Dear Future Gamer,

In FG30, Andy replies to the letter entitled 'Bioforge' by saying that Future Publishing has little influence with games companies and what to publish or develop. Sorry, but the mighty Future Publishing has at least some influence over what sells well and what doesn't. Each review comes with a percentage mark and, as discs and carts are expensive at £40 to £50 each, it's these scores that people look at when deciding which one to buy. They read the reviews and if one game gets a higher score than the other, the highest scorer is the one most people will plump for.

You don't realise it, but Future Publishing have most definitely influenced someone (even if it's just me) into changing their buying choices. Software houses take note of game sales figures, which are fuelled by lots of adverts and self-promotion, and I'm sure they read the magazine reviews. Whatever the score, the company will use that knowledge for their next project. There, you really do influence "big games companies"!

Personally, I always find out as much about a game as possible, and I read all the previews, news, reviews and directory entries. Unfortunately, the percentage system used by both FG and N64 is open to interpretation and can confuse rather than inform. Not only that, but the curt, occasionally stupid, sarcastic comments in N64's directory and the unserious reviews in FG don't always help.

Games with high marks are almost guaranteed to provide entertainment so I look at these first. Games with average scores are more difficult to decide on so I don't bother. Average scores don't tell anyone anything, especially those thinking of buying it, so I just choose another game (in the same genre). The asking price of £40 is, as I said, a lot of pennies to squander on a game that you have to play for a while to get to like, rather than one that is immediately fantastic. It's a guarantee that I don't get lumbered with a poor quality title that's 'almost there'.

Neil

FG: An interesting point Neil. We aim to influence people's buying decisions when it comes to games and yes, we know software houses make (usually marketing) decisions based on the ratings a game gets across several magazines (including FG), but I don't think we have as much sway as you think. A software house may say to themselves "Let's do Rally Racing 2 because Rally Racing 1 got great reviews and sold loads". But they're just as likely to say "Let's do Rally Racing 2 because even though it didn't get great reviews it sold quite well and we can really give RR2 a big marketing push". Even games that get great scores sometimes fail at retail (we ran a feature about this very thing in an earlier FG) for all sorts of reasons and it's a game's performance at retail that influences a software house's development decisions. Read the recent interview we ran with Jon Hare.