A bit by accident I happened to read the last two pages of a heated debate here (viewtopic.php?f=7&t=11664) in the OT section and it was about "opinions", so to say.
Now that topic is locked and over three months old so I thought I could start a new one here because it's an interesting subject after all.
I feel that in the old topic there has been some sort of confusion between "opinion" and "evaluation", which are two different concepts.
The way I see it (and hey, it's an opinion
) is that an opinion is not really based on facts or processed data but rather on taste. It's personal and by definition it can not really be an object of critic. Being that the case, one person might hate or love a game (because they were speaking of games there) even just looking at its cover. There is no "burden of proof" (term used in the old thread by DaveW) for an opinion or another opposite to it.It's different when we speak about evaluation instead. An evaluation is based on facts and it can be more or less competent and detailed. It has to do with appraising (when it comes to objects, for instance) and even diagnosing (in medicine, for example). It can be criticized because it can be objectively wrong. Speaking about games, we can talk about reviews: they should not express a mere opinion but judge the worth of the final product.
Cybernetic Pig in the old thread complained about people stating that one specific game was not to their liking. According to him, the fault lied in them not having accumulated enough game experience in order to express a "fair" judgement.
His critic could apply only to people who reviewed a game, but not to opinions.
So in the end, I think it was just a matter of miscommunication there. Personally I believe that a game evaluation should have different qualities to be reliable: one of them having experienced it as fully as possible. But it's not the most important one.
Feel free to chime in and tell me what you think!
