You can't trust board game reviewers

It's time to dispel some myths

There’s a groundswell of people in the board game hobby who don’t trust reviewers. As a board game reviewer myself, it causes me some problems.

Firstly, a lot of the reasons given are sweeping generalisations based on opinion. We’ll get into that. Secondly, as someone who wants to share his love for the hobby, and who wants to help people find games they might enjoy, it’s a hurtful thing to be mistrusted.

The arguments

I’ll preface this section by saying that this is entirely anecdotal. These are the arguments I’ve personally read and heard online.

In the case of each one, I’m going to address them and give you my take on them.

“You’re all just paid to give good reviews”

This is the big one. Money. There’s an assumption that a lot of reviews, especially from well-known channels, are paid for by the publisher. This would be a massive problem, right? Even if you ignore the legal, moral, and ethical problems with paid-for reviews, there’d still be a HUGE bias introduced.

Let me just state this now. For me, and for every reviewer I know, and 99% of the hobbyist reviewers out there, we do not get paid for reviews. Not one penny. I’ve been reviewing and working with publishers for over three years now, and I have never even been offered money for a review.

Every once in a while some controversy will raise its head. Most recently we had Quackalope and their apparent offer to scrap negative footage for Aeon Trespass Odyssey in return for payment, and things like that do massive amounts of damage to the trust in reviewers.

If you think it’s just the tip of the iceberg and they’re just the unlucky ones who got found out, then you’re wrong. The backlash wasn’t just from the public, it came from other reviewers and publishers alike. Are there some bad apples who actively look for money in return for a review? Almost certainly. But even those who say they hypothetically would take payment for a review, and (get this) say they’d remain unbiased, they get very quickly torn down by the rest of us.

I’ll go out on a limb here and confidently state that >99% of the reviews you watch and read are not paid for.

Paid previews, now that’s a whole other thing. Never mistake them for reviews.

“You just do it to get free games”

Here’s one you could argue for for some people, sure. For those starting their journey into reviewing something they love, the prospect of free games is exciting. All of a sudden you’re getting games sent to you, for free, by the publisher.

The lustre fades quickly.

If you shoot a message to your favourite reviewer right now and ask them how many games they have in their review backlog, I’m willing to bet most frown at the thought of it. Obviously, I can’t speak for everyone, but many of us are in a situation where we have too many games to review, and having more turn up can be a pain in the backside.

Aww, poor baby! Too many free games.

I get it. It sounds like a real privileged problem to have. Despite that, it’s a genuine problem. My review backlog at the time of writing is 18 games. 18 games I’ve got to learn, play multiple times, then draft and finalise reviews for. That’s on top of my full-time job, family life, and anything else I might want to do.

The excitement of getting a game for free doesn’t last long. It’s there at the beginning, for sure, but if you’ve been doing it for long enough, it’s a non-event. I can no better review a game I’ve never played than I can a restaurant I’ve never eaten at. If somebody wants to put a game in my hands for my opinions, so be it. I can’t afford to buy them all.

“You say good things about bad games just to keep getting free games”

This one falls apart the moment you start applying any amount of logic.

If you play a game and have a horrendous time with it, it’s usually down to one of two problems. Either the game has serious problems that weren’t picked up during development and playtesting, or that particular style of game just isn’t for you.

In either case, why would you want to continue getting games you don’t like? You’re either getting them from a publisher who doesn’t playtest their games enough, or getting a type of game you don’t enjoy. Why would you want to add to your looming backlog with more games you don’t like? Leisure time is precious, and we want to fill it with good games. It makes no sense.

You’re also working under the assumption that all publishers are going to cut ties the moment you say something negative about their games. That’s not the case. Many publishers welcome critical feedback.

“If you like the publisher/designer’s games so much, why did you wait so long to review it?”

I saw this on a review just recently. Most of us writing or recording videos about games do it in our spare time, as I already mentioned. We have other games to play and review. Somebody not reviewing a game within weeks of its release is indicative of nothing more than people having busy lives. It doesn’t make them a shill just because when they do get around to covering it, they like it and say nice things about it.

Get over it.

“You don’t play the games enough times to be able to review them properly”

You know what? In this instance, you might have a case. It’s subject to a couple of pretty big qualifiers though. Firstly, your idea of ‘enough times’ might be way different to somebody else. It might be that you want to play a game ten times before you form an opinion. Fair enough. That’s your preference. Secondly, unless you ask them, how do you know?

I’ve seen plenty of people give quasi-reviews after a single play. As long as it’s being labelled as ‘first impressions’, I have no problem with that. First impressions are valuable to a lot of people. My personal minimum is three times. I will play every game I review a minimum of three times. Does that mean I’ll always review it after just three plays? Heck no. Some games get played tons more than that. It depends on a lot of different factors.

If you want to be sure how many times somebody has played a game before rendering their opinion, ask them. Don’t try to play detective and look at their BGG plays, because not everyone logs everything. I have my policy documented on my website - review policy - and I’d never have a problem if someone asked me how many times I played a game before I reviewed it.

If in doubt, ask.

“You’re too friendly with the publishers. You’re biased”

This is the one where I’ll hold my hands up and agree. Even if we’re not getting paid cash money to write a review, we’re still getting free games from publishers. We often have good working relationships with publishers too. Naturally, there’s going to be an inherent amount of bias in any coverage of those games.

