My initial encounters with American gaming media, from IGN to Giant Bomb, lead me to think there must be a conspiracy going on since their reviews showed no significant differences, only the phrasing was different. There was no sign of individuality anywhere, as if one person was writing all these reviews.

With time I realized that the reason these reviews show no significant difference is that the people writing them are the same kind of people, with very similar backgrounds and very similar tastes in games.
So if you were ask the people at GameSpot, IGN, Giant Bomb et al. to list their 10 favourite games of all time I bet you would get almost identical-looking lists. There would be no major differences.

That this small group of people have such a massive influence on Western gaming is disturbing.

Imagine if Beliebers or the Britney Army would be in charge of writing all major music reviews, what would their review of Slayer's or Motörhead's latest album look like, what would they think of the experimentalism of Hal McGee, the neo-folk of Death In June ?

The views of this sub-group is enhanced by all youtubers and forum writers who simply repeat what they hear on the bigger media or youtube channels, because 'that is the correct way to think'. European media can't help but follow the ideology of their much more popular American brethren.

Western gaming media is not really 'Western', it is American, or more precisely Suburban American Gaming.

I'm not sure what kind of massive influence you think these publications have. I remember a survey that showed something like 4% of people make purchase decisions based on online reviews.

Totally agree with ET3D here, I have zero interest in what any of these idiots have to say. Same goes for any other media, zero interest in music/tv/film/game awards, magazine, reviews, youlube gimps playing/reviewing/comentating etc.

I look at a game, see if it has any untoward requirements - e.g. client, drm, account, dlc's etc, and what price it is offered at and then decide whether to pursue further. The next stage is to look at videos, or screens and see if its my type of game. If it passes both of these, then I buy it. Might scan the reviews section in case anything jumps out (like this game hasn't had xyz gamebreaking bug fixed since ddmmmyyyy), but other than that I make up my own mind.

Many studios are kind of clustered together in specific cities like San Francisco and New York, so the games media recruits people living in those areas to make contacts and establish or maintain their network. One of the downsides of this can be a limited set of perspectives where everyone is more or less on the same page. Wouldn't be surprised. I get my consumer advice from a multitude of sources, but the primary one is probably Youtube. You can just see the game in action right away. That's generally far more tangible than a written article.

*north american

:D

Did you get a long break from the gaming world?

Now most people don't trust mainstream reviewer anymore. Most people watch lets play to decide if the game is for them or not.
What better judgment is better than seeing the game in action?

I don't really bother with reviews unless they are from fellow users, Like Gnostic mentioned I watch a let's play to check the game out myself and get feedback from actual gamers who are playing the game then some Journalist with invested interests however there are let's players who are capable of being corrupted but by looking at the game being played myself I can see what it is like.

I agree with the points others have made, namely:

-The influence of written media is declining hugely. Youtube / Twitch and user reviews be them in Steam of Metacritic are climbing in importance. Word of mouth among friends is probably still the best guide overall.

-The media naturally focuses on hubs of game development, which means California is really big - and that carries some cultural baggage.

And I would agree with you on a couple of points as well:

-The US cultural perspective, particularly considering the academic background of many of hose involved in media, is specifically representative of a particular perspective which is not the dominant one among "gamers".

-That same cultural current spreads very easily and is consciously or not adapted and "appropriated" (hehehe) by most of the world, in some way or another, even if there is on the face of it opposition to its assumptions or underlying ideological aspects.

And I'd add a couple of points:

-The US is the largest single entertainment market overall, and the weight of that is obvious. Europe together competes in size, but the linguistic and cultural diversity over here fragments both media and markets. There was an interesting analysis from the SteamSpy guy some time back along those lines.

-Ignoring very niche publications / communities, some "mainstream" alternatives exist. For example a minority British perspective can still be found, of which RPS and Eurogamer are good examples. More the former obviously... I guess I don't need to explain why non-english language media does not even count? Maybe the french Joystik... but its serial bankruptcies kind of hammer home that point...

^this.

I read major reviews to see what's in the game, but I have to say, they rarely correlate with the actual game. Games aren't a media that can be reviewed very well by crafty writing and brilliant images. The images don't often match what you actually see in the game and the writing often reads funny, overtly advertistic (I made that word up), or emotional. Rarely do you get a glimpse into what makes the game a game.

I imagine the board game Chutes and Ladders getting a treatment like:

"The nuanced but poignant colors of slides drives the player to fear for their very safety as they traverse the landscape of this instant classic. A sense of success is often found with a full cookie jar at the end of a ladder, but then lost as the cookie jar shatters at the bottom of a chute. But this multiplayer mayhem does finally yield a winner, and that winner will have gloating rights for days."

91/100

Nowhere in there does it's a pure chance game for children who can't compete with their parents in any significant way, so their only hope is complete and utter chance. The game is made extremely cheap, it has a bit of nostaligia to it, children can win, and its incredibly boring. It's only redeeming factor is that it brings people together of varying ages -- that's the only amount of fun it can bring. And it does it well. But unless you actually play it or see it being played, you'll never know what it's really about.

The same goes with video games. We can tlak about the graphics, gameplay mechanics and story elements all day long. But how many times have you heard of a game you could have sworn you'd love, but upon playing it, it fell flat? And vice versa? I just beat The Force Unleashed last night. I loved it. Even the QTEs. And I hate QTEs. Perhaps it was just b/c it was Star Wars? I don't know. I liked the game. I'll play the sequel. And it had a metacritic score of 73 -- usually too low for me. Or is it?

Anyhoots, long story short: nobody cares anymore. Magazines and internet reviews are certainly a useful tool and often enjoyable reading. But check your emotions at the door, or they may lead you to buy some crap.

And lastly, OP, I totally agree. It seems they're all the same. And that's why we don't listen to them anymore. Games are far too varied, complicated and personal to trust any source for what you think will be good or not. But I do find them incredibly useful for pointing out horrible games. Sometimes, I get burned by listening to them (in the case of Alpha Protocol -- luckily, I did end up trying it later and ended up loving it).

yeeeah, what everyone else has said. I never read the paid reviews until after i've played the game. Most times they are pretty off. I always use user reviews (metacritic, amazon, etc) and let's plays to get a true sense of what to expect. There are a few paid people I do tend to trust, like Zero Punctuation (Yahtzee).

Here is his review of Fallout 4: http://www.escapistmagazine.com/videos/view/zero-punctuation/116433-Fallout-4-Review

Even though I love the game, I do agree with some of his complaints.

Only "Gaming Publication" I read is[url= http://www.rpgcodex.net/ ] RPG Codex [/url](I'm only a lurker there) since they've hit the nail in the head more often than not, and do something no other gaming media does, actually describe the game mechanics, which is what tells me if I would like or not a game, regardless of the reviewer's opinion. I've never paid too much attention to the ridiculously called "Gaming Press" since...2006?

They mostly review RPGs in depth, but in the forums you can also find customer reviews of other genres, if you can get pass the general edginess that permeates the threads it is the best site to tell you if you would like a game or not .

WTF is Chutes and Ladders? Are snakes copyrighted by King or something over there?
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Snakes_and_Ladders

I, like many of you, only utilize youtube videos to help decide on a game. I still review IGN, Gamespot, and the like for game information like previews and gaming world information at times.

In my opinion the gaming world is the same as any subject matter in the world - media drive the sheep in the direction they want them to go.

Information is so easy to come by these days via google, bing, etc., that people seem to no longer spend the time to figure things out for themselves and instead just "go with the flow" - its quite depressing if you think about it.

Way too many times these days are people wandering off a cliff (metaphorically speaking of course) without even realizing the cliff is right in front of them...