When I write a review I try to be fair and consider all elements of a game. I can't say that I'm perfect, but I try my best not to miss or overlook positives or negatives because of bias, one way or the other. One thing does still bother me, though:
If I start playing a game and I don't like it, will my review be fair if I force my way through that game?
Most recently this has come up with Ghost Recon: Advanced Warfighter 2. I picked it up for $2.50 during a Steam sale, and eventually got around to trying it. I played through the first mission and realized I don't really like the game. There's some cool stuff there - having a real time overhead of the mission area is pretty neat, and being able to use it to issue squad commands is even better. I wanted to be fair so I continued playing, but I didn't like the second mission either.
So what should I do at this point? Do I write a review of what I did play and explain that the game didn't hook me enough to keep going? Should I not write anything at all, to avoid being unfair towards a game that seems well put together but that I just don't like? I have done the former once or twice, most recently with Dark Void, a game that I wanted to like but couldn't finish due to completely game breaking bugs.
What do you think? Is there a minimum amount of game a critic should play before posting a review? How much game would that be?
I'd just quit playing it. One of my big problems with the major review sites is they hand games off to reviewers indiscriminately, so you end up with people complaining about dumb stuff like a strategy game being too hard. I doubt a hardcore wargamer would have the same complaint.
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