wow The Shadowlands User Metacritic Score Is... Problematic

[Starym 3,779]

 

It seems the Shadowlands aren't getting the best of receptions over on the user side of things on Metacritic, and since the critic reviews aren't in yet that's the only score available. The negative reviews currently outweigh the positives, which wouldn't be problematic in general, but as often happens with Metacritic user reviews some negative ones are not really accurate or helpful. And the reasoning given in some of these some reviews is pretty... "interesting", so one might characterize this as review bombing.

The scores themselves are always problematic with Metacritic, but it seems Shadowlands is particularly afflicted with this issue at the moment, as the vast majority of the negative side of the slider are just 0 scores. There are some negative ones that are perfectly legitimate, with fair evaluations of the person's opinion, but most are just 0 or 1 scores (in a 0-10 scoring system), and many of them have some VERY insightful "reviews" to offer:

Quote

-No new classes
-No new races
-Only temporary new abilities/traits to be wiped at the end of the expansion
-Still nothing done to fix UI/server/faction problems
-Leveling basically deleted instead of fixed.
Score: 0
...
Not many features. Compare to any expansion or classic, has lowest feature set.. just the tower and covenant. Not liking the covenant system so far.

Launch has had issues, but not as bad as most expansions.
Score: 0
...
Doesnt look like much was added. Will give it another month and re rate. People giving it a 10.. crazy.
Score: 0
...
Bored powers, balance issues, forced choices, server issues, and a launch during a major holiday. Activision needs to clean house and get someone designing the game that isnt a math nerd...
Score: 0
...
In the game you are called a special charkter and you and only You can change the fate of everyone
Score: 0
...
it's simply more of the same, the only thing that changes are the mobs, but the missions are the same **** the scenarios are combinations of past expansions, the blizzard thing is very weak
Score: 1
...
Have not been impressed so far. Absent standard features we come to expect in new expansion packs.
Score: 0
...Game has much to improve on. Some zones are nice, some are boring. No new class or major feature. Didnt research game ahead of time, was my mistake.
Score: 0
...No new race, class, or major features. Soundtrack, most zone design, and art good. Lots of cut scenes. Balance and launch issues.
Score: 1
...
Server: Defias Brotherhood. Horde. Waiting in queue for the dungeon almost 1 hour and 50 minutes. Bought the game after announcement at Blizzcon. This is unacceptable.
Score: 0
...
World of Warcraft, including the most recent Shadowlands expansion, is a 2004 game that is today's biggest example of an outdated game that is not underdeveloped for the amount of financial income gained by Activision Blizzard from it.

Shadowlands does not do help much, as it is a similar experience to Legion - and while the score would have not been lower than 5/10 - the 0/10 comes for the price that comes with this game.
Score: 0
...
Literally the worst expansion to any mmo I've ever had the luxury to deal with. If I could rate this trash with a negative score I would.
Score: 0
...
Popoo game popooo ahaaahh funny poop this game is poop really pooopy! Watch out for Poop!
Score: 0

Regardless of some of the above perhaps having some valid points, assigning a 1 or 0 to a game as complex as WoW is just laughable, and while it has become the de-facto way to say "I don't like this", it's just pretty sad to see in the WoW community.

Then there are also those that are legitimately frustrated at the very real issues present, like queues and similar (although with this logic, Vanilla, BC, Classic and basically the majority of WoW expansions would also get a 0):

Quote

The worst expansion ever.. imagine paying for the game and staying in 3-5 hour ques. It's been 4 days while other people are already ahead and some of us are still trying to hit max level. Unfair advantage, when I'm paid the same amount as everyone, I'm still at an unfair advantage by Blizzard putting me in ridiculous ques If there would be a - ve rating I would have given it. The worst part is Blizzard doesn't care about our plight on their official forums Collapse
Score: 0
...
Decent content, but that doesn't matter if you can't even play the game, which is the case here. Most of the issues that made it unplayable were resolved within the first 1-2 days, and now many of us are stuck in 3 hour queues whenever we go to login. This is ridiculous for a company as large as Blizzard. Compensation is due.
...
absolutely horrible at best, for 4 days thousands of players on EU and US servers unable to play, with huge numerous disconnection issues that are yet to be solved, the support is unprofessional and are not offering any compensations to the affected players, this might be planned for specific high pop servers to let players transfer to dead servers, to pay bills because of COVID and other company bs scams.

