Rather bitchy review of Dominions II at IGN

[Brian Rubin]

Am I the only one that thinks this review is particularly whiny?

http://pc.ign.com/articles/489/489136p1.html?fromint=1

I sure hope not.

[Ben Sones]

I just found this quote sort of funny:


Well, when you finally get all that figured out, you'll get to the actual game, featuring an overhead, 2D geographical map dotted with unlabeled icons and framed by an interface stocked with action buttons and more stats.

Don't you sort of defeat the purpose of an icon when you put a label on it?

I won't argue with his complaints about the game's accessibility and interface. Both are problems. I do suspect that he didn't play it much, though, because the game mechanics actually aren't all that complicated, once you figure them out. There aren't really that many things to do--you buy units, move units, do research, and build structures. That's 99% of the game, and the building bits are significantly less complicated than, say, the average RTS, since you can only build three different buildings. I absolutely agree that the game makes everything seem a hell of a lot more complicated than it really is, at least until you get used to it. That could have been easily solved with a better manual and a tutorial (or, alternately, with a better interface). But the basic gameplay is a lot simpler, mechanically, than he seems to think.

[Luke M]

Don't you sort of defeat the purpose of an icon when you put a label on it?


Not with most new games. Icons can be confusing without those little pop-up text labels that appear after you hold your mouse over them for a second or two.

[Rywill]

It really seemed like he didn't play the game. He talks a lot about how difficult the setup is and how hard it is to figure out what's going on. He says nothing--literally nothing--about what happens when you're actually playing the game, except to say that combat graphics are bad. He makes a couple of vague statements like "There's a decent game under there if you can find it," but I didn't see anything in the review that made me think he had actually played even a single game to completion...and a few things that made me think he didn't (such as his false statement that once you set dominion scales, there's no way to go back and change them without restarting the program. I don't know if he means once the game is underway, but it seems like not, because he also says that if you go over your points, it won't let you go back and make changes, which is also untrue AFAIK).

[olaf]

It was an ok review. Like some of the other negative ones, they are written for 'average' gamers and Dominions 2 is not going to be their cup of tea.

The review could have been longer though, he spent a lot of time describing the start of the game but not much time at all on the actual gameplay. He also went a little overboard describing how you have to back out and start all over during god creation.

I think it should also be clear by now that the game needs to ship with much better docs and some kind of ingame tutorial.

olaf

[MindToyGames]

IGN, after examing numerous reviews, seems to have some of the most uninformed and poor reviews on the planet, IMHO, on many games. They seem to cater to the "flash n dash" element, and not to gamers that don't follow a straight line to have fun. The Dom II review is a good example of this. I agree...it's written in a state of malaise and disinterest.

The just posted review of my game, Coliseum, seems much the same...seems like the reviewer made up his mind before he opened the case. Lots of picking on peripheral BS issues that has little to do with the actual gameplay, and some statements that told me he played it for about 20 minutes and wrote the review. *sigh* Three people have already wrote me and said they've e-mailed complaints to IGN about the review, but it's pointless, I guess.

Lucky for me most of my gaming friends tell me the last place they take seriously about game reviews is IGN. :)

[Ben Sones]

He makes a couple of vague statements like "There's a decent game under there if you can find it," but I didn't see anything in the review that made me think he had actually played even a single game to completion...and a few things that made me think he didn't (such as his false statement that once you set dominion scales, there's no way to go back and change them without restarting the program.

Yeah, I found that comment odd. He has nothing good to say about the game throughout the entire review, but then tosses in that bit at the end. It almost seemed like speculation--like he assumes there's a decent game there, but couldn't he be bothered to find it himself, and thus has nothing specific to say about it. It's a weird statement to put in such an overwhelmingly negative review, in any event. If I were his editor, I'd ask him to either elaborate on it or remove it.

[MindToyGames]

He makes a couple of vague statements like "There's a decent game under there if you can find it," but I didn't see anything in the review that made me think he had actually played even a single game to completion...and a few things that made me think he didn't (such as his false statement that once you set dominion scales, there's no way to go back and change them without restarting the program.

Yeah, I found that comment odd. He has nothing good to say about the game throughout the entire review, but then tosses in that bit at the end. It almost seemed like speculation--like he assumes there's a decent game there, but couldn't he be bothered to find it himself, and thus has nothing specific to say about it. It's a weird statement to put in such an overwhelmingly negative review, in any event. If I were his editor, I'd ask him to either elaborate on it or remove it.

Exactly...it's almost like writing, "If i'd been bothered to actually try to play this game and learn it before writing this review, it might have been pretty good!"

[extarbags]

But if you have to dig through an ostensibly boring, overcomplicated, and utterly unentertaining game and search for the good game that lies somewhere within, isn't that a serious flaw in the game?

[Chowhound]

The review of Coliseum wasn't so much a review as it was a bashing. IGN journalism at its best. They seem to pander to the LCD anyways. The Dom2 review was also a joke - 2 pages about the setup menus, and half a sentence about how there may be a good game there.

[Chris Nahr]

But if you have to dig through an ostensibly boring, overcomplicated, and utterly unentertaining game and search for the good game that lies somewhere within, isn't that a serious flaw in the game?

You... you casual gamer, you! I bet you even play console games...

[extarbags]

But if you have to dig through an ostensibly boring, overcomplicated, and utterly unentertaining game and search for the good game that lies somewhere within, isn't that a serious flaw in the game?

You... you casual gamer, you! I bet you even play console games...

I do... but... I also play games like four to six hours a day... is that really that casual?

[Rywill]

But if you have to dig through an ostensibly boring, overcomplicated, and utterly unentertaining game and search for the good game that lies somewhere within, isn't that a serious flaw in the game?
Sure. Dom2 absolutely has terrible docs, no tutorial (inexcusable in a game that is so complex, and also so different from most strategy games in both interface and game concepts), and an interface that is, at best, not terrible once you know everything about how it works. Those are all totally valid knocks against the game and any review should mention them.

The weird thing about the IGN review was that the entire review is about those things, plus some other made-up problems that the game doesn't even have. There's no writing about the gameplay itself, which is too bad because Dom2 is a terrific game if you can get over the hump and learn it. IOW, although it would be wrong not to describe the flaws of Dom2, it's at least equally wrong not to describe the good stuff in there.

Then at the end of the review, he says "But there's a great game in there if you learn to play it," but doesn't say why or describe it in any way. I'm not a writer or anything like that, but it really came off like somebody just trying to cover their ass. I doubt he played the actual game very much at all. 95% of the review is about the setup because that's all he was familiar with, I'm guessing. Then he throws in "But it's a good game underneath" to (A) make it sound like he played the game and (B) give himself some cover in case people blast him for his review.

[extarbags]

But if you have to dig through an ostensibly boring, overcomplicated, and utterly unentertaining game and search for the good game that lies somewhere within, isn't that a serious flaw in the game?
Sure. Dom2 absolutely has terrible docs, no tutorial (inexcusable in a game that is so complex, and also so different from most strategy games in both interface and game concepts), and an interface that is, at best, not terrible once you know everything about how it works. Those are all totally valid knocks against the game and any review should mention them.

The weird thing about the IGN review was that the entire review is about those things, plus some other made-up problems that the game doesn't even have. There's no writing about the gameplay itself, which is too bad because Dom2 is a terrific game if you can get over the hump and learn it. IOW, although it would be wrong not to describe the flaws of Dom2, it's at least equally wrong not to describe the good stuff in there.

Then at the end of the review, he says "But there's a great game in there if you learn to play it," but doesn't say why or describe it in any way. I'm not a writer or anything like that, but it really came off like somebody just trying to cover their ass. I doubt he played the actual game very much at all. 95% of the review is about the setup because that's all he was familiar with, I'm guessing.

First, I agree that he probably was trying to cover his ass, having not played the good part of the game. But it's IGN. You kind of have to expect that.

Second, that doesn't make it wrong for him to complain about the game without getting to the good part. The only problem is that he speculated that there might be a good part without actually knowing. If you're playing a shitty platform game, but the tenth level is just incredibly awesome, there's nothing wrong with not talking about the awesome tenth level because you stopped after six levels because the game is just that horrible. Reviewers are, imo, honor-bound to finish games that they give good reviews to, but not games that they give bad reviews to, because if a game is that bad for that long, chances are most people aren't going to care to stick around to see if there's a silver lining.

[Timemaster Tim]

Reviewers are, imo, honor-bound to finish games that they give good reviews to, but not games that they give bad reviews to, because if a game is that bad for that long, chances are most people aren't going to care to stick around to see if there's a silver lining.

I'll agree with that sentiment, but they should also disclose that they gave up on the game because it was just that bad. This is not the case with the Dom2 review. It goes from a detailed critique of the game set-up and interface to some vague comments about the game with a one-liner indicating that the game might be good if you fight your way through the problems.

If he didn't really finish the game, then bad on him for non-disclosure. If he really did finish it, then expand on the statement "There's a decent game under there if you can find it". Either way, it is a poorly done review.

[extarbags]

Reviewers are, imo, honor-bound to finish games that they give good reviews to, but not games that they give bad reviews to, because if a game is that bad for that long, chances are most people aren't going to care to stick around to see if there's a silver lining.

I'll agree with that sentiment, but they should also disclose that they gave up on the game because it was just that bad. This is not the case with the Dom2 review. It goes from a detailed critique of the game set-up and interface to some vague comments about the game with a one-liner indicating that the game might be good if you fight your way through the problems.

If he didn't really finish the game, then bad on him for non-disclosure. If he really did finish it, then expand on the statement "There's a decent game under there if you can find it". Either way, it is a poorly done review.

That much I agree with. But like I said, IGN.

[Greg Vederman]

IGN, after examing numerous reviews, seems to have some of the most uninformed and poor reviews on the planet, IMHO, on many games. They seem to cater to the "flash n dash" element, and not to gamers that don't follow a straight line to have fun. The Dom II review is a good example of this. I agree...it's written in a state of malaise and disinterest.

The just posted review of my game, Coliseum, seems much the same...seems like the reviewer made up his mind before he opened the case. Lots of picking on peripheral BS issues that has little to do with the actual gameplay, and some statements that told me he played it for about 20 minutes and wrote the review. *sigh* Three people have already wrote me and said they've e-mailed complaints to IGN about the review, but it's pointless, I guess.

Lucky for me most of my gaming friends tell me the last place they take seriously about game reviews is IGN. :)

The reviewer in question, Tom McNamara, was my intern over here at PC Gamer Magazine before he left for IGN. He's a huge fan of turn-based strategy games. I guarantee you that he did not enter into the game in a "state of malaise and disinterest."

-Vede

[Dr Fear]

The reviewer in question, Tom McNamara, was my intern over here at PC Gamer Magazine before he left for IGN. He's a huge fan of turn-based strategy games. I guarantee you that he did not enter into the game in a "state of malaise and disinterest."

-Vede
That doesn't mean he actually played the game.

[MindToyGames]

IGN, after examing numerous reviews, seems to have some of the most uninformed and poor reviews on the planet, IMHO, on many games. They seem to cater to the "flash n dash" element, and not to gamers that don't follow a straight line to have fun. The Dom II review is a good example of this. I agree...it's written in a state of malaise and disinterest.

The just posted review of my game, Coliseum, seems much the same...seems like the reviewer made up his mind before he opened the case. Lots of picking on peripheral BS issues that has little to do with the actual gameplay, and some statements that told me he played it for about 20 minutes and wrote the review. *sigh* Three people have already wrote me and said they've e-mailed complaints to IGN about the review, but it's pointless, I guess.

Lucky for me most of my gaming friends tell me the last place they take seriously about game reviews is IGN. :)

The reviewer in question, Tom McNamara, was my intern over here at PC Gamer Magazine before he left for IGN. He's a huge fan of turn-based strategy games. I guarantee you that he did not enter into the game in a "state of malaise and disinterest."

