a video-game session in any form of worded article or argument and I don't believe that anybody can truly achieve such a feat.
Suggest it's because I'm a bad writer, it may be the case but this is what I think on the matter. I suppose it comes perilously close to arguing that video-games are art, which I'll avoid for the time being but experiencing video-games evokes a barrage of feelings in me and I've never yet been able to put a feeling into words that I've been able to appreciate as much as the emotion itself.

--

See, this very symposium is why I love living in the 'Now' of video games. We're all aware that we're a new culture to the world, niche at best but this sort of argument shows that we're growing. It's at a point where professionals in the field are starting to be recognised on a widespread basis and they can, for the most part, experiment, try new things, like a symposium, referring to their own field. I've expressed before how much of an exciting time to it is to be a part of a community in this field and it's times like these that I like to be reminded that it's not just our one little community here at Giant Bomb, it's an entire culture.

B[o]ut.

P.S. I read that damned symposium in an hour and half which just feels too fast ;_;

Firstly, for anyone avoiding the piece, it's right here and I suggest you read it. Not because this blog won't make sense otherwise, more because it's actually a really fantastic combination of opinions on a specific matter that eventually branches out to cover so much more. It's my favourite type of discussion, the kind that stays true to it's original content whilst branching out whilst still retaining a sense of authenticity and without becoming stale.
I'm not meaning to harp on too much about how well it was written but there really wasn't a null point in there, it was an excellent example of discussion.

Right, now I'll get down to my opinions on the content of the symposium itself.
Review Scores aren't necessarily crucial, but they do seem to hold a secure place within the industry as we know it. It's actually kind of closed-minded to infer that the reviewing side of the industry can't change or expand, but as is proven repeatedly throughout the Symposium, there are a great deal of people within this...culture of ours that aren't ready to give up on scores.

I actually, kind of feel that the debate about review scores on the whole is kind of null and I always seem to groan a bit whenever Tycho from Penny Arcade or Yahtzee from Zero Punctuation exclaims that they don't believe a diverse opinion can be expressed numerically. Seriously, though, I think a part of that is because I'd assumed we all knew that already and had simply moved on with our lives. I've heard some people claiming a review isn't a review without a score, but it is. Although I mentioned the industry isn't ready for change, I rather meant that it's not ready for widespread change all across the board. We have room for variety and there are plenty of reviews scouring the internet (and I'm sure a few physical magazine publications) who feel no need to accompany their text with scores. That's cool. Personally, I am one of the few people who doesn't really mind whether a review has a score or not because if I check the score, then I tend to read the review anyway, and as long as the review is well-written and justifies it's criticisms, I'm content.

Admittedly, I don't read every review out there, it would be impossible. I don't even read every review on Giant Bomb, I tend to reserve the time it takes to read only the reviews for games that have taken my interest. Some may think that prudish, but frankly, the reviews aren't all there written just for me, and I've little doubt that a website with so large a community as ours will have some people out there who are a potential audience who will be ready to read it, The amount of comments each review recieves certainly suggests so.
Yes, I do watch every video review, but that's mostly for Vinny's editing if I'm not interested in the game, so I suppose that that's neither here nor there, although it is interesting to note that the video reviews don't recieve scores and they remain fairly popular (although I suppose those desperate for a score are only two clicks away from finding the written review).

My main train of thought behind my reasoning of Review Score Debate being redundant however, is actually one that I've never heard anybody else express before. Most people don't feel that a complex opinion about a video-game, an interactive experience, can be summed up by a number. Fair enough. But personally, I don't feel that a complex opinion about a video-game, an interactive experience, can be summed up by words either. Don't get me wrong, reviewers tend to do a fine job at approaching their work and even attempting to write a review about a video-game is admirable and can point a person in the right direction. The key word here, though, is Interactive and it's the interactivity that sets video-games apart from any other medium of media, except maybe seeing a live show and even then it's a rare and sketchy argument. I have a great deal of trouble believing that I can sum up all the flavours, all the tiny little...emotions I experience and savour during a video-game session in any form of worded article or argument and I don't believe that anybody can truly achieve such a feat.
Suggest it's because I'm a bad writer, it may be the case but this is what I think on the matter. I suppose it comes perilously close to arguing that video-games are art, which I'll avoid for the time being but experiencing video-games evokes a barrage of feelings in me and I've never yet been able to put a feeling into words that I've been able to appreciate as much as the emotion itself.

--

See, this very symposium is why I love living in the 'Now' of video games. We're all aware that we're a new culture to the world, niche at best but this sort of argument shows that we're growing. It's at a point where professionals in the field are starting to be recognised on a widespread basis and they can, for the most part, experiment, try new things, like a symposium, referring to their own field. I've expressed before how much of an exciting time to it is to be a part of a community in this field and it's times like these that I like to be reminded that it's not just our one little community here at Giant Bomb, it's an entire culture.

B[o]ut.

P.S. I read that damned symposium in an hour and half which just feels too fast ;_;

Nice post.

My feeling is that, in order to simply get a grasp on the medium, you need some sort of way of collating opinions on what is worthwhile and what is a waste of time. I don't see any other way of doing that than having scores, and then giving out nominations and awards to the best.

God help us if the only way to find out what is essential among the thousands of releases every year is to read a vague N'Gai Croal-style write-up on each game.

Problem with collating opinions to differentiate games that are worth it is that a lot of people have such contrasting tastes that it wouldn't work. For instance, I like Lost: Via Domus, whereas most people hate it, so if I were on that review team, it would just fuck it all up (I know that game sucks, but I still kind of enjoy it)
And regardless of reviews and what not, I tend to play my share of really shitty games just for the experience. I get the feeling that in the future I'll have a natural instinct for which games are gonna be good, so N'Gai Croal and his write-ups will feel obsolete.

Yay for scores, yay for awards!

By the way, was it just me or did N'Gai come off kinda strong in that symposium?

If what you're saying is that we know what we like almost regardless of how some games are reviewed, then I agree. But how did we work out what we liked in the first place? Review scores?

(I really like N'Gai Croal's writing. It's interesting to see him mentioning film reviewer influences on his writing, because I think he operates in a very similar way to the likes of Pauline Kael, except for games.)