When he gives a game a particularly good review, I usually take a look at it (I bought Painkiller after he reviewed it, it was only $10 so why not), but despite his opinions I enjoyed Mass Effect, Brawl, Umbrella Chronicles, Burnout Paradise, Army of Two, and MOH Airborne. As someone else said, I actually find it akward when I agree with him on something, since not pointing out that he said will lead to people accusing me of ripping off his ideas and starting any sentence with "As Yahtzee said..." apparently makes me a mindless sheep, regardless of whether I had those opinions before he reviewed the game in question. To summarize, I think there are an unfortunate number of douchebags that think the universe is hinged on Yahtzee's jawbone, but I will be making a heroic effort to ignore them.

I'm not quite sure how people could be influenced by his reviews since he usually only points out the bad bits of a game because of a mass of tards who reprimanded him after his fair review of Psychonaughts.

Obviously he only reviews games that have been made popular so he can be that one black sheep donned in yellow with monster shaped finger puppets and the gift of the gab to do his bidding for him.

I love Yahtzee's work, I completely disagreed with his Halo 3 review but I still found it funny. I completely disagreed with his Oblivion review as I found it as I was hooked on that game and completely immersed me within Tamriel. That's not the point.

I treat Yahtzee how I treat my weekly web comics. I look forward for them to come so I can watch something that will make me laugh. A Web comic wouldn't influence you about the main topic their week, so why should Yahtzee?

Sockerbit:
If anyone want the real reason why people are influenced by ZP it's because he makes good jokes and talk with a fast British accent, which makes him sound smart.

Being smart and funny is what makes people agree with you, it's not that they are sheep or stupid. They're human and have a pack mentality where they tend to agree with a dominant persona, this is what kept humans alive for thousands of years and has only recently become a bad thing, the idea REALLY took of with Gen. X.

People are sheep and you are probably the biggest sheep of all if you think you're not one yourself. Few, I mean like less than 1% of the population, form their own idea about everything they do and their hobbies. They listen to people which seem smarter than them so they can form a lifestyle which is the logical choice for them. That this does not include hobbies like video games, when it include everything from religion to political stance is highly unlikely.

I'm pretty sure if they act on their pack mentality that makes them (well, as we call them) sheep, because sheep tend to pack. Thats what great about humans, they are sentient beings that have urges, but can decide not to act on them.

And thinking your not a sheep makes you a big one? So if I believe I'm not a jackass, then I'm really the biggest jackass of all?

I just want to say just because you don't have an original idea or side with some one doesn't make you a sheep. You're a sheep when you side with some one with no independent thought. You're smart if you adopt smart ideas for yourself, thats just good practice for living life. You're a sheep when you have an opinion about something (lets say you played Oblivion and loved it) and changes it to some else's opinion (lets say Ben's).

Decroux:

I treat Yahtzee how I treat my weekly web comics. I look forward for them to come so I can watch something that will make me laugh.

Ditto.
If he reviews a game I had a mild interest in, sure, I might sway a bit one way or the other, but I don't base anything I say about it purely from what he says. Sometimes I'll agree, other times I could ramble on about what I disagreed on (which many have done here and elsewhere anyway, so even if I did want to there would be no point).
The point is that it's entertaining, and he solidly states his opinion based on his own experience, without some stupid number system that people like to think game godliness is based off of.

Yahtzee doesn't influence me, personally. I read his reviews mostly for the comedic value. Even if he says Halo sucks and Half-life is terrific, I'll still pick the former over the latter. He and I rarely agree, but when he does review a game that we both like such as Call of Duty 4 or GTA, I feel pretty good that we do share something in common and I actually can take his reviews into account.

I, for one, click on a Croshaw review expecting one thing: cynicism. And that's what I get. If it's a bad game, he tears it apart, if it's a good game, he nitpicks. Though he is genuinely a comic genius, sometimes the true comedy is seeing the dimwits who feel the name to defend their favorite game with more fervor than they would defend their own family, their country, or even themselves. No game is perfect, and even your favorite game has its moments that irk you... shrug it off, laugh with the rest of us, and don't base your opinion on what ANYONE says about a game, much less a mostly-comedic review from someone you'll never meet. The people who let Yahtzee or anyone else form their opinions with a brief review didn't have opinions of their own in the first place.

