Comments on: Yahtzee On Net Fame

By: vic

vic — Mon, 31 Mar 2008 15:51:41 +0000

I really like ZeroP the ADD flash works perfectly with his voicework. I know you can’t hold talent back … but it can frequently lay dormant or forgotten for many years and I’m always surprised by the way things emerge into popularity. Just when you think there is some media which is too obscure to ever become mainstream, it gets a remix and bam there it is.

By: Andrew Farrell

Andrew Farrell — Fri, 14 Mar 2008 11:04:28 +0000

Also when he hits something that I haven’t seen before, the burst intensity of the review can make it hilarious and eye-opening, like his Drake’s Progress review.

By: ran93r

ran93r — Thu, 13 Mar 2008 21:43:07 +0000

I see nothing wrong with beating down the negatives in games and building a whole review around them, he does what he does well. His review of The Witcher I found hilarious and although I didn’t disagree with anything he said, I still loved the game. As a format it can happily run and run and fair play to him.

By: Kadayi

Kadayi — Thu, 13 Mar 2008 19:29:42 +0000

@drunkymonkey

Your imposing constraints on him that simply don’t exist, as a means to excuse him. He’s done short reviews and long reviews, I don’t think it matters much to either him or the escapist how long they are or how long he takes, as long as they generate site hits and advertising revenue. The point is he runs down one (negative) aspect of a genre game (he did the same with Mass Effect and the whole Paragon/Renegade system), but doesn’t recognize the positive at work in others.

By: drunkymonkey

drunkymonkey — Thu, 13 Mar 2008 18:10:00 +0000

@Kad: But in such a limited time to do it (what is it, four minutes?), fitting in the introduction, the jokes, the ending, and the analysis in between isn’t exactly an easy job.

By: kadayi

kadayi — Thu, 13 Mar 2008 18:00:01 +0000

@Mitch

I think if you read enough reviews by a particular reviewer you get a feel for what it is they like or dislike in particular genres and why, and the better ones have a stance. Yatzee got his Escapist Gig off trashing Fable via Youtube, for it quaint good/evil choice system (Your actions are assessed by some universal measure as to what’s right and wrong, by some invisible monitor). However when he ‘reviews’ The Witcher for the Escapist completely fails to recognise that it delivers game choices that not only have genuine consequences, but also ones that don’t subscribe to universal notions of good and evil. Consistency would be a good thing.

By: Julian Murdoch

Julian Murdoch — Thu, 13 Mar 2008 03:19:10 +0000

I’m a huge fan of ZP. Not so much the “new” escapist, and Alexa is about the most misguided way of tracking traffic ever devised by man.

Love ZP thoguh.

By: Mike

Mike — Wed, 12 Mar 2008 23:17:15 +0000

I feel a little sorry for Ben. His fame is such now that he couldn’t get rid of it if he wanted, and it’s pretty hard to tell whether what he’s doing is good or not because so many people love him with Internet Love.

I think development would be his next best bet. Even if it was to create a kind of indie publishing label.

EDIT – The Alexa stuff is amazing, but not surprising. But Amazing.

By: Mitch Small

Mitch Small — Wed, 12 Mar 2008 22:55:21 +0000

@ Kadayi:

I’ve yet to see an game reviewer explicitly state a central philosophy to their work. Maybe I need to stop reading 1up, but it seems that they’re all disposable. Like all sudden stars, Yahtzee’s only being scrutinized because there’s so much attention lavished upon him. Internet reviews (and entertainment, as ZP falls into both categories) are all very ephemeral mediums.

But I don’t expect him to ride this train much longer. He seems restless, even if he’s having fun. I do look forward to games that he works on in the future. He’s got plenty of skill.

By: Alex

Alex — Wed, 12 Mar 2008 21:30:32 +0000

I detect a bit of envy in Mr. Alex ;)

I have been found out! ;)

Seriously though, I really hated the Painkiller bit, it felt like it was written by someone else, a 13-year-old boy, perhaps. But.. that’s just me, lots of people seemed to love it, more power to them. :)

His ‘reviews’ are always amusing (though I think the turnaround is having it’s toll), but to my mind Croshaw lacks an actual solid gaming philosophy, He’ll bemoan the lack of a particular element/aspect in one game, then completely fail to acknowledge the very same thing in another. He strikes me as the gaming equivalent of Dennis Pennis, amusing, but disposable.

You are right, I think, but the thing is that his pieces aren’t actual reviews as such anyway, they’re more entertainment than anything.

He tends to take a game from a genre he doesn’t like to task for having characteristics that are almost inherently part of that genre, which defeats the purpose of reviewing, really.

He also can’t really be a reviewer in this format, because when he talks positively about a game he finds it very hard to still be funny, which is why most people watch his “reviews” in the first place.

By: Jiki

Jiki — Wed, 12 Mar 2008 20:58:27 +0000

Well, ZP is the reason I stumbled on The Escapist and the only reason I stayed there. They’re articles are quite yawn though they have some better ones at times which have been quite enjoyable, but their main attraction is still ZP who’ll overshadow the rest of the site sooner or later.

By: dhex

dhex — Wed, 12 Mar 2008 20:12:34 +0000

“outside…20 minutes…pufferfish”