STALKER 2 has had a successful launch week, but is it being held back? Raphael Colantonio, founder of developer Arkane and co-creative director of the Dishonored series, thinks so, and he says Metacritic is to blame.

"The Metacritic ecosystem encourages devs to make safe boring games," Colantonio said on his X, formerly known as Twitter, feed this morning. "As long as a game is polished at launch, you're guaranteed a 80%, no matter how boring the game might be. Meanwhile Stalker2 [sic] gets a 73 because it's a bit rough on the edges at launch." At the time of writing, STALKER 2 has a Metascore of 74, with a user score of 7.7.

Metacritic scores can be a hot-button topic in the video game industry. Some developers, such as Suda51, think there's too much focus on them. Metacritic also allows users to score games alongside critics, but user scores have become an issue of their own. Metacritic and its parent company, Fandom, are cracking down on the practice of review bombing to ensure user reviews have more merit.

Despite its "less than appealing" Metascore (if you ask me, a 74 is still a solid score), STALKER 2 has been selling like hotcakes, breaking the one million units sold mark after just three days. In our review, we said that despite how much fun the game is, performance issues and inconsistencies hold it back until updates from developer GSC Game World arrive. GSC has stated that those updates are coming, particularly when addressing issues with controller support and the A-Life 2.0 system.

No matter how many updates GSC provides for STALKER 2, in the eyes of some, it won't escape the stigma of its Metascore. "A bad game with no bug has better score than a great game with bugs. Makes sense to you?" Colantionio adds. "It means the essence of the game is not taken into consideration, it means that 3 months later, when the great game is patched, it still has a [bad] score. Makes sense to you? [Fallout: New] Vegas is a great example of one of the best game [sic] ever made with a metacritic that doesn't match the reality. A fantastic buggy game can get patched, a boring game will stay boring.

Colantonio is on the money when talking about Fallout: New Vegas. It's considered one of the greatest RPGs ever made, and there's no denying that, upon release, it was one of the biggest games ever launched. Thanks to developer updates, the experience has become much smoother over time.

Time will tell if GSC can stabilize STALKER 2's performance and fix the game's bugs. As for now, they're saying all the right things, and fans are excited to see if they can deliver on their promises.

Posted: 2 hours, 26 minutes ago
Related Forum: Gaming Discussion

Source: https://www.dualshockers.com/stalker-2-suffering-from-metacritic-scores-according-to-dishonored-director/