When reviews go Rashomon

How does this happen? How do two review outlets write reviews that are diametrically opposed?

I’m not talking just difference of opinion: “This game is fun” versus “I didn’t enjoy this game.” That makes sense. No, I’m talking reviews that read like the differing perspectives of Akira Kurosawa’s classic film Rashomon: not just mere differences of opinion, but entirely different experiences of reality.

I’m talking comparisons like these, from the recent reviews for Mario Kart 7 from both Destructoid’s Jim Sterling and Gamesradar’s Justin Towell:

“Mario Kart 7 is as derivative as a game can get…it’s a lethargic and mundane game, easily outpaced by games that could be considered knock-offs of the formula Nintendo itself perfected.”

“(Mario Kart 7) plays better than the home console versions have since N64 and makes 90% of the rest of the machine’s catalogue look downright shoddy.”

That’s not even the most baffling part. Here’s the most baffling part:

“I must say that the Tanooki Tail is fairly useless — obstacles are easily avoided and the power-up rarely appears when you’re close enough to other racers to strike them.”

“But the best power up is the tanooki tail. Mario’s gone tail-crazy of late, but seeing a tail appear on your kart, waving around in gloriously animated 3D, is a real “I love this game” moment. You use it to attack your opponents like a furry baseball bat – even to deflect incoming shells.”

No, you know what, we have a third comparison. We have time for a third comparison:

“Rubber banding and fixed races are still an integral part of every course, and victory in a race yet again hinges hugely on the element of basic luck, with items such as the Blue Shell returning to punish players who commit the sin of maintaining success.“

“Races are close without being too dense and chaotic, thanks to superb weapons balancing that hands out appropriate power-ups depending on where you are in the field.”

Okay. Are you confused yet? You should be. Here we have two early reviews of a game offering up completely different opinions, different experiences of fundamental aspects of the game. One reviewer saying it’s the fairest game in the series, the other saying it’s cheapest. One loving the Tanooki Tail, the other saying it is impractical. One saying the game is beautifully well made and polished, the other saying it’s mundane and shoddy.

It brings us to the problem with the modern review. And that problem is the attempt at being objective.

What we have here, at its most basic level, is something we’ve seen since the dawn of time: one player appreciating a game, the other not appreciating it. There’s nothing wrong with either of these views. Jim Sterling has a right to think the game is tired and boring, just as Justin Towell has a right to think the game’s absolutely stone cold brilliant. They both seem like very honest reviewers; I don’t think either was “bought off” or even influenced by a desire to get on Nintendo’s good side. One of them just happened to love the game, the other hated it.

The problem, the problem nearly all reviews have, is that the two writers have couched these opinions in objective fact. Instead of not being enjoyable the game is “lethargic, mundane, and derivative.” Faults are found: the veneer is picked away and points are dredged up to justify giving the game a low score. It’s the opposite way for the Towell review: Mario Kart 7 is good enough to make your favorite game suck. It pisses on other games and laughs at you when you try to play them. It steals their lunch money.

Some time ago, games reviewers decided they had to be objective. By objective, we mean they had to review a game like someone reviews a tractor: “This part is good, this part is faulty, and that part is completely unnecessary.” Everything about a game has to be defined. But, at the same time, games reviewers want to be subjective: they want to make sure that readers, who have every opinion in the world, can have different ones. Games reviews try to combine these two ideas: they try to objectively inform you about the game, but also leave you to make your own interpretations. This leads to a lot of empty adjectives and pointless phrases; after all, if Jim Sterling thoroughly explained how slow Mario Kart felt, people would have grounds to quibble with him. Best to just say it’s slow, with a subjective air of opinion but with an objectiveness that stands out as confident reviewing. It’s the easiest way, if not the most informative.

It’s the problem with resorting to hyperbole in reviews (something I, myself, am very guilty of): you want to justify the score you give to the game, so instead of trying to find ways of expressing yourself inside the framework of the game you dig deep and find the most attention-grabbing thing you could say. A game being well made but not your thing becomes a slow, derivative mess. A game being the sort of thing you want to play right now because a masterpiece of game design that’s fast and fair. Small features have to be the best thing ever because you have to justify a 10; rubber banding to keep the game interesting has to be the devil to justify a 5. Nits are picked and adjectives are used because it’s easier to write that way.

Here’s the heart of the thing: I’m all for subjective reviews. I want a reviewer’s voice, I want them to tell me what they did and didn’t like about the game. The difference is that the thing I need from reviews is subjectivity couched in objective reasoning. I need to know why a reviewer feels a specific way, subjectively, about a game, rather than adjectives designed to justify a review score.

It’s the folly of the scored, timely review. For instance, look at my review of Rochard. I didn’t particularly like it. I had good reasons to not like it. But you, another player with entirely different likes and dislikes, you might love it. It might be your favorite game ever. So the question, to me, as a reviewer, is this: do I offer you an objective viewpoint, “The game is pretty, well-made, Jon St. John tries to be funny, things happen,” or do I do what I did and provide you a subjective viewpoint, trying my best to explain why you might hate a game, knowing you might not?

In the end, differing, subjective opinions like these two are a lot of sound and fury but they signify little. Without in-depth analysis what good can a review be to us besides Metacritic padding and a number at the end?