This New Wave of Journalist Exclusive Game Launch Experiences

mathello

mathello

Member
Did anyone else notice that the game Animal Well, and Blue Prince, are two indie games that have a meta critic of 90, and 95 ? There is probably much more examples of this, but these are games that "Journalists" had a month long or so: NDA with these puzzle games on a discord being the only place to discuss with the Devs and others with the game. It becomes a group of people themselves to be the firsts to collectively tackle the games.

These over rated style of Meta Critic Scores on games coming not from analysis of the game but the online party and "Friends we made along the way" event of discovery throughout playing the game.

Normal folks do not get to have a private group for every new game where people do their parts in progressing through something undiscovered or new. Figuring out and sharing metas. Yes I am sure Blue Prince is a great game, but for me to expect to be able to enjoy it like the people who scored it a 10, is just unrealistic. No one has those type of gaming friends groups as adults with careers. Blue Prince looks to have been big get together of journalist due to its nature.
In the 90's they would have had to figure out the whole game on their own, like the real journalists of EGM.
 
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mathello said:
Normal folks do not get to have a private group for every new game where people do their parts in progressing through something undiscovered or new.
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Playing day 1 and talking in an OT is very much like this. Can be fun, just know that you're going through the worst version of the game and once you're done with it and it's been patched up you might not be interested in going through it again.
 
mathello said:
Did anyone else notice that the game Animal Well, and Blue Prince, are two indie games that have a meta critic of 90, and 95 ? There is probably much more examples of this, but these are games that "Journalists" had a month long or so: NDA with these puzzle games on a discord being the only place to discuss with the Devs and others with the game. It becomes a group of people themselves to be the firsts to collectively tackle the games.

These over rated style of Meta Critic Scores on games coming not from analysis of the game but the online party and "Friends we made along the way" event of discovery throughout playing the game.

Normal folks do not get to have a private group for every new game where people do their parts in progressing through something undiscovered or new. Figuring out and sharing metas. Yes I am sure Blue Prince is a great game, but for me to expect to be able to enjoy it like the people who scored it a 10, is just unrealistic. No one has those type of gaming friends groups as adults with careers. Blue Prince looks to have been big get together of journalist due to its nature.
In the 90's they would have had to figure out the whole game on their own, like the real journalists of EGM.
Click to expand...
So you don't like indie games, wow what a new take 🙄
 
OP makes a valid point on the skewed perspective of game reviewers.

In the early 2000s journalists received crazy press kits, like the review copy of Dead Space was on a severed finger usb drive. Super sick idea, love it. Can't find a single image of it though and all the websites reporting on it are 404 now, and wayback machine has no snapshots.

Or when they sent IGN a Batarang with review copies of Arkham Origins:
H5UAEh.jpg


If I had received a batarang with my copy of Arkham Origins, I might have rated the game higher also. There's a clear Halo effect at work, where the positive impression of the press kit goodies positively influence your opinion on the game overall. OP uses fun Discord banter instead of plastic goodies to argue it has the same influence.

Not sure if I'd use Animal Well or Blue Prince as best examples though, but it's a fascinating topic. Great thread.
 
mathello said:
Normal folks do not get to have a private group for every new game where people do their parts in progressing through something undiscovered or new. Figuring out and sharing metas. Yes I am sure Blue Prince is a great game, but for me to expect to be able to enjoy it like the people who scored it a 10, is just unrealistic. No one has those type of gaming friends groups as adults with careers.
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So would the personal fix for you involve this game getting a larger, more dedicated online collective guide (fextralife-style) like with Elden Ring?
 
mathello said:
I'm Just trying to say the 95 of Blue Prince is created in Vacuum. And it's unrealistic to expect the game to play as great as how these journalist had it.
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Many of these journos/reviewers hardly do a thorough analysis nowadays. They just want to get through a game as quick as possible, preferably in hours, and be done with it- regardless of whatever quality the game has. They don't get into deep analysis and nitty gritty details of what the gameplay have to offer. Especially, the more intricate, complex and skill-based ones.
 
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At the end of the day, Animal well stands out on it's own no matter what experience you have with it because it's just that great.

