I made a big mistake today...

Review is to show people if the game is worth it. Give them a piece of the best parts of the game, and some of the worst parts.
I've also seen a lot of people doing these "First 30 minutes" videos.

It depends on the game. Some games you really do have to finish in order to get the complete experience. Other you can just play for 5 minutes before you know everything about it.

When I watch a "First impressions" I expect just that. When I watch a 'review' I usually expect the reviewer to have played through the entire thing(not counting every single side quest or collectible and such, but the "main game"), then tell us whether it was worth his time and why, or why not. And I always appreaciate when the reviewer talks about what kind of mindset is recommened whilst playing(if any), and even likens the experience to other works(movies, games, books), if possible.

Which game was it?

That's a good thread, first of all.

To review something is to judge its content, from every important thing (sound work, gameplay if it is a game, story, acting if it is a movie, voice acting and animations if it is a game, etc) and yeah, you can't just review something you didn't even finish. That's like reviewing a demo of a game (Like Hard Reset) and saying that the game will be that good but then, unfortunately, it is the whole opposite.

You aren't wrong on saying that to review something is to examine it, but, as far as I know, you should call a review when you are examining every aspect of the thing, after you've finished it.

It doesnt have to cover the whole game, but that should be noted in the vid.

You let youtubers get to you?

The place is troll/retard central, who gives a fuck what they think.

What I expect from a review is to show the mechanics and the gameplay of the game. I want to the see the graphics, if its buggy. I want to know the publisher and the developer. Already DLCs? Show if it feels unbalanced, not finished, boring, worthy to buy.

Everything else is already walkthrough in my opinion...If you want to unlock every secret and show every location of a game you cant talk about a review, trolo.

I would say a review is pretty much what was in the description of your 26 minute video. It sounds to me like they just wanted something to complain about, They think of themselves as the geniuses of youtube videos yet most of them who make those comments don't have any videos posted.

A review is... one, single, individual's opinion of a game/movie/show/etc. Nothing more.

Reviews can and are usually biased, i think first impressions are far better instead of giving a score which in the end means absolutely nothing (granted, they are also biased, but it doesnt usually stand out that much)

As for what you said, i believe a review does not need to have a complete view; if that were the case, you'd need to analyze it from major points of view, not just your own, in order to have a good, well developed one, which is something that very few (if none) reviewers actually do.

A score, in the end only helps those mindless bots who will only buy those games which are above 8.9 in score, which pretty much summarizes how narrow minded some people can be; while games are ALL technical data, i do not believe a numerical value does justice, not in the state the review scene is on right now.

You didnt make a mistake, you just stood up and gave your mature opinion, you just happen to do it in an environment where EVERYONE is a fanboy and if you make a negative comment in a higly subscribed channel, you will become EVIL and should burn.

It's the internet, Jake.

To be a good review, it must be done by Yahtzee. That's all

You could label it something more specific than just a "Review" such as "Initial Review". Or even "First Look at xxxxx". It's just wordplay but you get the gist.

Review, maybe not. A good "let's play", "wtf is", or something similar, that's just fine. Youtube people are stupid.

I think reviewing is defined as u stated. you dont have to play an entire game from beginning to end just to understand the combat system, the AI levels, the texture and graphics, and the over all story of where its direction is going. Some people are just whiners so i always say fuck off and get a life.

I think it's pretty self-explanatory. You try out a product and you offer your opinion on it. That's it. "Let's look at" by Northernlion on youtube are reviews. "WTF is.." by TotalBiscuit are the same.

A review is really just a personal opinion. Any sane person who comes across a review will read/watch a few and conclude if the concepts of the game being discussed appeals to them or not.
People like different things. Personally I'm a fan of gameplay depth and/or story and when a reviwer complains of a game being too complicated or too "preachy", I'll anayalise those points and see if any of those are the concepts I infact enjoy.

This is painfully clear with reviewers such as Yahtzee. Just because you disagree with him doesn't mean that either you or his critism are wrong, rather that your taste differs. Why the "fanboys" find this so hard to understand is beyond me.

When I review a game I usually play the game for 10 hours, or more depending on the game(online games dont require much time, again it depends on the game) and then after the 10 hours + I start to write the review with the notes I take while I play the game(usually bugs or parts that I loved).
If they dont like your review tell them to f##k off, I reviewed Blacklight Retribution and my viewers loved the review. For that review I spent about 15 to 30 hours playing tha game to avaluate the replay value(pretty good for a F2P game).

Thanks for Skyrim

As a reviewer you'll win some approbation over your criticism and a lot of readers/viewers who will agree or differ, they will return to see your videos again because you left something in their minds whether they liked your opinion or think that you're stupid and just want to remind it to you again

For example revelations 2012 that game suck and u dont have to play the entire game to come to that conclusion.

Youtube commenters are some of the most retarded people on the interwebs. Simply reading their comments lowers your IQ.

I suggest you ignore them and do whatever the fuck you want. Not a single professional reviewer ever plays 100% of the games they write about unless it's a really short game, and that's something I'm willing to bet money on. A lot of them won't admit it because they feel it would hurt their reputation or whatever, but otherwise they simply wouldn't have the time to play a game, do some research into its background/developer/history/games it's inspired by, and write a decent review. Just do whatever you think it most fair to yourself and others and allow the trolls to go fuck themselves, because you're not going to please everyone no matter what you do anyway. Might as well get used to it. Besides, a viewer who tells you how much you suck and how wrong you are about everything is still a viewer. If they didn't give a fuck they wouldn't get mad.

In all fairness, it would be a good thing to include something like "this review is based on the first 5 hours of the game" or something like that, but hardly anyone ever does anything like that so whatever, idgaf.

I know people have already moved on from this thread, but I was wondering.

If someone plays the first 2 hours of a 6 hour straight up action game, what percentage of the game do you think they have seen? The knee jerk reaction is simple math, 33%... but is that really true for video games?

I mean assume the game has no real plot or character development, it's just levels where you shoot guys and it's awesome. You might unlock some new weapons as you play, see some new enemies, go to some new locations, but the gameplay remains largely the same. In effect, the first hour or so you play, you actually know just about all the game has to offer, don't you?

At a certain point in most games there isn't much more content to experience, and that obviously differs from game to game. For instance, you can play Tetris for a few minutes to see all it's content, even though technically that game has no real end (or does it? I wouldnt know)

Dude, ignore those retards in youtube. All they can do is post "I'm in the weird part of youtube again loLol Xd"

You are wrong. WTF is - is not a proper review. It's just to get a feel for the game, show off the core mechanics, some of the earlier content, which, I assume, in this case, was sniper elite v2. It's not a review, even though it may seem that way.

Well, 'every-review' says "Mass Effect 3 is best game ever", and then 'all-gamers' says "those review sux, nobody mentioned how badly Bioware screwed whole ending sequence"...

All in all, I guess when you talk about story-driven game you shouldn't call "a review" something that only covers "tech-side", without knowing if whole story "have arms and legs". But games where story is "a glue to makes level stick" (sniper elite v2 is a good example) - I'm pretty sure you can write a review only based on demo and it would be accurate (beside info about guns and challenges etc.).

Didn't Gran Turismo 5 had tons of reviews that said "played for few hours", and players attacked them with "this game starts to shine after 20-or-something hours"?