Exactly so. The best argument for any platform -- console, PC, handheld, whatever -- is that there are amazing games on it that aren't available elsewhere. That doesn't mean that one should necessarily own every platform, or refrain from criticising a particular platform's flaws, but for the discerning gamer who isn't so much interested in "playing games" as playing certain, specific games, fundamentalist platform allegiance is a non-starter.
Exclusives aren't arguments for different platforms, they're arguments in favour of having only one platform. The best one of those is the PC.
Irrelevant on further examination of the rest of the thread.
Yes and I want a pony.Originally Posted by NathanH
People expect a reviewer to do his/her Job, namely watch a film from beginning to end or read a book from cover to cover and then write a review. This idea that somehow game journalists are so special that they're not beholden to the same critical standards is utter wank. I suppose next up we should be 'grateful' that the almighty reviewers took time out of their busy life schedules to deign to write to us mere mortals? Or is expecting someone to do their job diligently 'entitlement'?
Moreover, for your average human being who has limited free time and is disinclined to spend that time paying for the privilege of not having fun, a write-up covering 'only' the first six hours of a game (opportunity cost AUD $93 at current minimum wage) is perfectly useful.
How long a player may or may not play game (which is open to conjecture) has zero applicability as to how much onus is on a reviewer to do their job and play a game through.
Why yes you're right I'm deliciously evil
Tradition is the tyranny of dead men
Steam:Kadayi Origin: Kadayi GFWL: Kadayi
Probable Replicant
*blush* I'm flattered by the attention boys, but please let's not make the thread about liddle old me
That I would call Elitism. It's almost a dictionary definition of Elitism... "There are some, whose understanding of something somewhat secondary to the discussion is lacking, therefore their opinions/actions/contributions are less". What about someone who isn't a native English speaker, and has perhaps learned the newer connotations of the word? Their opinion is worthless to you?
Also... I wouldn't call that pragmatism. Seems like the opposite of pragmatism. It's idealism you're espousing. The pragmatic view would be to recognise that the word has a new, evolving meaning, that there is confusion and ambiguity when it is used, and to allow for a substitute.
ARPS unofficial motto - And then we leave. No heroic stands.
You seem to think that casual PC gaming is the same as console gaming. It isn't.
This is almost too idiotic for words. If you think that PCs are THAT ubiquitous, please show me some numbers. The only ones I could get (which I'm not 100% trusting) put there being around 40,000 PCs in the UK. That's <0.1% of the population.
Anecdote. Just because something is one way for you, does not mean it is that way for everyone. What now "smart" guy?
Gaming PCs are NOT cheaper than consoles. Better is a subjective word (I think gaming is better on PCs, but, for the reasons that have been given, some people might prefer a console).
ARPS unofficial motto - And then we leave. No heroic stands.
I think the site you are getting the data from is giving its numbers in units of 1,000 PCs (admittedly it is very unclear about this). mapsoftheworld.com estimates 35,890,000 PCs in the UK. From personal experience everyone I know under retirement age has a PC. Not everyone has a Windows PC, though.
Irrelevant on further examination of the rest of the thread.
The data I could find with a quick google search for Germany, which I suspect is very similar to other western nations, says 79% of households had at least one PC (including laptops and netbooks), and that was in 2009. The data comes from the Federal Statistical Office, so I thinks it's pretty reliable. How Unaco can even remotely think it's possible there are only 40000 PCs in the UK is a bit baffling to be honest.
True that (the site I got it from wasn't very clear). But that is the UK, which is 4th in World as far as penetration goes, and that's a little over 1 PC for every 2 people. I'll hazard that at least 50% of them are in business/academic use. At least. And it's only some of the top 5 or 6 countries (Japan#1, German#3, UK#4, France#5, S Korea#6) that have anywhere near that sort of penetration/ubiquity (China is #2 for the number of PCs in the country, with 53,000,000 serving a population of 1,338,000,000).
Point is, PCs are not so ubiquitous that you can say that everyone in the world (aside from sub-Saharan Africa) owns a PC.
Saturday morning, hadn't had coffee, reading a poorly formatted website that hid the "*number in 1,000s of PCs" thing way off the bottom.
ARPS unofficial motto - And then we leave. No heroic stands.
