King of the Potato People said: Why would Rockstar need to pay for reviews? Their games are usually of good quality. Click to expand...

Because a AAA game can't review as merely good, it has to review like the virgin Mary herself birthed it unto gaming to save us all from the sins of past, inferior games. It has to revolutionize gaming, redefine storytelling, and melt faces with eye-popping graphics. B-tier studios crap outgames all the time that land in the bomba bin; Rockstar delivers genre-defining Oscar-worthy tour de forces and goddammit press outlets better recognize.(seriously I think score inflation is a big problem--having your game review as an 8 is bad, bad, bad, which means your game can't just be good, it has to be, which leads to tons of pressure.)I don't know that they outright paid for reviews, but I can easily see RS strong-arming publications that fail to be appropriately blown away by their latest.