5 Things Gamers Secretly Judge Games On

As gamers, we have the tendency to be overly-critical of the medium that we love. Despite our addictions, we never seem to be truly satisfied. There always seems to be something that just doesn't sit right with us, and manages to dampen the experience. But what we fail to realise is that sometimes, we are judging a game on more than just the typical categories that you see in a lot of reviews that get published. Instead, we subconsciously critique based on some rather bizarre criteria that sometimes we don't understand unless we sit back and really think about it.

[domino5343]

The similarities to other games part is so true. Good article.

[NukaCola]

I think this is the biggest issue with reviews now a days. I'd love it that they didn't base a games quality on whether it compares to it's next similar release. COD isn't the standard for Shooters, Final Fantasy isn't the standard for RPGs.

[3-4-5]

Good read. Some of it was obvious kind of , but the other ones were definitely worth bringing to attention.

For me the Main character does matter. I for whatever reason can't get into any game that has a female lead, no matter how cool she is. I can't relate and it makes me feel like I'm playing a game that wasn't made for me.

I would also rather a game be a bit too long than too short. We used to all play tons of games that weren't that long, but we all made our own ways to play after beating the game, or played with friends, or invented our own rules within the game..ect... to extend the replay value.

You could do this with almost any N64 game. They made them just big enough to let you explore, but not enough that you ever felt totally lost in the world ( Mario 64, OOT , Banojo-kazooie ect... )

I kind of miss the mini worlds of Mario 64 and Banjo.

Little self contained worlds were you can do 6-10 mini quests and then move on.

Another thing I judge games on is difficulty. I don't know too many difficult games I've ever enjoyed. I like a bit of a challenge , but sometimes I just want to collect things, and do small quests and not die over and over again, and I think we've gotten away from those games for no good reason at all.

It's not all nostalgia either...As within the past 5 years I've gone back and played a lot of N64 game and some of them still hold up today. ( I've always been a fan of the N64 graphics )

[domino5343]

I feel the same way but older games was unforgiving in the difficulty department. No checkpoints at every spot, bosses was hard as ever, and you usually had to grind to get anywhere (in those certain games.) Also, if the story is good enough, I can play a game with a lead female character. Some examples are Tomb Raider, Metroid Series (Although they tricked us for some time lol), Half-Life 2, Portal Series and more. Also I love Sword Art Online so I had to say your avatar is awesome.

[SimplySneaky]

I actually enjoy some games more with a female lead. It feels different, and a lot of games seem to be emphasized for a male audience, with a female lead (Bayonetta anyone?).

[daveng88]

I think if a game is going to have a female lead, she needs to be interesting for more reasons that the two on her chest, otherwise it just comes off as pandering to a male audience for the sake of "sex sells".

[daveng88]

Don't worry, I'm a massive fan of the N64 as well. Like you, I think that most of their games would still hold their own against today's games (at least in the gameplay department). This is where, for me anyway, nostalgia becomes a bit of a comparison point, since I was such of huge fan of games from that era, that I start thinking about how it was done in the past when playing a game in the present. It just makes you think about your old gaming memories and sometimes current games just never seem to live up to them. That's how I feel sometimes, not all the time though.

Difficultly can indirectly be linked into length, since a more difficult game would "technically" be longer, since it would require more effort/input to progress. But sometimes (again as you said), simple games can be the most entertaining with your time. I'm always skeptical when a game states how many hours of gameplay is in it, since I know it means up to 30% of that time could involve repetitive quests and/or training to reach a point where the game can be finished. I love sidequests and running around at random as much as anyone else, but there does come a point when I want to see the ending, and I don't want to be holed into doing a bunch of pointless crap to see it sometimes.

Thanks for reading.

[3-4-5]

SAO is my first anime , but it's already one of my favorite shows ever.

back tot topic:

I actually just found a Retro Gaming store , when I bought GS's last copy of Windwaker 2 days ago, and it diddn't work.

guys has $200,000 disc refurbishing machine...anyways it worked.

but while I was in there I took a look at all the N64 games and I'm pretty sure I'm going back there tomorrow to pick some up before they go up in price.

On my list are :

Snowboard kids , Mario Party 2, Rainbow 6 ( because it's the first PC game version and they haven't made a Rainbow 6 game like it since and it's only $7.00 ), wave race

There are others I just forgot, but yea I miss the limitations of the N64..It really forced the dev's to think more intelligently about how they were going to accomplish things in the game design.

[Kratoscar2008]

I like silent protagonists so personality is not something important for me unless you get an awful MC wich you hate everytime he shows his/her face: Luke from TotA and Lightning/Sera from FFXIII.

Lenght surely helps, i want to get the most of it but i want the game to be long witouth resorting to backtracking or revisit the same areas: Silent Hill 4 and DMC 4 are big offenders.

Similarity is not a problem really, as long as the game is fun: there are GoW clones like Dantes Inferno and Darksiders that are really fun despite their similarities to GoW.

The ending isnt really a big of a deal since i apreciate the Journey rather than the end of it.

[daveng88]

I definitely agree about the length factor; It has to feel substantial without being a chore, which is a pretty fine balancing act.

Similarity is more to do with professional reviews rather than personal choice, although it does seem to sneak into some opinions on more than one occasion. There's never been more of a market for games than now, in terms of the sheer quantity of games being released, but at the same time, the number of unique games being released is diminishing. So having a vast quantity of games out that are similar in some aspect to a few other games will no doubt draw some form of comparison. Whether it influences your choice or not is another topic altogether, but the comparison does exist to an extent.

Endings don't bother me either personally, but I have heard a lot of rage from more than one person about lousy endings making games a waste of time, so I thought that it would be worthwhile to include it, just due to the amount of times I've heard it.

Thanks for reading.