Who reads the whole review?

A little take away from Jeff's recent article kind of struck a chord with me. N'Gai countered Jeff's point that he puts scores up for people who don't read the whole review. For me, I ask myself what number of people genuinely read the whole thing. A lot of the times I spend on gamespot.com system wars (GASP I KNOW!) a lot of people only care about 1 thing. score...

Nothing else mattered to them, once there was a thread that said "what is the worst review" or "what is the review you most disagree with" and what everyone pointed out, and literally everyone was the score....

As a passionate hobbiest reviewer who goes out of his way to write 3200 word reviews for games (simply because of how I believe user reviews should work) I would be disgusted by the fact that my attempted result of a professional review, boiled down to an evaluation of what my opinion of the score was. Even English class is more fair than this, because the teachers actually grade you on the structure and content of your review and not your opinions of it. As a result, I'm truly surprised that people like Jeff with the power to do so, do not simply snap after seeing something like this and abolishing review scores all together when your work is misrepresented like this. It's like building a world class car, and only to have people dismiss it by it's colour. It would be maddining for any professional who truly understands the professional work that went into it.

I have to admit though, that I have judged games in the past for their score and only their score. Doing the whole 7 to 10 scale for gamespot, which I would only play games that rated 7 to 10. I've recently tried to kick myself from the habit at the same time trying to be a professional reviewer, actually looking at the review text instead of the score. But I've always been curious with the general community of a website like Giant Bomb, where even though there is this sort of hero worship around the editors. Who reads the whole review?

I usually look at the score and read the last paragraph of the review for most games. However, if I'm interested in the game, I'll read the whole review. I just don't have the time or the attention span to read a ton of reviews.

Intresting topic. I, personally, read every reveiw through and through. You cant get the whole picture by looking at the score. I like games that send me on a rollercoaster ride be it emotional or an intense physical one. A game (take Fear 2 for example) which got good reveiws but I wouldnt have known how intense of an experience it was just by looking at its score. By the way, System Wars is a terrible, terrible place to go. No one has any sense there. But Im sure you already know that! =)

I do read the whole review, though I do usually (and how can't you) check the score first. Then I take it from there. The perfect trifecta is the written-score-video review combo, giving a lot of opinion together. I agree with you 100% that it is horrible that some people disregard well-written reviews just to obsess over a score. There are a lot of people out there...thankfully not many of them are here ;)

I read about 70% before I give up and skip to the end generally. Unless the game itself REALLY interests me.

I used to read/watch reviews, but I stopped doing that. If've recently come to the conclusion that continued exposure to a game before you have your hands on it will only dilute the impact the game can have on you. I want everything to be as fresh as possible, so I usually just check the stars before I make a purchase and then watch the review after I've finished the game.


Edit: That's not to say I don't read previews, watch trailers, follow coverage, etc. But once a game reaches a certain stage in development, when they are basically ironing out bugs and nothing more, I'll only check out trailers.

I read the whole review every time.  Otherwise, why would reviews exist for more than the pretentious natures of critics?

One of the podcasts I listen to weekly (IGN, Gamespot, and Giant Bomb) talked about this last week. Reviewers themselves loath the fact that they spent all this time working on a nuanced review only to have people do nothing more than look at the numerical, or star, score and pass judgement. You can't do away with those review systems however as it's how the entire industry is based. Just look at how Microsoft determines if an XBLA game will stay up depending on its Metacritic score or how the jacket for a game emblazons various high scores.

Personally I don't think I can make a fully informed judgement on a game unless I fully read (or watch in the case of X-Play) the reviews. There have been several games which got lower scores which I gave a chance because I read the entire review. Overlord is a good example. Just looking at its review score you might gloss over it. After reading the review however its unique structure and story is revealed.

Basically, people who just look at scores and harp on it are being shortsighted. A 6.0, or 3 out of 5, isn't a bad score for a game. It just means it isn't spectacular. If you looked at how people talk though anything below an 8 is garbage. Not the case at all.

So, yeah I think I had a point in there.

Depends on the game, and where I read it.

Like, if I already know I love the game, and they give it a decent score, I'll just skim it. If I love the game and they give it a bad score I'll read it all and find out why their score differs from what I'd give it.

If I know nothing of the game, I'll usually read it all.

Or, if it's in Nintendo Power, I always read the whole of the review for some reason. Maybe because the internet isn't there to distract me, and all I have is the magazine.

I usually hate reading, but love watching the full video review. Also reading  pros and cons of the game are important to me. I usually only care about the score to the extent that if is is 80 or above (which means its generally good) if it gets lower than that you can be sure that the game has flaws which usually only good to those who like the game genre

It depends. I read the review if I'm interested in the game, if not I just look at the score.