Sometimes a Yahtzee review is a good starting point though, because seeing firewall 5s or 10s or whatever system your review site du jour uses isn't that helpful... but knowing that it's a well told story with cool characters, but a camera that's going to make me want to punch children is helpful.

This has been the case with every review site in the past 20 or so years, and in that regard Zero Punctuation is small fry. People steal their opinions from Gamespot a helluva lot more faithfully than from Zero Punctuation. If your drawing this idea from what you see here, at escapist, then I should tell you that it's a smidge biased on account of 75% of the people who VISIT this site discovering it due to ZP.

I take him more seriously than I do any other reviewer, but I've never let any review influence whether or not I buy a game. Now, whether I watch a movie is another story, but even then I wouldn't take Ben's word on it.

Zero Punctuation, for me, ends up being more of an epiphany experience, or a mirrored sentiment. For example, I can completely understand where he was coming from with, say, Umbrella Chronicles. I actually enjoyed that little romp down memory lane (even if I am such a fanboy of Resident Evil that I was screaming at my friends for taking it as the gospel when the scenarios were horrible cut-downs that made little to no sense in the long run).

Assassin's Creed is another example; more often than not I'd find myself avoiding playing it, because I wasn't in the mood to go rescue some peasant woman from the guards, or pick-pocket someone, or eavesdrop, etc. Yet when the game got going and I was in the right mood I did find myself drawn to it.

So, while I'd say that it is sad that some people may be pointing to Zero Punctuation and saying "pretty much that", I think some wiggle-room should be allowed for a realisation within the viewer's perception of a title. I loved every moment of Shadow the Hedgehog, it didn't stop it from being a steaming pile of rubbish in hindsight.

I guess what I'm trying to say is that I don't personally think it's blind devotion to the Cult of Croshaw if you play a game he reviews beforehand, then watch a review and realise that he is right on the money regarding several issues. I also don't see a huge problem with him warning potential consumers of a products pitfalls.

The position of a reviewer is a tough one to take indeed, and at least he's trying something fresh with the format. After all, a much better experience is to go out and rent the game, or at least try a demo of it.

... Of course that's just my opinion, I could be wrong.

While funny, I don't think Zero Punctuation will make or break someone's opinion of a game. People like to follow the leader and all but anyone has actually had their mind made up by a comedic review like Zero Punctuation. Generally by the time he reviews something, the viewer has already formed some kind of notion on whether or not they'll like the game. If they think they'll like it, then the episode is mildly irritating. If they don't like it, then it's mildly hilarious.

It's the nature of Critics/Reviewers to have influence. If Ebert or A. O. Scott didn't influence people's choice of movies, then they wouldn't have jobs. This whole thread is bizarre.

I mean, if you start a thread with the topic "Is Zero Punctuation too influential?" doesn't that in itself answer the question?

If anything, I think ZP distracts people from the stuff I love about The Escapist: The Articles. Believe it or not, I actually got here by typing "Online gaming magazine" into a google search. Zero Punctuation was just the icing on the cake. I also like the News Briefs.

I'm suprised so many of you have forgotten that Yahtzee is a game reviewer.

Just like every other game reviewer on the internet.

Do you ignore them purely because of their occupation?

Or is this just Yahtzee hate.

I agree with ya. :O

But who really cares, as it is inevitably up to individual people how they act and purchase.

Yahtzee influences me to the extent that we both notice the same flaws in a game and, once or twice, have even thought the exact same things about those flaws. His reviews, then, are a way for me to gauge what frustrations I might be getting myself into. Still, while he hasn't made a review where I disagree with his thoughts, there are games I still like regardless.
It's interesting that Yahtzee changing peoples' minds is considered bad. The best reviewers are able to not just inform those who already agree, but to sway those who didn't.

