Knowing your entertainment and research before buying

[bman3k]

How important is it for you guys to get to know things before purchasing? Like when anticipating a big triple A title, do you go out of your way to find the insider scoop or do you just regularly follow developer announcements and stuff? I've begun to find that I sometimes prefer to be in the dark until a game is released, but mostly only when it's part of a series that and I was going to buy it anyways. For example I followed very few of Halo Reach's announcements before purchasing because I am a massive Halo fanboy; but for previous installments (Halo 2 and 3) I stalked the internet for info and had a very good idea of what the game was like before purchasing, but then it wasn't as sweet as discovering new features on your own.

Force Unleashed was another game I followed quite a bit (mostly because of a SW game drought at the time), but all the dev diaries ended spoiling the first half of the story for me and basically showed most of the "sync kills" for the boss fights, I felt the game was a bit spoiled for me. So I took the opposite mentality with TFU 2, but I ended up not caring for the game for a number of reasons and pretty much regretted buying it. What do you guys think is a happy in between for this type of situation?

I've made some totally blind purchases that I really enjoyed; I got Bioshock without knowing *anything* about it aside from see what was on the cover (I had no idea of the setting or gameplay), I just got it because I heard a lot of good things and I needed some games for my, at the time, new 360. This also applies to movies as well, I went into movies like Inglorious Basterds and The Dark Knight (not being a Batman fan or even had seen Batman Begins) and was totally caught off guard by what I saw as a very good film.

Are you guys for the whole ignorance is bliss followed by pleasant surprise, or do you tear into the details of something before release to determine it's quality and whether it is worth buying, or somewhere in between?

[Flagg]

I think ever since I was a kid, I would read a lot of gamer magazine reviews before deciding on getting a game I was interested in. However, some people will buy a game, even if its bad, because its part of a series or franchise they love. And the thing with some magazines, is that they will be massively biased toward a certain series, platform or company.

Today I think YouTube isn't a bad way to get a good idea of how a game will play. Watching actual footage can show a lot. I caved in and got Skyrim after seeing so many trailers/videos for it, and it turned out for me to be a good purchase. I really want to get Diablo 3 as well, but that would involve serious upgrades or getting a new hard drive all together.

I don't want to derail the thread, but despite what I said, I also made a lot of "blind" choices for the SNES and the Amiga in the 90's, and most of them were good. I don't know if I just liked games more then, or if games actually were better then, because I could not make a blind purchase today.

[overmind2000]

I've generally adopted the pattern of trying to avoid too much pre-release info on any title. I've had too many occasions where I've let the early development hype and info build me up into anticipation for a title; only to find that many of the features were significantly changed or removed from the final game release.

That said once a title is near or out on the market I do generally do some research into the title; even if its not that expensive I try to find out as much as a I can to see if its likely to be something worth me investing money and time into playing. Resources I'll use include:;
youtube videos - reviews, lets plays etc...
review websites - ( I used to read magazines, but with the net I tend to read them online now).
forums - I'll generally read generalist ones like here at relic or at steam forums; but I'll also glance through a games official forum (though I normally won't sign up to interact).
Demos - I love these, not just for getting to try a game, but also because I can find out if its actually going to run and look any good on my computer. I loath having games that I want to play, but which my not top rate system can't play, or will play with poor performance.
Chatting to friends - online/chat groups/in person etc... games are pretty mainstream these days so chatting can often be a great way to get more insight. I'll say that this is probably my current main introduction to new titles (new referencing their status to myself as opposed to just new games on the market).

As a result its rarer for me to make a blind purchase and what with pretty much all the info being online and most game shops now not stocking much if any PC games it just seems foolish to me not to do a little ground work before hitting the buy button.


So I'd say I prefer to make an informed choice over making an uninformed one. Though I will temper that against the fact that I tend to, but not always, be less research heavy on titles who's developer/series I'm already a firm fan of. This is often because I've already got a liking of their product/series and thus I'm more willing to give them a chance and try something without spoiling all the content. I also try to avoid any review which goes too far into divulging story elements - since spoilers are a mean way to ruin the fun of a game (you end up racing to get to the hinted/revealed "interesting bits" and miss out all the time between).

[Nurizeko]

I ignore hype usually, for the most part I base my decisions on:

1. The demo/free trail.

2. What peers are saying in real life/on forums such as these.

3. If I simply fancy it that day and have the cash spare/if I liked its predecessors in a series.


I used to hype for games in my younger days but old man is ooooooooooooold. (27)

[Rotlung]

I tend to check forums for opinions on the game, especially the technical issues sections to determine if the game is too glitchy to be played. I usually hunt for a demo whenever applicable, and check YouTube Let's Play videos.

So yeah, I make sure I'm as informed as possible, without spoiling plot, where applicable.

You only have so much money to spend on games. Better to make them count.