-Vede

Then how do you explain that...well...lousy review of Dom II? Almost everyone here so far agrees..it doesn't cut the mustard, it doesn't cover both strengths and weaknesses accurately and fairly, and it doesn't gel into a cohesive whole as a review in general.

Maybe IGN itself edited the article or whatever, but that review, as posted, is substandard, IMHO.

Derek
Stormcloud Creations
www.stormcloudcreations.com

[Jakub]

You guys and your conspiracy theories every time someone disagrees with the consensus on here.

I'm sure if he mentioned the gameplay, you guys would find some other reason to pick on the review. Maybe he wouldn't have said enough about multiplayer, or you'd argue he didn't play it enough.

While it's conceivable that he didn't play, if he's as much of a turn-based strategy buff as Darth Veder here says, that's even more of a condemnation of the game. If true, should he have disclosed that he found the game so dislikeable he couldn't even play it? Maybe, but that'd take away from his argument that it's a bad game.

[Brooski]

Also, if you want to cancel a setup stage and go back to a previous one, that's not possible-- you have to start from scratch if you accidentally click on the wrong scale and waste some points on something you don't want or are confused about and want to avoid. Then, if you spend too many points, the game notifies you and won't let you actually start playing. Okay, I'll just go back and undo...Ha! That's right, I can't go back. Yes, dear readers, you are stuck. You have to exit out of the game using one of your favorite Windows "get the hell out of this app" keyboard shortcuts like Alt+F4, CTRL+ESC, or good ole' CTRL+ALT+DEL.
Verifiably false statements. The review is his opinion, but it should not contain factual errors.

[Greg Vederman]

The reviewer in question, Tom McNamara, was my intern over here at PC Gamer Magazine before he left for IGN. He's a huge fan of turn-based strategy games. I guarantee you that he did not enter into the game in a "state of malaise and disinterest."

-Vede
That doesn't mean he actually played the game.

And a mistake or two in his review of a very complex game that shipped with extremely poor documentation doesn't mean that he didn't.

Here's the simple fact: If the Qt3 peanut gallery loves a game that has poor documentation and a bad interface, the Qt3 peanut gallery will jump on any reviewer who slams it. If the Qt3 peanut gallery hates a game that has poor documentation and a bad interface, the Qt3 peanut gallery will jump on any reviewer who praises it.

No one need dig much deeper than that to get to the heart of this particular "controversy."

-Vede

[olaf]

Also, if you want to cancel a setup stage and go back to a previous one, that's not possible-- you have to start from scratch if you accidentally click on the wrong scale and waste some points on something you don't want or are confused about and want to avoid. Then, if you spend too many points, the game notifies you and won't let you actually start playing. Okay, I'll just go back and undo...Ha! That's right, I can't go back. Yes, dear readers, you are stuck. You have to exit out of the game using one of your favorite Windows "get the hell out of this app" keyboard shortcuts like Alt+F4, CTRL+ESC, or good ole' CTRL+ALT+DEL.
Verifiably false statements. The review is his opinion, but it should not contain factual errors.

I think he meant that you cant go back and choose a new god once you have gotten to the point where you adjust scales and choose magic paths, etc.. And he's right, you cant. Once you are on the screen that says 'Design Your God' with (X Points Left) below it, you cant cancel out of that screen. You have to click Ready and actually create the God, or quit the game.

olaf

[Silverlight]

Here's the simple fact: If a game that the Qt3 peanut gallery loves has poor documentation and a bad interface, it will collectively jump on any reviewer who slams it. If a game that the Qt3 peanut gallery hates has poor documentation and a bad interface, it will collectively jump on any reviewer who praises it.

No one need dig much deeper than that to get at the heart of this particular "controversy."

It's almost depressing to note how close this is to traditional message board fanboyism. Whenever someone here says they don't like Dom2, the immediate response is that they didn't give it enough of a chance.

[Brian Rubin]

I think the real issue here is the sheer lack of length or depth in a review covering what is a long and deep game. The review is pretty basic, doesn't cover much regarding the gameplay itself, and seems to be mainly a bitchfest on the part of the author rather than an objective review. To me, it seems to be an unfair review.

[steve]

I think the real issue here is the sheer lack of length or depth in a review covering what is a long and deep game.
I do find it interesting that multiple people have mentioned the review being too short, as if more words alone would have made it a better review. No, that would have just made it longer.

But really, that IGN review is over 1300 words long. Tom Chick's review in the February CGM was 700, yet I don't think anyone would feel it was too short, mainly because... well, most of you agreed with it. And I guess it was "deep," whatever that means in the context of a review.

Anyway, a 300 word review could cover any game as well as a 700 word one, regardless of the depth of a game, if the writer is any good.

[Brooski]

I think he meant that you cant go back and choose a new god once you have gotten to the point where you adjust scales and choose magic paths, etc..
The review pretty clearly states that if you click on the wrong dominion scale, there is no way to change it, which is incorrect. If he meant otherwise, the review should be edited to reflect that.

And a mistake or two in his review of a very complex game that shipped with extremely poor documentation doesn't mean that he didn't.
Of course it doesn't. The only issue for me is that since the reviewer uses a name without any digits in it, which is also presumably his own, and he worked for you as an intern and created an obviously very favorable impression, that means he has some commitment to writing real reviews, and that he's a sharp guy. Given these two things, it would have been great to read a review by him which spent more time addressing the gameplay issues, whether or not he liked them. I'd be really interested in his opinion on these things, especially the dominion gameplay mechanic, which is a pretty interesting departure from previous fantasy strategy game models. Instead, most of the time wa spent on interface, documentation, and setup issues. That's certainly valid if he felt they were so important, but that means I didn't get his opinion on the things I'm interested in. So for me, it's an opportunity missed. Since I already own and like the game, I'm not his target audience. But it's unfortunate. For me.


But really, that IGN review is over 1300 words long. Tom Chick's review in the February CGM was 700, yet I don't think anyone would feel it was too short, mainly because... well, most of you agreed with it.
Good point!

[Old Man Gravy]

The thing that clued me into the fact that he hadn't really played was his assertion that a player, as a beginner, would kick the game's ass silly on easy AI. I thought the same thing during my first game, until I got to turn 36 and my scout saw (on the same turn) the enemy army of 120 units advancing towards my home provinces, all of which were guarded by about 12 units. Oh, and that same turn the scout saw one of the main enemy bases with 660 units guarding it. Thank goodness the demo's only 40 turns long!

I'm not a hard grognard, but I love Dom2 and didn't think it was that hard to pick up on (thanks to Bruce's docs). I can't imagine someone who is a true turn based strat fan not liking that game (even the cumbersome god/dominion creation part) if they have an open mind.

edited for spellnig

[Brian Rubin]

Steve, I agree that length isn't always an issue, but here the length that was devoted to the game didn't cover much, if any of the actual gameplay present in Dominions II. It also didn't go into any great detail as to playing the game itself, rather covered the initial setup options and what not. If the length involved had been perhaps more balanced, or more in depth, it would not be an issue IMO.

[Shadari]

Someone grow some balls and email the author and ask him about his review. Who knows, he might be very open about the situation. I'd do it if I knew anything about this darned game, but I don't, so I won't. :P

[Jakub]

Someone grow some balls and email the author and ask him about his review. Who knows, he might be very open about the situation. I'd do it if I knew anything about this darned game, but I don't, so I won't. :P
Why would he come here where everyone's convicted him beforehand and already dismisses any possibility he's played the game?

Nobody in their right mind asks a game's fanboys for comment on a review after they bash it.

[Jakub]

Anyway, a 300 word review could cover any game as well as a 700 word one, regardless of the depth of a game, if the writer is any good.
Yeah, girls say "size doesn't matter" to guys with small dicks too. :p

[Ben Sones]

Here's the simple fact: If a game that the Qt3 peanut gallery loves has poor documentation and a bad interface, it will collectively jump on any reviewer who slams it. If a game that the Qt3 peanut gallery hates has poor documentation and a bad interface, it will collectively jump on any reviewer who praises it.

No one need dig much deeper than that to get at the heart of this particular "controversy."

It's almost depressing to note how close this is to traditional message board fanboyism. Whenever someone here says they don't like Dom2, the immediate response is that they didn't give it enough of a chance.

I never said that. Neither did most of the other folks responding. Nor did we discount his criticisms--in fact, I said I agreed with him. And it's possible that he played a lot of the game and just felt that the problems outweighed the things he liked about it. It's hard to tell, though, because 95% of the review deals with the setup screen.

I have no problem with anyone that doesn't like Dominions 2. I can totally understand why the game might turn someone off. If the message you are getting fom my posts is "he didn't llike the game, so obviously he didn't play it enough," then you need to reread my posts. In fact, I don't think anyone here is saying that.

[Brian Rubin]

Someone grow some balls and email the author and ask him about his review. Who knows, he might be very open about the situation. I'd do it if I knew anything about this darned game, but I don't, so I won't. :P
I've played it a bit, and while it's not the "best game EVAR," I felt it's good enough to warrant at least a more indepth discussion of the gameplay itself. I might write the author if I feel it'll do any good, which it probably won't.

[Jakub]

If he spent 95% of the review commenting on the setup screen and gave it a good score, I doubt we'd see this reaction. Or if he completely glazed over the interface/tutorial/setup aspect.

Wouldn't he be just as unfair to his readers, who'd be lulled into a false sense of security and buy the game based on a good review and good comments about the gameplay - but be completely frustrated by the setup and interface?

[Brian Rubin]

If he spent 95% of the review commenting on the setup screen and gave it a good score, I doubt we'd see this reaction. Or if he completely glazed over the interface/tutorial/setup aspect.

Wouldn't he be just as unfair to his readers, who'd be lulled into a false sense of security and buy the game based on a good review and good comments about the gameplay - but be completely frustrated by the setup and interface?
No, this would also be unfair, granted. My main beef is at how unbalanced the review is. It covers mostly one aspect of the game (i.e. setting up a game) and seems to ignore or gloss over anything else. This is also unfair to the readers.

[Lum]

To be fair, Dom2 is a very, very deep game with a very, very hideous user interface. If the reviewer cannot get past the very, very hideous user interface, this may not be entirely the fault of the reviewer.

[Jakub]

No, this would also be unfair, granted. My main beef is at how unbalanced the review is. It covers mostly one aspect of the game (i.e. setting up a game) and seems to ignore or gloss over anything else. This is also unfair to the readers.
I'm with Lum. If Tom couldn't get past the beginning (which really isn't all that difficult to believe), it's hard to expect him to write about the gameplay. While it may be completely fair to expect him to say that he couldn't get into the gameplay due to the convoluted setup and interface, it's also completely unrealistic - and that carries greater weight. He clearly did play the game, and while you can argue until you're blue in the face whether or not he played it "enough", it sounds a lot like those MOO3 fanboy threads on "how to play MOO3 so you can enjoy it." Sorry, that's the way it is.

All-in-all, I think the score was fair, though perhaps a touch low relative to the IGN scale. I'm sure it also reflects the feelings of the average IGN reader quite well. I think Tom simply had the same problem with Dom2 that I had with Victoria. A good game underneath the mess, but nobody should really be expected to dig through it.

[edited one sentence for clarity]

[Brian Rubin]

You raise a valid point, valid enough for me to question my thoughts on this. Thanks. :)

[Jakub]

I'm just really happy I could get into a debate and not start throwing names around :)

[Ben Sones]

If he spent 95% of the review commenting on the setup screen and gave it a good score, I doubt we'd see this reaction. Or if he completely glazed over the interface/tutorial/setup aspect.

Yeah, we would. I would absolutely have a problem with a review that didn't talk about how incredibly obtuse and inaccessible the game is, because that's a major issue. But I think you are totally missing the point here. Nobody here is criticising Tom for not liking the game.

