The Witcher - Review @ The Escapist

One thing that puzzles me is the guy isn't even ashamed of the fact that he's writing the review after only playing the game for 10 hours. Some would call this sincerity; I'd say it's just insolence.

That is very common, but as Dhruin mentions it is really only acceptable when you are rushing for a Day of Release deadline.

I don't get paid for my reviews at any of the sites I deal with (other than a few thousand $$ of free games ... most of which I wouldn't buy anyway ... ) - but I do insist that I be allowed to complete games before reviewing. My time is important, but I only review games to share my views and insights with others and hopefully either encourage them to grab gems they might have missed or skip crap not worth buying.
 
Joined
Oct 18, 2006
Messages
14,911
I don't get paid for my reviews at any of the sites I deal with (other than a few thousand $$ of free games ... most of which I wouldn't buy anyway ... ) - but I do insist that I be allowed to complete games before reviewing. My time is important, but I only review games to share my views and insights with others and hopefully either encourage them to grab gems they might have missed or skip crap not worth buying.

Damn straight.

I do get paid for working on GameBanshee, but I mostly value that I can take my own time with articles, even up to selecting what I want to write about.

As I said on the Codex: When previewing Hard to be a God, I played the demo through 2 times and twice more with different builds just to be sure I explored it properly, I re-read the book which I hadn't picked up in ages, and only after investing that much time, way over 10 hours, did I consider myself qualified to do a preview.

And I think that should be standard. I can understand, having worked in the editorial office of printing media, that deadlines can mess this up and I have no problem with that, but you'd figure that in a month's time they could've spared more than 10 hours. What's more, if you've only spent 10 hours in the game, the article really shouldn't be called a review, because it's not, you're not reviewing the game, you're giving impressions from your sparse playing time. Call a bird a bird and a pig a pig, please.
 
Joined
Oct 19, 2006
Messages
1,558
Exactly. I would call this article a preview, not a review. Is this guy that biased or does he have a personal vendetta against CDProjekt? That was completely ridiculous! When he starts complaining about his ability to time attacks because Geralt becomes semi-transparent?? :rotfl:
Not only was he desperately trying to stretch every last negative flaw he could pull out of his butt, but he also showed his complete lack of skill in playing games in general. Wow, that whole article was incredible.
 
Joined
Oct 20, 2006
Messages
1,081
Location
Midwest, USA
Failure to compare like with like. Bioshock's graphics are praised in a vague manner. The Witcher is pulled up on some minor clipping issues, cast as indicative of an ugly game. This isn't the case, at least in my opinion.

The portrayal of women is intriguing. On the one hand there's some bawdy fun; with the outrageous suggestion that women might dare to enjoy sex too. On the other, depressingly matter-of-fact chatting between women regarding how badly their abusive husbands beat them.

I found it a refreshingly frank take on "olde worlde" gender roles; compared to the more "right-on" sanitised, contemporary-minded equality of other fantasy games. The rabid, fire and brimstone misogyny of the Reverend was nicely evocative.

As far as the idea that it is patronising and denigrates women that giving shiny, pretty things to them wins their favour (and rational men don't fall to such schemes) - men are cast as mercenary drunks who'll abandon their posts and the like for money, narcotics or plenty of hooch to ruin their minds and livers with.
I don't think either sex is unfairly vaunted or demonised here.
 
Joined
Oct 18, 2006
Messages
122
Location
United Kingdom, London
What's more, if you've only spent 10 hours in the game, the article really shouldn't be called a review, because it's not, you're not reviewing the game, you're giving impressions from your sparse playing time. Call a bird a bird and a pig a pig, please.

I wrote to Corvus (who has written some nice stuff in the past) about this and he said he couldn't stand to play any more. I don't have a problem with that (I disagree with his assessment but his opinion is his to have) but I said it should be a "first impressions" article, an editorial -- whatever, but *not* a review.
 
Joined
Aug 30, 2006
Messages
11,842
Location
Sydney, Australia
I wrote to Corvus (who has written some nice stuff in the past) about this and he said he couldn't stand to play any more. I don't have a problem with that (I disagree with his assessment but his opinion is his to have) but I said it should be a "first impressions" article, an editorial -- whatever, but *not* a review.

I know. I actually went to the Escapist to discuss this, here. As I said there:

I'm sorry but huh?

If I read a book review, I assume the reviewer read the entire thing. If I read a movie review, I assume the reviewer watched the entire thing. And if something is called a game "review", I should damned well be able to assume someone played the entire thing.