By far the worst experience in my entire 14 years of gaming

There's plenty more where that came from, as well as glowing 10-scores, so if you're interested, head on over to Metacritic's page and check them out!

[Dejo93 984]

They aren't completely wrong though, are they?

[Brutalis 165]

The leveling has been pretty pants, and the story is rather lame - especially given the last half of the zone's storylines are gated behind covenant choice. However, the dungeon mechanics are pretty fun this time around with the exception of Plaguefall which I will never, ever, run again, and Torghast is a great addition to the game despite the fact running it more than a handful of times per week is pointless.

0/10

[leapingshadow 50]

Metacritic user scores haven't been accurate for a long time. I'm not saying they're wrong, but they're so prone to bombing it's hard to take them with anything other than a mountain of salt.

[Starym 3,779]

17 minutes ago, Brutalis said:

The leveling has been pretty pants, and the story is rather lame - especially given the last half of the zone's storylines are gated behind covenant choice. However, the dungeon mechanics are pretty fun this time around with the exception of Plaguefall which I will never, ever, run again, and Torghast is a great addition to the game despite the fact running it more than a handful of times per week is pointless.

0/10

The tragedy of today's world is that I genuinely have no idea if that is meant as 100% crazy sarcasm or a genuine score.

[Starym 3,779]

21 minutes ago, Dejo93 said:

They aren't completely wrong though, are they?

Giving 0 or 1 scores based on what they said? Yes, they are 100000% wrong. Whether Shadowlands is good or not is a completely different issue.

[jinsu2301 273]

I tried to pick a herb, but it spawned inside a tree.

0/10

[Vanquinn 9]

As a cynical piece of *filtered*, I'm enjoying shadowlands so far, but all of these 0 ratings are 100% justified. The game isn't even in the same league as it was 10 years ago, which is wild, a game is supposed to get better, not worse.

Here's another thing to add to the 0 rating. TARGET CAP. Also having cosmetic choices ripped out of my hands because I want to be Venthyr but it's actual trash for my spec is pretty depressing.

On the flip side, people who think leveling needs to be hard are on drugs, the point of the game is end game tbh, and if you like leveling, then you can just keep leveling new toons to enjoy the experience. The overall experience feels great, other than not getting interrupts til like level 20+.

Edited November 27, 2020 by Vanquinn

[Brutalis 165]

3 minutes ago, Starym said:

Whether Shadowlands is good or not is a completely different issue.

Out of pure curiosity, how would you review and score it?

In all honesty I think it's too early to review an expansion. Due to the nature of MMOs you have to wait a while to get the actual content to review.

[Starym 3,779]

11 minutes ago, Brutalis said:

Out of pure curiosity, how would you review and score it?

In all honesty I think it's too early to review an expansion. Due to the nature of MMOs you have to wait a while to get the actual content to review.

I wouldn't, I'm at level 58 and not done the final zone or any of the endgame. I am very much enjoying myself atm, but that's as much due to not having played wow since start of BfA as to Shadowlands itself. I do think it LOOKS incredible (helps to have it on 4k and big ass OLED screen), prolly best looking expansion yet. I very much enjoyed the Bastion story, Maldraxxus so-so (the betrayals are laughable and written by 4-year-olds) and not really a fan of Ardenweald story (but it's also prolly the best looking zone ever in WoW).

[ignringerfinger 11]

damn crusaders

[Nakzul 37]

A score of 0 should only be given to games that doesn't work at all.. The idea that because there aren't any new classes / abilities or that the game isn't entirely finished is one thing - but giving the game a score of 0 when there's tons of stuff to do and the game is more than playable is something else entirely.

