There are 32 ‘critic’ reviews on Metacritic for Call of Duty on the PlayStation Vita, with an average score of 32%. That’s 32 out of 100, with an almost unilateral panning across the board from game reviewers. The highest is a 56% from a site called Digital Chumps, the lowest a 10% from PlayStation LifeStyle. It’s not, according to those that like to pronounce such things, a good game.
And yet, it seems like the buying public literally don’t care. The photograph above, taken this morning, shows the game, which is a staggering £45, is the best selling game on the PSN. I don’t know the criteria for this in terms of timespan and I’m assuming it’s legit, but that’s a remarkable state of affairs whichever way you look at it.
It’s not just sales, either – that’s a 4/5 rating from those that have bought it, from over 500 ratings. If it was terrible, that star score would reflect that, right?
- “Black Ops: Declassified is an insult to pretty much everybody and everything in the videogame industry” says Destructoid.
- “A disjointed mess of meaningless missions” says Giant Bomb.
- “Awful” says Edge.
- “Declassified is such a laughable attempt at capturing the Call of Duty formula that it borders on self-parody” says EGM.
Well, it looks like the public either don’t care what the reviewers say and buy it anyway, with the slightly ignorant (and probably nonsense) notion on-board that if you’ve bought a game for £45 you’re likely to perceive it to have a somewhat higher set of qualities, or – you know – it’s not actually as bad as everyone’s saying.
Now, I’ve not played the game – and that puts me in something of a neutral position. I’m also not exactly the world’s biggest FPS fan, but from what I’ve seen anecdotally, the game’s hardly top tier but it’s not 10% bad either. That’s just from opinions of gamers I’ve seen around the web, of course, but that’s the thing – why is there so much diversion between those that write about the games and those that play them with this game in particular?
[drop]With all the discussion about ethics in the industry (such as its somewhat laughable state is these days) it’s perhaps worth noting that I’m not suggesting any agendas here from anyone involved, and it’s clear that this is an Activision game with one hell of a brand behind it, but the difference here is nothing short of staggering.For reference, Amazon has the game at number two in their top selling charts at the time of writing, and it’s £37 there. That’s still (in my opinion) far too much money for a mobile game, especially given the rumoured development budget, but at least it’s cheaper than on PSN.
It also charted at number 16 in the all-formats chart this week in the UK, second only to Uncharted: Golden Abyss in terms of Vita exclusive.
We’ve been called out on reviews in the past – comments have suggested we’ve scored too highly or too low – and that’s fine (reviews are, after all, just one opinion, objectively as possible), but with Call of Duty: Declassified it seems like it’s just one of those games with such a powerful license that it transcends anything anyone else has said about it, regardless of the size of their readership or industry clout. That says more than you might think.
It’s almost a common internet meme now that the Vita has no games, but right now that’s simply not the case. Sure, it’s currently missing that AAA system seller (hi, Monster Hunter) and sales are on a downward slope in the east, but I’ve still got plenty to play so I’m not totally sure where that comes from, and this week’s introduction of Plus is hugely exciting.
Is this a indicator that the power of reviews and reviewers is waning? Probably not, there’s still a massive emphasis on the likes of Gamespot and IGN’s scores when a game rolls around, but in this case perhaps it’s more that such a big game can move beyond the low scores and still perform admirably at retail.
Nihilistic might have re-branded and opted out of this one, but it seems like they might just have gotten away with it.
pantherjag
Alex c
For the record I thought your review for unit 13 was very good, you understood that it was a game designed to cater for a handheld and reviewed it accordingly
A review of declassfied needs to be approach with the same mindset.
avengerrr
Indeed.
I don’t quite know why people think that it ‘needs’ to be a console game. Its a portable for crying out loud. Even NFS which is the exact same game shouldn’t be reviewed along with consoles as it is generally for people going to work, out and about and so forth.
I don’t know whether TSA know it, but they have touched upon quite a deep topic lol. I’ve seen this kind of stuff on YouTube comments, not discussions, but bitch fights. Luckily TSA is civilized and we don’t get cock fights. yay.
Alex C
Trouble is with the Vita is that it’s marketed as a console experience on the go. And those are console prices.
I’m happy to give a 69p iPhone game some slack, or even an £8 PSN game, but IMO if a game’s £45 it should be reviewed alongside other £45 games. That includes console games.
