They've converted the letter to a number value, Einstein.

i know but why? There reviews are in letters now. Not numbers that they convert to letters. It would have been easier to just put there grade up there as appose to converting to a number that you cant be 100% sure is correct

This is why 1UP shouldn't have used -/+s. It lets douche bags convert the scores to digits too easily.

I wonder if it's within ZD's right to demand Metacritic and Gamerankings to take down their review scores that have been converted?

lol

I believe it was Chris Grant from the last Joystiq podcast who said he hated the 1st Condemned. Ludwig likes the game though, but he was absent from the last podcast. Maybe if Chris would have played the game when it was released back close to the launch of the 360, he would have liked it more. I thought it was decent at the time, but I haven't went back to play it recently. There have been a lot of triple A titles between now and then.

I thought the first game was great. Chris's complaints about the storyline indicate that he clearly DIDN'T attempt to get all the birds and other collectible items that unlock the reports that actually fill in the backstory and make sense of the game's ending.

*SPOILER*

The cult is using subaudible waves to create general chaos in the city and bring about a period of dark terror. The sound waves are killing the birds and driving derelicts, citizens, and cops into homicidal rages. Serial killer X has been affected by the sound waves and driven to kill. To effectively channel his desire to kill, he has been hunting down other serial killers and killing them by the same methods that they used in their previous crimes. The easiest way to locate these serial killers was to follow Ethan around, since Ethan (a homicide detective) was already assigned to hunt them down.

*SPOILER END*

I didn't get all of the achievements (wussed out on melee master, IIRC), but I put a lot of time into it and didn't feel cheated in any way shape or form.

Now that I have an HDTV, I keep intending to get back to it, and the release of the sequel is probably what will bump it back up in my queue this weekend.

right behind the wii version of GTA 4

Been playing that on my Retro PC, its a good game, but the pacing is a bit weird...it doesn't give it enough time to build atmosphere before your fighting sets of armor...Still a very atmospheric game given the time it was released...shame about the FMV cut scenes.

My Retro Rig:
Pentium 90 w/80MB ram
2 dual 8GB SCSI-W drives
4X SCSI CD-ROM
Mach 64 VGA card
Voodoo2 3DFX 8MB
Sound Blaster 16 ISA
Roland MPU-IPC
10BaseT network card
Roland MT-32
Roland SC-55MKII

I've got a multi-boot for Dos 6.22,Win '95, and Win '98.

I love playing the classics with a better set up than I had back in the day when I first played them. I'm thinking about adding a Pentium 233 MMX instead of the P90 but other than happy I think its the perfect retro rig.

I'm sure you aren't stupid enough to not know that I meant "dEmo" and not "dOmo". But seriously, where the hell is it?

I'm not, but apparently you are too uptight to take a little ribbing. I enjoy exploiting the occasional typo, big deal.

No kidding. I just picked up Brawl and Bully SE, so unfortunately this will have to wait for a couple weeks.

No kidding. If they'd just be kind enough to put up that domo I'd be willing to say "Domo arigato" ;)

Metacritic feels the need to convert them to a number for whatever reason, and Joystiq is following along.

"Metacritic feels the need to convert them to a number for whatever reason"

How would you include a review in the average at metacritic if it wasn't numeric?

@vidGuy

Perhaps it's philosophically invalid to reduce a game to a number? Metacritic shouldn't be including 1up's "score" in the first place, since it's completely disingenuous to 1up's written review.

So it's philosophically valid to reduce a game to a letter?

I don't see what the problem is. We have a general idea of what letter grades are worth what percentages; a conversion that is off by a few points won't negatively affect the metascore by much and at least allows the review (by a large contributor) to be included in the metacritic.

Whether an "A" should be 92% or 94% is a little nitpicky if you ask me.

vidGuy, you completely missing my point. People of world, READ the friggin' reviews! Numbers, Letters, Gold Stars, etc. mean NOTHING. There's no way to make an informed descision without reading the review. Peoples' opinions of games, by virtue of being OPINIONS, are inherently subjective. Any kind of metric you use to judge something's worth is inherently objective. Metascores are no substitute for an informed impression of what a game is actually like, so stop buying games based on scores.