[RPG]: U3: The Final Enemy, reviewed by Lev Lafayette (4/3)

http://www.rpg.net/reviews/archive/12/12804.phtml

Lev Lafayette's Summary:

A challenging reconnaissance mission with an interesting environ (underwater) that gives credibility to the title of the series and concludes the threat to Saltmarsh. Hefty in size, fair artwork throughout.


Go to the full review for more information.

[Tori Bergquist]

I always did enjoyrthe U series modules, quite enjoyable. Good review....after watching some of the interesting commentary your MM review sparked, I was curious to see what this one was like.

[Lev Lafayette]

Originally Posted by Tori Bergquist

I always did enjoyrthe U series modules, quite enjoyable. Good review....after watching some of the interesting commentary your MM review sparked, I was curious to see what this one was like.

Oddly enough it doesn't attract the same attention!

[Tori Bergquist]

Originally Posted by Lev Lafayette

Oddly enough it doesn't attract the same attention!

Thus proving the point that a really good critic will know exactly what to say to get his or her audience going....

[Lev Lafayette]

Originally Posted by Tori Bergquist

Thus proving the point that a really good critic will know exactly what to say to get his or her audience going....

LOL, maybe if I just wrote "Everything is just fine, don't worry and be happy" there wouldn't be an issue...

I mean there's one reviewer, who I won't mention, but who has done a score of reviews and only 1 review recieved a substance rating of less than 3 - and that was a minature! Now either they're lucky or their ratings are skewed towards the positive.

[Tori Bergquist]

I know what you mean; I always thought it odd that you can find some pretty accurate and telling reviews for movies, books, and sometimes even video games (check out metacritic.com for example for a good cross section) but gaming books reviews tend to be very fannish and laden with praise. I suspect that most reviewers tend to fall in to one of two categories (keeping in mind I used to review for some print magazines that are now dead):

Reviewers who are kind because they love getting the free copies fo review, and who feel a sort of comraderie for the authors of the games they are reviewing, so it feels bad to sleight another aspiring designer's product.

and...

Reviewers who looooove the product in question, it's the best game ever, or they are enamoured with it and want to beat the drums of joy to alert everyone as to how great it is. I'm guilty of that with the new Mongoose Runequest, for example. I love that game, and overlook it's production issues and occasional design flaws as a result. Unfortunately, this reviewer tends to have a loose grasp on objectivity, and will often diminish real problems with a product, or de-emphasize them in order to hype up the exciting points. That essentially turns the review in to free ad space for the publisher of the game.

Now yeah, there are reviwers, some of them here at RPG.Net, who swing the opposite way: they Haaaaate a product so much they have got to let everyone know how delightfully bad it is. But ironically, it's usually the case that if someone despises a product so much (D20 and Palladium excepted I suppose), there's often a surprisingly good reason for it. Take Synnabar for example....