[Jakub]

Yeah, we would. I would absolutely have a problem with a review that didn't talk about how incredibly obtuse and inaccessible the game is, because that's a major issue. But I think you are totally missing the point here. Nobody here is criticising Tom for not liking the game.
Then why isn't everyone criticizing Tom Chick for liking the game despite the awful interface, no tutorial and useless manual? :)

[Peter Frazier]

Nobody in their right mind asks a game's fanboys for comment on a review after they bash it.
I'm glad you could get into a debate without throwing insults around. :roll:

[Jakub]

Nobody in their right mind asks a game's fanboys for comment on a review after they bash it.
I'm glad you could get into a debate without throwing insults around. :roll:
I'm sorry if you were insulted by that, in that case.

[Jobe]

Six threads about Dominions 2 on the front page alone.

What's the big deal about IGN panning the game? This is why you like games like this: the underdog, the game that the "masses" won't even go near. Not only are you okay with the game's bad graphics and poor documentation, but in fact they make your game experience even better.

What would be written on these pages if you couldn't say "some people can't look past bad graphics", and couldn't think "but I can!"? Yeah, many people post at sites like this one because they like games like Dom2, but that's just part of it: they also post at sites like this one because most people don't like games like Dom2.

So what's the surprise? Isn't this the second thread that has said "mainstream game review didn't like Dom2, complain within"? The conclusion to the review is no surprise, and the same old rants against the mainstream are really starting to wear on people, based on what I've read above. So what's the big deal? Do you just hope beyond hope that this game will get the mainstream credit that you think it deserves? It can't, it's not possible; you knew that the first time you played it. But it exists, and it's yours. Not a bad deal.

[Brian Rubin]

I'm not surprised by the low score, as Dom II isn't for everyone, what DOES surprise me is the sheer negativity present in this review, so much negativity that just smacks the reader in the face...well, at least it smacked me in the face.

[Jakub]

I'm not surprised by the low score, as Dom II isn't for everyone, what DOES surprise me is the sheer negativity present in this review, so much negativity that just smacks the reader in the face...well, at least it smacked me in the face.
That's true, but keep in mind it's all relative. I'm sure if someone who got stumped while playing the game read the review, he'd be saying "Wow, that Tom McNamara guy speaks the holy truth." In the end it's all opinion. While it might be nice if Tom had a better experience with Dom2 and could tell people to pick up the game if they have the patience to work through its quirks and discover a whole new style of play, there are other reviews that do that - like Tom Chick's. McNamara just presented the dissenting point of view and will serve as an extra caution for those unsure about their ability to digest such a complex and (initially) unfriendly game.

[extarbags]

I'm not surprised by the low score, as Dom II isn't for everyone, what DOES surprise me is the sheer negativity present in this review, so much negativity that just smacks the reader in the face...well, at least it smacked me in the face.
That's true, but keep in mind it's all relative. I'm sure if someone who got stumped while playing the game read the review, he'd be saying "Wow, that Tom McNamara guy speaks the holy truth." In the end it's all opinion. While it might be nice if Tom had a better experience with Dom2 and could tell people to pick up the game if they have the patience to work through its quirks and discover a whole new style of play, there are other reviews that do that - like Tom Chick's. McNamara just presented the dissenting point of view and will serve as an extra caution for those unsure about their ability to digest such a complex and (initially) unfriendly game.

Could you do me a favor and please rephrase that in a way that makes people who don't like Dom2 seem even more like a secret sect of imbeciles who deserve not to be shunned, but helped through life in a world that must seem utterly befuddling to them at every turn?

[Jakub]

Could you do me a favor and please rephrase that in a way that makes people who don't like Dom2 seem even more like a secret sect of imbeciles who deserve not to be shunned, but helped through life in a world that must seem utterly befuddling to them at every turn?
I don't think I phrased it like that at all. I'd hardly consider someone smart enough to save their money and not buy a game that's a chore to learn (and possibly play, depending on your opinion), as an imbecile. But there is the fact that there are some members of the mainstream who may grow to like these games if only exposed to them.

[Dave Long]

When you write a review, you focus on the things that matter to you as a reviewer while also looking at the product as a whole. Obviously, the stuff that Tom talks about in the review mattered to him and really drug the game down to where he didn't dig it much. It's his opinion, you guys don't agree.

Reading the review, the first page does a good job of telling me how convoluted the game is right from the start. All that seems fine to make a point about how much you need to know to play although it could've been done in one or two sentences. It's just a stylistic choice due to the need for over a thousand words in an IGN review.

If there's anything to get up in arms about it's that he does say there's a good game underneath all the stuff you have to learn to play it but doesn't go into any detail on why it's good. This review just needed an editor to get Tom focused on the important information instead of a lot of words to make one major point.

This is a cop out too...


Lasting Appeal
Once you untie the Gordian Knot of how to play the game, it's no so painful after all. But most people don't have the time or patience with so many games from last X-mas still waiting in their queue.

--Dave

[Anaxagoras]

Well Jakub, looks like you spoke too soon. I guess it's not possible to have a discussion of ideas without someone getting a bee in their bonnet.

Extarbags there was nothing in that post that indicated a "sect of imbeciles", nor people who need to be " helped through life in a world that must seem utterly befuddling to them at every turn". It was, instead, merely a reasonably phrased point of view. But thanks for playing, and next time, try not to get ego involved when someone posts an opposing viewpoint. It happens, you know. In fact, things would get very boring if it didn't.

[-Lord Ebonstone-]

What's the big deal about IGN panning the game? This is why you like games like this: the underdog, the game that the "masses" won't even go near. Not only are you okay with the game's bad graphics and poor documentation, but in fact they make your game experience even better.

I agree with all that.

Dominions 2 is a positively brilliant game that doesn't need to be marred and infected by the "mainstream." Dominions 2 works becase morons are filtered out, saying, "omg teh grafix r so bad" or "I NO NEED BUY DOMINYUNS WEN HL2 IZ SO NEAR!!!!!!111!!111!1" or "y cant i kontrol my unitz????!?!?!" In short, Dominions 2 is the software equivalent of extremely selective eugenics: all the poor imbreds get sterilized (and proceed to sign up for IGN Insider and Gamespot Complete), while us ubermensches get to bask in the glory of the best TBS ever released.

EDIT: Matthew Gallant is a tool.

[-Lord Ebonstone-]

Well Jakub, looks like you spoke too soon. I guess it's not possible to have a discussion of ideas without someone getting a bee in their bonnet.
He's just jealous that he doesn't 'get it.'

[-Lord Ebonstone-]

Oh, and about the review: It sucks.

[Matthew Gallant]

It's ubermensch, or rather, -ubermensch-.

[Ben Sones]

Then why isn't everyone criticizing Tom Chick for liking the game despite the awful interface, no tutorial and useless manual? :)

Because his review was well written. Again, because I'm not sure I'm getting through here: The issue was not that the IGN guy didn't like the game. I have no problem with that. I can totally understand how someone might not like this game. In fact, I said as much about the Gamespot review (which was about 1000 times better than that IGN review) in the other thread.

The issue was that most of his review was about the first minute and a half of time that you spend playing the game. He spends 90% of the review talking about the goddamn setup screen, and then barely even mentions how the game actually plays, almost in passing. The funny thing is, he didn't even touch on any of the stuff that really makes the interface annoying. The stuff in the setup screen is pretty trivial.

Maybe in your mind a review is "good" as long as the writer nails the score that you think the game should have. Personally, I have a problem with a 1300-word review that contains exactly as much information as I could gather myself by playing the demo for three minutes.


Yeah, girls say "size doesn't matter" to guys with small dicks too. :p

Yeah, and the guys with big dicks always think they're the shit, even if they're lousy in bed. What's your point?

[Luke M]

Here's the simple fact: If a game that the Qt3 peanut gallery loves has poor documentation and a bad interface, it will collectively jump on any reviewer who slams it. If a game that the Qt3 peanut gallery hates has poor documentation and a bad interface, it will collectively jump on any reviewer who praises it.

No one need dig much deeper than that to get at the heart of this particular "controversy."

It's almost depressing to note how close this is to traditional message board fanboyism. Whenever someone here says they don't like Dom2, the immediate response is that they didn't give it enough of a chance.

No, if it was message board fanboyism, then there'd be a million post calling the detractor a fuckhead or dumbass.

And, besides, who in their right mind's going to trust a review from IGN? Any game site that names itself after a made up acronym automatically looses all credibility to me.

[XPav]

Isn't it about now someone makes a McGriddles crack?

[Erik]

Once you untie the Gordian Knot of how to play the game, it's no so painful after all.

Aren't you supposed to cut a Gordian Knot rather than untie it? And "It's no so painful" is usually written "ees no so painful". Other than those things, I think the review's accurate.

[extarbags]

Isn't it about now someone makes a McGriddles crack?


Dominions 2 is about as bad as a Burger King Croissanwich! I'll stick with my McGriddles, thank you very much. Delicious eggs, cheese, and bacon, sausage, or ham on a syrup-infused english muffin. I'm Lovin' It (tm).

[Luke M]

Anyway, a 300 word review could cover any game as well as a 700 word one, regardless of the depth of a game, if the writer is any good.
Yeah, girls say "size doesn't matter" to guys with small dicks too. :p

Isn't there an amandment to the Nazi clause about dick size buried somewhere in the anals of Thread Killing Topics?

[-Lord Ebonstone-]

It's ubermensch, or rather, -ubermensch-.
Fuck off.

[Erik]

Dominions 2 is a positively brilliant game that doesn't need to be marred and infected by the "mainstream." Dominions 2 works becase morons are filtered out, saying, "omg teh grafix r so bad" or "I NO NEED BUY DOMINYUNS WEN HL2 IZ SO NEAR!!!!!!111!!111!1" or "y cant i kontrol my unitz????!?!?!" In short, Dominions 2 is the software equivalent of extremely selective eugenics: all the poor imbreds get sterilized (and proceed to sign up for IGN Insider and Gamespot Complete), while us ubermenches get to bask in the glory of the best TBS ever released.

I have about ten things I want to say about that amazing paragraph. I'm going to settle for haha Bruce, this guy's on your team.

[steve]

I'm sure it also reflects the feelings of the average IGN reader quite well.
Is it the job of a publication to always reflect the perceived feelings of its readers, or to occasionally challenge them? Is it a reviewers job to look over the demographics of the publication and try to tailor his or her review to their tastes? If this is what you're supposed to do, why bother with reviewers at all; just run reader reviews, or surveys, or just have one person summarize forum posts and call it a review.

So many reviews are safe, or are afraid to take strong stands, or qualify every criticism, as if they're anticipating every nasty letter. (That's where you end up with that, "There's a great game buried under this mess" type of comments comes from.") We could probably sit here and predict every rating from most major sites before they're even published.

It's easy to write a glowing review of a game like Dominions II that provides plenty of warning: "It has a crap interface, the graphics suck, it has a learning mountain instead of a curve. But if you stick it out, you're rewarded with the best turn-based strategy experience in years. 90%."

If the "average" IGN reader reads that, they're probably smart enough to make up their own minds how much interface and graphics matter.

[Jakub]

Steve, why should Tom McNamara write a glowing review for the game if he thinks it blows?

[extarbags]

I'm sure it also reflects the feelings of the average IGN reader quite well.
Is it the job of a publication to always reflect the perceived feelings of its readers, or to occasionally challenge them? Is it a reviewers job to look over the demographics of the publication and try to tailor his or her review to their tastes? If this is what you're supposed to do, why bother with reviewers at all; just run reader reviews, or surveys, or just have one person summarize forum posts and call it a review.

So many reviews are safe, or are afraid to take strong stands, or qualify every criticism, as if they're anticipating every nasty letter. (That's where you end up with that, "There's a great game buried under this mess" type of comments comes from.") We could probably sit here and predict every rating from most major sites before they're even published.

