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Avowed review — fantastic fantasy RPG is a big win for Xbox exclusives

Canezza304,175

Posted yesterday at 17:27
Lord Kanaletto said:
I find it funny that a site called TrueAchievements does not even mention the achievements in it's review, or the completion, missables, collectibles, etc. other sites even score the achievement list in their review.
We usually do if the list is already live. It's a bit hard to do when you can't see the list and don't know what's on it...
HolyHalfDead829,248

Posted yesterday at 17:31
SeeD Red said:
Boots Orion said:
SeeD Red said:
Do you ever give less than 9 out of 10?
Yes…but to provide a more detailed answer…

They used to review way more games of varying quality. Now, they don’t seem to review as many games and they tend to be only of the AAA variety.
Agreed, but it also really bothers me to find 8.5 and 9 out of 10 ratings on English speaking websites, 6 or 7's on foreign language websites.
I don’t think I have ever seen a 3 or 4, but TA is not alone in this.

6 or lower = game is an unplayable mess
7 = game is bad with some significant flaws
8 = game is average
9 = game is good with only minor issues
10 = game is really good although there is still room for improvement

And as you have found since the whole 1-10 scale is no longer used, 0.5 is added to bring back some granularity.

Although I prefer it to the either 1 or 10 scale used on sites like IMDB.
1 = worst film ever made, until next week
10 = perfect in every way (usually left by a shill)

Nobody is going to give a 1 or 9 or anything in between as they want the maximum effect of dragging the average up or down.
He's not a man. He's the holy Half-Dead who has seen the Underverse and returned with powers you can't imagine.
Lord Kanaletto356,017

Posted yesterday at 17:34
Canezza said:
Lord Kanaletto said:
I find it funny that a site called TrueAchievements does not even mention the achievements in it's review, or the completion, missables, collectibles, etc. other sites even score the achievement list in their review.
We usually do if the list is already live. It's a bit hard to do when you can't see the list and don't know what's on it...
Forgive me, I left my crystal ball at home. Maybe a footnote about the achievement list not live would be nice, but I don't get to say how to do your job. Sarcasm aside, so you plan to update it once it is live?
Imperfection and impurity still infects this galaxy. My crusade was left incomplete... and now I will complete it.
Canezza304,175

Posted yesterday at 17:35
HolyHalfDead said:
SeeD Red said:
Boots Orion said:
SeeD Red said:
Do you ever give less than 9 out of 10?
Yes…but to provide a more detailed answer…

They used to review way more games of varying quality. Now, they don’t seem to review as many games and they tend to be only of the AAA variety.
Agreed, but it also really bothers me to find 8.5 and 9 out of 10 ratings on English speaking websites, 6 or 7's on foreign language websites.
I don’t think I have ever seen a 3 or 4, but TA is not alone in this.

6 or lower = game is an unplayable mess
7 = game is bad with some significant flaws
8 = game is average
9 = game is good with only minor issues
10 = game is really good although there is still room for improvement

And as you have found since the whole 1-10 scale is no longer used, 0.5 is added to bring back some granularity.

Although I prefer it to the either 1 or 10 scale used on sites like IMDB.
1 = worst film ever made, until next week
10 = perfect in every way (usually left by a shill)

Nobody is going to give a 1 or 9 or anything in between as they want the maximum effect of dragging the average up or down.
I gave CoD: Modern Warfare III a 5/10 in our site review If peeps are interested, here is our review scale:

10 — A genre-defining release. A 10/10 score does not suggest perfection, rather a title that is the pinnacle of what gaming can offer.
9 — An amazing experience, with maybe just a few minor foibles keeping it from the top of the pile.
8 — A great game, if perhaps one with some issues or more limited appeal when compared to those that score higher.
7 — Enjoyable and entertaining — a solid effort and one likely to find favour with fans of the genre.
6 — Shows promise in some aspects, but either unambitious or held back from greatness by glaring issues.
5 — An average or mediocre game that excels in no area and does nothing to advance the genre or medium.
4 — A sub-par offering or one marred by unignorable problems, although genre fans may still tolerate it.
3 — A legitimately bad game with only a few saving graces.
2 — Truly woeful and practically impossible to recommend to anybody.
1 — Genuinely unplayable, and not in a temporary way.

