not at all..... Critics criticizing a game is fine and to be expected... indeed fair %age of my posts are at least in part critical and yet for the most part I would say I am a huge ED fan.
HOWEVER
it IS a critics responsibility esp one who is respected in some quarters to at least have a rough understanding of the mechanics of the product they are bashing..... and sadly it is on this point that in this day and age of youtube and twitter etc where more and more fall down.
^This
I completely agree that critics need a voice and should be allowed to do what they do, but just like any profession, they have to do it properly. Reviewing a game (which is essentially what his FW series is) requires you to know the game. Turning it into a sarcastic rant and making false claims is very wrong, very irresponsible. Nerd makes his money through his channel, so he should at least take it more seriously.
I just have to say that the state of game critics at the moment is dire. I had to unsubscribe from PC Gamer because there is this huge culture right now of glorifying indie games and waging war on big budget games. It seems to be welcomed into a game-critic circle, you have to prove yourself by finding some big title and finding everything wrong with it, and literally ignoring or downplaying anything amazing about it, and then you have to review some crappy indie game glowingly. Once you do that, I'm sure you get approached by all the big game magazines.
I don't think it's right. Every game should be judged on its own merits and with correct context. Good points and bad points should be weighted properly for a final score. Bias, preconceptions, agendas serve no place in the critic world.
The Crew, for example, made me see red when I saw the reviews. I'll go through why based on my 4 points:
- Good and bad weighting: The reviewer completely sidelined the biggest innovation of the game - in fact I would call it a Wonder of the Gaming World - the map. It was HUGE, and not only HUGE but PACKED to the brim with detail. Every square meter was hand-designed. This alone made it a completely remarkable game. In fact, it was the main purpose of the game. Instead he focussed on the bad, the stuff that was just meant to add to the map, not be the point of the game itself.
- Bias: The reviewer obviously was biased against the game, using the story as his bias - he seems to hate games that have crappy story
- Preconception: The reviewer had put the game into a box - a pure racing game. He compared it to games it had nothing to do with like ETS and NFS. He found fault with things that he was expecting but the game wasn't even trying to be.
- Agenda: Clearly this reviewer, like all others, feels it his duty to "fight the man". Yes big Production companies need to be criticised and need to be held in check. But bashing every game they make, hating it simply because it was made by a big rich company, is not on.
I bet most of you haven't even heard of The Crew, and if you have, never gave it a second thought due to its bad press. Well it was one of the best games of my life, and would be to you too if you like exploring and big worlds.