If one guy had made The Division (I mean its literally probably impossible) it would be praised beyond all criticism because even with its downfalls (Stardew's controls are not the best, there are key things the game doesn't tell you) the scale of the project vs people/money is absurd. One guy making this "little" game that I can easily dump 80 hours into is impressive and should be a part of the review.
I think we'll have to agree to disagree, as I vehemently disagree with your statement.
If the game is good, it will be praised, if it is garbage it will not be excused because one guy made it. Also you shouldn't slam The Division to pieces because a team of 100's made it. What sort of weird justification is that?
I'm not saying that the single guy making it should not be mentioned, or valued, or respected, or held in high regard - but I'm saying that stating it multiple (3, including the header) times in a review is a little too much, and Dan has leant on that fact too much when there appears to be (and should be) many more things he can praise in the game aside from that. Objectively, subjectively, whatever!
that lets us totally rip it apart for any and all of its downfalls because so many people and so much money went into it.
Wait what??? You really think that? This is why you would not make a good reviewer.
First, no one has claimed that small teams are better than big teams. No one. Don't go constructing straw men.
Second, the fact that this is a one-man game does make a difference. Imagine this: there are two houses in front of you, indistinguishable from one another. From the furnishings, to the piping, etc., all is the same. You deem, after close inspection, that the two houses are both of good quality. Furthermore, imagine that after this inspection you are told that one house was built by various people (construction, plumbing, interior decorators), while the other house was built by one man. You sit there and marvel how one individual could have done everything and still produce the same final product that took an entire team otherwise.
Again, this does not make his house better. It just seems hard to avoid such a labor of love. Such an attention to detail and quality control. We're told to separate the art from the artist, and that's far more understandable in big team games, but it's hard to divorce these when this monolith rests on the back of one man.
Thus, it is by no means irrelevant to put an emphasis (if we should even call it an emphasis) of this point in the review.
Fair enough. I may have reacted a bit too strongly, but I'd suggest to your first point that the fact Dan, multiple times brings up the fact that the game is made by one person, is suggesting that the game is better for this fact, it's even in the summary line... so I suggest it may be fair to assume that Dan is heaping a little too much praise in lieu of the game being a one-man job, when for all intents and purposes, this should not prop the game up, at all. If the game is great (which it sounds like it is) it doesn't matter that one duder sat down to create this.
You and I can read whatever we want out of this review, and I will react a bit prissy about the suggestion that I am saying Giantbomb's editorial intent should not be there for the reviews, only in their proper 'editorial' a la Austin and what Jeff does from time to time (and less so the others). I also posit that Dan is not the best writer on the crew and is thus less-suited to hiding his bias.
It's impressive, and it's absolutely valid to think about how something is made when you're reviewing it.
If you think "all that matters is what's in the game itself and torch all knowledge of anything else" is the way reviews should be, game criticism is doomed – we should all just pack it in, and not bother writing anything that isn't a simple pro/con lists and component scores. That's a dark path.
I disagree. It doesn't matter how big the dev team was, in every AAA release do you think they need to say how large the team size was or where it was made? I don't think so. It's obviously impressive, but it doesn't change the fact of the game as a product. In some cases it can be good knowledge, because Stardew Valley is still technically in development with the multiplayer mode coming later, but a game having a smaller team doesn't instantly make it better because it was harder to make. I'd focus on judging the game for its merits.
Mentioning that it is a one man band is fine, but regurgitating it over and over, in a review is not right. Yes this should be excluded from being important in a review, as a review is about the end product, not the journey to get there. Games criticism is larger than the actual review, and that's where talking about a one-man team is appropriate. You can have editorial, or whatever... but for a review, yes I disagree and stongly feel that the team behind the game is wholly irrelevant.
Cibele should not be seen favourably because the one lady made it, but rather it involved her highly personal experience.
What next? Game of the year is decided by how big a game budget is? What resolution the game can go upto? (4k woohoo!!)
