Tired of reviewer bullcrap.

Resident0

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I'm getting increasingly tired with the amount of 'It's good but the PS3 has terrible framerate...' reviews i've been reading about games on the PS3, I just recently got 'The Orange Box' for a gift on Xmas Day, having read IGN's and Gamespots reviews on the title, I was expecting something akin to a slideshow with some occasional graphics with discoloration, as those were the main problems listed in IGN's review of the game.

Now a few hours into the game, I have not seen any 'terrible framerate skipping' nor have I encountered any 'huge slowdown in vehicle sections', and as for the discoloration problem... I don't even know what they mean, other than some areas looking slightly darker and grittier, which in my opinion enhances the 'feel' of City 17, there's been nothing to suggest that the game is discolored.

As for the loadtimes/pauses during quicksaves, the game offers you the chance to hold 'START' to quicksave at any time, and when I loaded a quicksave game it took 7 - 8 seconds, not the 17 - 18 seconds stated by reviewers, also the load times are further cut if you install the game to HDD.

I'm beginning to think Microsoft are visiting all the reviewers and magazine companies and handing over large wads of cash in order for them to be ultra picky about PS3 games, I read in one magazine that the game was not as good as the 360 because of the colors and that Alyx's jeans were 'slightly darker blue' than in the 360 version... I mean WTF?

"I can't play this pile of crap, her jeans are slightly darker blue than in the 360 version, lame port!!"

Maybe if the reviewer spent more time playing the game instead of staring at Alyx's ass, maybe he would notice other stuff, like how good the reflective surfaces look in HD, or possibly the deeper, more accurate sound, or the great background music being in 5.1, stuff like that?

I'm not saying the game is perfect, but it's a damn sight more complete than reviewers will have you believe.

Any other guys on the forum ever play a game that was really good, only to read a really poor review of it?

I'd love to hear your opinions on it, because honesty I'm beginning to wonder why we need review sites if even the reviewers are biased?

wub.gif
 

4saken

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Or maybe it's because they don't think the PS3 is performing as it's hardware should allow. Most cross-console games get rated similarly though (eg. SKATE, Guitar Hero, Rock Band, etc).

It is a reviewers job to find faults, regardless of how small (though this stuff about jean colour is total crap
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Sinkhead

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I came to this topic from the RSS feed expecting you to be moaning about us, the GBAtemp reviewing team
tongue.gif


Anyway, I agree that is a stupid point to make, and that is why I never trust game reviews from sites with adverts on. You really can't tell who they are in contact with...
 

.TakaM

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yeh, I think the PS3 version is capped at 30fps.
I heard a lot about portal being ridiculously low, was expecting something like 10fps, but nope, looks alright

*shrug*
 

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yeh, I think the PS3 version is capped at 30fps.
I heard a lot about portal being ridiculously low, was expecting something like 10fps, but nope, looks alright

*shrug*

There is no way the PS3 version is capped at 30fps, the jetboat sections run just as fast as the 360 version, and the graphics are exponentially better, especially the reflections and sound.

Definately a case of money over matter for the reviews of this game.
 

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I just did the 'Highway' vehicle section in the dune buggy that they said was terribly slow, the game seems fine, the framerate didn't even skip except for when i held START to quicksave and even then it was millisecond rather than a full on 17 second pause, IGN can shove their reviews im never trusting them again, especially after saying PES2008 was fantastic on PS3 and it ended up being laggy and needing a patch, and now The Orange Box being 'unplayably jerky' and that being a blatant lie too!

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Veho

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How about Lair then? All reviews say it has glitchy, laggy video and disastrous controls. Is that true?
 

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yeh, I think the PS3 version is capped at 30fps.
I heard a lot about portal being ridiculously low, was expecting something like 10fps, but nope, looks alright

*shrug*


There is no way the PS3 version is capped at 30fps, the jetboat sections run just as fast as the 360 version, and the graphics are exponentially better, especially the reflections and sound.

Definately a case of money over matter for the reviews of this game.

