Home
Warning: Contains Inception spoilers...but not Gears of War spoilers!
I recently saw a NY Times headline that said something about how we all might have existential crises because we're living in an age now where our pasts can't escape us. You can thank the Internet for that. And double thank the message board trolls while you're at it.
Shortly after I reviewed the original Gears of War for EGM/1UP, someone took a screenshot of the article, highlighted all the negative things I brought up about the game, circled the score (which was originally a 10/10, then got converted to an A+ when we went to a letter scale), chopped off the second half of the text where I justified that very score, then used what was left as an example of what an idiot of a reviewer I was.
Obviously, purposely omitting half the review isn't fair, but that doesn't mean I'm not an idiot. Can a flawed game get a 10 out of 10? It's an age-old argument, but I recently found an ally: the movie Inception.
Over the years, that half-screenshot would flare up here and there and continue to haunt me, especially on the NeoGAF message boards. I wish I could magically make it disappear -- mainly because I won't always be around to help fill in the missing side of the story. Luckily for me, some NeoGAFers have jumped to my defense, either letting others know that entire passages of that review were cut out or that it's perfectly reasonable to give a problematic game the highest score possible.
The best pro-me argument that I've seen: Someone was appreciative of the fact that I didn't review Gears of War like a robot, where I automatically docked points for every problem that I found, like I was working off of some imaginary checklist. Cliched story? Negative one point. Limited multiplayer? Negative half a point. Thus reviewer Dan Hsu must computate this product to score 8.5 out of 10 with a 0.009% margin of error.
This particular defender argued that the sum of my emotional experiences with the game should determine the final score, not a list of nitpicky pros and cons. That was exactly what I was trying to convey! As a professional reviewer, I didn't want to gloss over the problems in Gears of War. But in the end, the full experience (from campaign to multiplayer) was so memorable for me, I had to give it the top score. (It's worth noting at this point that EGM/1UP didn't define a 10/10 as "perfect." Since "perfect" doesn't exist, we made that allowance in order to use the full scale, because before that, we used to screw some legendary games out of their deserved scores, like 9.5 for Super Mario 64 or 9.0 for Castlevania: Symphony of the Night -- both deserved better in hindsight.)
So where does Inception come in?
Let me tell you, that movie has some epically stupid moments (reminder: spoilers coming up). I understand some exposition is absolutely needed, especially for a plot as complex as this one. But c'mon...do we really need a full summary of just about everything that's about to happen seconds from now? Some of the dialog is embarrassing (Joseph Gordon-Levitt announcing "Paradox!" before dropping the guy from the flip-flopped stairwell sounded like something a Mortal Kombat announcer would say). And Inception is full of cliched filmmaking, from opening with a scene from later in the movie (director to audience: "Oh, don't worry, you don't understand this now, but you will be surprised when you see this again later!") to the obvious ending (of course we're not going to see what happens to the top).
Let me also tell you, I love Inception. Love...like I wanted to see it again as soon as it was finished. Love...like I think about this movie all the damn time. Love...like I may want to marry it someday when that sort of thing is legalized in California.
I loved it so much, it made me despise those bad moments even more. How dare they blemish such a great film? But you know what? It doesn't matter. I can't think of one person I wouldn't recommend Inception to...even if that person was totally stupid and wouldn't be able to follow the multiple layers of the plot. I won't bother telling you all the reasons why I love this movie, as that's not really the point of this post. But if I were a film critic scoring it? 10 out of 10, easily...with conditions, obviously -- just like in my Gears of War review.
OK, listen...don't be a jerk and interpret this to mean I think Gears of War and Inception are equal or even comparable. They're most certainly not. But it's worth remembering that a review is so much more than one number that conveniently tells the whole story and fits very neatly into a "rent/buy/perfect" sort of scale. Games can provide moments that make you hold your breath, grip your controller with adrenalized superhuman strength, or simply go, "Oh...wow." Try to enjoy those moments...and let the critics enjoy them, too.
