How this trust score was computed
Trust blends alignment (40%): does the outlet rank games the way players do; decoded accuracy (30%): after translating the outlet's own scale habits (a '7/10 means mediocre' scale is decoded, not punished), how well its reviews predict player sentiment; and player-side (30%): on games where press consensus and players sharply disagreed, whose side it took. Recent reviews weigh more (2-year half-life), and the blend is shrunk toward a neutral prior (60) so small samples can't peg the scale. Player quality is launch-window Steam sentiment, so outlets aren't punished for reviewing a launch build that later got patched.
Controversy record: on 5 games where press consensus and players sharply disagreed, this reviewer sided with players 2 times.
Computed 6m ago · full methodology →
Outlet vs. players
Each dot is a game both this outlet and players scored. The dashed line is perfect agreement: dots above it mean the outlet was more generous than players, below it more harsh.
Biggest disagreements with players
The receipts: games where this outlet's verdict landed furthest from player sentiment.
- +42No Man's Skyoutlet 90 · players 48 · Aug 2016
- -36Resident Evil 7 Biohazardoutlet 50 · players 86 · Jan 2017
- -15Watch Dogs 2outlet 60 · players 75 · Nov 2016
- +28Call of Duty®: Black Ops IIIoutlet 90 · players 62 · Nov 2015
- -14Preyoutlet 70 · players 84 · May 2017
- +24Deus Ex: Mankind Dividedoutlet 90 · players 66 · Aug 2016
- -7ABZUoutlet 80 · players 88 · Aug 2016
- -9Oxenfreeoutlet 80 · players 89 · Jan 2016
- -16RiMEoutlet 70 · players 86 · May 2017
- +26Pinstripeoutlet 100 · players 75 · Apr 2017
Recent reviews (33 tracked)
- 80South Park™: The Fractured But Whole™Oct 16, 2017
“The new combat enhancements and crafting elements aside, it still feels like you're playing through a hilarious episode of South Park, where nothing is sacred, and everything and everyone gets skewered.”
read full review ↗ - 100Mario + Rabbids: Kingdom BattleAug 28, 2017
“It's a fan service fractal that works both as a gonzo strategy masterpiece and series love letter. It's a studio-publisher (Ubisoft) that's been around nearly as long as Nintendo's been making video games, reflecting all the whimsy and allure of a franchise that's sold half a billion copies worldwide. I blaspheme, but if you've ever wondered what an archetypal Nintendo game made not-by-Nintendo would look like, here you go.”
read full review ↗ - 80ARMSJun 7, 2017
“Yes, it's tennis-boxing inside a carnival wrapped in a learning curve that against practiced players feels steep, and yes, that sounds like something few would play. Which is why Nintendo calls it Arms, a game that is more than it seems, novel in a genre prone to repetition, and precisely the sort of pick-up video game the Switch was designed for.”
read full review ↗ - 70RiMEMay 25, 2017
“Its final moments are commensurately heartbreaking but also bracing. They don't resolve the game's shortcomings — in games the journey must by definition upstage the destination — but the ending is beautifully handled, cleverly connected to the undertaking, and almost worth the price.”
read full review ↗ - 70PreyMay 10, 2017
“If you're in the mood for a corridor crawl modeled after the Dishonored series' "one problem, multiple solutions" approach, Prey has plenty to offer. Its pedigree is clear, an homage to design DNA you can trace back to Looking Glass Studios 1990s "Thief" and "Shock" games. There's no shame in iteration, and Prey does nothing worse than its precursors. The only question, given how familiar most of its ideas feel in 2017, is whether homage is enough.”
read full review ↗ - 90What Remains of Edith FinchApr 24, 2017
“It's an exceptionally well-told story, an anthology of remembrances experienced through the eyes of each family member at the precipice of their demise.”
read full review ↗ - 100PinstripeApr 24, 2017
“Pinstripe isn't a game with grand twists of the sort that drive TV or film goers to social media frenzies. It feels more smartly made, fully aware that post-Ambrose Bierce rug-pulling tends toward cheap trickery too often masking cheaper material.”
read full review ↗ - 90Tom Clancy's Ghost Recon® WildlandsMar 6, 2017
“Watching all this unfold feels like listening to a jazz musician tee up changes for other players to jam over. Slight variations ripple and become riveting permutations. We've seen and to a certain extent done much of this in games like Far Cry 4 and Watch Dogs 2. But never on this scale, or as deftly balanced.”
read full review ↗ - 100The Legend of Zelda: Breath of the WildMar 2, 2017
“It's like nothing else Nintendo has made, an experience so simultaneously prodigious and accomplished that it feels like a mind-blowing mic drop to the sort of "open world" games (Grand Theft Auto V, The Elder Scrolls: Skyrim, The Witcher 3) the industry seems bent on proliferating.”
read full review ↗ - 50Resident Evil 7 BiohazardJan 23, 2017
“Casual players aren’t touching something with a “7” in the title (nor is it clear will newcomers). Fans of action-angled survival horror like Dead Space or Dying Light may balk at the game’s deliberately poky controls and too easily grasped opponents. Old-school fans seem like the obvious target. But survival horror is a crowded space in 2017, and too much of what Resident Evil 7 is up to we’ve seen elsewhere — and done better.”
read full review ↗ - 60Gravity Rush 2Jan 10, 2017
“I can’t help but admire what the studio has attempted here: a glorious, galloping adventure worthy of applause for all it attempts, even when some of those things don’t work as intended. It’s more satisfying stumbling through a game as gonzo and idiosyncratically brilliant as a Gravity Rush 2 than pronouncing another polished but unadventurous standard-bearer playable. And it’s laudable to the extent studios deserve tribute for attempting difficult, different things, mixed results or no.”
read full review ↗ - 100The Last GuardianDec 5, 2016
“In The Last Guardian, Fumito Ueda is showing us how to bang out another kind of tune that makes something else move, something perhaps higher. It feels momentous, a design breakthrough I wasn’t expecting, and an experience that seems more likely to stand the test of time than others we like to point to. It calls out some of what’s crass about this industry while showing us another way forward, the shape of things to come.”
read full review ↗ - 90Final Fantasy XVNov 28, 2016
“Something wonderful and improbable must have happened towards the end of the topsy-turvy decade it’s taken Square Enix to finally produce a Final Fantasy worth crowing about. Thank director Hajime Tabata for somehow righting the ship. How he did so could presumably fill a book. How many games get 10 years to simmer? Change captains mid-journey? Have lord knows how many investment dollars (to say nothing of franchise esteem) on the line? And how often does vaporware materialize, after years of elliptical studio messaging, this lively and focused and fully realized?”
read full review ↗ - 60Watch Dogs 2Nov 17, 2016
“For now, what looks at first like a few hopeful steps forward for this fledgling franchise turns out to be too much shuffling sideways. The protagonist is more interesting, the writing and voice acting vastly improved, and the tactical components more intricate and differentiated. But it’s too easy and tempting to exploit the most powerful among the latter, to play ants off ants ad nauseam, or just go in guns-a-blazin’, a blithe and hypocritical madman.”
read full review ↗ - 50Call of Duty®: Infinite WarfareNov 3, 2016
“An assemblage of hits and misses, that's the measure of this year's Call of Duty. I could say something about publisher Ubisoft pulling back from its annualized Assassin's Creed franchise, or how even Doctor Who gets a break. But it's probably simplest to remind that it's shooter season, and this year, the alternatives are formidable.”
read full review ↗