Why make concessions when the publisher isn’t doing the same for the retail price?
skibadee
I really like it as well.
Peter Chapman
If nothing else, this game has stirred up a lot of discussion and that’s always nice to see.
(especially on TSA, where it’s sensible)
The Lone Steven
And usually includes a high number of biscuit jokes. Plus i thought you had outlawed sensible people when you took over the site? :op
bunimomike
It’s the biscuit jokes Peter should outlaw. :)
The Lone Steven
We should also outlaw you but for a number of different reasons. Some are too horrifying to mention.
An-dz
I have been told you can finish the entire game in under an hour. Which is pretty bad for £45 i guess
aerobes
And this is why I don’t pay any attention to reviews. Not here, not anywhere.
colmshan1990
Reviews are great for any game I’m unsure of or just want to know more about.
They usually throw up aspects of the game that the pre-release trailers or press-releases never mentioned or revealed, both good & bad.
The score is good for quick comparisons, but only in similar games reviewed by the same person. Of course, an outlier score of say a 10 or a 1 can tell you a lot about the overall quality of the game, but never enough.
But that’s why there’s an actual review with the score. A measured opinion put down on the paper, actually explaining the game, mentioning a few good points, a few bad points, and generally the best piece of information you’re likely to receive on whether a game is worth your hard-earned money or not without playing the thing. If I’m unsure of a game I generally read a few from a number of sites I pull from metacritic (at least one high score, a middling score and a low score) and see if the same issues are common to each review.
As for reviewers and your reviews: I appreciate them, I respect them, and I enjoy reading them. Thank you guys for doing them.
I even enjoy complaining about them if I feel differently about a point raised in it, but that’s just a clash of opinions, and I hope I don’t come off as too much of a pain when I do (I really don’t mean to). I especially enjoy a site like this one where I could ask a question about a point raised in the review, or something which wasn’t, and get an answer.
Thanks for doing it. And playing the crap, broken games so I don’t have to.
I’m still jealous of you guys getting review code for the good games early though.
Germanos
Well I don’t seem to have problems with reviews. Watch a lot of them: If all are describing a game as crap then it’s crap. If everyone is amazed by a game, then it’s good. If the scores are half bad / half good, just follow yourself. Works each time.
Of course there’s also one more solution: read the ones on TSA :)
CdmanJak
Every game should have a demo so you can form an opinion on your own the review system always forgets that its all subjective and people have different taste a number out of 10 does not define anything
Krisaim
We didn’t review this high to be different. In fact, when we reviewed this only two other reviews were live. We play for fun and we stick by our scores but we are backed up by 100’s of gamers that are playing and feeling the same as us. To give this game 2, 3 and 4s is an insult to the critic imo not the game. I have played some bad games but to score this under games like Barbie Horse riding is just stupid. Something has upset reviewers and I don’t think it’s the game so much. ;)
Here’s our review and “A week on” update.
Our Review.
A week on……
Grantman
I’m a vita owner and base my decision to buy games for any platform on research because I hate wasting my money on rubbish. I view numerous critic reviews and evaluate them. If they are positive and it’s my sort of game I will buy, if not I certainly won’t. I was hoping for an awesome COD vita game, but clearly the game is a spectacular failure. I won’t be touching it with a 12 foot barge poll. As far as the positive PSN ratings go (currently over 4 out of 5 stars), I recognize them for what they are, people justifying their stupidity to buy the game, people enamored with a “COD Vita wow!” attitude, fanboism etc, resulting in premature and certainly obstinate ratings. I have noticed PSN user ratings skewed to the positive regardless of critic reviews (Resistance for eg.), therefore I have learnt to take zero notice of them. They are a joke.
You can bet your boots the negative criticisms of Blops has a tremendous affect. Imagine the atmosphere created by an awesome COD vita game that left everyone buzzing. It would be boom time for vita and everyone would be feeling warm and fuzzy about the vita and blabbing about the game. Missing out on this effect is huge. All you have now are residual sales of a brand name, the creation of resentment and distrust, and a bad taste in everybody’s mouths (at least those with a half decent taste in games).
So contrary to what the title says, game reviews are exceptionally relevant except to those that have poor taste in games or are unconcerned about wasting their money. And, as I learnt a while back, PSN user ratings are a joke.