With data like this, you have to look at PCs per household, not PC per person (or even total number of PCs). That's a much more meaningful statistic in this context.
Fair enough, I know how lack of caffeine can screw with reading comprehension. :)
Last edited by Subatomic; 05-05-2012 at 12:20 PM.
*shrug* Replace "manual patches" with update drivers, kill background processes or anything else which isn't simply "put a disk in and play".
PC gaming is much better now than it has been but it still, apart from online delivery, isn't as convenient. That's a bad thing.
Games are longer. Games reviewers don't get paid more than film reviewers. Assuming you don't think that it's okay for people to be working below the minimum wage then there's an issue here. In an ideal world a games reviewer would get paid 10x that of a film reviewer and we'd all be happy. But unless that happens, if you want games reviews then that's going to mean that a good proportion of the time a reviewer puts into the game is his own time. And that has two major effects: a) a sort of confirmation bias - reviewers pick up reviews for games they're fairly sure they'll like or would have bought anyway, thus making that time a fair trade off, b) in some cases a reviewer might not want or be able to put in that extra time, so will do the best job he can. I do wish there was more openness and acceptance about this sort of thing though. Reviewers should say how long they played and where they got to, and readers shouldn't immediately dismiss them because they didn't finish a game or rushed it.
and? I'm fairly sure books are longer than films, should we cut book reviewers some slack as well?
I specifically responded to your concerns about this earlier on in the thread Dean. But in short if you're a freelancer and you're asked to review Bethesda's next 100 hour megadrop then negotiate your terms accordingly.
Why yes you're right I'm deliciously evil
Tradition is the tyranny of dead men
Steam:Kadayi Origin: Kadayi GFWL: Kadayi
Probable Replicant
*blush* I'm flattered by the attention boys, but please let's not make the thread about liddle old me
It is precisely because game journalists aren't special that you're not entitled to thrust all these special obligations upon them, i.e. to finish a game before commenting upon it. Just as I am perfectly within my rights to say that I spent an hour with game X and that it was terrible, so is Tom Bisell or anyone else.
As a reader I can judge what has been written by whatever criteria I wish. Perhaps I decide that I do not like Tom Bisell's writings because I do not like people named Tom and that as such I shall no longer support the publication for which he writes with my patronage. Fine. Perhaps I even write a strongly worded letter to the editor about the perils of employing people named Tom. Also fine. And perhaps the editor laughs and throws it in the trash. Quite likely. But what I am not entitled to do is to pretend that his writings violate some objective law for writing about video games that has any force outside my own head.
That is one point. There is a further point which deano has already alluded to and explored in his own directions -- namely that six hours is quite a lot of time to spend playing a video game. I wouldn't expect anyone to put more time into a game that they aren't enjoying than that. All I would ask of them is that they clearly disclose the extent of their experience with the game when commenting upon it, which is all that I would ask of anyone, including myself.
Moreover, six hours is certainly enough time for his observations to (in theory) be of value to people. Indeed, most facets of any game will be laid bare or at least hinted at within this period, and I suspect that in most of the cases where this is otherwise we would regard that as a flaw in the game. Indeed, the greater risk in only looking at the first six hours is that one would be inclined to overrate the game given the well-known tendency amongst developers to frontload their efforts *cough* GTA IV *cough* which in turn is in large part a function of the fact that most gamers don't actually finish the games that they play.
Beyond specific observations, that he spent six hours playing a game and didn't enjoy it is also a (potentially) valuable piece of information in itself. Most people are not inclined to spend six hours of their leisure time paying to not enjoy themselves. A piece of writing that says "heads up, you're in for at least six hours of pain" could be more useful to Actual Human Beings with limited time, limited funds, and a long list of other stuff wot they could be doing instead than a piece that praises the game as the second coming of Christ and neglects to mention that its laudable qualities only emerge with some 50 hours invested.
Last edited by Rii; 05-05-2012 at 04:46 PM.
Yes. I have this crazy idea that people should be paid based on the amount of time they spend doing something.
And any terms will not pay anywhere near minimum wage for that job. You also suggested putting staffers on it, but if you think a magazine staff writer gets to spend two 40-hour weeks (half the magazine cycle) doing nothing but playing Skyrim then you're crazy. Again, they're doing tons of unpaid overtime.But in short if you're a freelancer and you're asked to review Bethesda's next 100 hour megadrop then negotiate your terms accordingly.