It's easy to write a glowing review of a game like Dominions II that provides plenty of warning: "It has a crap interface, the graphics suck, it has a learning mountain instead of a curve. But if you stick it out, you're rewarded with the best turn-based strategy experience in years. 90%."

If the "average" IGN reader reads that, they're probably smart enough to make up their own minds how much interface and graphics matter.

You (and by you, I mean somebody) said this about the last Dom2 review too. Why is it so hard to believe that the reviewer isn't afraid to take a stand, that maybe, just maybe, he really doesn't think it deserves a 90%. Maybe he really does think the game deserves the score he gave it.

[Silverlight]

It's almost depressing to note how close this is to traditional message board fanboyism. Whenever someone here says they don't like Dom2, the immediate response is that they didn't give it enough of a chance.
I never said that. Neither did most of the other folks responding. Nor did we discount his criticisms--in fact, I said I agreed with him. And it's possible that he played a lot of the game and just felt that the problems outweighed the things he liked about it. It's hard to tell, though, because 95% of the review deals with the setup screen.

I have no problem with anyone that doesn't like Dominions 2. I can totally understand why the game might turn someone off. If the message you are getting fom my posts is "he didn't like the game, so obviously he didn't play it enough," then you need to reread my posts. In fact, I don't think anyone here is saying that.

I'm thinking back to when I said I didn't like Dominions 2 and made a crack about never spending more than ten minutes on an incomprehensible interface. I got a rather harsh response to that one.

If 95% of the review deals with the setup screens, then I suspect that he installed it, got totally confused by the initial setup, somewhat mystified by the lack of any direction, got into the game proper and found that nothing - absolutely nothing - worked as expected. He spent another ten minutes trying to figure it out, found that it was totally confusing, and wrote his review on that basis.

And I'm not going to fault him with it, because he's probably more experienced than his average reader and therefore can't possibly expect them to have any fun with it.

[Rywill]

I'm with Ben. The problem is not that the IGN guy (or anyone else) disliked the game. All these convoluted theories about the Qt3 folks being game fanboys, or desperately hoping the mainstream won't like their favorite game, or all that other garbage is, um, garbage. I would like nothing better than for Dom2 to get good reviews. It'd be great if folks could get past the bad interface and learn how cool this is, because then I could play against different people in email games all the time. I'm not sure what makes Jakub and Jobe think we're all computer-game versions of the guys in "High Fidelity," but I'm guessing it's just a convenient way to discount contrary opinions without having to think about or rebut them.

I think people are just saying the review needed to be "longer" because it spends a whole page and a half talking about the setup screen and then sort of ends. But really, all it needs to be is more comprehensive. Whether you do that by tacking on another page abou the gameplay, or cutting out some of the long rant about the setup screen to make room for stuff about the gameplay, it's all good. But having a game review that is almost all about the setup screen is just dumb, and naturally makes me think the person writing it probably didn't get much beyond the setup screen.

The only real arguments I've seen are:

1) "Would you like it better if he spent all his time talking about how great the game is but glossed over its flaws? Wouldn't that be unfair to the readers?"

Of course it would be. It would be just as unfair as the review that was posted. You're kind of omitting the possibility that the reviewer might have written a comprehensive and balanced review. That's always an option!

2) "Maybe he didn't play it, but it would be unrealistic to expect him to say so."

Uh, okay. I guess you're right: morally, the only option he has is to lie about having played it. What else can he do? Excellent point. It's bizarre; you're kind of saying "Well, if the interface is so bad he can't get to the game and enjoy it, he should write a bad review. But he shouldn't say that the interface kept him from the game, because that would make his review less credible." Huh?

[steve]

Steve, why should Tom McNamara write a glowing review for the game if he thinks it blows?
He shouldn't, that wasn't my point.

I just thought it was implied that regardless of how he personally felt about the game, it's IGN, hence they're obligated to dislike it because that would meet the expectations of their readers.

I gave the example just to show that if he did love it, he could still offer enough meaningful info to warn away all the hardcore FPS fans who might want to try an ugly and convuluted turn-based strategy game. Both of them.

[Troy S Goodfellow]

If 95% of the review deals with the setup screens, then I suspect that he installed it, got totally confused by the initial setup, somewhat mystified by the lack of any direction, got into the game proper and found that nothing - absolutely nothing - worked as expected. He spent another ten minutes trying to figure it out, found that it was totally confusing, and wrote his review on that basis.

If this were the case, we would hardly expect Mr. McNamara to write that the game was rewarding and replayable once you got beyond the interface. Which he didn't.

And this is the major problem with the review, and I think is Ben's problem. A reviewer is free to hate a game or love it, but if your conclusion states that the game is deep and replayable, I want to know more about it. Nothing on strategy, nothing on AI, nothing on the game itself beyond "Once you get beyond the interface, you might find something you like." Great.

(And I write this as a Dominions 2 agnostic, having never played it)

Troy

[snowcrash22]

You realize this thread is making me fish the Dom2 demo out of the recycle bin.

I hear that there is a gem of a game underneath the interface.

[-Lord Ebonstone-]

(And I write this as a Dominions 2 agnostic, having never played it)

There are no agnostics in Dominions 2! :P

(And if there are, they're lowly Milita units who are devoured by turn 3.)

[Dr Fear]

Is the Tom McNamara that wrote this review the same as the "Tom" who posts here?

http://www.quartertothree.com/phpBB2/profile.php?mode=viewprofile&u=545

He lists "Rocking until the sun comes up" and "Associate Editor, IGN.COM" in his profile.

[Jakub]

Maybe in your mind a review is "good" as long as the writer nails the score that you think the game should have. Personally, I have a problem with a 1300-word review that contains exactly as much information as I could gather myself by playing the demo for three minutes.
I doubt you could get that far in three minutes.

That he could spend 3/4 of his article explaining the shortcomings of the interface, design, manual and tutorial is pretty damning in and of itself. You also can't deny that he played the game. How much? I don't know, you don't know. Maybe he played an hour and was so turned off by it, that even though it was his job, he couldn't stomach any more.

A review that says "stick with it" is selling the game, not reviewing it. It's a "This is how you should play Moo3 so you can have fun" thread, not a review.

I'm sure if Tom enjoyed it, he'd have said "No tutorial, terrible interface, useless manual, but if you can look past those flaws, you might enjoy it". But Tom clearly didn't enjoy the game and felt no compulsion to make excuses for it or to brace potential gamers for its flaws.

Why are you guys so obsessed with trying to invalidate his review? You're picking on his comments because you disagree with the score. If Dom II got the standard IGN 9.1, this thread wouldn't exist. You're making assumptions of his time with the game based on the length of his commentary on the gameplay. Hardly fair.



Yeah, girls say "size doesn't matter" to guys with small dicks too. :p
Yeah, and the guys with big dicks always think they're the shit, even if they're lousy in bed. What's your point?
It was a joke. Maybe not funny, but please lighten up.

[Jakub]

He shouldn't, that wasn't my point.

I just thought it was implied that regardless of how he personally felt about the game, it's IGN, hence they're obligated to dislike it because that would meet the expectations of their readers.
How did you get that from the incidental statement that "I'm sure it also reflects the feelings of the average IGN reader quite well"?

[Jakub]

If 95% of the review deals with the setup screens, then I suspect that he installed it, got totally confused by the initial setup, somewhat mystified by the lack of any direction, got into the game proper and found that nothing - absolutely nothing - worked as expected. He spent another ten minutes trying to figure it out, found that it was totally confusing, and wrote his review on that basis.

If this were the case, we would hardly expect Mr. McNamara to write that the game was rewarding and replayable once you got beyond the interface. Which he didn't.

And this is the major problem with the review, and I think is Ben's problem. A reviewer is free to hate a game or love it, but if your conclusion states that the game is deep and replayable, I want to know more about it. Nothing on strategy, nothing on AI, nothing on the game itself beyond "Once you get beyond the interface, you might find something you like." Great.

(And I write this as a Dominions 2 agnostic, having never played it)

Troy
Perhaps he simply felt pressure to acknowledge that some people enjoy this? It's hardly an uncommon sentiment among reviewers. It may be sloppy but it's hardly damning evidence of sloth or incompetence.

[Jobe]

Rywill: My post had nothing to do with contrary opinions. I promise you that I didn't think about anybody else's opinion at all :) I wasn't even addressing anybody's posts, so I have no idea how I refused to think about particular opinions. Perhaps this is like where Xpav randomly accused me of insulting scharmers though I've never spoken to him before in my life. If so, I'll take a hint from that case and not expect any clarification.

I didn't even say this above, but yeah, all of the people who said "my, this looks a lot like a fanboi thread" aren't in need of spectacles.

Of course, my opinion is actually contrary to yours, and in dismissing mine you basically did what you accused non-thinking me of doing. Weird and kinda smelly, but not very interesting. You seriously didn't realize how hypocritical your post was?

This is such a bizarre message board. It's hard to even get mad anymore at all of the weird, quirky attacks, and that's a shame.

[Timemaster Tim]

Why are you guys so obsessed with trying to invalidate his review? You're picking on his comments because you disagree with the score. If Dom II got the standard IGN 9.1, this thread wouldn't exist.

I've never played Dom2. I have no idea idea whether the score is "okay" or not. But that review is simply poorly written.

[Ben Sones]

I doubt you could get that far in three minutes.

You are mistaken. I mean, I guess you could spend hours fiddling with the setup menus if you wanted to, just like you could theoretically spend hours watching the game credits over and over again. But once you learn how the stuff works, it takes less than a minute to set up a game. And I agree with him that the setup menus are intimidating and confusing and not at all newbie friendly. I just don't think I'd spend 1000 words saying it, at the expense of talking about the rest of the game.


That he could spend 3/4 of his article explaining the shortcomings of the interface, design, manual and tutorial is pretty damning in and of itself.

He doesn't talk much at all about the game interface, which is funny, since some of the interface quirks in the game itself are a lot worse than the setup menus, which are relatively benign. (And, as Bruce pointed out, several of his setup menu complaints are just factually incorrect). He only spends a sentence talking about the tutorial (which is all it really warrants, since there is none). He mentions the manual three times, very briefly, but not to criticize it (even though it definitely deserves some criticism). He spends precisely zero words talking about the design, unless you count the part where he says "there actually is an interesting game underneath it all," which I don't.


You also can't deny that he played the game. How much? I don't know, you don't know. Maybe he played an hour and was so turned off by it, that even though it was his job, he couldn't stomach any more.

As countless other people in this thread have brought up, he could have said that. And if that's the case, then why throw in that line about how there's an interesting game underneath it all? It doesn't seem like he found it very interesting, because he couldn't even be bothered to comment on it.


A review that says "stick with it" is selling the game, not reviewing it. It's a "This is how you should play Moo3 so you can have fun" thread, not a review.

Huh? Are you serious? MOO3 wasn't worth sticking with because there was no payoff. It was just a bad game, and no amount of familiarity could change that. Is it really inconceivable to you that a game could be difficult to learn but entertaining once you understand it?


I'm sure if Tom enjoyed it, he'd have said "No tutorial, terrible interface, useless manual, but if you can look past those flaws, you might enjoy it". But Tom clearly didn't enjoy the game and felt no compulsion to make excuses for it or to brace potential gamers for its flaws.

Well, he didn't brace them very well, because he missed most of the major ones.


Why are you guys so obsessed with trying to invalidate his review? You're picking on his comments because you disagree with the score.

You keep saying that, but repetition doesn't make it true. As I pointed out before, I had no problems with the GameSpot review, which also pans the game. And if you go back to the beginning of this thread, you'll see that I didn't comment at all on the fact that he disliked the game. I said that his review wasn't very comprehensive, and it seemed like he wasn't particularly familiar with how the game works. And having read his review a few more times, it still seems that way. But I didn't say that he should have given it a better score, nor did I imply that.


It was a joke. Maybe not funny, but please lighten up.