I'm still deciding how I feel about blue prince, I'm only on like day 11 but I am finding it rather disappointing overall, not really the puzzle game i was hoping it would be and what overall puzzles there are seem to be overly obtuse or reliant on RNG mechanics (yes i know there are ways to store a single item or circumvent some of the RNG nature), I am just not gelling with it at all and this is someone who lives and breathes puzzle games.

I'm hoping that being the rogue-lite it is, I'm gonna get to a point where it's "god mode", and everything falls into place.

In regards to the OP, having played the games I kind of see their point where Blue Prince seems like it's more enjoyable as a community discussion, but I'd then counter that with Animal Well being able to stand up entirely on it's own and community discussion for that game is really only relegated to the post game content and extremely out of left field solutions which are completely optional.

So basically, one shoe doesn't fit all.
 
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Blue prince is a great game. Not a 9.5 good, and yes, we inevitably won't get the same experience of as a community unlocking its puzzles. They were already solved and just a google away. It's like that blue box thing, which tho it turned out to be nonsense was extremely memorable and engaging seeing the community work together theorising and working stuff out, for those where blue prince (already a great game) also had that component it would 100% elevate for that select group, so I kinda get where they are coming from.
 
I think an apt comparison the OP could make would be the release of Destiny Raids.

The raid unlocking for everyone at the exact same time almost promotes community discussions. Some of those raids and finding the solutions were the best part of that game.

Especially in D1, where there was no LFG/Matchmaking or anything along those lines, you'd just add a random from the tower to your squad, and his team realised that if you do X, then that solves part 1 of the encounter.

I still remember the first VoG and Crota raids; they were so much fun around release.
 
StueyDuck said:
I think an apt comparison the OP could make would be the release of Destiny Raids.

The raid unlocking for everyone at the exact same time almost promotes community discussions. Some of those raids and finding the solutions were the best part of that game.

Especially in D1, where there was no LFG/Matchmaking or anything along those lines, you'd just add a random from the tower to your squad, and his team realised that if you do X, then that solves part 1 of the encounter.

I still remember the first VoG and Crota raids; they were so much fun around release.
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For sure. The zeitgeist of figuring out a new game (or raid) is always the most exciting time to play. It adds an intangible excitement and sense of community on top of the actual gameplay.

The best part about, say, Elden Ring, was playing through it in the first couple of weeks as everyone was trying to uncover the little secrets together. And good luck finding the Dark Souls 1 DLC entrance on your own.

The first really good example of this that I can think of happening in the internet era was Fez, but it goes all the way back to the schoolyard, swapping rumors about Tomb Raider nude codes or Mortal Kombat playable Goro on Genesis, and I'm sure further back before my time as well.

It's a double edged sword though. While it's can be a cool experience, especially when a game is new, I'd prefer if everything in a puzzle game was solvable by a relatively clever determined individual. Needing a dual doctorate in linguistics and applied mathematics, to platinum a game solo, is a bit too far.
 
Grizzled Ghost said:
It's a double edged sword though. While it's can be a cool experience, especially when a game is new, I'd prefer if everything in a puzzle game was solvable by a relatively clever determined individual. Needing a dual doctorate in linguistics and applied mathematics, to platinum a game solo, is a bit too far.
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This is kind of where I'm landing on Blue Prince at the moment.

Again, I really have only scratched the surface of the game; my time with it has been short. But I'm getting a strong sense that its going to be more the type of puzzle-solving you have mentioned here than that of Animal Well, which to me is just an amazing game when it comes to the player experience. Animal Well does an amazing job at making you feel like you came up with some clever solution, where really that was the idea all along.

My opinion on Blue Prince could change. It being a rogue-lite and having already unlocked some additions like the apple orchard and west path, I can see there being a situation where by day 20 or whatever, it's just puzzles galore that are naturally solvable through deduction or lateral thinking and exactly what I want.
 
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Press kits and junkets are nothing new. I have the Arkham batarang and it didn't make me like the game any better. I had a great time at launch events and drank publisher's booze.

Yes, the whole point is to butter up the press, but you don't have to play along. I still wrote unfavorable reviews.
 
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