I actually like scores. This site uses a very simple scoring system and it's clearly explained at the link at the bottom of every page.
As for "making a point on the industry", if you mean that I'm disappointed so many supposed critics are instead industry cheerleaders who confine their ratings to a narrow range between 7 and 9, then I guess I agree. It's a pretty sad state of affairs that there isn't more critical discussions of videogames at a time when they're well worth that level of discussion.
I can guarantee you the kind of people who get riled up at the score were never going to be party to a critical discussion. The culprit is not the score.
Furthermore, I don't think it's fair to dismiss the noise level as being a product of "the masses". The problem is very young, very insecure, very inarticulate, and very crassly loud people who look to reviews to validate their opinions. Many of them are incapable of engaging anything other than a number, which is why so many of them demand "objective" reviews. I'm not content to let that mentality dictate how a ratings system should work, and that's what I would be doing if I abandoned ratings entirely.
You list off bugs and how you dislike the offline simulation and then go on to give this game a 5/5. Could you be more obvious that you are metacritic traffic hunting? Could have made yourself less obvious and given it a 4.5/5 but you seem to only believe in whole numbers (for some God forsaken reason) and the idea of being under the next highest score of an 85 probably scared the shit out of you.
Well-written but followed by a score that the write-up doesn't even warrant. And your review system really needs a decimal system. But maybe that is just so you can justify the scores you are handing out.
Mr. Viper, our ratings system has only five ratings, and each one is simply an indication of how much I liked the game. It's not at all a statement of the game's inherent quality, or a judgment on how hard the developers worked, or a reward for technical prowess. It is very simply this:
1 star: I hated it 2 stars: I didn't like it 3 stars: I liked it 4 stars: I really liked it 5 stars: I loved it
State of Decay has some very serious flaws. It even has a fundamental design concept -- time running while the player is away -- that I strongly disagree with. But none of that detracts from the fact that I love it.
I love this game, but to me, it is more proof of concept. It is a little buggy and a little shallow, but the structure for greatness is there. Tighten up the controls, get some better graphics, and expand the world, and MS could have something here. A big budget State of Decay 2 could have been an Xbox One system mover.