Aren't you people getting paid for this? I'd say an integral part of being able to call yourself a game journalist (I usually don't, as the term has too many negative connotations) is that you have more expertise on the subject and, perhaps more importantly, spend more time on games than the average person?

Let me put it this way, if someone plays the Witcher for ten hours, goes onto a forum and posts "this game are the suck", I'd probably fault his usage of the English language, but other than that I'd shrug and go "at least he gave it a try." But he's not a professional, it's not his job to review games. The moment you make that your job, the moment you claim journalistic professionalism, you are held up to higher standards.

Because when push comes to shove, that's what this is about. A journalist's standards. If you do not play the entire game, don't come running to your users with something you claim to be a "review". You haven't played the entire game, then how can you review the entire game? That's patent nonsense. This article is an opinion piece, or an impressions piece, it is not a review.

The Escapist takes its sweet time, being one of the last to review this game, and then brings us a bunch of impressions based on an incomplete playthrough...and you're actually surprised people don't like it? It's an insult both to the professionals who did invest a lot of time before coming to their conclusions and it is deceitful to the readers to call it a review when it really isn't.

But at least Corvus opens by providing some context, that's good.

The fact that you're trying to defend it as such reflects really badly on the standards of the Escapist, you know.

I'm not really blaming Corvus, this is just bad editorial work. Especially when you consider what he mentioned on the Codex:
Well, here's more fuel for the fire. After considerable run-around in getting a copy of the game to run successfully on my machine (auth code mixups on the promotion company's end), my preview code expired. Atari graciously forwarded me a full copy to review. I wanted to get something to the Escapist in a timely fashion and completed the article within a week.

This was back when the game was just released. If I'd known it wasn't going to press right away, I would have taken more time with the game.

Anyway, the patch wasn't out then. So no, I didn't run it with the patch.

Seriously, that's just real bad.
 
Joined
Oct 19, 2006
Messages
1,558
How come everyone at his site who disagrees with his review is banned?
 
Joined
Oct 18, 2006
Messages
7,834
How come everyone at his site who disagrees with his review is banned?

Because disagreeing is trolling :rolleyes: (note, not "his", though. The writer of the review is a guest writer, he doesn't run the forum in any way)

Apparently, even though I'm not sure as I forgot, Russ Pitts banned me last time too, when I criticised his Fallout 3 preview (which you might remember for being filled with factual mistakes or, as VDweller put it, "[a]s a marketing piece the article is brilliant")

I dunno, maybe I thought too highly of the Escapist when I noted I think of them as a top-tier gaming site in one of their threads recently. Nevermind their forum policies, their editorial standards are really bad, and they're not good at taking criticism.
 
Last edited:
Joined
Oct 19, 2006
Messages
1,558
I'm not banned there yet. Perhaps I have been too civil.
 
Joined
Oct 18, 2006
Messages
589
'tis aint the Codex, bro. BTW, they're doing some deletin' back there in the Escapist thread: noticed the replies count increased to 53, but went back to 52 when I checked.
Well, maybe someone got scared of his own post, who knows. Or maybe it was some hideous profanity (=more criticism).
 
Joined
Oct 18, 2006
Messages
589
Yes, some posts have been deleted, including Matt7895's post which quoted Corvus' invitation to criticise and then said "if you want feedback, why are you banning everyone?"

And my post above was a self-deprecating joke, Elwro :p
 
Joined
Oct 19, 2006
Messages
1,558
I just noticed one of the associate editors has Stalin as his avatar. How very fitting!!
 
Joined
Nov 11, 2006
Messages
257
Gee, I wish they'd pay Dhruin, Mike and me to write reviews; we buy the games ourselves, usually too!! :) Ah well, at least volunteer sites like this are still well respected!!
 
Joined
Aug 31, 2006
Messages
12,805
Location
Australia
Gee, I wish they'd pay Dhruin, Mike and me to write reviews; we buy the games ourselves, usually too!! :) Ah well, at least volunteer sites like this are still well respected!!

No problem. Just ask Myrthos to implement some standard banner code. Then we put 3 banners on the main page and add a nice little annoying pop-under. :p
 
Joined
Aug 30, 2006
Messages
7,830
Too complicated. Sell the site to a gaming news network and let them write your code.
 
Joined
Oct 19, 2006
Messages
321
Why not sell the site to M$ instead, they have more money!! :biggrin:
 
Joined
Aug 31, 2006
Messages
12,805
Location
Australia
Too complicated. Sell the site to a gaming news network and let them write your code.

Not progressive enough. This method is so 2004.
 
Joined
Aug 30, 2006
Messages
7,830
Back
Top Bottom