And when someone is doing unpaid overtime, they're not doing their job. And while this is all inevitable and there's no way around it, I don't think you're entitled to expect this from them or castigate them for not doing it. Especially as it's 99% likely that you're not even paying for their work anyway, and expect to get it for free.
Yes, but again you're not a games reviewer. The comment was made in relation to games reviewers. What you do or don't do is irrelevant to the comment.
A critics job is to to assess a game by criteria for an audience. That role has nothing to do with 'like'. I'm sure many film critics watch films they themselves wouldn't choose to see ordinarily, but they see them because it is their job.That is one point. There is a further point which deano has already alluded to and explored in his own directions -- namely that six hours is quite a lot of time to spend playing a video game. I wouldn't expect anyone to put more time into a game that they aren't enjoying than that. All I would ask of them is that they clearly disclose the extent of their experience with the game when commenting upon it, which is all that I would ask of anyone, including myself.
Is anyone forcing people to review games? Or do they choose?
Overtime is for people who earn by the hour. When you're salaried you do what is required in terms of hours to get the job done.And any terms will not pay anywhere near minimum wage for that job. You also suggested putting staffers on it, but if you think a magazine staff writer gets to spend two 40-hour weeks (half the magazine cycle) doing nothing but playing Skyrim then you're crazy. Again, they're doing tons of unpaid overtime.
Why yes you're right I'm deliciously evil
Tradition is the tyranny of dead men
Steam:Kadayi Origin: Kadayi GFWL: Kadayi
Probable Replicant
*blush* I'm flattered by the attention boys, but please let's not make the thread about liddle old me
Tom Bisell's job is whatever his employer is paying him to do. Your expectations of the role are irrelevant.
Games journalists choose to play and write, publishers choose to pay for and publish those writings, and you choose to read. You're the one who seems to be under the bizarre impression that things are otherwise and that Tom Bisell or the publication he writes for is somehow beholden to your expectations of what constitutes a proper game review. If you don't like it, what you're reading, stop and take your busines (such as it is) elsewhere.Is anyone forcing people to review games? Or do they choose?
Last edited by Rii; 05-05-2012 at 08:41 PM.
Re: number of PCs in the UK:
http://www.ons.gov.uk/ons/rel/family...es-nugget.html
Shows it going from just under 50% in 2001/2 to just shy of 80% in 2010.
It'll be higher than that by now.
That's -households- with PCs; a much more indicative result than 'number of PCs'.
Also, from the ONS again; we now have a situation that there are more internet connections in homes that home PCs. So you can be pretty much guaranteed that ownership of a PC equates to internet access.
I'm pretty confident ill informed unfinished reviews certainly aren't what they want Rii, because such things reflect badly on the site/magazine as well as the writer. There are these things called 'standards' generally organisations like to hold to them.
The guy wrote on his own blog. He didn't write it for a magazine or a site, and I doubt given his inflammatory words or unfinished dismissal of the Witcher 2 anyone would of paid him for it in the first place. Still feel free to argue the toss if you think it's going to save face somehow.Games journalists choose to play and write, publishers choose to pay for and publish those writings, and you choose to read. You're the one who seems to be under the bizarre impression that things are otherwise and that Tom Bisell or the publication he writes for is somehow beholden to your expectations of what constitutes a proper game review. If you don't like it, what you're reading, stop and take your busines (such as it is) elsewhere.
Last edited by Kadayi; 06-05-2012 at 09:25 AM.
Why yes you're right I'm deliciously evil
Tradition is the tyranny of dead men
Steam:Kadayi Origin: Kadayi GFWL: Kadayi
Probable Replicant
*blush* I'm flattered by the attention boys, but please let's not make the thread about liddle old me
According to Market and Research, 82% in the US have a computer in the home as of 2011. The US Census generally corroborates that with 2009 statistics about internet usage in the home, while also pointing out that the demographic least likely to have a computer over the age of 55 - every demographic is ~85% except for the elderly, where it's 66%.
So, yeah, they're pretty fucking ubiquitous.
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