It's not a bad game because you're bad at it

One of my pet peeves about game reviews are the ones in which the game receives a poor final judgement that's reflective not of the quality of the game itself, but of the players inability to play the game effectively. I'm not saying those reviewers (I'm going to avoid specific examples and names unless it needs to be discussed further) are bad at gaming in general, but we all have our strengths and weaknesses when it comes to this hobby. That being said, sometimes there are some games that certain reviewers just shouldn't touch unless a disclaimer is given at the beginning.

To illustrate my point, I'll use myself and the Tekken series as an example as that's one particular series that comes to mind that I often have difficulties with.

Where my fighting game experience is concerned, I grew up playing 2D fighters pretty much exclusively. As such my taste in fighting games continues to lean more towards the 2D entries of the genre. Knowing that, you probably assumed correctly that I don't particularly enjoy the Tekken series. Some of the reasons why are that I have difficulty maintaining proper spacing between myself and my opponent on a 3D plane, I have trouble sometimes getting the characters to move how I want, and in the heat of combat sometimes the combo system gets lost on me. When I play Tekken it's usually the single player experience as taking on a live opponent can be frustrating for me.

Does that make any of the Tekken games bad? Typically the Tekken series delivers top notch graphics and the music is always amazing in my opinion. It's usually the gameplay itself that I have trouble with. Tekken has a tremendous amount of followers that spend hours upon hours mastering the game competitively, where as the majority of my time has been more of a casual single player experience. Do I really have the right to condemn the game as a bad one? Can I really make statements about the combo system being bad because I personally had trouble with it?

If I were to write a review on a Tekken game, my opening statement would clearly state that I played the game from a casual user standpoint. That should be the standard with any game or genre you're not comfortable with.

I think the problem with a lot of reviewers, especially the folks that write for major publications, is that they don't want to admit that they can't be a master at every game they play. Which shouldn't be something to be ashamed about, but I do understand that landing a position as a professional reviewer probably has certain expectations of skill to uphold.

That's really all I can say on the subject, is just to be honest about what you really thought about the game itself and not let your frustrations make for a sour review. It's certainly okay to talk about how difficult a game is, just remember that what is difficult for you may be easier for others and vice versa.

I just had a thought from writing this. I should post my own standards for review so people will have a better feel of what kind of player I am. That way they can decide how much stock to put into my reviews.  Something to think about anyway.