I don't take his reviews seriously. He makes valid points and talks game mechanics and setting like any good reviewer should but above all I think he is a brilliant comedian. His comedic medium just happens to be game reviews with fast dialogue animated by Microsoft Paint and Windows Movie Maker. A unique take on an ancient form of entertainment. What he actually thinks about a game is just as irrelevant as what Jerry Seinfeld thinks of flying on an airplane, if he's gonna make you laugh he's gonna talk about the discomforts and flaws and it's gonna look like he hates it.

Wrong Wrong Wrong Wrong Wrong! People should pay close attention to what he says. Yahtzee hates EVERYTHING and you can completly judge how good the game is by his quirky and insightful reviews. Too many reviews focus all too much on what is good and not what is bad, and it makes you jump up in surprise and wash that bitter taste from your mouth when you find out other critics are too busy having sex with themselves to be bothered with focusing on the game. The reviews that show the most benevelence toward a game (Portal and CoD4) are my personal favorites! I love Oblivion too, but I agree with his points on the game and would support anyone who uses it as a bases for purchase (especially since they're two years behind on releases like with Oblivion).

So shout for joy, let him criticize my spelling and punctuation, and Praise the Mighty Croshaw!!!

Sad to say, that the only one I've been swayed on was the Jericho review. Other then that, I either agree or disagree with what he says. I take him seriously as a reviewer but I don't take his source alone. If I want to make my mind up about something, I play it or I read a vast array of reviews.

EDIT

Rogue 09:
Wrong Wrong Wrong Wrong Wrong! People should pay close attention to what he says. Yahtzee hates EVERYTHING and you can completly judge how good the game is by his quirky and insightful reviews. Too many reviews focus all too much on what is good and not what is bad, and it makes you jump up in surprise and wash that bitter taste from your mouth when you find out other critics are too busy having sex with themselves to be bothered with focusing on the game. The reviews that show the most benevelence toward a game (Portal and CoD4) are my personal favorites! I love Oblivion too, but I agree with his points on the game and would support anyone who uses it as a bases for purchase (especially since they're two years behind on releases like with Oblivion).

So shout for joy, let him criticize my spelling and punctuation, and Praise the Mighty Croshaw!!!

I'm sorry, I can't take this post at all seriously. To much of a suck up and fanboy to be real.

SirSchmoopy:
I am a completely different gamer then Yahtzee, I watch them for the funnies not because I need to know which games to buy. He brings up good points sometimes but other times I disagree with him completely. Matter of opinion on all subjects but I still find his movies entertaining.

Same here, just because he is funny as hell does not mean I agree with every thing he says about the games he reviews.........except Clive Barkers Jericho.......written by Clive Barker. I love that one episode

I don't watch for a "review" necessarily, I watch for a laugh. It's still just one guy's opinion and just because he has a feature on the escapist doesn't endow him with title of "video game Christ/Anti-Christ". I mean, shit, I was laughing even when he tore up GTA IV and Mass Effect, games that I love.

I don't use Yahtzee's reviews for anything but entertainment value but I am not very critical when when playing games so it takes a lot to make me hate a game.

Well, I'm just going to have to jump on board with the sheep here *irony* and say, while Yahtzee is hilarious, quite often correct, and makes Wednesdays something to look forward to, no reviewer could sway me one way or the other into spending my hard-earned cash on something, as I have probably made up my mind beforehand. I have never been a fan of first person shooters, thereby cutting myself from roughly 96% of the new games market, so he could lavish praise on one all he wants, I'm not buying it. I have Tomb Raider Anniversary, Portal, and Oblivion (and had them in the days before coming here), and while I agree with what he said, the problems highlighted have not been enough for me to stop playing them, and I should hope no one person would ever hold that kind of power over me. I have my own reasons for no longer playing them, respectively, stuck, finished it, and boredom (although I have recently relaunched into Tamriel for reasons unknown even to me). The closest he has come to holding influence over me is Psychonauts. He piqued my interest enough to give the demo a whirl, and the demo held it's own. I, as I assume many others here, had never heard of Psychonauts, so I had no preconceived opinion about it, but today, I have it, and I'm stuck at nearly the end (damn you, meat circus!). Sure, GTA IV sounds terminally boring the way he describes it, but as a fan of III, VC, and SA (I and II, not so much), I for one look forward to the inevitable PC port.

