Would you like to see game reviews on TPU?

[Octopuss]

I think there is a ton of gaming websites already, so voting no.

 

[alwayssts]

Get your own games and review them on your own site. Maybe w1z would be kind enough to link to some of the reviews if he is in a good mood. /thread

edit: my comment isn't addressed at anyone in particular, just throwing out what i know to the general tpu public. but yea, i would read game reviews on this site.

Yeah, more-or-less this.

I very much appreciate the community around here and their opinions, but also feel dilution in pure, focused content can feed dilution in pure, focused membership. If I want tech news/opinions/zeitgeist/boothbabes, I read TPU and the comments. If I want game news/opinions/zeitgeist, I check out the duders at Giant Bomb/GAF. It's not quite oil and water, but the overlap isn't exactly chocolate and peanut butter.

(Did anyone see the not-saved stream of the GBeast guys trying to build a pc recently? I think that's the perfect analogy...they ordered a z97 and Ivy Bridge-E...and were perplexed for a good while why it didn't fit. Similarly, tech-first guys are usually more detail than personality focused as opposed to straight gamers imho.)

Plus, you already see the shit w1z has to deal with when he posts things even slightly outside the norm; better to keep it closer to hardware on the front page, but be inclusive to those whom are also interested in gaming (from a tech perspective?).

I liked The Evil Within thread W1z started; it would be nice if more threads like that could be commonplace (perhaps have a spot on the sidebar?). Helpful info on how it plays, bug fixes/mods, realistic testing of system requirements, etc. I feel that fits with this community.

That is just my opinion.

 

[RCoon]

I liked The Evil Within thread W1z started; it would be nice if more threads like that could be commonplace (perhaps have a spot on the sidebar?). Helpful info on how it plays, bug fixes/mods, realistic testing of system requirements, etc. I feel that fits with this community.

I'll be working on things like that very soon, obviously it takes time, and W1z is OK with letting me head up that sort of thing. I think that uniform style of General Discussion threads for games is quite good, with the genuinely good information on the OP.

I've been pretty overwhelmed with how much people have given me feedback on this, and I appreciate all of it, especially those who have said no. It's points I'd like to work on. I'll be working on getting the Games forum tidy, and get more Official threads up and running with a good OP that provides some useful information to those jumping in for the first time. As for reviews, I understand all the issues such a thing brings.

I won't put something where it's not wanted, as a trial, I'll be spending some time working on a single review with good content, based on what feedback I've seen in this thread. I'll create the official thread for general game discussion (and only general game discussion), and add the review to the second post, and review feedback can be submitted only to that review thread. Once it's up, I'd very much appreciate if people could give some feedback on whether it's something they like, if there's bits they'd like added. You're also welcome to tell me if you really don't want it on the forum at all, but only if you've read and formed an opinion on it. We can see just what that kind of thing brings to the forum, if it's all bad at all. I'd also quite like if people told me what games they wanted to see reviewed next, the purpose is to cater for what the users want, not necessarily what I can "be bothered" to review.

It's one thing disliking the idea, but another if you get the chance to see it in action.

 

[de.das.dude]

i too actually prefer reviews that give a look at the game instead of rating it. ratings have no meaning for something like this because everyone has different tastes.
so, if the reviewer can show us the game and what its all about and stuff, it would be really awesome.

ps i dont mind doing reviews either... even though i have never been published :3

 

[rtwjunkie]

Probably, as you mentioned @RCoon, the way to make everyone happy is to make the official threads more focused on the technical aspect, kind of like W1z did with Evil Within, only expand it more. Fits in perfectly with the site then, and gives people in-depth information they don't have.

 

[RCoon]

i too actually prefer reviews that give a look at the game instead of rating it. ratings have no meaning for something like this because everyone has different tastes.
so, if the reviewer can show us the game and what its all about and stuff, it would be really awesome.

ps i dont mind doing reviews either... even though i have never been published :3

Scores won't be included, nor will I say the game is "Perfect" or "Shockingly awful". Just a general overview of gameplay, story, background, video options, performance, etc. General stuff that people on both sides will like/dislike, such as gameplay issues etc.

If people are interested in doing reviews, wait up for me to get my first submission passed through, I'll throw up a template and the kind of expectations based on the feedback we get, and you can submit them to somebody for checking grammar and what not, then put them through on the forums as a separate link on the general game discussion thread. I'm also hoping to add some graphs for average system power consumption during the game to see its load and effect on modern hardware.

In the event the feedback is entirely negative, we'll just stop it there and stick to just making discussion threads tidy and uniform. That will be first and foremost anyway.

 

[Ahhzz]

i too actually prefer reviews that give a look at the game instead of rating it. ratings have no meaning for something like this because everyone has different tastes.
so, if the reviewer can show us the game and what its all about and stuff, it would be really awesome.

....