Fair enough. Sorry to be so antsy, but it's a bit irritating when the blanket response to my comments is "you're just a Dominions fanboy," even though I didn't say anything one way or the other about the review being negative.

[MikeOberly]

I just read this review.It's typical of many game reviews,especially those for online sites,in that it doesn't really tell the reader much about the game really.It almost reads like some offhand comments after futzing with the interface for a while,and maybe playing a turn or three.I don't give a shit if he likes or dislikes the game,but this is just a lame review.There is no there there.

I don't see much different from this than the type of reviews that Bruce rails against which amount to only a list of a game's features.But if my thinking this review is a piece of lazy journalism makes me part of some secret QT3 fanboy club,then I think that's pretty cool!

[Rywill]

Rywill: My post had nothing to do with contrary opinions. I promise you that I didn't think about anybody else's opinion at all
Really? My bad, then. Given that you were dissing everyone for criticizing the Dom2 review, I made the assumption that you were disagreeing with them. I hope that's enough clarification. I wouldn't want you to feel bad like you did after the XPav thing.

But what you're saying makes total sense: I have no trouble believing you didn't think about anyone's opinion before posting your response, because the stuff you said in your response doesn't bear much relationship to the stuff people said in this thread.


Of course, my opinion is actually contrary to yours, and in dismissing mine you basically did what you accused non-thinking me of doing. Weird and kinda smelly, but not very interesting. You seriously didn't realize how hypocritical your post was?
I seriously didn't. Both of my posts go into some detail about why I think the IGN review was bad (if anything, they're too detailed). Yours didn't. You threw out a lot of asshole generalizations about folks on Qt3, which I summed up with my "High Fidelity" analogy: that we like it when "mainstream" people slam the games we like, like games with bad graphics and bad manuals, and live to feel superior to the "masses" because we like games that the masses don't get. That's all not true at least in my case, and most of the folks here. Which is, you know, pretty much what I said to you in my original response, so it seems funny to be repeating it.

I guess what it comes down to is this: of all the people in this thread and on this board, the one who is most trying to make himself feel cool by being an edgy outsider is you. By all means, if you think the folks around here are tiresome posers, stop reading, for God's sake stop posting, and go somewhere that you feel more at home.

[VegasRobb]

He shouldn't, that wasn't my point.

I just thought it was implied that regardless of how he personally felt about the game, it's IGN, hence they're obligated to dislike it because that would meet the expectations of their readers.
How did you get that from the incidental statement that "I'm sure it also reflects the feelings of the average IGN reader quite well"?

Which goes back to an earlier Dominions 2 thread, why is IGN reviewing games like this if they don't appeal to the "average IGN reader"? Why even invest in reviews of games that your readers won't like?

Sites and their reliance on having to whore themselves out for "unique hits" seems to be the norm.

I see lots of people are saying, "well that's just IGN". That's damning with faint praise.

[VegasRobb]

I don't see much different from this than the type of reviews that Bruce rails against which amount to only a list of a game's features.But if my thinking this review is a piece of lazy journalism makes me part of some secret QT3 fanboy club,then I think that's pretty cool!

I can see Vederman's view, as he's defending someone he knows. That's human nature. In hindsight perhaps he should have said nothing as most of the talk on this thread revolves around how poorly written the review was and that reflects directly on the abilities of the writer. So it's possible Vederman is stuck in a bad spot defending bad work by someone he has a personal relationship with. Perhaps he should have read the review a bit closer or waited to make comment, but I can't fault him for stepping in for his guy. I just wish he hadn't invoked the cult/fanboy defense.

As for Jakub, we had a very similiar discussion in another thread, yet he seems to have forgotten it almost entirely.

It's kinda nice Dominions 2 points out the need for companies / gamesites to use qualified trustworthy reviewers. Likewise, paid reviewers should hold themselves to some kind of standard in terms playing through a game, providing useful insight.

[Old Man Gravy]

dick size buried somewhere in the anals

I know it's off topic, and crude, and doesn't have anything to do with the arguments going on here, but this is the absolute pwning-est Freudian slip/misspelling I've ever seen.

[Enidigm]

I think most of you are wrong, the review was completely correct in its scathing attacks upon Dominion 2's obtuse presentation and lack of guidance into a combat and magic system complicated enough to befit a roleplaying sourcebook.

Dominions 2 is almost unplayably dense unless you spend considerable effort to understand its complexity. I hate making decisions in the dark, and Dom2 makes reaching conclusions about your decisions a mere matter of trial and error that stretches over hours of meadering and false starts.

How many points should i put into my Pretender's magic skills? Well, let me dig through each magic school, every time, over and over, until out of frustration and boredom i just shrug, pick something random that looks good, and start playing. Oops, then i dig into the manual and discover each magic discipline has passive effects as well! Back to the drawing board. I bet i spent 2 hours testing different Pretenders for the PBeM game just to avoid making some newb mistake and pick one totally unsuited for my faction.

Its documentation isn't so much bad as it's badly organized and at best a reference. It's like learning to be a doctor by reading medical dictionaries. I had to reorganize the game's unhelpful manual by writing an excel spreadsheet just to have something i could quickly refer too whenever dealing with magic without spending 15 minutes rummaging through spell-trees.

The interface's lack of emphasis easily causes confusion and a sense of lacking any clear direction. In an RTS game, your resources are clearly centered and labeled, with icons and popups, in a convenient place in the UI. Now i see a province window with 30000k ppl, 100 resources, X defense, supplies, income, ect. Which one(s) is(are) the most important? New players might find the casual listing baffling.

I would say, however, the games most noteworthy error is the lack of a tutorial. RTS games nowadays go to the extreme length of explaining that the "black area on the map" represents unexplored terrain. God help us if we know how to begin in Dom2. Should i research, attack, build units or save my money, raise taxes, pillage my province, search for blood slaves, make a magic item, send a scout, make a prophet, preach, build a building? Most games have a 'flow' of gameplay in mind; RTS games usually start with a build-up phase. Without a tutorial to a game this complicated you have absolutely no idea where even to begin, unless, like most of us here, our past experiences with similar games intuitively inform our predictions as to what we should do next.

All that aside, I still like the game :).

[Jobe]

Rywill: I think Ebonstone took my post in the manner intended, and if you had done the same, perhaps you wouldn't have been so offended. But who knows. This is the thread for Dom2 fans to be offended. Now you can be offended at me AND the guy from IGN! Combo bonus!

I'm not generalizing over all QT3 posters, just the ones who rail on fanboys and then turn around and make this the Dominions2Vault board. Judging by the increased amount of posts where people seem really weary about the entire thing, it's not as polarized of an issue as you'd like it to be.

Since you're a fan of "if u dun like it, leave", may I suggest for the IGN reviewer, "u couldn't do any better, so don't criticize Dom2@!!" Be reasonable, the real rule is "if you don't like it, talk about it." We're both doing just fine by that!

[Anaxagoras]

Wow. I know this has been said by every one on the board, but I'm stunned at how bad the interface is. I just downloaded the demo, and I couldn't even figure out how to play a turn when I had Bruce Geryk's walkthrough in front of me. After half an hour of futzing around with it, I finally realized that you manually have to select the nation you'll play for that turn. Have they just thrown out all gaming UI conventions???

Ah well. If even half of Geryk's strategy walkthrough is accurate, it should be fun.

[Philomath]

You've got to get a reviewer who likes that sort of game and is willing to put the time into it to really understand it prior to writing the review. If it's unplayably dense, then burn it in the review, but at least put the work in so that no one can think you don't know what you're talking about.

You guys are candy-coating this. Only a fool could think that the IGN guy spent any time with the game, or was anything other than cynical about the assignment from the outset. I guess IGN doesn't pay enough to hire reviewers who care about the quality of their work, or editors responsible enough to hold writers accountable. It's just laziness and indifference.

[Jon R.]

You guys are candy-coating this. Only a fool could think that the IGN guy spent any time with the game, or was anything other than cynical about the assignment from the outset. I guess IGN doesn't pay enough to hire reviewers who care about the quality of their work, or editors responsible enough to hold writers accountable. It's just laziness and indifference.

Kind of like Illwinter's laziness and indifference toward creating an efficient interface? The point some people are trying to make is that it's not like some footnote feature of the game, some crappy nitpick about trains or whatever, it's about something that you spend the entire game using. Giving up on a game because of an inefficient and nearly unusable interface isn't a huge stretch.

[Brooski]

I just downloaded the demo, and I couldn't even figure out how to play a turn when I had Bruce Geryk's walkthrough in front of me. After half an hour of futzing around with it, I finally realized that you manually have to select the nation you'll play for that turn. Have they just thrown out all gaming UI conventions???
Which part were you stuck on? Starting up a game after the "Create New Game" part, where you have to click on the nation you're going to play? I'll put a paragraph in the walkthrough about it, although I have to say that's the first complaint I've heard about that part. I think the reason that the game has you do those things is that it is designed to be very hotseat-friendly, so if you have five people playing on one computer, you can play the turns in any order. Not the most important feature, I know. It would be nice to have a solo game skip the intermediate selection screen that comes up each turn.

[Philomath]

Giving up on a game because of an inefficient and nearly unusable interface isn't a huge stretch.

Sure, it's terribly unprofessional and downright embarrassing if you're being paid to evaluate the game.

Nothing wrong with knocking the game for the reasons you mentioned. Those may be fatal flaws that should be identified, but you can't do so without being laughed at if you don't know anything about the game because you only played it for 52 minutes, like the IGN guy.

He prob read a couple of message boards, got a sense for what people liked, and added that to the review as well, in a failed attempt to avoid sounding as blatently ignorant about the game as he is.

[Tom Chick]

I have no comment about IGN's review, but this kind of stuff...


Kind of like Illwinter's laziness and indifference toward creating an efficient interface?

...is pretty silly. The problem with Dom2 isn't that the interface isn't "efficient". As many of us have pointed out, once you've learned the basics, the interface in Dom2 is actually pretty decent (if you want to see a problematic interface, try the first Dom!).

I think the complaint you're trying to get at, Jon R., is that the game has a steep learning curve. Which it does, as per SelfishGene's post (although applying RTS conventions to a complex turn-based strategy game like Dom2 is also pretty misguided).

-Tom

[Brooski]

To be fair, Dom2 is a very, very deep game with a very, very hideous user interface. If the reviewer cannot get past the very, very hideous user interface, this may not be entirely the fault of the reviewer.


I'm with Lum. If Tom couldn't get past the beginning (which really isn't all that difficult to believe), it's hard to expect him to write about the gameplay.


If 95% of the review deals with the setup screens, then I suspect that he installed it, got totally confused by the initial setup, somewhat mystified by the lack of any direction, got into the game proper and found that nothing - absolutely nothing - worked as expected. He spent another ten minutes trying to figure it out, found that it was totally confusing, and wrote his review on that basis.

I'm not suggesting that Tom didn't get past the interface - I just want to say that I think this is a really sad statement. If you're a professional reviewer, you may feel that a game has such a horrible interface that no one will get past it. But if you give up on it after an hour because that's what most people would do, you should find something else to do for a living. If you can't put ten hours (for instance) into the game, then don't review it at all. If you were trying to simulate what most people would do with an obscure, opaque game, then you'd uninstall it after ten minutes and your review would say "this sucks." But you're not most people, and you're not a most people simulator. You're a professional - have some professional pride, for God's sake. If you feel it's warranted, set a cut-off time and describe how little progress you've made after that time, and warn people that there's little likelihood of anyone progressing past this point before uninstalling the game. That cut-off time can be short - like an hour or two. But then go ahead and keep playing, because, frankly, it's your job. Fansites are one thing - paid, full-time reviewing is something completely different. Play the game until you understand it so you can comment intelligently. Imagine having your father go to the doctor and be told he had pancreatic cancer, but since this is an particularly aggressive and lethal form of cancer, his doctor is just going to blow it off because, really, what's the point? He's going to die anyway. Would you take that for an answer? I hope that you're already scrolling down to hit the Post Reply button because I'm implying that writing a half-assed review of a game creates a life-threatening situation, because this thread needs to become even more of a circus and I'm the guy to help get us there. But the fact is that once a review is published, it is your work product. I can't imagine putting out a work product that doesn't reflect my best effort. Just for my own sake. Quitting after an hour, or two, because the game seems tedious, is not my best effort. If I'm not going to present my best effort, then I'd just as soon pass on the whole thing.