Come to think of it, I could probably delete all of the above and just type "Look at the SSBB Mailbag showdown" and stopped there. The ungodly number of people who apparently wrote in to tell him how wrong he was should have enough to stop this before it began.

I consider reviewers like Yatzee and Seanbaby to be comidians first and critics second. Their style of reviewing is used for comedy. Just because Yahtzee overexagerates every problem a game has doesn't mean he isn't necessarilly enjoy the game. These reviews are created for comic relief, they should not be taken so seriously.

Well I wasn't that serious about the whole thing. Pretty much the part which says smart+funny=popular and people will emulate the ideas of this person. There is nothing good or bad about it, only the ideas that are spread around can be good or bad. It's like saying that the internet is good or bad since it can be used to do crime and help people at the same time.

However if we want to stay a bit on topic the idea is probably that most people that watch ZP probably think no one else does, for some reason, and try to come off as smart or funny when they reenact the review. Trust me I've seen these people IRL, it's very sad. Of course this isn't the only reason, most anti-[any game] people sometime happen to read a review which says "BLARGH! BAD GAME! REVIEWER SMASH!" and then they simple use their arguments for the game being bad instead of bothering to form a sentence of their own bad experiences with the game in question. I'm sure that sometimes their experiences are the same as in the review and it simply put words to their rage.

Sheep and jackass are two different things. A sheep generally thinks he is a free person capable independent rational thought and all his actions are based on his own reasoning, thus he joins the pack without even realizing it and since he doesn't know about it he cannot stop. If you don't know you have a problem, you can't fix the problem. Anyone can be a jackass and stop being a jackass isn't impossible, it's like quitting smoking or any other bad habit. Since being a jackass is something which can be clearly defined by the nature of etiquette, you can simply look the etiquette-standard and act accordingly. The sheep effect really is a never ending loop since humans are pack animals by nature. We just do it even if we don't want to.

Even so, the heart of our disagreement seem to stem more to the fact that our definition of what a sheep is are different. I wouldn't call what you call a sheep a sheep, more like an insanely weak minded trendist which idolizes someone or an insecure person who is desperately trying to fit in, which a sheep doesn't have to be.

I'd played Brawl before seeing the ZP review. I was watching with my friend, and after we had our laughs, we were discussing it and I was pointing out a few flaws that Yahtzee had simply missed (because he didn't play the game quite enough) to back up my opinion of Smash. But seriously, it was small stuff.

My friend immediately jumped on me declaring that I was hating on Yahtzee and just trying to be, in the words Yahtzee had just used, "That Guy" who knows everything.

Some people hear it and are changed completely. Others hear it and shrug it off.

Either way, it's not Yahtzee's fault. You just have to deal with people, y'know?

His reviews tend to be:

A) Heavily biased- sometimes, like with JRPGs, he admits it, sometimes he doesn't. You can tell here and there that he had his opinion mostly formed before he played the game.

B) Heavily idiosyncratic. Most critics will try to review a game with it's intended audience in mind and try not to put excessive weight on things they know to be more a personal peeve than a widely-agreed upon flaw. Yahtzee's reviews are all about him.

Yahtzee's redeeming quality is that his individual points are mostly true, and that he makes good observations about the games and why some things work/don't work and why.

if there gonna form opinion's based off what he says, thats there problem, if you liked the game, why should he change that?... he is meant to be amusing and informitive, it still wont stop me from liking or disliking a game....

GeeDave:
I'll tell you what's even more annoying... not being able to comment on a game after Yahtzee (Yes. I know his name, but "Yahtzee" is more iconic than "Ben") has reviewed it due to me often having similar thoughts. The first thing someone would do is accuse me of just 'following' the crowd. But this simply isn't true. I've enjoyed every single one of Yahtzee's reviews quite simply because I agree with what he is saying. And anything that isn't necessarily debateable is just comedic.