While not a bad version per se, you can't deny that the PS3 version lacks in texture quality and lightning effects (grittier than the 360), but those are porting issues, don't trust my words?, look at this.
I clearly see your point, to which I have the following comments (god, I'm starting to sound like Urza):
1. The reviews and complaints about the game were focused mostly on Episode 2, are you talking about that particular expansion, or the previous games?
2. I've also noticed that GameTrailers for example rarely gives PS3 games a score that surpasses a 9, when the 360 games are getting 10s from all over the magazines and sites, don't take it personally, just look at the age of each console and the experience of the developers, Insomniac and Naighty are the only ones that pulled a more than 9 score on their games, both development houses have a lot of design and programming experience.
3. Talking about the "experience" too, you can see that most "multiplataform" games are the ones more affected, just look at RS: Vegas or Virtua5, it actually looks worse on the PS3. I believe, that the myth about the PS3 being harder to develop is true.
The problem is that given the Cells architecture you rely heavily on the development tools. I think Sony has risen the "Cell" capacity to sky high levels and doesn't provide enough support for its own tools, so, developers try, but they don't succeed.

Just give them a little more time I say.
 

Veho

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The problem is that given the Cells architecture you rely heavily on the development tools.Â
True dat. Since developers aren't familiar with the new architecture yet, they rely heavily on development tools, that come with ready-made functions and algorithms. This does make development easier, but the end result isn't optimal. Just like what-you-see-is-what-you-get web editors, the end result is never as good as going down to code level and doing some serious tweaking. Unfortunately, developers don't have time nor resources to tweak and optimize code for every platform out there, so they concentrate on one platform, and for the ports, create the entire game in pseudo-code, and then let the respective development kits and compilers do the rest. What is left is a jumble of standardized functions and procedures, that does the job (in theory), but is far from the optimal solution.

But the main problem, I think, is that given PS3's much-talked-about stronger hardware, the reviewers expect graphics not only on the same level as the X360 versions, but better.
 

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I think developers are scared to put time and effort into PS3 development and make one game hugely better on PS3/360 than on the other platform because then people will constantly expect the same level of dedication and graphics on every other game, and also because it will take longer, say Quake 5 came out for PS3 and it looked amazing, better than what the 360 could possibly do (or vice versa im no fanboy!), and then the company pushed out a half baked, trimmed down version for the other console (think Quake 2 on PSX compared to PC) owners of said console would go crazy saying the company had 'sold out' and had taken huge wads of cash to make the other machine look bad...

So either way they can't win, or they develop for a 360 knowing they haven't the option to fully use the 50GB or the install to HDD option and have to take the flak from PS3 owners saying "Why didn't they use the HDD or the 50GB blu-ray" etc.

It's a lose-lose situation until each console starts getting some proper 100% bona fide exclusives (see Ratchet And Clank PS3 for example).
 

Crygor64

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It isn't the developers its the crappy PS3 hardware.

Orange Box PS3 pales in comparison to its Xbox 360 counterpart. This seems to be the case with many PS3/Xbox 360 games. Most look and play the best on the Xbox 360. Much like its predecessors, the PS3 is difficult to develop for and instead of blaming sony for their incompetent design, sony turns the tables and blames the developers instead. (you hear a lot of clueless sony fans repeating this nonsense spin.)

Meanwhile...

Sony pleads with developers not to abandon PS3

Anyway you know what I'm really tired of? The constant childish complaints of whiny, bitter PS3 fans.
 

cenotaph

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yeh, I think the PS3 version is capped at 30fps.
I heard a lot about portal being ridiculously low, was expecting something like 10fps, but nope, looks alright

*shrug*


There is no way the PS3 version is capped at 30fps, the jetboat sections run just as fast as the 360 version, and the graphics are exponentially better, especially the reflections and sound.

Definately a case of money over matter for the reviews of this game.
All console versions of games based on the Source engine run at 30 fps. They run at 60 fps on PC however.
 

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It IS the developers to blame for, just look at how well the UT3 performs on Ps3. So smooth and it has one of the best graphics on the system. Because the team has been working on the system since the day one.
 

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It IS the developers to blame for, just look at how well the UT3 performs on Ps3. So smooth and it has one of the best graphics on the system. Because the team has been working on the system since the day one.

Well, it also depends on the developer's experience, just look at Lair, and Factor 5 was THE development house on the GC days. Perhaps Lair released was rushed by some other company? *cough*Sony*cough*.
 

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Some reviews I'm pleased with (like Drill dozer, Garfield's Nightmare, and Pokemon Ranger)
Where as some I completely disagree with, and really hate them for it. (Both Touch Detective games) It is especially bad when all three reader reviews (yeah, I read those too) disagreed with IGN's review for the first Touch detective. And if I were to write a review, I would disagree too.
 

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