Absolutely. RCoon's taste in games doesn't represent everyone here; hell, I'd be surprised if he represented 25%. But he's a well-spoken/written frequenter, and best that I can tell, intends to write more about how the game performs on a specific level (or levels) of equipment, and how it looks visually, than doing some sort of scoring. I'd like to see how the first few (or one) turn out, anyway. I think it's got a chance to appeal to enough of us here to make it worth his time.

 

[Protagonist]

Would be a nice addition to a forum that already has impressive hardware reviews

 

[Devon68]

No. This is a great idea but not on this site. I come here for the tech news and great community but lets face it, when I'm looking for a game review I will rather go to game debate, youtube or similar sites.

 

[BiggieShady]

I vote Yes because it would be great opportunity to read game reviews with a tpu twist - measuring performance hit from different game quality settings, using gpu profiler to analyze game sections that are graphically intensive, finding hidden tessellated water surface in next Crysis or such

 

[RCoon]

First review is up with 1440p videos
http://www.techpowerup.com/forums/threads/tpu-review-styx-master-of-shadows.206335

I'd love your feedback, particularly what you'd like to see in detail regarding system performance, any suggestions for software monitoring that you'd like to see etc. I'll be working to get a power meter so I can also record the average power consumption of a typical gameplay session. Let me know what you like and don't like, and if you want the images higher res (they're currently 800pixels wide to account for differing size monitors, and to not overpower the text).
I'd also like to hear what reviews you want to see next, so I can work on the next one ready for the start of next week. I've got Starpoint Gemini II up next on my list, but that list needs to grow!
Reviews currently look awful on a 1440p screen, I'll talk with W1z about the layout.

 

[FordGT90Concept]

I vote "no" because the extent of my looking at game reviews is usually on Steam. I have not been steered wrong by them yet because they are player reviews, not critic reviews (which often involves money). Seriously, most games can be summed up in a short paragraph ending with "play this," "don't play this," or "good enough for the bargain bin."

 

[newconroer]

We're talking actual reviews, in depth writing, taking some time to write thoughts, some screenshots of the reviewers playthrough and possibly some videos. This is not a "sure I'll write a 100 word review on a game", it's more of a content rich idea, with at least some professionalism involved. Something to build more of a community around and bring more people to TPU for more than just tech.

Not many people are aware I'm a published author, and W1zzard noted that not enough discussion is being centralised around recently released games, and threads die within a week of the game coming out. Rather than make a million threads with the Official tag, I'd like to see things grow a little. I'll try out one run, I've got a lot of experience with photoshop, streaming and video recording, if you don't like it, or someone can do it better, we'll see what happens. Now is a good time, I don't have anything relying on my time besides a few more books to write. I'll leave it to stew for a while, and wait for @W1zzard and the other moderators take on this.

The more people who vote the better, gives us an understanding of what people actually want around here, and if you vote yes, drop your ideas down, and what you really don't want. If no, feel free to elaborate.

EDIT: Alternatively, if you'd prefer singular threads of discussion on recently released game titles as they come out with the Official tag, but in more of a formal and thought out layout (aka the OP gets updated with sensible and useful information), let me know.

One benefit would be that some games TPU staff review, can then be sent to W1z for his GPU/CPU benchmark tests. Lord knows he needs some more current titles

Oh and section off the 'Official' threads into their own sub forum. They look silly dotted around the various pages of game threads.

 

[FordGT90Concept]

Oh and section off the 'Official' threads into their own sub forum. They look silly dotted around the various pages of game threads.

This is driving me batty.

 

[bubbleawsome]

Also, if you went into this (which I think is a good idea) maybe do mini-reviews for less popular games. Things like a quick performance overview at recommended specs or something like that. Give people a heads up on stutters and driver issues. *cough*watchdogs*cough*

 

[AsRock]

Yes sure as long as they are not bias like most places, i guess open minded reviews not just their opinion as it was the reason i stopped buying mags many years ago.

 

[Bansaku]

I vote yes, but ONLY if it is a performance review. I do not care about another person's thoughts on game-play/story, that is up to me to decide. I only care about how it runs.

 

[Naito]

I liked The Evil Within thread W1z started; it would be nice if more threads like that could be commonplace (perhaps have a spot on the sidebar?). Helpful info on how it plays, bug fixes/mods, realistic testing of system requirements, etc. I feel that fits with this community.

This. Focus on the more technical aspects of gaming; tweaks (console commands and configuration mods), performance in relation to specification requirements (minimum, recommended), video and graphics options (FOV, AA options, brands-specific features like Mantle or PhysX), bugs and issues (I.e. too many AI on screen causes slow downs in x scenarios, enabling x performance feature causes unstable framerate/random drops, are these issues brand/driver specific?), limitations to the games engines (lacks x features, doesn't seem to support multithreading to a large degree, scales poorly with technology (i.e Crysis 1)). These are just a few ideas to look at, however, as I think they'd be the most important for people who come to hardware/tech forums looking for answers as to why their games run poorly or how to get over that magic 60 FPS mark, and so on.

