TBM wrote:Also, a lot of the reviews were done within the first week, when servers were completely unstable. This has long since been fixed, so that isn't a problem anymore.
Adding to that, a lot of reviewers (at least the ones whose reviews counted towards the metacritic score) didn't really take online/server stability into account when rating NBA 2K14 and other releases in recent years. 2K15 was kind of the first time a lot of them factored it into their score.
Of course, even when sites do lay out their scoring criteria, the numbers can seem pretty arbitrary from year to year. A different person may review each game for the same publication, they may not be a hardcore basketball fan/gamer, or the scoring criteria/scale may change between games. IGN gave NBA 2K12 a score of 9.5/10 and NBA 2K13 a score of 9.1/10, yet described NBA 2K13 as the superior game. It's more informative to read what reviewers and gamers are saying about the games, rather than worrying about the numerical scores. It's just a shame those scores drive the industry.