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Traditional videogames reviews look at fairly simple criteria. How does the game look? How does it sound? Does the control system work? Most games reviews work around these criteria and stick to them quite dogmatically. A few reviewers do add in extras like influences and storylines to add a bit more depth to the review but this generally depends on what publication or website the reviewer is writing for.

Jenova Chen from Thatgamecompany has ruffled a few feathers by saying in his session on the making of fLOw and Flower at this year’s Develop conference that reviewers are “getting it wrong”. Flow and Flower are both exceptionally unconventional games and whilst they both received fairly high scores in reviews they did both receive lots of comments that the games were both very much style over substance. Most reviewers commented that the games were visually stunning but lacking in much in the way of gameplay with one reviewer commenting on Flow that it is a “very pretty demo of what the SIXAXIS can do” (Hardcore Gamer Magazine).

The main thrust of Chen’s speech was; games need to develop more mature content in a manner more sophisticated than simply jacking up the violence and sexual content. With both Flow and Flower Chen’s desire was to create games that generate more sophisticated emotional responses from players. He even went to the lengths of cutting out the script and spell system from Flower, preferring to let the gameplay itself do the work of engaging the player. And to that ends, Flower is an impressive achievement. It is an exceptionally emotional experience, inducing very euphoric feelings of relaxation.

In developing titles that aspire to go beyond our traditional idea of video game experiences Chen came up against a wall when his games met with the critic’s pen. He recently collated information on a group of games that had been reviewed. He found that phrases like ‘crystal sound’, stunning graphics’, ‘best FPS’ and ’60 hours gameplay’. This is where he has determined that games reviewers are missing the point somewhat. His feelings are clear on the use of the traditional criteria: “That’s like talking about a car and how fast it goes – saying ‘it has great graphics’ is like saying ‘this car has four seats’. Reviews should be talking about what a game makes players feel.”

Modern big-budget games have not changed very much in terms of core content in the last 20 years. They all follow the same structure in terms of gamer satisfaction. The main goal is to progress forward either through the game’s story or through improving you character in order to beat stronger enemies. Some games make this very obvious like the Monster Hunter series and some disguise it very confidently with narrative such as Mass Effect. Because games haven’t changed very much in this respect the way we review them hasn’t changed either. The closest we will get to emotional comment on most games is on how rewarding the game is to complete.

This is not to say that developers have not tried to engage gamers on a more sophisticated manner. Quantic Dream and Bioware have both tried to add dimensions to their games by introducing emotional elements. Quantic Dream went the whole nine yards with Fahrenheit (Indigo Prophecy in the US) and tried very hard to put the gamer into the shoes of the game’s characters an feel what they feel. Over all this was fairly successful although the game did tend to feel more frustrating than engaging at times. Their new PS3 exclusive Heavy Rain looks to be taking this idea forward even further by creating a story that will persist even if one of the main characters dies.

Bioware began by taking a more subtle approach by introducing morality to the choices a player is confronted and having the choices influence not only the way other characters respond to the player by also affecting the result of the story. This has reached a zenith with the Mass Effect trilogy, as players’ decisions in the first game will have lasting consequences that carry over to the second and third games. This creates a more engaging experience as players do develop emotional attachments to the characters in their party and the death of these characters (at least one does die in the first game and the player chooses who) has lasting effects.

Both games have worked to achieve a more sophisticated gameplay experience that Chen is looking for at Thatgamecompany. If we have a look at how these games have been appraised by writers most reviews give no more than a cursory comment to the emotional engagement of these exceptional titles before or after expounding the virtues of each game’s technical achievements in graphics, sound and narrative. Quotes from Metacritic for Mass Effect paint the picture perfectly.

“The cinematic design is nothing short of masterful. This is a game that takes the aspects of film that make cinema so compelling and crosses it with the interactivity of games with unprecedented success. Linear storytelling feels quaint by comparison.” (IGN)

“A strong, robustly put-together RPG that for every shortcoming has a magical moment too.” (Gamesmaster UK Christmas issue 2007)

“It’s surprising that so many small annoyances and glitches made their way into a game of such general high quality. Still, most players will be able to look past them and enjoy Mass Effect for what it is: A terrific role-playing game with great production values and fun, exciting action.” (Gamespot)

“Mass Effect is still enjoyable enough to warrant 24 hours of play (completion with sub-missions), and the stops it makes en route are visually stunning. It just doesn’t find what it goes looking for: the myth and exotica to accurately follow Star Wars.” (Edge Magazine Christmas issue 2007)

“Where it doesn’t quite hit the mark for me is in the action stakes. Although it underpins the game with all sorts of excellent ideas that ought to make it a deeper, more intelligent and immersive experience, the simple truth is that the minute-to-minute combat simply isn’t as intense and involving as you’d expect from a game in 2007.” (Eurogamer)

These are the true heavy weights of games journalism here. We have Edge, Gamesmaster, IGN, Gamespot and Eurogamer all relying on standard conventions to judge a game that was far from conventional. Some reviewers got the point though:

“A game of such rare emotion that we became attached to our characters to the point of missing them now it’s all over.” (X360 magazine UK Christmas issue 2007)

“It’s a rare thing when a game comes along with the power to move a player emotionally… Mass Effect takes interactive entertainment to breathtaking new heights.” (Gamespy)

Both of these reviews did also consider the technical merits of Mass Effect but the quotes show that reviewer felt the need to state that the game offers much more to the gamer than an impressive interactive light show.

We will soon reach a point where we will have trouble building faster processors into smaller spaces and when that day comes the leaps in graphical and sound quality will stop. Games developers are perfectly right to want to move in more creative directions to build games that will have much more emotional interaction. Games like Mass Effect, Flow, Flower and Fahrenheit are only the beginning. It is only fair that as journalists, we catch up. If we can explore the emotional content of games effectively then we will do our part to help the industry mature in a more efficient and healthy manner.

We don’t need to stop asking how does it look, sound and play, these are still important questions. The question we should ask alongside these is how does it make us feel? Answer that one and no one is a loser.