When you buy a video game, do you focus on a games rating or do you let other aspects of the game influence whether or not you want to buy it? Like general reviews, videos, audience scores, word of mouth, franchise, etc?

Right now two of the most popular grading systems for video games are Metacritic and IGN. Sometimes a game does really well and sometimes it's just so bad according to critics and reviewers but do you let that influence what you get?

In my case, I usually focus a lot on the score of a game. Unless it's a game that I already was hyping up or is part of a series that I really like, I won't get it unless it has a good score. For example, there were a few games that I was going to get, like Lego Worlds, and then I found out that It had a Metacritic score of just below 70%. That's not bad at all but in the end I chose not to get them.

Usually after I pick out games that I want and read through all the reviews and watched a bunch of videos, Metacritic is the last step. If a game has a score between 80% and 90% I usually ens up doing more research before I decide and if it has more than 90% I usually just play along and get it.

For example, here are all the games I bought over the past 6 months that were so let because of their score and I would have normally not gotten it.

Titanfall 2
Deus Ex: Mankind Divided
Detroit: Become Human
Horizon Zero Dawn
Burnout Paradise
Diablo III
God of War
Spider-man
Red Dead Redemption II
Breath of the Wild
Super Mario Odessy
Bayonetta 2

How do you deal with Metacritic, IGN, and Game Informer?

I really love Metacritic. In fact, I think it's the only place worth checking to get a balanced review score. As it's name suggests, it calculates a meta score based on a multitude of reviewers, so you know you are not just getting one person's opinion, but a general average. 

I rely heavily on reviews, as I find I'm very close to agreeing with them. That goes for movies too. Very rarely do I find myself disagreeing strongly with the metacritic reviews.

I probably won't even buy the game if it doesn't have very good reviews. 

I don't follow what new games are coming out so I generally have no clue of their existence, let alone their reviews.

I get introduced to most of my games through YouTube gaming videos so if I see one on YouTube that I find interesting or fun looking, that's when I might look up some reviews/scores. I don't let it dictate my decision though, and I mostly use them to figure out the flaws of a game (bad multiplayer, etc) rather than why I should buy them.

If the game is a part of a series I really enjoy like Ace Attorney or pokemon I probably won't even look them up.

Light Knight : I'm the complete opposite of that for movies. In fact a lot of the movies that I like or really want to see are the ones that have the lowest scores. I'm not really sure how that happens though.

Only very rarely. If I know next to nothing about a game, I will do a quick google search and gloss over what a lot of people think of it. Although, I have a lot of gaming related opinions that differ from a lot of other people sometimes, so it's kind of hard for me to tell if I would like it or not. 

I pay attention to scores for games I'm already interested in. And if they get a low rating, I usually don't care too much, I might still pick up the game. The scores are really only to supplement my interest.

I don't really pay attention to reviews or scores or anything like that when purchasing video games. The only factors that influence my decision of whether or not to buy a game are my own experience with the game or other games in the same series, recommendations from friends, or video clips of gameplay on YouTube or Twitch.

No, I never pay attention to reviews for pretty much anything. Especially games, because I buy games that I know I'll like, so if it gets bad reviews, I still know that I'll enjoy playing it. 

Like LK said, it's the same with movies. I don't listen to critics, because I know what I like. 

I don't entirely rely on the score as the deciding factor on whether or not I buy a game, but I definitely take it into consideration before buying. I like to know what the general consensus is on a game so I have an idea what to expect before playing. 

That said, I don't allow myself to be too strongly swayed by what other people think. I like to play and experience things for myself before forming my own opinions. Plus, I already have a pretty good idea of the types of games I like, so it isn't too difficult to come to a decision.

I try to find reviews that show an ample amount of gameplay before I decide whether or not to buy a game. There are still some games that I buy or don't buy regardless but that's usually dependent on whether or not it's in a genre I know I don't care for or if it's part of a series I already enjoy.

If, say, I'm browsing games on Steam, I tend to glance at the overall review rating (where it says things like "Positive," "Mostly Positive," "Mixed," "Negative," etc.). If a game I know nothing about has a Mixed or Negative review, I might hesitate to buy it. 

I also watch a lot of gaming vids on YouTube, so if I see a game recommended by some of my favorite YouTubers, I might be more interested in giving it a look. Of course, sometimes I'll buy a game simply because it's part of one of my favorite series.

I tend to look at ratings sometimes, but not take them as gospel. It depends a lot on who's doing the scoring - for example, if someone who really doesn't like JRPGs rates Octopath Traveler poorly, I know that I might still actually like it because JRPGs are my thing. If someone who loves JRPGs to the core gives a poor rating to a JRPG, then I think a little bit more about it. At the same time, if someone who hates JRPGs gives a JRPG a really good rating, then that'll also draw my attention. It's something that a lot of people overlook, but knowing how your tastes stack up to a reviewer's tastes is important.

It depends. A lot of times, game scores can help separate the bad games from the good, but there are cases where games with really high scores just aren't my type of game. Best examples in my case are the Metal Gear Solid series because I hate stealth sections in video games, and Bloodborne due to it's cruel difficulty.

In other cases, some games that get low ratings are actually really good games. The best example I can think of is the Pokemon Mystery Dungeon series. They always seem to get bad to mediocre critic scores, yet they're all fantastic games (aside from Gates to Infinity).

Overall, whether or not I take review scores into cosnsideration for depends on the type of game I'm looking into I suppose.