From: Our official site review scores are changing (a bit)
Stefi4ReaL381,327

Posted yesterday at 17:52
Great review i will definitely be playing this game 😁
On oled its looking incredible
Paper21940,742

Posted yesterday at 18:06
Exclusive? Who are you fooling at this point?
- J
Reelbiggerfish2,132,133

Posted yesterday at 18:31
May not play it day one but will definitely be diving in at some point!
"I'm fine. I'm disgusted with my life and my self, but I'm not unhappy about that."
WJS Osiris1,176,632

Posted yesterday at 18:42
SeeD Red said:
Do you ever give less than 9 out of 10?
TA gave Space Marine 2 a 7 out of 10 and that game is the best game ive played that has released in the last few years. Unless you are talking specifically about this author.
nagryn244,951

Posted yesterday at 18:57
Obsidian never fails.
mobilis in mobili
BigDirtyFart39,524

Posted yesterday at 19:02
WJS Osiris said:
SeeD Red said:
Do you ever give less than 9 out of 10?
TA gave Space Marine 2 a 7 out of 10 and that game is the best game ive played that has released in the last few years. Unless you are talking specifically about this author.
Space Marine didn't have an agenda and Twitter activists calling everyone racist online, Obsidian does, so it will be pumped up by access journalism. (I'm ready to be attacked by 15 people now on this site)

Independent journalists said it was okay, not great, and once you get past a certain point its a slog. Lots claiming it is a bug riddled mess, some saying it isn't, etc.

I might try it, since it's on Game Pass and it will be free for me.
Vok 250562,752

Posted yesterday at 19:11
BigDirtyFart said:
WJS Osiris said:
SeeD Red said:
Do you ever give less than 9 out of 10?
TA gave Space Marine 2 a 7 out of 10 and that game is the best game ive played that has released in the last few years. Unless you are talking specifically about this author.
Space Marine didn't have an agenda and Twitter activists calling everyone racist online, Obsidian does, so it will be pumped up by access journalism. (I'm ready to be attacked by 15 people now on this site)

Independent journalists said it was okay, not great, and once you get past a certain point its a slog. Lots claiming it is a bug riddled mess, some saying it isn't, etc.

I might try it, since it's on Game Pass and it will be free for me.
What political agenda does Obsidian have with this game release? First I've ever heard mention of it.

As far as I can tell this is a classic MS blunder where an Xbox Game Studios owned developer makes an absolutely banger game and MS gives it next to 0 marketing compared to utter flops like Redfall which were plastered all over every marketing platform imaginable. Other than this website I have seen literally no coverage of this game. On YouTube everyone is still busy frothing over KCDII (completely warranted frothing mind you).
my bullitt588,523

Posted yesterday at 19:17
I really thought I’d be more excited for this. Maybe once it’s out everywhere and I get to see more of it. Kind of more excited for Outer Worlds 2 though.
FightingMegaFoo879,168

Posted yesterday at 19:29
Yay! Can't wait
BlackEyedMonkey1,747,531

Posted yesterday at 19:47
Vok 250 said:
BlackEyedMonkey said:
Vok 250 said:
SeeD Red said:
Boots Orion said:
SeeD Red said:
Do you ever give less than 9 out of 10?
Yes…but to provide a more detailed answer…

They used to review way more games of varying quality. Now, they don’t seem to review as many games and they tend to be only of the AAA variety.
Agreed, but it also really bothers me to find 8.5 and 9 out of 10 ratings on English speaking websites, 6 or 7's on foreign language websites.
I think it comes down to natural biases. For the past couple of years most of the articles on western sites seem to be sponsored material and a ton of that coming directly from MS/Xbox public relations team. I don't think they are being told to rate a certain way, but that kind of constant influence does breed a certain level of bias into the publishing. If it didn't work then MS/Ubisoft/Sony/Disney/WB/EA wouldn't spend hundreds of millions of dollars a year on it. Western sites also tend to give the reviews to authors who already enjoy that type of game so that naturally leads to higher scores. Every author here is going to passionate about Xbox as a platform and by extension any GamePass game or exclusive. Plus in this cast the author's bio already said she was excited about this game and loves open world RPGs. These days it's more of influencing than reviewing here in the west anyway.
Would it make more sense to you if someone who didn't like these kind of games to review it for you?
That would just be bias in the opposite direction.

Your comment is a great example of how this is a cultural thing here in the west. It's become so normalized that anything else is unthinkable and people jump to the defense of the status quo if you dare to question it. Your use of "make more sense" is hostile language implying I am misunderstanding something. That's not the case. I'm just making an observation and building upon the context of the comment I quoted. The only reason that's upsetting you is because my observation is counter to a cultural norm.

