In yet another example of a negative review resulting in mass rage, Washington Post video game reviewer Michael Thomsen is being targeted with insults, anger and outrights threats for posting a bad review of Naughty Dog’s Uncharted 4.
The review, which was unflattering but contained no numerical score, was submitted by the Washington Post to Metacritic, the score aggregation site, with a 4/10 added on by them. As of this writing, his is the only score for the game in Metacritic under 80.
The anger toward the review has been quick and vicious. A Change.org petition demanding the removal of the review from Metacritic has already gained almost 5,000 signatures. The reviewer’s Twitter account has been deluged with insults and threats. The worst part about all this, however, is that it could be seen coming from a mile away.
I am personally against review scores for games. I do understand that a review score is a simple metric that can be used to sum up a review succinctly, but assigning a mere number to a review does not take into account the many things that may have led a reviewer to that number. A lot of subjective feeling and nuance goes into a proper review, and a review score is a cold, definitive, objective number that takes all nuance and perspective away.
Worse, review scores can be pointed to by hardcore fans and judged superficially. Nowadays, giving a revered game anything less than an 8/10 is punishable by drawing and quartering. In some cases, a review of “just” 8/10 hints that the title is anything but absolutely perfect, which is actually worse than saying it sucked. The review score has become a way for people to verify their love for something, and any score that deviates a half a point from the expected score results in rage.
Would he have received so much hatred if the Washington Post had merely left the review as-is and not submitted to review to Metacritic with a made-up score? I believe he would not have. At the very least, his score would not have skewed the site’s aggregate score for the game, which currently sits at 93.
