So this is a bit of an oddity I’m trying out but we’re going with it anyway. This is the first ever TTV Metascore prediction league, where we can finally settle debates once and for all over which is the best game releasing this holiday.
(notrly)
Actually what we’ll be doing is seeing how well we can predict critic approval of any given game. What we’ll be using to determine critic approval is the game’s metascore, or Metacritic score, which is an average of all major gaming websites’ reviews. Essentially the goal is to predict what the majority of critics will think about a game.
We’ll be predicting a grand total of 20 games; 6 Nintendo exclusives, 3 games exclusive to Microsoft and/or Sony platforms (wish I could do more but there’s so few), and 8 multiplatforms or PC games. If at least 10 people sign up with predictions…then there may be a prize thrown in for the winner as well.
NINTENDO GAMES:
Sonic Boom: Rise of Lyric (Nov 11, 2014)
Pokemon Omega Red/Alpha Sapphire (Nov 21, 2014)
Super Smash Bros for Wii U (Nov 21, 2014)
Persona Q: Shadow of the Labyrinth (Nov 25, 2014)
Captain Toad’s Treasure Tracker (Dec 5, 2014)
Ultimate NES Remix (Dec 5, 2014)
MICROSOFT/SONY GAMES:
Little Big Planet 3 (Nov 18, 2014)
Project: Cars (Nov 18, 2014)
Halo: The Master Chief Collection (Nov 21, 2014)
MULTIPLATFORM/PC GAMES:
Call of Duty: Advanced Warfare (Nov 3, 2014)
Binding of Isaac: Rebirth (Nov 4, 2014)
Lego Batman 3: Beyond Gotham (Nov 11, 2014)
Assassin’s Creed: Unity (Nov 11, 2014)
Dragon Age: Inquisition (Nov 18, 2014)
Far Cry 4 (Nov 18, 2014)
The Crew (Dec 2, 2014)
Lara Croft and the Temple of Osiris (Dec 9, 2014)
To enter, just sign up here and copy the list, putting a score next to the game indicating what you think it’s metascore will be. Scoring works on a basis of proximity: If you’re within 3 points of the game’s metascore, you’ll get 2 points. If you’re within 2, you’ll get 3 points. If you’re 1 away, you’ll get 4 points. If you’re right on the money, you’ll get 5 points. If everyone is horribly off and no one lands within 3 points of a right guess, the person closest will get a single point. That said; it isn’t a good idea to just pick the furthest guess from the mean in order to try for a single point; if your prediction happens to be the furthest away from the actual metascore, you will lose a point.
Points will be tallied when the New Year arrives, and the winner will…win. Possibly a prize if at least 10 people join.
Some rules:
#1: The metacritic score for a game being released on multiple platforms will be the one with the most scores entered. So if 30 critics review a game on the PS4, and 10 review it on X-Box One, we’ll be using the PS4 score.
#2: The sign up deadline for this is October 24, or nine days from now. That’s the latest I can guarantee that the games listed won’t have metacritic scores posted. You can still join after that, but you won’t receive any points for a game you haven’t predicted.
#3: Any prediction for a game MUST be submitted before the first review is posted on the Metacritic website. You can do some predictions now and some later, but just remember to submit them before reviews start rolling in (usually, at earliest, that’s 10 or so days before the game releases).