Just a general overview of gameplay, story, background, video options, performance, etc. General stuff that people on both sides will like/dislike, such as gameplay issues etc.

By all means include gameplay, story and background, but it will be hard not to have some sort of bias, as each game will be experienced with your perception. Even when trying to look at it from a different angle, you will still be applying your angle of how you perceive said angle, if that makes sense. The only way to kind of avoid that is to be very general, like for gameplay you could say, this game has x control system, has y combat elements, z camera position and whatever, but putting your opinion on it may divide people. I'm not a published writer, so maybe I am wrong, but I am just calling it how I'm likely to see it. Maybe you could be objective throughout, but at the end of each section or the entire review, have a paragraph or two labeled 'My opinion', then give your perspective of what has been said/experienced.

I'm going to vote Yes, because I would like to see a cleaner game sub-forums and it's hard to form an opinion without actually seeing this all at work. For those of you that say no due to this being a hardware forum, perhaps consider that since we have already got a game sub-forum anyway, why not clean it up a bit? They're inevitably going to exist anyway, as a fair majority of people here use their computers for gaming.


EDIT: Actually having read the review posted a few posts earlier (trying to read a massive wall of text on a phone screen, while out and about, brings upon an immense feeling of dread), I must saw that it was quite a good read. While I'd still like more orientation towards technical aspects of games, it was still a very well written piece work and I think it's great that you gave up your own time to do something for the TPU community. Can't ask for much more. Thanks RCoon!


It would be awesome if a small group of dedicated gamers who enjoy analyzing and reviewing games came together and volunteered their time to make this a regular occurrence. I'd think it would greatly enrich this forum as a whole and increase the quality of content found in the gaming related threads/sub-forums.

 

[LightningJR]

I didn't read every post in this thread so I apologize if it's been already said. I would like TPU to do game reviews, I would also like the reviews to have an very in depth section of the TECH of games, like graphics/physics/sound, etc. Since this is techpowerup and we're PC focused so I think it's important.


One of the main reasons I would like TPU to do game reviews is because I trust TPU's reviews on hardware so I could trust it's neutrality with games. I don't know if I know of any sites that I can say I fully trust with game reviews.



pss, just did a very quick check on the post above mine and noticed my first point is covered. Im one more for the team of tech aspects of the game!

 

[FordGT90Concept]

I think you hit on something I would be interested in: the tech of games. There is no good resource out there about game development and the technology in games. If someone could land an interview with developers working on the game and ask them questions like "tell me about the engine," "what new technology in the game excites you the most," and "what was the weirdest bug you had to squish?" So much about games relies on the engine which is a thread that passes through many titles. Unless the interview brings up things like gameplay, TPU shouldn't write much about it because that varies a lot from game to game on the same engine. TPU should be the place game developers go to sell their engine, not necessarily their game.

There are no good resources out there on game engines.

 

[Winston_008]

I voted no, to be honest I think game reviews is more of a next powerup thing.

 

[BiggieShady]

There are no good resources out there on game engines.

This is part of what I meant with doing reviews with a tpu twist ... kind of what guru3d does at http://www.guru3d.com/articles-categories/game-reviews.html, but they focus exclusively on performance ... i agree, it would be great to have engine features analysis from a developers standpoint

 

[RCoon]

This is part of what I meant with doing reviews with a tpu twist ... kind of what guru3d does at http://www.guru3d.com/articles-categories/game-reviews.html, but they focus exclusively on performance ... i agree, it would be great to have engine features analysis from a developers standpoint

I'd love to talk to devs about engine features, the work they do with engine upgrades and how it handles processes, however I'm not staff, and I don't think TPU has the kind of weight needed to get devs to talk to me about that sort of thing In addition to CPU, GPU and VRAM usage, what indepth tech details do you want to see in the next review? Eventually all the charts I've done will grow to provide comparison. And if requested, I'll update graphs for specific resolutions too.

EDIT: Clockwork Empires devs Gaslamp Games do a blog on the actual creation of their game. they might spare a few words for me. However, I'm not sure the game is one the people of TPU would be heavily interested in (would you?). From what I see on the games forums, it's mostly FPS, Space Sim, Racing Sim, and the occasional minecraft-esque.

 

[FordGT90Concept]

Clockwork Empires sounds interesting to me. I'd read it. They're based out of British Columbia, Canada though.

 

[Scatler]

I really wonder how's TPU going to deal with the inevitable onslaught from the likes of youtube commenters, blatant trolls, haters just for sake of hating and other imaginable garbage that surround reviewers because most of them don't even bother with moderation or quality of commenters.
I vote yes, but only if the commenters will be held accountable for what they post.