week five; games journalism

this weeks blogging task has us reviewing some game reviews and journalism, and write back about it, after reading most of the links provided i found that some writing about games can be really in depth and longwinded, but interesting non-the less.
one thing we've been asked too look at is NGJ, which is new games journalism, which started in 2004 by journalist Kieron Gillen, and is a form of new journalism, implied into video game journalism. this type of review includes personal anecdotes, referenced to other media and creative analysis to explore games, rather than the older style which iv'e seen alot of where a reviewer lists the so called pro's and cons of a game, and then gives them a score? like 5 out of 5, or 95%? but what i don't get is that if a game scores 100% which some do, they should be the perfect game if this system works, but i know of games that have been given 100% that i hate, but shouldn't a so called perfect game appeal to just about everyone?.


how i see it the numbers don't mean anything, its how the reviewer puts it across to the gamer that the game is worth buying, and i think with the added personal level of ngj people are more than likely to buy games that they like, rather than just buying a game with a good number, and hate it.



also from this reading i have found out that game reviewers are actually under alot of preassure to get these reviews out on time, whereas i thought it was just people sitting playing games all day in there underwear and then write a little bit, it turns out they are really pushed, because new games, such as rpgs and such, have literally hundreds of hours of gameplay that could add to a review, and the reviewers don't have that time.



a case of this arose in 2006 where a reviewer majorly underplayed a game, the game was the ps3 title enchanted arms, i have this game and i know that 3 hours into the game i was nower into it, and this is apparently as far as the reviewer got into it, before publishing his review.



i think i where to be the game reviewer (and if i had enough time to get a decent play in) id try the ngj aproach to writing, because so far i have found these reviews far more helpful in buying games than other reviews.



one reviewer who i beleive is ngj, is ben Yahtzee, who doues the zero puntuation reviews on the escapist magazine website.

although sometimes i disagree with whats said, every point made is true, and all the bad, and good points are made, in a way that isnt listing them but connecting with the reader through jokes and humour.