The most hatred-filled review you'll come across

[Andulias]

It's quite the read.. It seems the guy just hates Civ V with incredible passion, and the review reads more like a rant than anything else. Still fun to read though.

 

[Glassmage]

yawn, when I get the game tomorrow I judge for myself.

 

[stannis]

At least it tells us a little bit more about the Rome and Renaissance scenarios.

 

[Eagle Pursuit]

He doesn't like:
that religion spreads itself
that it's importance fades
that beliefs are first-come-first-served
that espionage is pretty passive

He claims that religion doesn't effect diplomacy very much. That the AI is still bipolar, and that it's tactically dumb.

 

[AfterShafter]

"It’s like improved shaving technology that just keeps adding blades."

I don't actually disagree with his overall point leading up to this, that religion is just like another tech/culture type thing where it's just another form of tech tree, and this is a bit of a let down, but... If he wants to say this makes the game worse, that's a terrible analogy, because razors just seem to keep on getting better the more blades they add. Until they add one in the handle, I'm on board for adding more and more blades

The review is generally very negative, but it does bring up some interesting points which will resonate with a lot of people on here. Grumbling about religion being to western centric (IE - less important as time goes on) is kind of one of those situations where people would complain either way they did it. On the other hand, the peeking into cities thing - that costs gold? Really? To quote him, "Can I afford not to have a spy working on stealing a technology?"

This is a very negative review, and while some of it is grumbling, a fair amount of it sounds pretty reasonable to me.

 

[headcase]

but I’m sorry to discover the game hasn’t gotten better a year and a half after I reviewed it

Right off the bat this comment gives a good idea what kind of review this is. Really, vanilla hasn't gotten better since launch? That's as much as insult to Thal as it is the devs (claim is that a lot of the work in VEM was applied to patches).

Of what sounds troubling (and hopefully exaggerated in this review, like the quoted line above), most of it sounds like stuff that will be improved in mods. Still anticipating the modless game though.

I shave with one blade (edit: multi-blades work fine, but 2-bladers are the worst; your hair just gets stuck between them!)

 

[Andulias]

He doesn't like:
that religion spreads itself
that it's importance fades
that beliefs are first-come-first-served
that espionage is pretty passive

He claims that religion doesn't effect diplomacy very much. That the AI is still bipolar, and that it's tactically dumb.

And that actually contradicts what other reviewers have said. Guess we'll have to wait until tomorrow (or in my case, until Firday, argh) to find out.

 

[KevinLancaster]

Err, he's Tom Chick, the guy who hated Deus Ex; I don't think you guys should take it too seriously.

 

[blackcatatonic]

Yeah, I stopped reading when he admitted that although there were new features he 'couldn't care less' about them.

 

[Zhahz]

The dude is operating from the premise that Civ 5 is broken to begin with (and I'm sure he has all the answers, because armchair devs with zero clue are what games need), which I don't really agree with.

 

[Andulias]

Err, he's Tom Chick, the guy who hated Deus Ex; I don't think you guys should take it too seriously.

Lol woot?! There is a person on Earth that doesn't like Deus Ex? Jesus Christ, what little credibility he had in my eyes just went down the drain.

In all seriousness though that's why I said it's "hatred-filled". He is obviously trolling on the game, and seems to have made up his mind long before he got to play it. I mean, disregarding new features because he doesn't care about them is as stupid as you can get when reviewing an expansion.

So no, it shouldn't be taken seriously.

 

[Rob (R8XFT)]

Sadly, someone has decided to cancel their order based purely on Tom Chick's review.

 

[cuc]

He doesn't like:
that religion spreads itself
that it's importance fades
that beliefs are first-come-first-served
that espionage is pretty passive

He claims that religion doesn't effect diplomacy very much. That the AI is still bipolar, and that it's tactically dumb.

No, he has no problem with religion spreading itself, and "first-come-first-served" beliefs are one of the things he praised.

If you have problem picking apart his views, it's because you are not used to his style. He's not writing in a straightforward style, but in the American higher middle class self-depreciating humorous style (yes, this is a real style).

 

[Hadley]

I paid 6€ for Civ5 and with these reviews I never ever will buy it for ~20€ at release. I read alot of Reviews and all say the Expansion isn't game-changing and is more like a huge patch.
So I'll wait and will try to get it, when there is a Deal <10&#8364;.

 

[headcase]

I paid 6€ for Civ5 and with these reviews I never ever will buy it for ~20€ at release. I read alot of Reviews and all say the Expansion isn't game-changing and is more like a huge patch.
So I'll wait and will try to get it, when there is a Deal <10€.

Probably that will come in a couple months, maybe earlier outside of Steam, and a really deep sale (75%) within a year.

 

[jjkrause84]

The tone wasn't great, but he raised a series of pretty reasonable criticisms. Is the 'build up points, pick a buff!' mechanic the only one the devs know? It seems like Civ isn't even pretended to try to render government and religion in any reasonable fashion.

[Doesn't mean I'll stop playing the game, mind....it's still fun. Just not as fun as it could and should have been, in my view.]

 

[BobDole]

Tom Chick's a pretty good reviewer. Not perfect, but he's always been pretty fair, in my opinion. He's allowed to have his own opinion, so if he doesn't like the game, that's fine.

 

[strijder20]

Funny how he lost a city (Barcelona), maybe some of his hatred originates from it ^^ Weird how he also says how 'Mongolia can throw whatever it wants into his defence, he won't lose anything anyway' while having lost Barcelona.
He raises some valid points, though. Civ V HAS flaws. But I've learned to ignore them and quite enjoy the game in general.

 

[nokmirt]

He doesn't like:
that religion spreads itself
that it's importance fades
that beliefs are first-come-first-served
that espionage is pretty passive

He claims that religion doesn't effect diplomacy very much. That the AI is still bipolar, and that it's tactically dumb.

Was there anything he did like? I am glad they tortured the poor guy and made him play a game he hated so much. He must be testing the hater copy of it. Like I said I'll judge for myself.

 

[Andulias]

Tom Chick's a pretty good reviewer. Not perfect, but he's always been pretty fair, in my opinion. He's allowed to have his own opinion, so if he doesn't like the game, that's fine.

No, it's not fine. I used to work for the biggest gaming portal in my home country for close to two years, and distancing yourself from your own opinion was key to writing a good review. Without going into too much detail, I'll illustrate with a few examples.

I was tasked with reviewing Crysis: Warhead. Why the big guy gave it to me when I was the RPG/4X geek I'll never know. Do I actually like Crysis? Not really, I find it has a bland story and setting, and some potentially interesting mechanics that don't really come together for me. I was fully aware though that the problem was in me, not the game, a personal opinion that has little justification beyond the "to each his own" argument. So I put that aside, looked at what the expansion was doing to elevate the core game, and gave it 8.5, a score I thought it really deserved. Have I ever touched it afterwards? Nope. I don't like that game. It's good, but not my cup of tea.

On the other hand was Mirror's Edge. I gave it around 7 (don't remember exactly how much) even though I unexplainably fell in love with it. The clean, stylized look was in stark contrast to the sea of gritty and industrial modern shooters, the parkour was refreshing, and I really liked the simple, but fun story. But putting aside my bias I couldn't close my eyes to the control issues, the "trial and error" nature of play or how freaking short the game was. I did say in my review that I fell in love with Mirror's Edge despite its flaws. That didn't stop me from criticizing it.

Judging from this article Tom Chick in my eyes is NOT a good reviewer. He embraces his personal opinion and states it as facts. He ignore new additions to the gameplay and opts to bash the game some more instead. He hates it because it's not what he wants it to be, while he should be judging it for what it is.