Once again, I'm not suggesting that this is what Tom did. I'm responding solely to the idea that it's somehow ok, as a professional reviewer, to give up on a game because you never got past the interface. Unless it truly took you ten hours to learn the hotkeys, in which case you absolutely must show me this game because I am buying ten copies.

[Enidigm]

Oh i was commenting on emphasis, which relates to accessibility to newer players and gameplay expectations, and since im most familiar with RTSs i used them as my example. For example having a large "Treasury" gold icon with your total gold listed seperately from income, province income and the other listings. Actually, from the perspective of functionally the interface isn't bad and in some ways, after your used to it, superior in many ways to the (few) recent TBS games ive played.

[Jason McCullough]

For what it's worth, I deleted the demo after 15 minutes. The UI was truly, truly awful; I couldn't figure out what the hell was going on even with Bruce's guide.

[Tom Chick]

Oh i was commenting on emphasis, which relates to accessibility to newer players and gameplay expectations, and since im most familiar with RTSs i used them as my example.

Ah, fair enough. My bad for not paying closer attention. Dom2 really does have a problem with accessibility. Illwinter could have opened it up to a larger audience with a better manual and/or a tutorial.

Also, can we call the reviewer Tom 'I hate Dom2' McNamara to distinguish him from Tom 'I love Dom2' Chick?

Also, what Bruce said.

-Tom 'I love Dom2' Chick

[Brooski]

If Tom couldn't get past the beginning (which really isn't all that difficult to believe), it's hard to expect him to write about the gameplay. While it may be completely fair to expect him to say that he couldn't get into the gameplay due to the convoluted setup and interface, it's also completely unrealistic...
This is the other completely crazy, objectively nutso statement I'm going to respond to this evening. If you have an opinion, stating the actual basis for said opinion seems to be a reasonable expectation. The only opinion I'm comfortable expressing is one I can actually support with facts I'm not trying to hide, like that I didn't actually play the game but I'm pretending that I did. I think that I just don't understand the fantasy logic at work here. You're saying that if a reviewer couldn't be bothered to get past the interface, and thus didn't have anything to say about the gameplay, it's understandable that he didn't mention this, and that's ok, because that's how it is. I could teach you how to be the world's undisputed champion of Dominions 2 in less time than you could get me to understand or accept this statement.

[Brooski]

Oh i was commenting on emphasis, which relates to accessibility to newer players and gameplay expectations, and since im most familiar with RTSs i used them as my example.

Ah, fair enough. My bad for not paying closer attention. Dom2 really does have a problem with accessibility. Illwinter could have opened it up to a larger audience with a better manual and/or a tutorial.
I'm only making this post as part of scientific experiment, the null hypothesis of which is that my mouse and keyboard are both broken, but someone needs to point out that Illwinter Game Design isn't the only place you should lay the blame during your turn of playing The Blame Game. As I understand it, issues like the lack of a tutorial are equally the fault of the publisher, especially when the publisher takes producer credit. As far as I know, one of the things a producer does is direct the game's presentation. If Illwinter showed up with Dom2 and I were a producer at Shrapnel Games assigned to the project, the first thing I would do would be to learn the Swedish words for "comprehensive tutorial." Frankly, I can't see how a publisher could let a game go out the door in this state, especially with the abysmal manual. Shrapnel has said many times that manuals this size are very expensive, which only makes it more bizarre that the game's documentation is in the state that it is, because it's like throwing away money in the form of useless paper that just protects the CD - you could just use cardboard inserts. I can't imagine any thinking person whose job it is to work with developers would play the game once without thinking, "nobody is going to get this." I mean, how did the producer play the game in the first place? Didn't he get mad?

It's possible that the publisher did nothing but duplicate the CD's and arrange for the printing of the manual, plus Q&A. In that case, I hope that Illwinter's royalty structure reflects this lack of support.

[Tom McNamara]

You guys are candy-coating this. Only a fool could think that the IGN guy spent any time with the game, or was anything other than cynical about the assignment from the outset. I guess IGN doesn't pay enough to hire reviewers who care about the quality of their work, or editors responsible enough to hold writers accountable. It's just laziness and indifference.




Giving up on a game because of an inefficient and nearly unusable interface isn't a huge stretch.

Sure, it's terribly unprofessional and downright embarrassing if you're being paid to evaluate the game.

Nothing wrong with knocking the game for the reasons you mentioned. Those may be fatal flaws that should be identified, but you can't do so without being laughed at if you don't know anything about the game because you only played it for 52 minutes, like the IGN guy.

He prob read a couple of message boards, got a sense for what people liked, and added that to the review as well, in a failed attempt to avoid sounding as blatently ignorant about the game as he is.

Call the article shit if makes you feel warm and fuzzy; it's not the most well-written of the lot. But judging my overall work ethic, my personal habits, etc., based on a single piece of work is either unexpectedly simplistic or unsettlingly malicious--take your pick. That your smug vitriol stands unquestioned is even worse, and part of a more fundamental problem that is not within my scope of address. It is this problem that leaves me feeling decidedly uninterested in adding anything to this discussion beyond what I have just said.

Edit: And it was fiftythree minutes, dammit.

[XPav]

We've decided over in the crazy-person politics and religion board that Philomath is a big fat troll. Just ignore him.

(Philomath will now call me an biased idiot, and say that I'm 16. He'll probably also throw a liberal crack in there too for good measure).

[Jon R.]

Oh i was commenting on emphasis, which relates to accessibility to newer players and gameplay expectations, and since im most familiar with RTSs i used them as my example.

Ah, fair enough. My bad for not paying closer attention. Dom2 really does have a problem with accessibility. Illwinter could have opened it up to a larger audience with a better manual and/or a tutorial.

This is what i was trying to get at as well. Maybe it works well enough when you dig in, but it's not all that intuitive. An efficient interface, to me, is something that i don't have to lump in with the actual gameplay as a challenge to overcome. That's the main thing that keeps me from having too much of a problem with the review.

[Johan O]

You guys are candy-coating this. Only a fool could think that the IGN guy spent any time with the game, or was anything other than cynical about the assignment from the outset. I guess IGN doesn't pay enough to hire reviewers who care about the quality of their work, or editors responsible enough to hold writers accountable. It's just laziness and indifference.

Kind of like Illwinter's laziness and indifference toward creating an efficient interface? The point some people are trying to make is that it's not like some footnote feature of the game, some crappy nitpick about trains or whatever, it's about something that you spend the entire game using. Giving up on a game because of an inefficient and nearly unusable interface isn't a huge stretch.I have no issue with you complaining about the interface, the manual or the lack of tutorial, but I take some offense at you attributing these flaws to laziness and indifference.

[Jakub]

If Tom couldn't get past the beginning (which really isn't all that difficult to believe), it's hard to expect him to write about the gameplay. While it may be completely fair to expect him to say that he couldn't get into the gameplay due to the convoluted setup and interface, it's also completely unrealistic...
This is the other completely crazy, objectively nutso statement I'm going to respond to this evening. If you have an opinion, stating the actual basis for said opinion seems to be a reasonable expectation. The only opinion I'm comfortable expressing is one I can actually support with facts I'm not trying to hide, like that I didn't actually play the game but I'm pretending that I did. I think that I just don't understand the fantasy logic at work here. You're saying that if a reviewer couldn't be bothered to get past the interface, and thus didn't have anything to say about the gameplay, it's understandable that he didn't mention this, and that's ok, because that's how it is. I could teach you how to be the world's undisputed champion of Dominions 2 in less time than you could get me to understand or accept this statement.
No...

OK, I'm not saying that Tom didn't play Dom2. I'm just saying that IF he didn't (which I find unlikely), it's unrealistic to expect him to admit that. It'd be fair, but it wouldn't happen anyway.

And given my aptitude (or lack thereof) in Dom2, I think you'd come to see eye to eye with me on this point much sooner :)

Anyway, this debate is going in circles. My argument, summed up, from which I won't budge:

Dominions 2, QT3 Game of the Month, got a bad review for the second time at a mainstream site, and for the second time a review is being dissected and an author lambasted for his fair opinion. Tom McNamara, author of the Dominions 2 review on IGN is being unfairly accused of sloth and/or incompetence based on the length of his commentary about the gameplay, which is being ridiculously extrapolated through some sort of magic equation to suggest how long he played. People here are unwilling to concede that their pet game might not appeal to some gamers, apparently including reviewers.

[Erik Andersson]

If Illwinter showed up with Dom2 and I were a producer at Shrapnel Games assigned to the project, the first thing I would do would be to learn the Swedish words for "comprehensive tutorial."
"Comprehensive" exists in Swedish ("omfattande"), but I'm not so sure if the kind of tutorial we are talking about actually has a word. I didn't find it in a dictionary with 60000 English words at least, but I think I've seen translators use "användarhandledning". I hadn't thought about this before and who knows, it might be a part of reason there isn't one...

[Jon R.]

I have no issue with you complaining about the interface, the manual or the lack of tutorial, but I take some offense at you attributing these flaws to laziness and indifference.

They would instead be attributed to...?

[Johan O]

I have no issue with you complaining about the interface, the manual or the lack of tutorial, but I take some offense at you attributing these flaws to laziness and indifference.

They would instead be attributed to...? Illwinter is essentially a two person outfit, dom 2 was made without a budget. Making a game of the scope of dom 2 in your free time without any certain monetary compensation doesn't strike me as particularily lazy. So if you need attribute these flaws to any particular traits try nearsightedness from spending to long on the game and failing to grasp what newbies find difficult or lack of manpower skilled in UI design or any number if other reasons associated with a small non budget project, just not laziness.

[Lum]

You're saying that if a reviewer couldn't be bothered to get past the interface, and thus didn't have anything to say about the gameplay, it's understandable that he didn't mention this, and that's ok, because that's how it is.

I think what we're saying isn't that he didn't bother to get past the interface, but possibly that he COULD NOT get past the interface. As in literally physically could not actually play the game.

I know that was my first reaction when I played it. Uh... OK, so I create a pretender to my throne, isn't it a bit early for violent insurrection? Hm, lots of stats and they do what? Wait a minute, where's my troops? I click on this guy? Where's the next turn button? Oh hell, a "Host" menu? I'm not playing multiplayer, this makes no sense!

I mean, come on, Bruce. You wrote a walkthrough for a strategy game. You do realize that 99.999% of all strategy games don't require a walkthrough. It's like if a wargame suddenly launched Myst as a child process and you had to solve a gear puzzle to get access to the 4:1 column on the CRT.

[VegasRobb]

Dominions 2, QT3 Game of the Month, got a bad review for the second time at a mainstream site, and for the second time a review is being dissected and an author lambasted for his fair opinion. Tom McNamara, author of the Dominions 2 review on IGN is being unfairly accused of sloth and/or incompetence based on the length of his commentary about the gameplay, which is being ridiculously extrapolated through some sort of magic equation to suggest how long he played. People here are unwilling to concede that their pet game might not appeal to some gamers, apparently including reviewers.

The majority of people aren't attacking the reviewer. It's very bad of you to take such a patronizing attitude towards that majority. I think it's a good thing that Dominions 2 is in a position that people actually pay attention to reviews instead of passing them off as "Well that's just IGN/Gamespot/etc, what can you do?"

