IGN’s Review Revamp Still Won’t Buy Any Credibility in the New Decade
IGN is changing up how it handles review scores, but does that really matter with a publication that can't be trusted in the first place?
A complex review score scale is the least of IGN's problems. | Source: IGN
- IGN is switching to a “simplified” 10-point system for game reviews.
- That doesn’t matter when the publication’s review standards are fundamentally broken.
- The website hasn’t given its readers any reason to trust its reviews.
IGN is changing up its review scores in a major way. The gaming publication will be removing the 100-point decimal system from its reviews in favor of a 10-point scale.
Who cares? It’s still IGN.
At this point, anyone reading the website for its game reviews is doing themselves a disservice. The review scores coming out of it are all over the place.
Just Look at How Bad IGN’s Review Scores Are
- Kingdom Hearts 2 – 7.6/10
- Dirge of Cerberus: Final Fantasy VII: Lost Episode – 7/10
- God Hand – 3/10
- Alien: Isolation – 5.9/10
- Pokemon Alpha Sapphire and Omega Ruby – 7.8/10
- Fallout 4 – 9.5/10
- Pokemon Sword and Shield – 9.3/10
It’s hard not to look at IGN’s reviews and just laugh at the inconsistency. The mess that is Dirge of Cerberus scores a 7, but God Hand gets stuck with a 3?
Of course, everyone also knows about the “too much water” meme that comes from the Pokemon ORAS review.
Let’s also not forget those Fallout 4 and Pokemon Sword and Shield reviews. It’s like IGN couldn’t help but give glowing reviews to these big-name games no matter their flaws.
If that wasn’t enough, IGN can’t even care enough to vet its own reviewers before letting them post on its website.
Stealing YouTube Reviews Doesn’t Help
Let’s talk about the infamous Dead Cells review that IGN put out back in 2018. There was an immediate backlash after Boomstick Gaming exposed how IGN stole from the YouTube channel.
The writer behind that IGN review of Dead Cells was Filip Miucin. This wasn’t some new writer for the publication but was rather its Nintendo editor. At least it fired him after the controversy, but that still doesn’t instill faith in the review website.
IGN’s poor review methodology and lack of control over its writers are major problems, but there’s still one problem that’s even worse.
IGN Won’t Even Listen to Its Readers
The gaming news website recently allowed its readers to vote for the Game of the Year in 2019. Cool, giving readers a chance to share their opinions is great!
Oh, shoot. I almost forgot we’re talking about IGN here.
The problem started when Death Stranding soared to the top of the Game of the Year poll. That’s even after the publication’s attempt to cripple it by waiting until 7,000 votes were in to add the game to the list of options.
At this point, any trustworthy publication would realize there’s no stopping Death Stranding, but again, this is IGN. Rather than let readers choose it as Game of the Year, the publication simply removed Death Stranding from its nominee page.
It’s Time to Give up the Ghost
Why in the world would anyone trust IGN after all this? It doesn’t let readers voice their opinions, its own reviewers don’t bother to create original content, and its review scores suck.
No amount of changes to its review system is going to make IGN any more trustworthy. If readers haven’t already, they need to jump ship.