Why is a smaller team better than a larger team?? THAT may be worth editorial. You could argue that a larger team (AAA) makes a much better game just as successfully perhaps.
Thus, this is irrelevant in a review.
Subjectively you may respect the game more because it was made by one person, but objectively it does not make the game any better. This is not the same as discussing price, or length of gameplay, as it has NO factor on the game as a product... FOR REVIEW
Edit: I've gone through the review again and Dan only makes a point of the one man team 3 times. Less than I thought. Let's blame that on the fact in addition to those times he talks about the creator a few more times, but you could swap that out for a development company name with no change, thus being a sole creator the tone shifts a little. Let's just say I think there is a bit too much pandering (towards the one-man thing) being put in a review for a game that should probably stand tall (I haven't played it - so from what everyne is saying about it) regardless of whether 1 or 100 people were involved.
@drewbert We've changed the Melbourne logo this year unfortunately, to a really boring, really basic typeset. See the Australian Open in January. The 'book-like' logo is unfortunately no more :(
@sudsdev@xedrox First time I've actually looked at this track in-game. They've done a pretty decent job modelling the buildings along St Kilda Rd and the like... not bad at all!
I can hear the grand prix from my apartment. It's bloody loud.
I dispute that, these are quiet as all hell. I'm in Toorak and can hear them, but they positively used to roar, even from here, before they changed the engines. The V8's are louder now...
@freakache:He's talking about the tyre stack things, which are locale based, or more obtuse is the boat map, and the lights in the lake as mentioned.
I've got the real finish as far as I'm aware - (sky hotel) , solved about 540 puzzles, and found about 15-20 animals, a bunch of cloud trees, the eyes that see you, solved all the cave puzzles, found a bunch of faces, a whole bunch of grey 'pompeii-people' perspective trick things, etc (generally shown on the screens in the sky hotel)
Only place I had serious trouble were the sound puzzles, and this was only because I was playing mostly without sound at all.... d'oh!
The philosophising in this game completely rubs me the wrong way, as opposed to Talos which was interesting, relevant to the game, coherent and an actual narrative, so in that regard this game falls short for me. For puzzle design and world building otherwise? It's fantastic.
Weird puzzles:
River line at the top that Brad missed
Cave puzzles at the end that do nothing?
Keep puzzle after you've already activated the laser - did this do anything?
I no longer care about this man or whether he is working on SS. He lies (or what I interpret as misleads) on whatever he is working, as he appears to be a salaryman now. What about all that 'Disney is the best job/company/IP ever' bullshit he was talking, before gracing the world with the abjectly garbage Mickey games? Oh well he hasn't actually made anything good for a long, long, long, long time. It would seem at least Harvey Smith can crank out a half decent game since the LGS days.
Spector is also largely responsible for DE:IW and T:DS being 'consolised' crap also - remember unified ammo?
Even his concept of the unlimited 'city block' simulator has sort of been done now, and I bet there are many, many developers that can do a better job than him.
Hopefully I end up eating my words as SS2 and Thief are pretty much my favourite games but wow I'm not holding my breath.
This man has been irrelevant since 2004, and his opinion on things has flipped flopped more times than I can remember. Anti-violence, talking about Wolfenstein (which actually turned out to be one of the best shooters of that year), Disney characters are the best ever, SS2 glory days, yadda yadda yadda, why does anyone care anymore?
Similar to that guy that everyone thinks was an amazing developer that has started and left 3-4 studios in the last 10 years or so and has absolutely nothing to speak from it. I wonder if that has more to do with the person than it does the studio?
You know who I'm talking about??? Doug Church - another LGS alumni hack that is riding off the success of Thief, Deus Ex and SS. The only reason people know who Spector, Church and Smith are because of the Origin/LGS games, from 15 years ago. Smith is the only one that's actually done anything worthwhile since with Dishonoured, apart from Ken Levine of course.
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