As said in an earlier post, Jakub, you seem to have forgotten almost entirely what happened in the first thread that you're referring to. It has very little to do with author and very much to with why "mainstream" sites even bother reviewing games that they won't devote proper resources to and dont appeal to their "average" user.

[VegasRobb]

You guys are candy-coating this. Only a fool could think that the IGN guy spent any time with the game, or was anything other than cynical about the assignment from the outset. I guess IGN doesn't pay enough to hire reviewers who care about the quality of their work, or editors responsible enough to hold writers accountable. It's just laziness and indifference.




Giving up on a game because of an inefficient and nearly unusable interface isn't a huge stretch.

Sure, it's terribly unprofessional and downright embarrassing if you're being paid to evaluate the game.

Nothing wrong with knocking the game for the reasons you mentioned. Those may be fatal flaws that should be identified, but you can't do so without being laughed at if you don't know anything about the game because you only played it for 52 minutes, like the IGN guy.

He prob read a couple of message boards, got a sense for what people liked, and added that to the review as well, in a failed attempt to avoid sounding as blatently ignorant about the game as he is.

Call the article shit if makes you feel warm and fuzzy; it's not the most well-written of the lot. But judging my overall work ethic, my personal habits, etc., based on a single piece of work is either unexpectedly simplistic or unsettlingly malicious--take your pick. That your smug vitriol stands unquestioned is even worse, and part of a more fundamental problem that is not within my scope of address. It is this problem that leaves me feeling decidedly uninterested in adding anything to this discussion beyond what I have just said.

Edit: And it was fiftythree minutes, dammit.

To be fair, most of these comments were written very late at night/early in the morning when most users of this site are fast asleep or doing other stuff. Already people are addressing the comments and the user who made them.

I think you're in a position to add some very valuable insight and perspective to this discussion. I hope you'll decide to rejoin the topic(s) at hand.

[Ben Sones]

Dominions 2, QT3 Game of the Month, got a bad review for the second time at a mainstream site, and for the second time a review is being dissected and an author lambasted for his fair opinion. Tom McNamara, author of the Dominions 2 review on IGN is being unfairly accused of sloth and/or incompetence based on the length of his commentary about the gameplay, which is being ridiculously extrapolated through some sort of magic equation to suggest how long he played. People here are unwilling to concede that their pet game might not appeal to some gamers, apparently including reviewers.

I wrote a huge response to this, but then realized it was really just a recap of this entire thread, so why bother? My summation: your summation is a misrepresentation of this discussion. You keep saying that last bit ("you guys just can't stand the idea that someone might not like Dominions 2") over and over again, as though by repeating it, you might someday make it come true. But it's not true--everyone here has acknowledged that Dominions 2 isn't for everyone. I said that I can totally understand someone not liking the game, several times, and I said the same thing in that other thread that you refer to.

[Wheelkick]

Not having played any Dominions 2 (but have reviewed games) I can only add this to the thread:
There are one good reason for a reviewer to finish a review before they finish the game: deadline.

That's what I did. And perhaps why I don't review games anymore...

[DennyA]

Just so Tom doesn't feel completely singled out, Penny Arcade devotes its textual content (www.penny-arcade.com/news.php3?date=2004-02-04) today to ripping on IGN reviews.

[Mark Asher]

I'm with Lum. If Tom couldn't get past the beginning (which really isn't all that difficult to believe), it's hard to expect him to write about the gameplay.

I don't know if this reviewer did or did not get past the beginning, but you can't really review a game if you get stopped at the beginning.

[Skinner]

IGN, after examing numerous reviews, seems to have some of the most uninformed and poor reviews on the planet, IMHO, on many games. They seem to cater to the "flash n dash" element, and not to gamers that don't follow a straight line to have fun. The Dom II review is a good example of this. I agree...it's written in a state of malaise and disinterest.

The just posted review of my game, Coliseum, seems much the same...seems like the reviewer made up his mind before he opened the case. Lots of picking on peripheral BS issues that has little to do with the actual gameplay, and some statements that told me he played it for about 20 minutes and wrote the review. *sigh* Three people have already wrote me and said they've e-mailed complaints to IGN about the review, but it's pointless, I guess.

Lucky for me most of my gaming friends tell me the last place they take seriously about game reviews is IGN. :)

The reviewer in question, Tom McNamara, was my intern over here at PC Gamer Magazine before he left for IGN. He's a huge fan of turn-based strategy games. I guarantee you that he did not enter into the game in a "state of malaise and disinterest."

-Vede

If he's such a huge fan of TBS than it wouldn't be a far stretch of the imagination to believe he would/should/could have found the creamy goodness that is Dom 2 like others of us did. I'm mean, c'mon if he's a veteran TBS gamer than I deduce he really didn't try. Yes, the setup is taxing but the gameplay is outstanding. His single ambiguous gameplay statement gives away that he didn't even try to play the game. Well.... maybe not but who the hell can tell from his ambiguity?

[Skinner]

The reviewer in question, Tom McNamara, was my intern over here at PC Gamer Magazine before he left for IGN. He's a huge fan of turn-based strategy games. I guarantee you that he did not enter into the game in a "state of malaise and disinterest."

-Vede
That doesn't mean he actually played the game.

And a mistake or two in his review of a very complex game that shipped with extremely poor documentation doesn't mean that he didn't.

Here's the simple fact: If the Qt3 peanut gallery loves a game that has poor documentation and a bad interface, the Qt3 peanut gallery will jump on any reviewer who slams it. If the Qt3 peanut gallery hates a game that has poor documentation and a bad interface, the Qt3 peanut gallery will jump on any reviewer who praises it.

No one need dig much deeper than that to get to the heart of this particular "controversy."

-Vede

Not true. I believe not a single peanut gallery member would dispute his opinion on the difficulty or clarity of the setup, lack of docs, or complexity of the game. Also, I believe the gallery agrees, and rightly so, that by his lackadaisical attitude concerning the discription of gameplay he didn't really play the game. Ah, if only he could be convicted on circumstantial evidence. :D

Those sentiments have nothing to do with it's popularity here.

[Skinner]

Also, if you want to cancel a setup stage and go back to a previous one, that's not possible-- you have to start from scratch if you accidentally click on the wrong scale and waste some points on something you don't want or are confused about and want to avoid. Then, if you spend too many points, the game notifies you and won't let you actually start playing. Okay, I'll just go back and undo...Ha! That's right, I can't go back. Yes, dear readers, you are stuck. You have to exit out of the game using one of your favorite Windows "get the hell out of this app" keyboard shortcuts like Alt+F4, CTRL+ESC, or good ole' CTRL+ALT+DEL.
Verifiably false statements. The review is his opinion, but it should not contain factual errors.

I think he meant that you cant go back and choose a new god once you have gotten to the point where you adjust scales and choose magic paths, etc.. And he's right, you cant. Once you are on the screen that says 'Design Your God' with (X Points Left) below it, you cant cancel out of that screen. You have to click Ready and actually create the God, or quit the game.

olaf

I agree with you on that thought. He's just didn't explain it correctly.

[steve]

I think what we're saying isn't that he didn't bother to get past the interface, but possibly that he COULD NOT get past the interface. As in literally physically could not actually play the game.
That's entirely possible, and maybe even likely--I know I've found a few games I just couldn't or didn't feel like figuring out, though I passed on reviewing them for that reason--but the summary sentence, "If you can get past the faults of the interface and almost complete lack of guidance, there actually is an interesting game underneath it all" implies that he did get beyond the interface, otherwise he wouldn't know the game is interesting.

[Skinner]

Steve, why should Tom McNamara write a glowing review for the game if he thinks it blows?

The problem is he doesn't say the games blows. He says the setup blows - and that's all he says. I'll echo Ben - Jakub, I believe you're missing the point.

He says there is a good game in there somewhere. Not that the game blows. The problem is he doesn't get any evidence to support anything except the setup. Now, if the game sucked dog dick to such a degree that he didn't play the game, well, fine by me. But at least say that. He doesn't. He say there's a good game in there. He's the perfect illustration of unsupported contradiction.

[Skinner]

I think most of you are wrong, the review was completely correct in its scathing attacks upon Dominion 2's obtuse presentation and lack of guidance into a combat and magic system complicated enough to befit a roleplaying sourcebook.

Dominions 2 is almost unplayably dense unless you spend considerable effort to understand its complexity. I hate making decisions in the dark, and Dom2 makes reaching conclusions about your decisions a mere matter of trial and error that stretches over hours of meadering and false starts.

How many points should i put into my Pretender's magic skills? Well, let me dig through each magic school, every time, over and over, until out of frustration and boredom i just shrug, pick something random that looks good, and start playing. Oops, then i dig into the manual and discover each magic discipline has passive effects as well! Back to the drawing board. I bet i spent 2 hours testing different Pretenders for the PBeM game just to avoid making some newb mistake and pick one totally unsuited for my faction.

Its documentation isn't so much bad as it's badly organized and at best a reference. It's like learning to be a doctor by reading medical dictionaries. I had to reorganize the game's unhelpful manual by writing an excel spreadsheet just to have something i could quickly refer too whenever dealing with magic without spending 15 minutes rummaging through spell-trees.

The interface's lack of emphasis easily causes confusion and a sense of lacking any clear direction. In an RTS game, your resources are clearly centered and labeled, with icons and popups, in a convenient place in the UI. Now i see a province window with 30000k ppl, 100 resources, X defense, supplies, income, ect. Which one(s) is(are) the most important? New players might find the casual listing baffling.

I would say, however, the games most noteworthy error is the lack of a tutorial. RTS games nowadays go to the extreme length of explaining that the "black area on the map" represents unexplored terrain. God help us if we know how to begin in Dom2. Should i research, attack, build units or save my money, raise taxes, pillage my province, search for blood slaves, make a magic item, send a scout, make a prophet, preach, build a building? Most games have a 'flow' of gameplay in mind; RTS games usually start with a build-up phase. Without a tutorial to a game this complicated you have absolutely no idea where even to begin, unless, like most of us here, our past experiences with similar games intuitively inform our predictions as to what we should do next.

All that aside, I still like the game :).

That's a better review than what he wrote. However, you made the same mistake, you didn't tell us why you like the game. :D

[Shadari]

He says there is a good game in there somewhere.
Forgive my nit-picking, but the reviewer actually said there's an interesting game underneath it all. And to be fair, I think one can say a game is interesting without having played it comprehensively. There's lots of games I find interesting that I haven't really played much or at all. That said, I do think a reviewer is obligated to either play the game "fully" or to inform his/her readers that s/he played the game for only x amount of time for whatever reason.

[MindToyGames]

I have no issue with you complaining about the interface, the manual or the lack of tutorial, but I take some offense at you attributing these flaws to laziness and indifference.

They would instead be attributed to...? Illwinter is essentially a two person outfit, dom 2 was made without a budget. Making a game of the scope of dom 2 in your free time without any certain monetary compensation doesn't strike me as particularily lazy. So if you need attribute these flaws to any particular traits try nearsightedness from spending to long on the game and failing to grasp what newbies find difficult or lack of manpower skilled in UI design or any number if other reasons associated with a small non budget project, just not laziness.

No offense intended at all, but...i'm a 1-man company with an even smaller budget in all likelihood who spent almost a year with my latest game, Coliseum. I know it's a bit of a different kind (and somewhat less complex) of a game, but I made sure that the interface was simple to access and manipulate, with lots of help, mouse-over pop-ups and the like. I know that can be a deal-breaker with some people, especially with an "indie" product, so I took extra time to make that right. So please don't blame "lack of manpower" on that. :)

I'll say one thing though: if I gained ownership or control of the Dominions property, I know the first thing I would do is revamp the whole interface top to bottom, ditch the publishing for tiny platforms like Solaris and all of that (to allow for crisper and more consistent graphics and interface standards), and add an in-depth intro/tutorial. Those things alone would instantly double your sales, IMHO, along with improving the reviews greatly. If you'd really put that kind of time into it, based on the responses of fans you have even now, you're sitting on a friggin gold mine.