[Calorat 78]

If you have the opinion that the game is complete garbage and deserves a Zero,  score the game a Zero, it's your opinion and yours alone.  Reviews are just opinions and you have a right to whatever opinion / score you want to give it.  Giving your opinion should never be "problematic"

[revjiggs1 0]

1 hour ago, Dejo93 said:

They aren't completely wrong though, are they?

except they completely are. This expansion has more features than even legion. that just had artifact weaapons and yet people loved it

[Starseed 113]

2 hours ago, Starym said:

-No new classes
-No new races

 

2 hours ago, Starym said:

..No new race, class

yeah i also would love a new class i think there are quite a few potential classes they could make and a completely new race that dont remind me of another one like the allied races do would also be nice but is this really a reason to give a 0 there are 12 classes right now and i doubt these guys play or have played every single one off them if there isnt a single class right now that you like even remotly then maybe wow isnt the game for you at the moment

[Migol 425]

Target cap, no mounting in the maw, general "rushed" feeling of the maw and parts of the other zones.     And I'd echo a lot of the comments above about no new real powers, just the same talents/borrowed power with small tweaks.   Not a 0/1 out of 10 but I think a 5/10 is very arguable so far.

[Skayan 52]

3 minutes ago, revjiggs1 said:

except they completely are. This expansion has more features than even legion. that just had artifact weaapons and yet people loved it

Yes, artifacts.
not the class fantasy
not mythic+
not world quests
not demon hunters (new class)
not class campaigns
not flightmaster whistles (which now are missed by many)
not legendaries (really love it or hate it feature, i'm on the side that loved the legendaries especially with raid sets)
not broken shore mage tower
not that they were constantly adding new dungeons with each major patch.
So far in Shadowlands only Torghast is new, covenants and conduits are literally Artifact Traits but in my opinion worse. While i like the concept of "choose your side you want to fight for" i think it punishes all players in some way, unless you're PvP only player. Yes, conduits give you more space for customization but if you already took covenant that sims highest, is there really any space for your own choices? This is the problem that Blizzard faces since almost always, most of us will go for what's the best and then Pikachu Face when Ardenweald is laggy. I chose Night Fae on my Arcane Mage, because covenant ability is op and the zone looks amazing. Does it fit my class fantasy...? 

Torghast would be fun if it was infinite and giving gear as reward. Maybe not something with high ilvl, but at least something that would make gearing alts fun. Currently each layer has only 6 floors so you finish it before it gets fun. If i had to rate Shadowlands it would go like this.
Zones: 7/10 (only 7 because i hate Maldraxxus), Ardenweald and Bastion are stunning, Revendreth is meh, not a fan of ugly vampires and goth cities, Mald looks like puke, no ty.
Story: somewhere between 2 and 3 out of 10, Shadowlands don't make sense. You died. You go to Shadowlands. You are a noble soul. You go to Bastion. You are now Ascended. NOW SOMEONE ON AZEROTH REVIVES YOU AND YOU ARE NOW A DEATH KNIGHT KEK. Or: NOTHING ESCAPES THE MAAW
except my character who has quests to go to the maw for 5 minutes and go back 10 times a day.
Quests: 5/10 -> Zone score and Story score divided by 2. I think quests are just for players to enjoy the zone and to better understand the story.

Dungeons: 8/10. Much better than the BfA dungeons.

Features: it's hard to talk about features, the expansion is only a few days old but i'm very disappointed with Torghast. I was hoping it will be endless or at least much, much longer than it is now. It kinda feels like doing Horrific Visions without the whole "do it asap" and with multiple layers. I'm really hopeful that they will add more powerful legendaries, do more covenant balancing, allow us to choose 2nd covenant and maybe fix Torghast.

[durdyenglish 298]

Imagine deciding in 3 days that a game this complex (with much of the content to come) is a 0. 

I swear, the players will get me to quit this game before any design decision does.

