From, obviously, Penny-Arcade
Go to Metacritic, which is destroying the video game industry, by the way, and check out the Tomb Raider: Underworld‘s metascore. Right now it’s 78. That’s not good enough, apparently.
It’s like this: Eidos, which publishes the game, instructed its PR firm to ask sites to hold off on publishing Underworld reviews before Monday (yesterday) if they were less than 80 percent. The idea, I guess, was to maximize sales before too many people found out about the game being good or bad (I haven’t played it, so I can’t comment either way). It’s like how in the movie industry, the opening weekend is key because, after that, people will have found out if the movie is good or bad, and whether or not it’s worth their time and money to see it.
Now there’s a controversy regarding Eidos, the PR firm and magic bullets. It’s very meta. Also boring.
My advice to those of you reading game reviews: ignore the number. Ratings are an archaic practice that are largely irrelevant nowadays, what with reviews being a dime a dozen online. Read the actual content of the review and decide from there.