What effect can BasedGamer have on gaming?

FULL DISCLAIMER: I have written review on BasedGamer, one of which has been featured. I have also exchanged messages with people who works there. This includes some question I sent them to get their view to prepare for this article.

So, what is BasedGamer? BasedGamer is a website where anyone can review videogames. This was started to give the consumer a place to review games. According to Jennie Bharaj, one of the creators of the site, "BasedGamer.com is a crowd-curated game review platform for the community". I have seen people compare BasedGamer to Rotten Tomatoes. This would be a poor comparison though the spirit is in the same way. As I have made review on the site I can say that you, as an ordinary person can't just rate the game overall like on Rotten Tomatoes.

This is because a game is on some level fundamentally different to a movie as with a movie all you have to concern yourself with is if it is a good watch. On BasedGamer, every review needs to rate several aspects of the game, those being gameplay, visuals, storyline, music/sound, sociability, entertainment and the difficulty of the game. This gives the user several metrics to judge the game with which is very useful as some consumers are more interested different parts of a game compared to other. Some players for instance only care about how the gameplay is and doesn't care how the game looks or how the storyline is.
They are currently in what they call Phase One where people can start making review, although this is to be able to have reviews available when the site launches.

Now that we know what BasedGamer is we need to ask one question, how will it compare to Metacritic? BasedGamer will have a chance to take over from Metacritic just because it is focused on games and as such will have information that the consumer wants. And in that way, the comparison to Rotten Tomatoes works a lot better. The obstacle for the BasedGamer team to overcome is how to get the review up early. One major advantage that Metacritic has over BasedGamer is that the major publication will still make their review and those review will be connected to Metacritic. I think that with the weakening effect that the major publications have on the market have combined with the rise of alternative reviews such as John "TotalBiscuit" Bain will help the BasedGamer team getting people to start using the site. When I asked the BasedGamer team what their biggest worry was they said that they try not to focus on the worries as that would only be a hinderance. Something I think is admirable but also might risk the team getting sideswiped the a problem down the road.

One major problem with any site relying exclusively on consumers in gaming is the pre-order culture that publishers seem to want to push. This means that the majority might pick the game up before any review can come up on the site. This could be circumvented by working together with the aforementioned alternative reviewers. This is because even among them there are those that get review copies with which they make the reviews you see that comes out before the game is released, just like the major publications. If the site is successful and a large amount of consumers starts to use it, we might see the publishers start to decrease the amount to pre-order pushing currently going on.

But in the end, BasedGamer will only be successful if the consumers make it so. And according to the team, if you look at the response, there will at least be some community that use BasedGamer. And in my opinion, any form of community that tries to inform each other will be good for gaming. It might end up saving people from buying bad or defective games or it might show people a hidden gem. But that will all be decided by how well the platform works when it comes out and how the review look. Judging by the current look of the site, they have a good chance to succeed and they attitude of the BasedGamer team is quite inspirational, with their positive outlook and drive.

I'd like to thank Jennie Bharaj for answering my questions for the article, and on a purely personal level, I wish the team good luck in creating a good community.