Don’t get it wrong. I don’t mean I’m going to sing the praises of someone I like who put a turd in a box and gave it to me for free. But it might well mean I’m more lenient with design decisions, for example. I’m not even talking about things I consciously know I’m doing. Every time I close off a review that I was given a review copy for, I state “Thoughts and opinions are my own”. I state it in my review policy too. I mean it when I write it, but can I be 100% certain that some level of bias hasn’t crept in? No.

I’m not naive enough to believe I’m not in some way affected, even if it’s a very small amount. Jason Perez recently published a great interview with two journalists where they talk about bias, and it’s worth watching. The point I’m trying to make is that bias is everywhere. What matters is how much, and how much influence you - as the consumer of a review - believe it has. Even if you buy your own games every time, if you love Jamey Stegmaier’s games (for instance), you’re more likely to overlook small issues.

Totally unbiased reviews just don’t exist. Find reviewers whose opinions you trust, even with those things taken into consideration.

What can you do about it?

If you’re willing to accept that the vast majority of us are not being paid for our opinions, that we really don’t care if we get a free game to the door every day, and that we’re almost certainly biased in some small way, what next?

What can you do to reassure yourself of a particular reviewer’s honesty, motivations, and ethics? How can you trust them and their opinions?

Policy

Find out if your favourite reviewers have a review policy. If they have a published policy, that’s a great place to start. You’ll have a good idea of where that person’s opinions are coming from, and how they go about forming them.

If they don’t, don’t necessarily take it as a red flag. It might inspire them to create one. If you’re a board game critic or reviewer reading this and you don’t have one, it might be as good a time as any to write one. It’s useful for you and your audience.

Ask questions

If you aren’t sure if somebody got a game for free, ask them.

If you want to know how many times they played a game before they reviewed it, ask them.

If you want to know if there are any designers, publishers, mechanisms or genres they don’t like for one reason or another, ask them.

If you want to know how much money they received for a paid preview, ask them. They might not tell you, but if they do, it might give you a good idea of how much money people actually make doing this, and might make you have a change of heart.

We write and record reviews because we like to know people want to hear our opinions about games, so most of the time we’re only too happy to answer questions about them. We can’t help it, we want to talk about games all the time. We’ve got a problem.

Of tar and brushes

We live in a connected age where nothing stays secret for long. You’re going to hear about controversies and dramas. Someone in the reviewing and content-creation space is going to do something stupid and shame themselves. It happens.

When it does happen, don’t assume everybody else is the same. Don’t tar us all with the same brush. There are plenty of us on this side of the fence who have standards, morals, and ethics. There are plenty of us not on a cash-grab, who don’t do this with a view to making a living doing it, or even a bit extra cash as a side hustle. We just want to share our love of the hobby.

So the next time you see Bob of Bob’s Boardgame Bonanza taking an envelope of cash from Slimy Steve of The Mediocre Boardgame Co., remember that that’s just Bob doing that. Bob doesn’t represent all reviewers. We don’t like Bob either.

Find your tribe

If you don’t like what someone is saying about games, if you get a bad vibe from them, or you don’t trust them because they’re a Pisces, that’s your prerogative. Don’t watch them, read them, or listen to them. Move on.

Reviews are always going to be subjective, it’s the very nature of trying to define whether something is fun or not. So take your time to check out different reviewers, and not just the big names, check out smaller ones too. You’ll find someone who has similar tastes to you, and when that happens it’s good news. It means if they love a particular game because of the things it does, there’s a good chance you’re going to enjoy it too.

There’s no shortage of great reviewers out there, just take the time to find some.

Acceptance

Get used to the fact that reviews are subjective. We’re talking about how much we like a particular thing. We’re trying to define ‘fun’. There’ll be some bias, there’ll be feelings and opinions taking effect, and the big one - we might not share the same opinion as you.

Gasp! The audacity!

In all seriousness though, just remember that just because you don’t share someone’s opinion doesn’t make them objectively wrong. Tom Vasel hates the art style in Escape the Dark Castle with a passion, but I love it. It doesn’t make him wrong. It doesn’t make him a bad reviewer.

Most importantly, don’t go ranting at someone just because they don’t love a game as much as you do, or vice-versa. Don’t say something online you wouldn’t say to someone’s face.

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In the interests of transparency

Just in closing, it’s only right that I’m as up-front as possible with a few truths.

• I’ve never taken monetary payment for any of the content on my website, Punchboard.

• I receive free games from publishers regularly.

• Every single review or preview written with a free copy of a game has it stated at the bottom of the review.

• I’ve been paid for published work. Most recently I was paid by Tabletop Gaming Magazine here in the UK for some reviews. Note that this is not the same thing as being paid by the publisher for the content of a review.

• Any game with a rondel in it is going to start off in a good place with me. I’m a sucker for a rondel. Big bias there, deal with it.

• Even with a few monthly supporters (who I really appreciate - thanks folks!), it costs me more to host and run Punchboard than I make. I lose money every month to have my own little soapbox on the internet.

Thanks for reading. If you have any questions or comments, please get in touch. You can leave a comment here, or find me on Twitter, BlueSky, Facebook, Instagram and Discord.