From the perspective of those of us who are somewhat... smarter than kids or diptards, it becomes difficult to not agree with most of what is said. There's always usually 'a point', even if it isn't as accurate as some fanboy would have liked it to be. (I didn't want to use the word "fanboy" in this message... but it had to be done)

I suppose this doesn't really act as a valid reply to your question though. You're asking if someones opinion can change due to watching the review. Well, yeah... not just Yahtzee reviews either. I know of people who NEED to read reviews on anything they might buy/see/do. And those reviews will definitely change their mind, it all depends on how much you know beforehand. If you know absolutely nothing on a particular subject, then you'll certainly absorb the first information you receive on it. It's just the dullards who take it at face value and reply with things like "lol i wuz gunna buy dat gaim but know i wont, cheerz yhatze!"

... hmm, odd. Thought I had more to type. Ah well, I'll reply again if anything springs to mind.

have to agree with you on that

I was giving Yahtzee like reviews (pointing out flaws, ranting, making jokes ect) to my friends long before i watched ZP. Yet if i now go on the net now and do the same thing ive always been doing im a sheep with no imagination, just ripping off the works of a comic genius.

I enjoy his reviews and find that his key points are the same as i have pointed out (different jokes usually, but still just as funny/meaningful). Its a nice change to the "balenced" reviews that always seem to give popular (or overly hyped) games perfect scores. Being a misanthrope and hater of things in general (until it has proven itself otherwise or as Yahtzee put it producing a certificate of not shit) i can spot a flaw in just about anything, so I dont understand why (and are irritated by) reviewers always puting high scores on such games.

I also hate rip offs and occasionaly remakes (though i do like them porting system shock 1 and 2 to the doom 3 engine) especaly those people that download videos (sometimes change them a little) post them on Yotube (or other websites) and try to claim it as their own.

Anyway back to the topic.

Most people follow the crowd, changing things about themselves for fear of being ostracised (thats why you see all those people with stupid glasses, hair cuts and the overwelming urge to use the "ur mum" joke a minimum of 12 times a day). These people usually have the brain of a 13 year old and the mentality of an 11, but can come in ages ranging from 15 - 40 (i have had the unfortunate experience of meeting someone still in this group that looked as if he was 55). As such when they hear that a popular reviewer hates the game they choose to hate it to just so they can fit in and feel popular.

But as for those posting on these forums Zero Punctuation should have little to no effect on what games they buy (mostly because the people here dont fall into the above crowd). They might make them see some of the flaws in their "perfect" game but reguardless theyll play it anyway.

Well he's funny regardless, which I guess is the point. The problem I have with him is not so much on whether or not he's influencing gamers to buy games, but how much influence he has with the gaming industry given his *ahem* guest videos and such. His popularity making the people who create/finance the games see him as a voice of the people and what gamers want so to speak.

This is a problem in paticular because Yathzee basically confirms what a lot of bottom-line concerned suits want to hear: Lengthy story and plotline are pointless to a game, all people want to do is run around and kill things while watching pretty lights from explosions and such. By all means create 30 shooter games using the same engine!

Yathzee busts on people who play the shooter games and such too, but he's not really consistant with that. What he's most consistant on is seriously ragging these huge (and doubtlessly expensive compared to re-used engine shooters) RPG productions like "Mass Effect" and "The Witcher" because you might actually have to pay attention to them, and perhaps talk to a few NPCs in a hub (town, space station, etc..) between doing things. The idea being that anything more involved than a mission objective NPC who basically tells you "go kill stuff" between rounds, or the occasional downloaded "computer file" or whatever that you can ignore without really reading or understanding in your quest to kill, is too much.

His message to game developers is basically "Be lazy, why hire all those voice actors and animators? Reskin yesterday's game! Put in a gun that shoots Shurikens and Lightning and I'll rave! We don't remotely care about the plot!".

I guess his success (he's becoming more mainstream) is what is making him a potential problem. He started out as someone to make game geeks laugh. But now I'm concerned he's growing into a voice heard and acknowledged by those who don't realize he's what he is for being funny, not because of real, god to goodness accuracy.