Aborted freelance review and a question for you all

[Bandango]

So I recently started writing freelance reviews for a casual gaming site called Gamezebo. I was asked to write a review for a Facebook action RPG and I scored it rather harshly. My editor politely told me he would have to re-assign the review because, as far as Facebook games go, he thought this one was actually really good.

So then I had an idea to do a little feature story. The editor liked it. The question it would examine, in his words: "Should different games aimed at different audiences be handled with these differences in mind?" Should a Facebook game be reviewed in the context only of other Facebook games, with the casual soccer mom audience in mind? Or should they be stood up against other browser based games of their ilk, games that have a more hardcore audience like Realm of the Mad God?

So, as part of this feature I'm asking the sagely opinion of the CoG body. What do you guys think?

Also, if you're interested, I'm going to post the review below.

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Cloudstone

Pros: Worth more than 1.5 stars if you are a parent looking for a kid friendly game. Competent fast paced action on Facebook. Good loot and sense of humor.

Cons: An energy system restricts play time unless you pay cash. Boring missions. With all the other free to play action RPGs out there -- browser based and otherwise -- I can’t think of any reason why you’d want to play this one.

1.5 stars

Cloudstone is an action RPG, which is a good thing and a bad thing. Right now the big boy on the block, as far as action RPGs go, is Diablo 3. You may have seen commercials for it on ESPN. Or, if you're at all familiar with PC gaming, you may recognize it as one of the most anticipated games of all time, or as the sequel to one of the best games ever -- Diablo 2. As you might have deduced from this eager introduction -- from the praise I’m lavishing on Diablo 3 -- that I’ve been playing a heck of a lot of it. Which is why Cloudstone being an action RPG is a good thing and a bad thing. Its release benefits from the wave of action RPG excitement that Diablo has brought with it. But, at the same time, a glut of action RPGs on the market means that Cloudstone has a lot of competition.

I should specify that Cloudstone is a browser based free to play action RPG for Facebook, so it’s not really on a level playing field with Diablo and should not be judged in comparison. Yet Cloudstone is on a level playing field with dozens of other free to play Action RPGs, some browser based and some standalone -- some of which are put out by Nexon, the publisher behind Cloudstone.

But before I get into that, let me tell you what Cloudstone is. When you first start playing, you’ll find yourself thrown into a tutorial that teaches the basics of how to play -- basics which are indeed very basic. See that evil green slime monster over there? Click on it, hit it with your weapon, and watch it die. See that chest full of gold? Click it and get the gold. This is the basic premise of every action RPG. Essentially, the genre is a never ending search for loot. Kill bad guys, acquire gold and better weapons, and use those better weapons to kill more bad guys. It’s a beautiful system that will keep you coming back for more, and Cloudstone does it well. As you progress through the game’s four worlds and bosses, a sense of progression and accomplishment keeps things moving at a nice pace. The carrot is dangled before you, and you will want to bite from it. You will want to play that next level in order to obtain a new wooden sword bedazzled with peppermints, to acquire a new helmet that looks suspiciously like a wooden bucket (these are real items -- the game has a sense of humor).

The carrot on a stick compulsion that makes action RPGs so much fun is also where Cloudstone’s free to play revenue model kicks in. You have an energy bar in this game, with a maximum energy of 30. This energy is used to enter a level at the cost of about 10 energy per stage. When you run out of energy, that means no more playing. Energy replenishes itself slowly over time, but can also be replenished by in game foodstuffs, which are earned as rewards for quests or after beating a level. These foodstuff can also be purchased through the use of rubies, which can only be acquired, as far as I can tell, by paying real money. So if you really like this game and want to play for more than 30 minutes at a time, be prepared to shell out some cash.

Which maybe isn’t such a bad thing. This game appears to be geared towards children. Most of the enemies are non-threatening creatures like animated mudballs or angry flowers that spit yellow seeds at you. The weapons and armor you acquire are, as I mentioned above, silly for the most part. There is no blood and the game is nothing if not colorful. You’ll explore caves, forests, farms and the requisite ice world, among other locals. If Cloudstone’s target audience is indeed children, maybe it’s not the worst thing in the world that you can’t sit down and play for 4 hours straight (without mommy and daddy’s credit card, at least).

