Today I am going to discuss a subject that I talked about last week but I want to go more in detail about the effects and benefits of video game Review is.
Video Games are a new form of media, to most of us it may not seem new to most of us because video games have been with us for most of our life in one way or the other. However literature has been around since ancient times with cave paintings, film has been with us since the 1890's, television has been with us since the mid 1900's but gaming has only been with us enmasse since the 1980's with the original NES of Nintendo. Video games have only been with us for about 30 years and society is still working out the kinks on to how th industry operates. One of the most crucial aspects of the industry is the review process.
Some people view people should not make money based off of someone else's work. A reviewer by their logic should not be able to make any money for reviewing a video game. This however is largely misunderstood as to whose work the reviewer's review belongs to. Whether it be Jim Sterling's written reviews or AngryJoe's Angry Review on Youtube, the review is the work of the reviewer. It is not the work of the developer. No reviewer should be forced to give royalties to developers for reviewing the developer's game. The review, the effort of playing the game, the effort of writing the review, and the effort of making the review belongs to the reviewer, not the developer. Through this, there is also less room for bias by the reviewer because they are forced to give money to the developers. Likewise developers should not pay the reviewer because the review may draw sales to the game. In neither scenario should one party give money to the other.
Review is a necessary aspect of the video game process. I am pro consumer, I do not care about big or small industry. I care about which will provide the better deal to the consumer because we are the ones spending the money and we are ultimately the ones who decide which industries succeed and which fail.
Some developers also believe they should be able to censor negative review. Some people defend these developers by stating that the negative review is impacting sales. That is the point, if a game is bad and broken then there are others who will agree or disagree. If people watch or read a review by Jim Sterling who believes a game is terrible and broken then most people will agree. If a game runs well and has mechanics that make sense it will find its audience. If a game is broken then consumers should be notified before the waste money on game they would know beforehand that they would not enjoy.
Click this link to watch the AngryJoeShow as an example for youtube video game review.
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