AIAS President: 'Game Reviewers Are Lazy'

So the president of the Academy of Interactive Arts & Sciences says that “game reviewers are lazy.” Do you agree? How many times have you played a game that reviewers raved about only to be sorely disappointed after you bought it?

"My pet peeve is that game reviewers are lazy," he said. "Not all, but in terms of the reviews [something like] 'This game isn't as good because let's compare it to that game over there and that game was great.' Who gives a, you know, bleep?" "How can you review a game, how can you give a comment about a game like Grand Theft Auto IV, that has 40-plus hours or more of gameplay, if you've only spent 2 1/2 to 3 hours playing it?"

Back when we used to do them, our game reviews were done on retail games and played start to finish by 3 separate reviewers with three separate conclusions. All artwork and logos were done in house and no canned screenshots were used unless they were used for comparison to actual game play footage and so on. In-depth reviews like that are underappreciated in the industry and the rush to be “first” only complicates matters further. In other words, they want a quick and dirty “10” yet they compain about “laziness” in the industry. You can’t have both, can you?

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