But for those of us over the age of 12, there isn’t too much here to offer. Each level lasts a few minutes and demands a simple objective be met. Most levels fall into one of the following categories: gather x number of objects, kill x number of creatures, find x character, or defend x for a period of time. I will say this though: for a Facebook game the action is fast paced, a refreshing change from the management style games that are the norm. If you are an action RPG fanatic and you need something to play during your 15 minute break, this game might be able to satisfy your urge for loot. But anyone interested in a meaty action RPG experience should look elsewhere.

For example, Nexon has under its umbrella two excellent free to play action RPGs, MapleStory and Dungeon Fighter, both of which are kid (and grown up) friendly -- especially MapleStory. These games have 10 times the character, depth, and fun that Cloudstone has. And if you want something a little more grim -- something a bit more Diablo 3 -- try Drakensang, another free to play browser based action RPG. And let’s not forget about the endless supply of free indie titles out there like Dungeons of Fayte, Wayfarer, and the truly excellent browser based action MMO Realm of the Mad God (http://www.gamezebo.com/games/realm-mad-god/review).

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[biosc1]

Just as I don't expect a pure Final Fantasy player to review FIFA '12, I would imagine that reviewers review games in genres/styles/difficulties that they have experience in.

You can't compare Final Fintasy My Life As A King against something like Etrian Odyssey and then complain that FFMLAAK is not hardcore enough.

Having said that, I think you wrote a good review that clearly points out that this is a game geared towards children and then you offer other games that are better geared towards adults.

[Kelegacy]

Why even have review staff if editors refuse to publish reviews that aren't glowing? If he didn't agree with your score he should review the friggin game himself.

I saw a story recently were a review was pulled for giving top high of a score. That is one reasonfor why gaming journalism can't be taken seriously. Let the reviewers do their thing. Imagine if CNN reassigned a story on Syria because the reporter was too harsh on the civil war or Eberts review of Transformers was given to another because it wasn't favorable enough. Lame.

[violent]

At the end of the day, a game is a game is a game. When reviewing, the caveats that usually come with Facebook games should be covered. This, of course, works with my belief that a game should be judged of its own merits, not any sort of superiority or inferiority to a similar title.

[Bandango]

Good stuff guys. Keep it coming.

[Shieldmaiden]

I tend to agree with Violent on this one. Games should be judged on their own merits, although the platform should be taken into account. For example, Facebook games are going to have some kind of pay to play element, so knocking them for it is kinda pointless. Criticising how it's implemented, on the other hand, would be an important part of the review.

[Krispy]

I agree that the platform dictates the structure of the game and this cannot be ignored.

However being prudent to point out the shortcomings of a game whether they are platform dependent or not is valid and useful. I might be more interested in finding a good browser action RPG than just a good Facebook action RPG and if this is my criteria then I want to read reviews like the one rejected.

To me this highlights the drawbacks of a points rating system because they are most certainly on a relative metric and it's hard to determine what exactly they are relative to. Other Facebook games? Other browser games? Other games simpliciter?

I'm not convinced you can rate a game on an absolute scale. I'm not sure what your metric could possibly be.

[kyrieee]

I think there's room for reviews from all sorts of different perspectives and in different contexts. For me I'm sure that your review would've been much more helpful to me than a review aimed at a soccer mom. It's the same with hardcore games too, maybe I've never played an RTS so reviewing StarCraft II from that perspective would be valuable to me.

Maybe I misunderstood your question though :P

[J Arcane]

Facebook games only being judged in the context of other Facebook games is part of why Facebook games are so shitty.

[Joshkdmw]

As gamezebo specializes in "Social, mobile and Casual games" (their words, from their website) then it is probably a bad idea to compare games reviewed there to hardcore titles. That's what they do as a publication, and you dance with the one that brung you.

