The Shrine

IGN gave it 10s across the board

http://wii.ign.com/articles/109/1091239p1.html

May eventually challenge the original in top overall score of all time. Currently at 96.5 or so, a full point behind it.

http://www.gamerankings.com/wii/960551- ... index.html

Sine, we know you don't care. But for the rest of us that do, I hope to hell these guys aren't just jumpin' on the hype train and it really is that much better than the original. That one blew me away, I'd love it if this one did as well. Man, I gotta beat Alan Wake and quick....

Gametrailers gave it a 9.7 Overall, and a 10 in Gameplay

http://www.gametrailers.com/video/revie ... rio/100404

5/5 stars at giant bomb

This is characteristic of every single Mario and Zelda game. Doesn't matter if the game good or not. Even games like Mario Sunshine. Luigi's Manson got more favorable results than it deserves. If the CD-i Zelda games came out today, critics would be giving them 4-5 stars, glowing reviews, etc.

The fact of the matter is that you can't get a good review of a Mario or Zelda game that doesn't feature the reviewer have freaking orgasm over the game.

Not exactly. Luigi's Mansion wasn't very well reviewed, averaging a 79%

http://www.gamerankings.com/gamecube/51 ... index.html

Mario Sunshine was very well reviewed, averaging a 91%. That may be a little on the high side but not astronomically so. It also means a large chunk of reviews were in the 80s. It was a far better game than it initially appeared and it used the waterhose very, very well later on. I would have given it an 85% or so, personally. But it certainly was not the groundbreaking game 64 or Galaxy were

http://www.gamerankings.com/gamecube/53 ... index.html

When you start averaging 95%+, it's another level of general acceptance than high 80s, low 90s. Looks at the all-time list:

http://www.gamerankings.com/browse.html

Generally, those are excellent games, although in the top 20, I wouldn't have put MGS for GBC or Uncharted 2 that high myself.

That's why I put a little more stock in this, the equivalent of Rotten Tomatoes for games. If you start getting surprisingly high reviews across the board with 50+ people, it's different than just reading one reviewer. That's the reason I caved on Bioshock. I didn't really want "yet another" FPS, particularly back then. But it averaged a 94% and I read a couple of reviews where they talked about how different it was, almost like a survival horror FPS, so I got it. And it was the best game that year. Same with Alan Wake. I really wasn't that interested initially but all of a sudden it ended up with 84% on Gamerankings. That's pretty damned good for a survival horror-type game. Reading a few reviews it seems like the general shortcomings of the game were just the standard survival horror ones (combat not too hot, a little "too much of the same") but the strengths were exactly what I look for in survival horror games. Two eps in the can and I can tell you, it's a phenomenal addition to the genre.

Yeah, but you're comparing non IP with Mario/Zelda IP. Generally speaking, the Mario/Zelda IP gets rated higher than the non-IP of the same quality. There's a "ZOMG!1!! It's Mario!" factor with these reviews. Twilight Princess was boring. Young Link and the Sea wasn't bad, but ultimately boring. SMG was boring.

If it was any average game, they would be bitching about how the gameplay hasn't changed much from the original. It's like how Megaman ends up with top-notch scores for something as stupid as MM 9/10. Seriously, does that mean games like Bioshock and Braid are just as good as Megaman 10? According to the reviewers, it does, but that's far from reality.

It's sort of like how you read Famitsu would always rate a Final Fantasy game as 36 or higher because otherwise someone would burn down their headquarters. Nintendo is never going to get an unfavorable review on its flagship games unless they totally screwed it up and they very rarely screw up on the major games because the major Mario/Link games are just 3D platformers that's their bread & butter.

So what does means is that a difference between say, 9.7 and 10.0 is actually very significant for a Mario or Link game.

SineSwiper wrote:Yeah, but you're comparing non IP with Mario/Zelda IP. Generally speaking, the Mario/Zelda IP gets rated higher than the non-IP of the same quality. There's a "ZOMG!1!! It's Mario!" factor with these reviews. Twilight Princess was boring. Young Link and the Sea wasn't bad, but ultimately boring. SMG was boring.

If it was any average game, they would be bitching about how the gameplay hasn't changed much from the original. It's like how Megaman ends up with top-notch scores for something as stupid as MM 9/10. Seriously, does that mean games like Bioshock and Braid are just as good as Megaman 10? According to the reviewers, it does, but that's far from reality.

Again, this is why you look at a breadth of reviews and filter it according to trends, expectations, etc., and adjust the score accordingly. We all know FF games get rated insanely high all the time by the vast majority of the reviewers yet there's only been one good one in the last 10 years. So I don't put too much stock in FF reviews. Halo games? Always insanely high. ODST got an average of 85% which, to me, would indicate it's an average FPS at best. Any other FPS and it likely would get about 75% average (and 75% is an average game nowadays). And after playing it (and beating it) I can definitely say it was a 7.5 and certainly not an 8.5.

So when it comes to Zelda, I don't actually look at reviews. NO reason too. I've played basically every game in the series, I'm getting it regardless. Unless the reviews are extreme (ie. 70% or 95% avg) they mean nothing to me. Same with Mario games. But when it comes to newer games, it's a bit different. With Red Dead Redemption, I could have told you from the beginning it was going to get 90s+. It's Rockstar, the vast majority of reviewers jerk off to everything they do. Fucking Table Tennis got 82% average for cryin' out loud. But at the end of the day, I'm not overly interested in that kind of game so even though it's gotten 96%+, I still don't care.

And all reviews are to be taken in context as well. MM9 or MM10 you're reviewing it as a NES-level game, not a next-gen game. You're not expecting as much out of it 'cause you know it's not being made like that. So is it as "good"? Well, that's a matter of opinion. But it certainly does not have nearly the length, depth of gameplay, graphical prowess, etc., of Bioshock or even Braid. But it's also not meant to so you can't punish it simply because it's not like another game. You can't punish EDF because it doesn't have the depth of gameplay of Bioshock. It was a $20 game designed to be a fun shoot-em-up run through, not a deep narrative, innovative FPS/survival horror. The fact that it had the sheer volume of weapons which had enough variety to make it a bit of a action-puzzler as well as a drop-collection game (a la Diablo) wasn't innovative or particularly "deep" but it was more than expected and required, so it became a positive.

And Sine, stop putting in your constant jabs at anything Nintendo releases or the majority of Wii releases throughout your post. We know you hate everything they've done since the SNES days, you don't need to reiterate it ten-fold every single post.