I read the whole review just looking at the score doesn't give you the full meal deal on the pros and cons of the game.

I read the whole review. I don't know how you could be a far judge of it if you don't.

If I'm not interested in a game, then I wouldn't even look at the score. So anytime I look at a score, I'll read the review.

So maybe we should have it be like movie reviews now where it falls under three categories of play it, rent it or skip it.

I usually do read the whole review only if its a game that I'm seriously considering buying.

I actually do tend to read the whole review if it's a game I'm interested in. Also, if a game that I paid no attention to gets a high review score, I'll then read the review to learn more about it. 

If I have time I read the eintire review word ofr word, but if I am in a hurry then I look at the first paragreaph then skip to the bottom line.

If I'm considering on buying the game, I'll read the whole review. If not then I'll usually just read the summary, score and watch the video review if there is one.

I always read the entire review. Game reviewers/writers put all their work and effort into the words, not the score. If you don't want to read the review then you might as well not even look at the score...a score tells you nothing.

Always, always read the whole review.  Mostly because scores are always subjective, and therefore, suspect to differentiation as a result of taste. 

Take something like Spider-Man: Web of Shadows.  It got knocked by critics because it did very little to reinvent or reinvigorate the "free-roaming Spidey" template established all the way back in '04.

Thing is, I'm the type of person who loves a refined experience just as much as a refreshing, brand new experience.  My taste happens to encompass high-res remakes of game designs I know and love, so when something like Web of Shadows comes down the pipeline, I can't trust scores to be an adequate gauge as to whether it's worth playing or not. 

If I had my way in a perfect world, I'd play every game that piqued my interest in the slightest.  The problem, however, is that I'm a full-time college student and  I work a full-time job, so I haven't the time to sit down with every game I want.  That means I have to rely, to some extent, on reviews to point me in the right direction regarding what I want to play when the mood strikes.

Lately I have started reading most reviews all the way through, both because of GB's 5 star scale and because I'm finding scores to be less and less informative. Plus, the EDGE vs. PSXetreme hubbub just reminded me of how bad it can be to just fixate on scores.

Review scores still have a purpose though, it helps frame the opinion the reviewer has on the game but ultimately the text itself is what tells me about the game, a 7,5 or 4*/5* won't tell me squat about the framerate or the story so the only way I can find out is to read dat text

I used to read entire reviews. But these days I just tend to skim through the reviews, looking for points that are relevant to me. Granted, if it's a game I really am interested in, I'll probably give the review more attention.
However, I don't own an Xbox 360 or PlayStation 3 or even a decent PC, so it's not essential for me to read the entire review. I'm not going to be playing those games anyway.

I read entire reviews for games I'm genuinely interested in. Otherwise, I can't be bothered.

If I'm interested in the game then I'll read the review, otherwise I just look at the score.

I read the whole review and watch the video review. 

If you care to hear a review about a certain game at all, you will read the whole review. A score is pointless and always will be. That's why it bothers me so much when people bitch and moan about the way review scoring is done. The ones that want it on a 10 point scale and anything else isn't good enough, its just completely stupid. Also, metacritic needs to die.

These days I only look at games I'm interested in, or if something on a website catches my eye.  Now, back when I used to get EGM (my subscription ends this April!) and Game Informer, I used to choose which reviews I read off the score.  Again, if I was interested in a game I'd read the article regardless of the posted score, but for the rest of the games, if a game was scored poorly, I'd skip the review.  Well, games that got a score of 1 or 2 would warrant a perusal, but not many games are so shockingly bad.  Anyway, if I did read the review of a game, I read the entire review, and still do today.  When I read a review either here or on any other game site, I start at the beginning and read every word until the end.  I've committed myself to understanding the reviewers opinion, so I might as well get it in full. 

If I'm interested in a game, I'll read the whole review(or watch the video review, if available). Just reading a chunk - or even worse, only looking at the score - is pointless.

I find myself not reading reviews for X360 games, because most of the time all that is relevant to me is said in the opening paragraphs, and the rest of the review is talking about the graphics and the quality of the netcode, both of wich are of little relevance to me.

I do, however, read Wii reviews.

  Well to tell you I did not even read your whole ? (Or other form post for that matter).
  I also think you have bad taste to go to Gamestop(Yup, I went there.....again).  

I always read the entire review of a game I'm planning on buying, but if I had no interest in a game and it gets a 2/5 then I won't even bother reading it.

If you're interested in the game and the reviewer went to the trouble of writing a review, then the least you could do is read the whole thing.  Otherwise it's all a waste of time.  Hell, sometimes I read the entire review to justify the score.  If I see a hyped up game getting a 3 or a normal game getting a 5 or 1... I want to know why and will read the entire review....even if I don't even own the system the game is for.

that depends on how interesting the review is