Review Scores and Toxicity
Numbers oversimplify a writer’s opinion and encourage review crunch — to the point where it emboldens social media toxicity
Cyberpunk 2077’s initial reception was marred by a controversy where GameSpot decided to award the game a 7/10. On its own, that sentence does not sound very dramatic, but the consequences on social media are as real as ever.
Its writer (and GameSpot’s reviews editor), Kallie Plagge, chose the 7/10 score based on a good experience hampered by some major bugs in the review copy. This is in addition to some critique on how the game handles trans identity and different cultures in a way that feels superficial. Upon reading the full text, it reads as a thoughtful comment on how people identifying as trans or people from different cultures may interpret the choices in this game. You may agree or disagree with her choices, but it’s an opinion grounded in some context. It’s not an emotional knee-jerk reaction.
There was also a revelation from another writer at Game Informer Liana Ruppert, who disclosed that at one point, the game has epileptic triggers that had caused her to suffer from a bad seizure. Epilepsy charities also worked on promoting the warning for players who are prone to epileptic seizures. The developer has since reached out over Twitter to state its intentions to add an additional warning and to change the way these graphics are handled.
And, yes, the bugs deserve a mention — particularly now as footage of the state of the game emerges on YouTube. When a game as big and as immersive as this forces you back to reality with disappearing environments, invisible NPCs and floating objects, it leaves a sour taste. Looking at the footage, it approaches the lofty peaks of Fallout 76 bugginess.
Clearly, the game had very real issues that needed to be talked about in a calm, adult manner, but sadly, we live in a world where Twitter exists. These valid concerns and health safety warnings were drowned out by outrage over the 7/10 scoring. It prompted Liana to reach out once again to try and get people to refocus on the awareness around people’s safety rather than the toxicity that followed. People interpreted Kallie’s take on identity and representation as an unjustified attack on a game that they love (albeit have yet to play).
I can’t help but wonder whether removing the numbers from this situation would have made the ordeal less toxic. People have taken to comparing Cyberpunk’s 7/10 to the scores of other games, disregarding entirely the pages of text that enable a reviewer to come to that conclusion.
I wrote about the futility of scoring games in this way before, and I will repeat the words I wrote then here, because I think they are just as relevant:
Despite being a cliche, it is a fact of life that it is impossible to please everyone. Saying that a game is 10/10, for example, suggests that the game is perfect, or close to perfect, or that the consumer will at least have a perfect experience when playing. To some people, perhaps, but would someone with a fleeting interest in RPG titles find lasting enjoyment in games like Skyrim or The Witcher 3? It’s impossible to know for sure, and scores do not adequately reflect that.
It also encourages lazy analysis. Some players value in-depth storytelling or worldbuilding, other players may want fluid controls and combat, and others still may crave different difficulty levels, in either direction. A number does not speak to all of these people at once, but the temptation is there to skip the text and go straight to the data.
It is the data that people are now laser-focused on. For people with no passing interest in the representation of identity and culture and just want a cyberpunk themed RPG to mess about in, I can see why this 7/10 score may feel like an insult: they view it as an insult because it punishes a game for features that these players do not value. It doesn’t mean that these criticisms are not true for all players, and this is where the scoring system falls down.
For a player with a keen awareness and sensitivity to these issues, or even for a player who just wants a game that feels complete and is free of major bugs, this score feels more reasonable. Many reviewers have noted that the game is severely hamstrung by these technical issues — and these are technical issues that would cripple the reputation of lesser studios or brands. Cast your minds back to the hilarity of Fallout 76 or Mass Effect: Andromeda for some recent examples.
Significantly, by some measures that developers or publishers may use, that score may also render some people out of pocket. Back in 2012, Kotaku’s Jason Schreier covered a tweet by Obsidian’s Chris Avellone about Fallout: New Vegas. In it, Chris says the following:
“FNV was a straight payment, no royalties, only a bonus if we got an 85+ on Metacritic, which we didn’t.”
If the scores averaged out around a 7/10 or less for CDPR, I can’t help but wonder if similar bonuses would be out of reach here, as well. That is, if they existed for Cyberpunk.
The only positive I can see for keeping review scores is that they are easily marketable, and that only benefits the people who make and market the game anyway. It encourages publishers to keep a tight rein on reviewers — who just want to critique a game fairly — with time constraints and restrictions on what gameplay to publish.
This all culminates in a review that is not comparable to the average play through because the embargoes limit what can be shown and what can be said, written in a time-sensitive environment where the longer you take, the less money you could earn from clicks.
How can a review score accurately take all of this into account? Quite simply, it cannot, and it falls short of what can be expressed through data alone. Scores are used as weapons for people to throw at each other in Twitter threads and the like.
The focus needs to shift to listening to what is actually said.