Another point I didn't bring up in my first comment is that the west has become very black-and-white when to comes to media. This is backed up by statistics. People rate things either very highly or very poorly. What should resemble a bell curve is more like the opposite in USA and Canada. It's even worse in public ratings, but reviewers have begun doing it too. IMHO TA is one of the few websites that still has good honest data and doesn't get that kind of kneejerk rating style like rotten tomatoes or Steam. Before they moved to a 0-10 scale the most common rating was 3.5/5. Seemed like every other review was a 3.5 out of 5 game lol. Which was fair in retrospect as that generation of games we overwhelmingly average. I haven't been reading reviews faithfully enough these days to know if it's still mostly 6 and 7 out of 10 games. If TA give a game a 9 or 10 I tend to trust it though. Historically they haven't shied away from giving out lower scored to average games.
I wasn't asking for a thesis on how reviews work around the world. I wasn't trying to be hostile or imply anything. You were jumping around topics so it was hard to follow and made it read like you were giving no merit to the review because of the author's tastes. This is the status quo of becoming defensive to any interaction based on western ideals and blah blah blah. It looks like we agree the review is written in good faith, I'm going to play the game, we're all consumers and someone is trying to sell us something. This is a video game website about achievements. Let's move on with our day.
Vok 250562,752

Posted yesterday at 20:20, Edited yesterday at 20:31 by Vok 250
BlackEyedMonkey said:
Vok 250 said:
BlackEyedMonkey said:
Vok 250 said:
SeeD Red said:
Boots Orion said:
SeeD Red said:
Do you ever give less than 9 out of 10?
Yes…but to provide a more detailed answer…

They used to review way more games of varying quality. Now, they don’t seem to review as many games and they tend to be only of the AAA variety.
Agreed, but it also really bothers me to find 8.5 and 9 out of 10 ratings on English speaking websites, 6 or 7's on foreign language websites.
I think it comes down to natural biases. For the past couple of years most of the articles on western sites seem to be sponsored material and a ton of that coming directly from MS/Xbox public relations team. I don't think they are being told to rate a certain way, but that kind of constant influence does breed a certain level of bias into the publishing. If it didn't work then MS/Ubisoft/Sony/Disney/WB/EA wouldn't spend hundreds of millions of dollars a year on it. Western sites also tend to give the reviews to authors who already enjoy that type of game so that naturally leads to higher scores. Every author here is going to passionate about Xbox as a platform and by extension any GamePass game or exclusive. Plus in this cast the author's bio already said she was excited about this game and loves open world RPGs. These days it's more of influencing than reviewing here in the west anyway.
Would it make more sense to you if someone who didn't like these kind of games to review it for you?
That would just be bias in the opposite direction.

Your comment is a great example of how this is a cultural thing here in the west. It's become so normalized that anything else is unthinkable and people jump to the defense of the status quo if you dare to question it. Your use of "make more sense" is hostile language implying I am misunderstanding something. That's not the case. I'm just making an observation and building upon the context of the comment I quoted. The only reason that's upsetting you is because my observation is counter to a cultural norm.

Another point I didn't bring up in my first comment is that the west has become very black-and-white when to comes to media. This is backed up by statistics. People rate things either very highly or very poorly. What should resemble a bell curve is more like the opposite in USA and Canada. It's even worse in public ratings, but reviewers have begun doing it too. IMHO TA is one of the few websites that still has good honest data and doesn't get that kind of kneejerk rating style like rotten tomatoes or Steam. Before they moved to a 0-10 scale the most common rating was 3.5/5. Seemed like every other review was a 3.5 out of 5 game lol. Which was fair in retrospect as that generation of games we overwhelmingly average. I haven't been reading reviews faithfully enough these days to know if it's still mostly 6 and 7 out of 10 games. If TA give a game a 9 or 10 I tend to trust it though. Historically they haven't shied away from giving out lower scored to average games.
I wasn't asking for a thesis on how reviews work around the world. I wasn't trying to be hostile or imply anything. You were jumping around topics so it was hard to follow and made it read like you were giving no merit to the review because of the author's tastes. This is the status quo of becoming defensive to any interaction based on western ideals and blah blah blah. It looks like we agree the review is written in good faith, I'm going to play the game, we're all consumers and someone is trying to sell us something. This is a video game website about achievements. Let's move on with our day.
You're the one that responded to my comment buddy. If you're going to response with flippant comments, but then not even bother reading responses in good faith then I'm just going to block you man. If you weren't interested in what I was discussing then just don't response at all. Just move along with your day as you say. You're just wasting my time otherwise.
BlackEyedMonkey1,747,531

Posted yesterday at 20:31
Vok 250 said:
BlackEyedMonkey said:
Vok 250 said:
BlackEyedMonkey said:
Vok 250 said:
SeeD Red said:
Boots Orion said:
SeeD Red said:
Do you ever give less than 9 out of 10?
Yes…but to provide a more detailed answer…