[Ragingwolf 286]

For what is already given in the expansion this has been rather smooth launch for me and a few people.  Had 2-3 minute queues as Tank or Healer when doing Normal-Heroic Dungeons.  Don't really expect to instantly have any new races or classes.  New borrowed power is at a low setting till possibly further down later in the expansion.  Node spawning seems more widespread this time around and farther apart when it comes to gathering.  Same when finding select areas to fish.  Torghast is fun and engaging for me when soloing or bringing a friend in to grind out the layer.  This season of keystones is going to be very interesting when clearing trash, fighting AoE cap, and the new affix.

6/10

-Fell through the map one time due to odd glitch.

-Apparently no one understands the mechanic for Tirna Scithe

-No Auction House in Oribos

-Made 1 Druid mad for not helping him kill all the mobs he pulled in Bastion while I looted a chest and went my merry way.

[durdyenglish 298]

2 hours ago, Calorat said:

If you have the opinion that the game is complete garbage and deserves a Zero,  score the game a Zero, it's your opinion and yours alone.  Reviews are just opinions and you have a right to whatever opinion / score you want to give it.  Giving your opinion should never be "problematic"

Disagree - you have a responsibility when using a site like Metacritic to approach it logically. What these people are doing is juvenile and akin to throwing a temper tantrum. 

A 0 rating for Shadowlands is wrong. It's not a matter of opinion - assigning a game like Shadowlands a 0 means most other games on the market must be ranked at or below a 0. I looked - some of these users are ranking universally accepted bad games higher than this expansion. 

Ranking a game is not "I liked it" or "I didn't like it." It's subjective analysis laid over the top of practiced and accepted standards for measuring the success of a product. When you ignore the standards on which ALL games are judged and assign it an arbitrary grade that amounts to a pass/fail (which is NOT what a 0-10 scoring system is designed for), your opinion simply cannot be taken seriously by anyone approaching it with measured reason. 

When you rank Shadowlands a 0, you're declaring your distain for Blizzard, not ranking the product they put out. That is not what that website is for and it should not be hijacked for the agenda of the disgruntled, long-since disinterested fan boys who DON'T KNOW WHEN TO QUIT THE GAME. After 16 years, did you ever just think you were done?

No - it must be Blizzard's fault for their inability to hold your attention span.

A ZERO? GTFO - that's insulting to everyone who worked on this game and everyone who is enjoying it.

 

[durdyenglish 298]

9 minutes ago, Ragingwolf said:

-Fell through the map one time due to odd glitch.

You're going to drop points on a score for a week one bug that they are actively working to squash?

Ease up.

[Reno2171 24]

4 hours ago, Starym said:

and a launch during a major holiday

Why does it matter if it's released over a holiday?

Choosing to spend time with your family or playing wow with friends should NOT be a hard decision. But, I'll break it down for you.

Do you love your family? If yes, spend time with them if not play wow.

[durdyenglish 298]

19 minutes ago, Reno2171 said:

Why does it matter if it's released over a holiday?

Choosing to spend time with your family or playing wow with friends should NOT be a hard decision. But, I'll break it down for you.

Do you love your family? If yes, spend time with them if not play wow.

tbh that they even got the game out this year WITH A GLOBAL PANDEMIC and it plays this well is astonishing. 

[Starseed 113]

1 hour ago, Ragingwolf said:

-Fell through the map one time due to odd glitch.

-Apparently no one understands the mechanic for Tirna Scithe

-No Auction House in Oribos

-Made 1 Druid mad for not helping him kill all the mobs he pulled in Bastion while I looted a chest and went my merry way

- well did it happen one time or more often 

-i suposse you mean the fog door riddle thing well its a riddle they want it to be a tiny challange

-its that way for i think ever if you realy need it that bad go ingi than you have one

-you really take a piont down for you making a player mad? i mean really?

[Starseed 113]

i dont know why but some of these reminded me of the review for a dna test kit i found last week were a young woman complaind and gave one star cause she had just german dna like its not the test fault