As far as a more academic stance, I think it'd be unfair to judge a game by the standards of a hardcore game in this context.

Try to judge it based on what it is attempting, and how well it achieves that goal. If it wants to be a simple, enjoyable way to spend time without lots of complexity, then ask yourself "Has it done that?" If so, then it's probably deserving of a higher score.

I've been talked out of the basement a time or two by editors who reasoned that even if I hated the game and wanted to give it a one, then that didn't necessarily mean it DESERVED a one.

Granted, when you're writing in the first person for a review, you want to just call it your personal opinion. But the opinion of a reviewer should be informed and measured, not knee-jerk. Reviews contain opinions, but that's not ALL they contain.

[Bandango]

A further question would be what constitutes a platform. Is Facebook a platform? Or is the browser a platform? Is there is a distinction between the two? If so, then why? Whats the difference?

Also I might PM some of you guys for quotes if that's cool, if I am going to actually write something from this.

Thanks for your input everyone.

[muddi900]

Tripple Town will be fun when compared to Gears of War or when compared to Farmville.

[KamaItachi]

How much of a vaccum games are reviewed in has always seemed weird and arbitrary. Is it okay to give a game a good review if there are others in the same genre that are better? Is it okay to trash a game because you think the RRP is too high? I've seen reviews that do both. I could even agree with the viewpoint, but not the manner in how that affected someone evaluating the game itself.

[Krispy]

A platform can be as specific or general as you like but the usefulness of speaking about a platform as you get to the extremes becomes extremely limited. This mirrors philosophy of science problems regarding taxonomies. First pass at a platform: any standardized basal structure that a game must conform to in order to exist. Most of the time it is also the bottleneck for availability of the game so that there is value to competing platforms.

Thus XBLA can be considered a platform unique to Xbox 360 albeit one contained by the other. Facebook and browsers are analogous. The interesting part about this relationship is that to play Facebook games you most likely can also play browser games (I don't think they have a dedicated game player yet) so you might think weighs in on your relative metric.

[Kielaran]

Target audience should play a big role. You would never compare Gears of War to Barbie Horse Adventure. Seeing how they are for two completely different audiences, it is apples to oranges.

Pros: Worth more than 1.5 stars if you are a parent looking for a kid friendly game. Competent fast paced action on Facebook. Good loot and sense of humor.

This is a good way to help adjust for this. The difference is who the game targets. If it is a kid friendly focused game, then I would think that you would instead say "3 stars, but lower you are an adult looking for your own experience" or something similar. I think that identifying who the game is really for and rating it for that demographic is worth more than trying to unify it overall.

[muddi900]

So Adam Sandler movies should be reviewed considering their target audience is stupid people?

[Krispy]

Reviewing something relative to its target audience does seem like a dog chasing its own tail. Then we are asking, "Did they achieve their goal?" instead of asking, "Was their goal worth achieving?"

Come to think on it, both questions seem equally relevant.

[Joshkdmw]

Good call, Krispy. Just ask both.

[TheKeck]

Originally Posted by Kielaran

Target audience should play a big role. You would never compare Gears of War to Barbie Horse Adventure. Seeing how they are for two completely different audiences, it is apples to oranges.



This is a good way to help adjust for this. The difference is who the game targets. If it is a kid friendly focused game, then I would think that you would instead say "3 stars, but lower you are an adult looking for your own experience" or something similar. I think that identifying who the game is really for and rating it for that demographic is worth more than trying to unify it overall.

And it's not like he was comparing this game to Skyrim or something. He was comparing it to other browser games. That seems more than fair and helpful to me.

Limiting the view to just Facebook is like saying, "Well, it's really good for a game you can buy through Origin. Or really good for a game available at gog.com."

[Joshkdmw]

I think the Facebook casual crowd is its own demographic at this point. People play Farmville who don't play anything else. Realm of the Mad God, for instance, has more appeal to the core crowd than the casual. Just because two pieces of art share a medium doesn't make them comparable.