Market Research Firms Claim Game Reviews Aren’t That Important

At the LA Games Conference 2009, industry experts agreed that game reviews from magazines are not nearly as important to potential consumers as other factors.

Nick Williams, from the industry research firm OTX GamePlan, gave the example of MadWorld for the Wii. IGN gave it a 9.0 and its Metacritic score was 82 — they thought the game was going to take off, but Madworld only sold 66,000 copies in the US. It turns out, only 8% of the Wii market had even heard of MadWorld.

Ethan Titelman, from the market research firm Penn, Schoen & Berland, believes that critical reviews won’t change gamers minds. If a gamer thinks the game is great, and they read bad reviews, it won’t necessarily stop them from purchasing. Unlike film reviews to movie goers, Metacritic scores don’t hold as much weight with Joe Gamer. He claims a concept with mass appeal is far more important, along with a strong marketing strategy. Whereas movies typically spend 1/3 of their budget on advertising, games only spend 1/6th on average.

How important are game reviews to you? Do they effect your purchases?

http://www.siliconera.com/2009/04/29...hat-important/