Ratings

We all see them and we either like them, or we hate them. That is just the way it is. I have been on both sides of the fence, mainly because I was a reviewer in the early days. Yet, in the last few days I have been playing LEGO Star Wars: The Skywalker Saga. I have been playing it on PS5. I was later to the party because I played the previous games and as such I expected a remake. 

Boy was I wrong!

This game takes us through the 9 movies and if we play them by movie release (4,5,6,1,2,3,7,8,9) we get to go chronologically and we see the brilliance of the game. We have open fields that link to the levels of the game. It is an immense game, it is larger than the sum of the previous Lego Star Wars combined It has the levels, the area’s connecting the levels and there are at least two of those for every game, in some cases even more. There are the space missions and there is so much to get.

This is not a game you do in one sitting. There are 1200 bricks to amass over 9 movies and the makers have been creative in the approach to it. As Lego games go, this is an absolute master. So when I saw the rating of 82/100 (Metacritic) There were 5 reviews below the mark. In this there are two parts I want to illuminate The first one is “World design and presentation, with John William’s classic score and the beautiful graphics, are top notch, but the gameplay and quest design got redundant only after few hours” (PCGamer, 60) The reviewer is not entirely wrong. But with “quest design got redundant only after few hours” he got it wrong. Some quests are running a mile and hitting a certain amount of objects. Some take inspiration to solve and some are merely there, sometimes hiding in plain sight and there is always the ability to see the hidden objects. But it was his/her view on the matter. The second review gives us “The Skywalker Saga is at its best when it delves into it’s more linear and tightly designed sections, as the open areas are devoid of life and exciting missions to spend your time on” (Gamer.no, 60) Was this reviewed by a Fortnite gamer? I myself would write “An amazing ending to a triple trilogy, the music is well placed, the graphics are sublime and every inch of Star Wars Fandom is addressed, things we might not have noticed in the movies will be seen in the game (like a ship, or scene). This is clearly not a game to play in one go, it comes with hundreds of hours of fun and challenges and beyond that the cutscenes are  great way to see Lego’s approach to a cut scene. The game does not fail to impress and even as we run around in the open area’s, we do so because in several situations we do not have the right character. The game has its own rhythm and it leaves you to do what you want” (Lawlordtobe, 92). Oh and in case you think it is my age, it is not, it is the rating. The issues I saw were minimal but I cannot give it 100%, VGC did that. And in this I believe 92% is fair and well deserved. And yes, the Metacritic is an average of reviewers and as such I do not accept the two 60% reviews. Even as PC gamer gives a decent review, it is too low as I personally see it, but I will not attack it. But as such the end result of 82% is too low, that is my feeling on it and that is the issue with reviews, they are all stages of subjectivity. And it is hard to get it right, that I why I never looked at GTA, I never liked the game. And we should not review games we do not like, subjectivity becomes skewed and the wrong rating is the result, not the ‘wrong’ rating, more an inaccurate or unjust review. A review that holds my displeasure of a game. That is why I remained mostly in the RPG field, they are my kind of games.