PS For the record, I almost gave up on the game about an hour into it. "A Host menu?? WTH??" And i've been playing games for many years, so I can only imagine what a newbie or moderate level game-player is thinking. I stuck with it and now enjoy it, but it took me a long time to get used to actually manipulating things to the point where the UI didn't actually get in the way, and I actually knew what was going on.

Derek
Stormcloud Creations
www.stormcloudcreations.com

[Lloyd Heilbrunn]

I have no issue with you complaining about the interface, the manual or the lack of tutorial, but I take some offense at you attributing these flaws to laziness and indifference.

They would instead be attributed to...? Illwinter is essentially a two person outfit, dom 2 was made without a budget. Making a game of the scope of dom 2 in your free time without any certain monetary compensation doesn't strike me as particularily lazy. So if you need attribute these flaws to any particular traits try nearsightedness from spending to long on the game and failing to grasp what newbies find difficult or lack of manpower skilled in UI design or any number if other reasons associated with a small non budget project, just not laziness.


This is exactly where the publisher's QA team should pick up the slack.

BTW, I love the game and disagree with Tom's rating but he picks up some good points and I think all us fans of the game could present you guys with a long list of things we would like to see in a patch or Dom 3.

Also, it seems all the guys that unfairly assume Tom did not play the game long enough because it is not his type of game are ignoring Vedeman's info that Tom is a TB strat fan.......

[MindToyGames]

I have no issue with you complaining about the interface, the manual or the lack of tutorial, but I take some offense at you attributing these flaws to laziness and indifference.

They would instead be attributed to...? Illwinter is essentially a two person outfit, dom 2 was made without a budget.

This is exactly where the publisher's QA team should pick up the slack.

You're right, but based on my dealings with Shrapnel (and I love them, don't get me wrong, they've been great with me), they don't do a whole lot to the product after the developer delivers it, that I can see. They leave a lot of that type of thing to the developer, which is why their royalties are usually some of the best around (it saves costs, I imagine).

They act mainly as a distributor and printing manuals, boxes, etc and deal with the "business" end of it (press releases and all of that kind of thing).
This is not carved in stone, but based on my personal dealings with them.

Derek
Stormcloud Creations
www.stormcloudcreations.com

[Brooski]

I think what we're saying isn't that he didn't bother to get past the interface, but possibly that he COULD NOT get past the interface. As in literally physically could not actually play the game.
Having played the very same game, I simply reject this idea. If a reviewer were to sit down with the game for ten hours and systematically work through the game, he'd absolutely get the hang of the interface, and get pretty far into the gameplay as well. We're not talking about learning to perform surgery - we're talking about a computer game interface. I taught myself basic Perl programming in much less time than this, and I didn't know much about programming anything when I started. It's simply not conceivable that an intelligent person could not figure out the interface to a computer game if he put ten hours into doing so. Specifically, to this computer game.

Like I said in another post, it's different if you're a fan reviewer writing for your own website, and you say eh, I couldn't get into this game - it was wicked opaque and I have better things to do with my time. It's an entirely different story if you're a paid professional reviewer assigned to a game. Your job requires you to put in that time. And if a turn-based strategy game is released that truly frustrates the efforts of an experienced turn-based strategy gamer to learn the interface for ten hours then I want a review copy of this game sent to my house immediately.

I'm not arguing that Dominions 2 isn't opaque (although I'll definitely argue that the problem with the interface is the initial learning curve, not the functionality once you understand the conventions). I'm simply disputing the idea that any game could be so opaque that ten hours later you'd throw up your hands, and say, "well, that's it! I couldn't even figure out how to make a character!" Because that's totally crazy.

[Wheelkick]

I think what we're saying isn't that he didn't bother to get past the interface, but possibly that he COULD NOT get past the interface. As in literally physically could not actually play the game.
Having played the very same game, I simply reject this idea. If a reviewer were to sit down with the game for ten hours and systematically work through the game, he'd absolutely get the hang of the interface, and get pretty far into the gameplay as well. We're not talking about learning to perform surgery - we're talking about a computer game interface. I taught myself basic Perl programming in much less time than this, and I didn't know much about programming anything when I started. It's simply not conceivable that an intelligent person could not figure out the interface to a computer game if he put ten hours into doing so. Specifically, to this computer game.


Maybe he thought the game sucked and just gave up on it. And then he put the line "interesting game..." at the end to make up for bashing a game that he couldn't figure out.

[Brooski]

Maybe he thought the game sucked and just gave up on it. And then he put the line "interesting game..." at the end to make up for bashing a game that he couldn't figure out.
As I said several times, if you are a paid professional reviewer, you do not have this option.

[Jon R.]

I think what we're saying isn't that he didn't bother to get past the interface, but possibly that he COULD NOT get past the interface. As in literally physically could not actually play the game.
Having played the very same game, I simply reject this idea. If a reviewer were to sit down with the game for ten hours and systematically work through the game, he'd absolutely get the hang of the interface, and get pretty far into the gameplay as well. We're not talking about learning to perform surgery - we're talking about a computer game interface. I taught myself basic Perl programming in much less time than this, and I didn't know much about programming anything when I started. It's simply not conceivable that an intelligent person could not figure out the interface to a computer game if he put ten hours into doing so. Specifically, to this computer game.

That so did not help your position. At all.

"It took me less time to get a foothold in Perl than it did to learn this game's interface."

[tmastern]

Having played the very same game, I simply reject this idea. If a reviewer were to sit down with the game for ten hours and systematically work through the game, he'd absolutely get the hang of the interface, and get pretty far into the gameplay as well. We're not talking about learning to perform surgery - we're talking about a computer game interface. I taught myself basic Perl programming in much less time than this, and I didn't know much about programming anything when I started. It's simply not conceivable that an intelligent person could not figure out the interface to a computer game if he put ten hours into doing so. Specifically, to this computer game.


This is what really gets me. I'm certainly not any brighter than most of the people here, but I was able to pick up the interface within minutes.
Now, without a doubt, I've hardly scratched the surface with regards to stratagy, magic usage, etc, but learning the game interface was a non-issue for me.
But, learning a game is half the fun for me. Some people seem to want a list of point by point actions to start the game, whereas I enjoy figuring that out for myself, for the most part.

[Brooski]

"It took me less time to get a foothold in Perl than it did to learn this game's interface."
Not at all what I said. I did not say it took me ten hours to learn the interface. I said that I was able to learn basic Perl in less than ten hours. Thus, a much less complex task will take much less time. So when someone says that maybe a reviewer simply could not get past the interface and thus was unable to play the game, my response is that this is impossible if the reviewer spent just ten hours on the game, which for a paid professional reviewer is probably the absolute minimum. Since it took me less than ten hours to learn basic Perl, anyone who spends ten hours with Dominions 2 will get far, far past the interface. So the argument that "just learning the interface took so much time that it prevented a paid professional reviewer from getting to the gameplay" is impossible to take seriously.

[Wheelkick]

Maybe he thought the game sucked and just gave up on it. And then he put the line "interesting game..." at the end to make up for bashing a game that he couldn't figure out.
As I said several times, if you are a paid professional reviewer, you do not have this option.
Obviously you do have that option.
And though I posted this earlier mostly to jest, when I reviewed I had a deadline which dictated how much effort I put into a game before deciding on the final word. This was for a weekly at a newspaper, but I'm guessing online game reviewers don't have infinite time to write up a review.

[Brooski]

Obviously you do have that option.
And though I posted this earlier mostly to jest, when I reviewed I had a deadline which dictated how much effort I put into a game before deciding on the final word. This was for a weekly at a newspaper, but I'm guessing online game reviewers don't have infinite time to write up a review.
I should have said that you do not have that option if you have any professional pride. Of course, anyone has the option of doing a half-assed job in whatever profession they choose to pursue, and justify it with whatever excuses make him or her feel better about it. If the deadline given is less than the time required to do a professional job, you have the option of not accepting the review. This has been covered in other threads. If the income limitation that this imposes prevents someone from achieving the standard of living her or she desires, that person has the option of finding a different profession. Or, of course, that person has the option of doing as much half-assed work that he or she can get away with.

I'm done now. Sorry for dragging this out.

[Jon R.]

Not at all what I said. I did not say it took me ten hours to learn the interface. I said that I was able to learn basic Perl in less than ten hours. Thus, a much less complex task will take much less time. So when someone says that maybe a reviewer simply could not get past the interface and thus was unable to play the game, my response is that this is impossible if the reviewer spent just ten hours on the game, which for a paid professional reviewer is probably the absolute minimum. Since it took me less than ten hours to learn basic Perl, anyone who spends ten hours with Dominions 2 will get far, far past the interface. So the argument that "just learning the interface took so much time that it prevented a paid professional reviewer from getting to the gameplay" is impossible to take seriously.

That's sounding pretty arbitrary. Where's the breaking point for learning the interface and being able to get on with the game then? 7 hours? 5?

[steve]

This was for a weekly at a newspaper, but I'm guessing online game reviewers don't have infinite time to write up a review.
They can also ask for an extension. I doubt anyone would mind with a game that's not likely to generate much traffic like Dominions II; being first ain't going to cause a traffic spike.

[Wheelkick]

This was for a weekly at a newspaper, but I'm guessing online game reviewers don't have infinite time to write up a review.
They can also ask for an extension. I doubt anyone would mind with a game that's not likely to generate much traffic like Dominions II; being first ain't going to cause a traffic spike.
Or if they think the game is crap, just quit trying and write what they know.
Bruce decided he's done, and I probably am to, being late to the thread and all. But I think that having this view on "professionals" is quite absurd. As a professional programer I made many errors due to time constraints. As a professional games publisher I helped publish plenty games with bugs in them because of time constraints. And as a professional project manager I have pushed projects to completion early due to time constraints. That is, like, a fact of professional life. You don't always have the time to do everything perfect. So you cut the corners where you think the least damage will be done.

Above might have zero to do with the thread subject, though. Just my thoughts on professionalism.

[-Lord Ebonstone-]

I have no issue with you complaining about the interface, the manual or the lack of tutorial, but I take some offense at you attributing these flaws to laziness and indifference.

They would instead be attributed to...? Illwinter is essentially a two person outfit, dom 2 was made without a budget. Making a game of the scope of dom 2 in your free time without any certain monetary compensation doesn't strike me as particularily lazy. So if you need attribute these flaws to any particular traits try nearsightedness from spending to long on the game and failing to grasp what newbies find difficult or lack of manpower skilled in UI design or any number if other reasons associated with a small non budget project, just not laziness.
Jon R. :arrow: pwned.

[Viridian]

While you can use "professional" to mean being employed or paid to do something that others do as a hobby ("professional programmer"), the sense that Bruce was using it in has more to do with a code of conduct, with specific techinical and ethical standards that are distinct and independent from the wishes of one's employer.

Even though game reviewing is not, strictly speaking, a profession, someone who takes their work seriously would adhere to a certain set of standards common to quality reviewing.

I have some sympathy for Tom McNamara's reaction to Dom2, as it was essentially my reaction to Dom1. I bought it, installed it, tried to muck about with it for half an hour, and then said "screw this" and gave up. I think this is a perfectly appropriate reaction as a casual gamer. As a reviewer, though, it is weak work.

What struck me about his review is that in reviewing a strategy game, he doesn't discuss any of the strategic choices a player has to make in the game. Do you go for 9 Astral for your pretender, thus giving up the variety of a rainbow mage, in exchange for some wicked powerful spells in the mid- to late game? How does gameplay change when you're playing Ermor as opposed to Jotunheim? Do all those settings that Tom M found so frustrating at the start of the game really affect anything? Does a Luck 3/Order 3 dominion really play any differently than a Turmoil 3/ Misfortune 3? These were the sorts of things that I found missing in his review.