They used to review way more games of varying quality. Now, they don’t seem to review as many games and they tend to be only of the AAA variety.
Agreed, but it also really bothers me to find 8.5 and 9 out of 10 ratings on English speaking websites, 6 or 7's on foreign language websites.
I think it comes down to natural biases. For the past couple of years most of the articles on western sites seem to be sponsored material and a ton of that coming directly from MS/Xbox public relations team. I don't think they are being told to rate a certain way, but that kind of constant influence does breed a certain level of bias into the publishing. If it didn't work then MS/Ubisoft/Sony/Disney/WB/EA wouldn't spend hundreds of millions of dollars a year on it. Western sites also tend to give the reviews to authors who already enjoy that type of game so that naturally leads to higher scores. Every author here is going to passionate about Xbox as a platform and by extension any GamePass game or exclusive. Plus in this cast the author's bio already said she was excited about this game and loves open world RPGs. These days it's more of influencing than reviewing here in the west anyway.
Would it make more sense to you if someone who didn't like these kind of games to review it for you?
That would just be bias in the opposite direction.

Your comment is a great example of how this is a cultural thing here in the west. It's become so normalized that anything else is unthinkable and people jump to the defense of the status quo if you dare to question it. Your use of "make more sense" is hostile language implying I am misunderstanding something. That's not the case. I'm just making an observation and building upon the context of the comment I quoted. The only reason that's upsetting you is because my observation is counter to a cultural norm.

Another point I didn't bring up in my first comment is that the west has become very black-and-white when to comes to media. This is backed up by statistics. People rate things either very highly or very poorly. What should resemble a bell curve is more like the opposite in USA and Canada. It's even worse in public ratings, but reviewers have begun doing it too. IMHO TA is one of the few websites that still has good honest data and doesn't get that kind of kneejerk rating style like rotten tomatoes or Steam. Before they moved to a 0-10 scale the most common rating was 3.5/5. Seemed like every other review was a 3.5 out of 5 game lol. Which was fair in retrospect as that generation of games we overwhelmingly average. I haven't been reading reviews faithfully enough these days to know if it's still mostly 6 and 7 out of 10 games. If TA give a game a 9 or 10 I tend to trust it though. Historically they haven't shied away from giving out lower scored to average games.
I wasn't asking for a thesis on how reviews work around the world. I wasn't trying to be hostile or imply anything. You were jumping around topics so it was hard to follow and made it read like you were giving no merit to the review because of the author's tastes. This is the status quo of becoming defensive to any interaction based on western ideals and blah blah blah. It looks like we agree the review is written in good faith, I'm going to play the game, we're all consumers and someone is trying to sell us something. This is a video game website about achievements. Let's move on with our day.
You're the one that responded to my comment buddy. If you're going to response with flippant comments, but then not even bother reading responses in good faith then I'm just going to block you man. If you weren't interested in what I was discussing then just don't response at all. Just move along with your day as you say.
Apparently you didn't read my comment. It's whatever. Do and assume what you'd like, block away. Have a nice day.
Vok 250562,752

Posted yesterday at 20:43
SeeD Red said:
Boots Orion said:
SeeD Red said:
Do you ever give less than 9 out of 10?
Yes…but to provide a more detailed answer…

They used to review way more games of varying quality. Now, they don’t seem to review as many games and they tend to be only of the AAA variety.
Agreed, but it also really bothers me to find 8.5 and 9 out of 10 ratings on English speaking websites, 6 or 7's on foreign language websites.
For the industry as a whole I'd absolutely agree. I won't get into the discussing those details because the opinion police will get mad at me again, but yeah you're not wrong.

For TA though I'm inclined to believe this rating. Historically this website has not been shy about giving middle-ground ratings to average games. I'm not fully up to speed on their new 1-10 rating system, but in the old 0.5-5 rating system they gave out tons of 3s and 3.5s which would be about the middle. They do rarely give anything below 3/5 or 5/10 so adjust expectations to match.

Also their is some bias as all writers here naturally like Xbox and Game Pass and the author loves RPGs as said in their bio under the article. That's not nefarious bias, but should be kept in mind if you don't share the same taste. With reviews it's best to find authors with similar taste to you. It sounds to me like you might vibe more with Canezza's reviews which tend to be a bit more critical and a bit less biased based on personal preference. I've always found his ratings very fair, even when the article is full of subjective praise.
PhilthyAnimal95799,614

Posted yesterday at 20:56
At the end of the day reviews are literally one persons opinion that you'll never 100% share even if you usually agree with them. There's people who I agree with 90% of the time that absolutely hate games I loved & vice versa.

Anyone using a review as anything but a rough guide or looking for deeper agendas/conspiracies is losing the plot if you ask me.
Lord Midas457,788

Posted yesterday at 21:01
Phew, I completed Sniper Elite Resistance in the knick of time. I really looking forward to this
Would you kindly...
Elessar1191368,843

Posted yesterday at 21:17
More fantastic exclusives are just what we need.

What we don't need is for MS to sabotage another potential USP for Xbox by bloody putting it on PlayStation.

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