Hey folks, I'm launching a website today: videogamescritic.com It started as a little database I built for myself. I use Metacritic and OpenCritic a lot and they're clearly useful, but to me as a designer the user experience always felt a bit lacking. Then the thing kept growing, and at some point I realized it had become genuinely useful for any gamer, not just me. So here it is, for everyone. My main problem with the existing aggregators: Their scores tell you how the press felt about a game, not how players did. That made sense 20 years ago. I cared a lot what GameSpot gave a game back then. But today we can actually measure how players felt, and to me that will always matter more than how the press did. On videogamescritic.com, players hold at least two-thirds of every score, by rule. Press still counts, it just can't outvote the people who bought the game. The other big problem: Those sites rate a game once, at launch, and then never really touch it again. But that's not how games work anymore. A game can launch rough and get patched shortly after, but on Metacritic and OpenCritic it carries that scarlet letter forever. No Man's Sky is the obvious example: Famously rocky launch, and Hello Games has spent the years since relentlessly improving it. Its Metacritic score has never moved. On videogamescritic.com it launched at 50 and sits at 82 today, because scores here are LIVE: launch-era reviews fade out over time, and reviews written after a significant patch count the most. When player sentiment changes, the number changes. Simple. And since press does still count, I ended up reviewing the reviewers too. Every outlet and creator gets a trust score based on one question: When they reviewed a game, did players end up agreeing? You can see who consistently calls games the way players see them, and who doesn't. Again, simple and fair. And everything is transparent. Every game page shows exactly how its score was computed, and the full methodology is public. No editorial opinion, no magic number. Anyway, I hope you get a kick out of it! Even just as a way to see the best games on each platform, find something you missed, or browse a site that isn't wallpapered in ads, I think it's already pretty useful. Enjoy!👍❤️

For a game that costed hundreds of millions and an IP so popular that there isn't a single generation of kids/adults these days who has at least one version of Superman that they love ? Yeah, 18 millions copies fucking sucks.

Been reading through all of the posts against me over my stance on the Stop Killing Games initiative. Tons of people calling me a liar or that I misrepresented the initiative. Also lots of content creators dogpiling on this to get their pound of flesh. Lets dig into what I actually did and said. I put out two videos on August 6th 2024 and August 7th 2024. These videos are linked at the bottom of this post. Many people have not watched them and are just calling me a liar or attacking my character. Give the videos a watch, read the initiative itself, make a conclusion that you aren't copy pasting from social media. Monetization on these videos is disabled so no this is not some ploy to increase revenue. I just care about this subject and have rightful concerns as a person working in this space. In the first video. I go through what an initiative is, how it's not law, and how it's a starting point for this entire process. This helps people understand that this is to start the conversation for change and can adapt later. I then go through the initiative and some of it's goals from the official page for it. I then talk about the repercussions of them should they be implemented. As written all games need to be left in a "Functional Playable State". Next I bring up The Crew and walk through the business around it, the sequels, and the size of the player-base at time of sunset. I did this because it was called out by this initiative as an example of publishers destroying a game. I also harshly critique Ross Scotts wording in his videos because they disparage the lawmaking process and lawmakers which doesn't benefit players or this movement in any way. In the second video. I talk about potential scenarios where a studio could be abused if the initiative was implemented as written. It adds new paths for abuse and that needs to be discussed to help hone this initiative into something that would do good without doing harm. I then explain that very few people in the game development space can actually discuss this from the other side due to fear of losing their jobs. A studio is much safer in silent dissent then they are discussing the drawbacks of your ideals. The recent attacks on our games is obvious evidence of this. To recap. My main issue with this initiative is that it is broad in it's approach to change the industry and the exact language of the initiative, not the FAQ, requests that all games stay in a "Functional Playable State". This is not feasible for all games at a technical level and could potentially restrict developers from making online-only games like MMOs, MOBAs, and User Generated Content games in the future. That list is not exhaustive and it doesn't matter if you do or don't like those kinds of games. Effectively this has the potential to restrict future developers from making kick-ass experiences because it locks a weight on their designs. Even though this is an initiative that can change in the future this goal is core to the mission and deeply disruptive so it needs to be called out. To clear up some disinformation about my character. I left AAA in 2016 because I fucking hate how the industry is now and prefer indie entirely. I don't like Blizzard or I would have stayed working there. That's why I quit. That's the entire point. Fuck AAA and what many studios have turned games into. Outside of that no I am not financially supported by live service games. I make a single player RPG and am the Director of Strategy for offbrand games. In that position I am paid MINIMUM WAGE by my own decision because I care about games succeeding not about profiting off of them. To further this the games we're publishing are all playable offline anyway because their gameplay loops are not only based on inter-player interaction. Not all games are like this and not all games can be like this. No, I have not been running away from discourse on this I talked about it for around 8 hours on stream yesterday. I never took my videos down and I have not discussed the initiative in the 10 months it's been since I released those videos. My internet also died mid-broadcast so I had to go live again 30 minutes later. Thanks ISP. For those that will scream HE'S DOUBLING DOWN. Yes I damn well am. I give a shit about this initiative and what it means for games, developers, and players in the future. To finish out. Just because I don't support this doesn't mean you should blindly follow me in that just because I said pretty words on the internet. You also shouldn't blindly bash me because some other creator said to. Watch the videos I put out, read the initiative, decide for yourself. Apply critical thinking and don't outsource it to others. As always. Stay Frosty. First Video: youtube.com/watch?v=ioqSvLqB… Second Video: youtube.com/watch?v=x3jMKeg9… Minimum Wage Proof: xitter.cf/PirateSoftware/status/…

Gearbox chief Randy Pitchford has responded to a fan who expressed concern about the prospect of paying $80 for Borderlands 4, saying: “if you're a real fan, you'll find a way to make it happen.” bit.ly/43DhERc