I saw this article from an mmorpg site I frequently visit: http://www.mmorpg.com/discussion2.cfm/thread/334338/I-Have-a-Weird-Feeling-Someones-Paying-Gamasutra-to-Bash-Skyrim.html

It says:

I don't know if the claim is true, but I have read recent articles from the site and it seems the case. I haven't read all the articles, though.

So for someone to criticize the game they must be getting paid for it? Check please.

I'm more than happy to get paid to bash Skyrim as well...

Why does this matter to us that much? Let them, glad you featured it though, always worth a read. But I am not letting someone else dictate my game experience, which I already have experienced for myself.

I don't know that site, but if I need help deciding whether I should buy a game or not I check mulitple sources. You never know who has what agenda. "Professional" gaming reviews are silly to me though. I take them as seriously as BleacherReport articles for sports.

No you didn't understand the article. She said that they don't look like they are criticizing the game. It's as if they're bashing the game with every article, to the point it becomes unbelievable.

I do understand the article, I just believe it's defending the game to the point where it becomes unbelievable.

Well, yeah, maybe. I still haven't read the other articles though, so I wouldn't be able to say if what she's saying is probable or not.

As far as I know there are much more reviewers get paid praising the game.

That thing is called "advertisemant" and game websites depend on it to survive.

Well, I generally do not trust game sites that much. And I don't trust gaming journalists at all because they are paid organ monkeys repeating mantras again and again. Just like for Skyrim which 90% of game sites treat like this is the MOTHER of all games. Ridiculous and exaggerated as well. And seriously, I personally have not seen ONE better known gaming site writing something even nearly negative about this game.

Its Gamasutra's credibility that is taking the hit here not Skyrim. If they think this game is no good then they obviously have no idea about games and henceforth this null and voids ANY opinion they might have on ANY game.

Won't bother with them myself.

My second post applies retroactively to this statement. I don't care about Gamasutra (never heard of it until now) but the implications of what you are saying are mindbogglingly nonsensical.

What the hell is gamasutra? Sounds like some third rate garbage no one cares about.

Sounds like what you'd call Toho Monster porm.

Skyrim's become big even in the realm of MMORPGs, and gamasutra is something like a source of gaming news for mmorpg players (if i understand it correctly).

Well...

Reading the articles, they are gamers telling about their experience.

...
Experience is subjective, and while the game is awesome, and the first game I've spent 100 hours playing since Neverwinter Nights (Well, Baldur's Gate 3 never came out, so I needed placebo), praise can be summed up in a few sentences, because it's based of a state of mind, a symbiosis of multiple positive experiences that completely elude our conciousness.

...
We may go "wow, that was an awesome view" -- or DAMN that was a fun fight.

Then try tell anyone WHAT was so awesome.

...
...
It is nearly impossible.

BUT encounter a problem, and you will know exactly how to express it. And you will, because problems breaks the awesomeness.

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The game gets 95% out of 100 from me once it is fully patched and skills have been slightly rebalanced, 90% as it currently is.

PEOPLE SOMETIMES FIGHT OVER VALUABLE ITEMS IF YOU DROP THEM!
SALMON SWIM UPSTREAM AND JUMP WATERFALLS!!!

Some people RETURN items you have dropped!

Someone actually made the Eye of Magnus in 3d-modeling and made the unwind-animation for it!

The ingame books..!
...

Sometimes I wonder how the heck they managed to do all this in 5 years, when Diablo III looks like World of Warcraft with more black, or Diablo II with more pastelles and more 3-d objects.
WHEN the world is fully rendered.

Giants fighting dragons?

Hunters killing deer and wolves?

Nightingales quest twist?
Nightingales shadow-room?

The freaking dwarven machines?

Arrows deflect off hard metal enemies and sometimes off heavy armor?

The awesomeness far outweighs the annoying parts by far.


But the annoying parts ARE annoying.

Destruction scaling.
Level scaling; How bandits improve... instead of simply spawning as a more powerful creature.
Dragon infests the lands.
Replace bandits with lesser dragons or some sort of dragonkin who invades the world.

...
That is probably THE problem with these games:
There is no invading evil that can fill up the caves, more powerful the longer you wait, that can be defended by the storyline.

Review sites that consistently praise a game are consistently accused of being bought off. Now the review sites that consistently criticize a game are also being accused of being bought off? This whole "must have been paid to have your opinion" bandwagon is ridiculous.

Reviews are opinion pieces. Written by people. People that have opinions. Human people. Some love, some hate, some stay indifferent. I encourage everyone to agree with whatever review they most agree with, and to move on from the others. Better yet, post something constructive that addresses the article's merits.

Writing any review, weither it makes it looks good or bad if it brings in alot of traffic makes them money, so if it works, they'll keep doing it.
Since advertisemant usually plays a big part in their income; Lots of Traffic = Lots of Money.

So if what they are saying about a popular game and hot topic right now works for them to play the controversy card and grabs them loads of traffic they are doing their job, which earns them money.
Yes they could be said to over critiquing but let them, it's their opinion, not a fact you have to accept as the only truth.

I'd rather suspect the opposite. All those "game of the year" reviews seem to be quite blind and deaf to Skyrim's MANY weaknesses.

So you remain "uncommitted" over the bizarre idea that some unnamed eeeevil power is paying a website to say two or three times that they didn't like a game you really, really enjoy?

Funny, I heard you, imanoobsowhat27, were paid by a major game developer to plant threads attacking any website that criticized Skyrim. Of course, I don't know if the claim is true.

And before you get riled up, reflect upon how this feels, how unfair it is, and how your own re-posting of that silly smear on Gamesutra must feel to its editors, who are being attacked without a shred of evidence. (Disclaimer: don't know anyone at Gamesutra, never really liked their style of writing. But come on!)

Gamasutra is probably the industry's biggest e-zine. It's reviews carry a lot of weight. It's not "gaming news for mmorpg players". Industry professionals read it.

Edit: Incidentally, that's probably why the review focuses more on the flaws. It's aimed somewhat toward developers.

I clicked on this because I thought it was about six.

It is much easier to believe that gaming sites are "paid off" for the positive reviews than the negatives.

First off, who benefits from having a game slandered? Of course competing games to some degree, but wouldn't that money be better spent promoting your own game? If you drive people away from one game there are a multitude of games they could go to, but what you want is to draw them specifically to your game.

The biggest danger to legitimate game reviews is game reviews sites that sell advertising space to the games they promote. They can quickly set the status-quo, silently and without an outright agreement that purchasing a big advertisemant package = good/better reviews. If you don't think it is happening you are on crack. I find Gamespot to be one of the biggest offenders.

I've seen a few huge advertising campaigns run days before a release and then suddenly here comes the "review"... 9.0!!! WOW!!! Turns out, game is not so good...

Ah Review sites, AKA bias and predujuce. If you want to know what the Game is like, play yourself. Nowadays reviews aren't helpful and are always 1 sided. Just like a game scoring system, never needed to exist either, but gullible people fall for it, Derp this game has a low score it must be bad. Sure it might be to the reviewer but other people may enjoy it. TL;DR Try before you buy.

Seing as how skyrim hs many flaws I would agree. Also the argument is weak when you include the CK, thats not for 2/3 of the community, its not the developers work either. Its the modders. I dont thank the tool manufacterer when a plumber fixes a problem. Bethesda just exploits its community, you see it in skyrim "wd can make it buggy and have rushed unfinished quests, we still get praise for mods people make, and they can fixour bugs".