For me, how long depends on the game for sure, but it also depends on how long I take a break for.

A good example is recently I tried the Aion trial. I played for probably 5-6 hours non-stop before I went to bed. The next day I had to go out of town and the trip took me about 6 hours (round trip). The entire time I was gone, I never thought about the game and went I got home, I never had the desire to login.

Counter that to the trials of some other games, where I woke up in the middle of the night thinking I wanted to go play. or counting the minutes until the end of the day when I could get home and play. or finding ymself at work, surfing the Net trying to learn more about the game.

If the game doesn't grab me and make me want to play, then I think I can form a valid opinion. I will know in that time frame that the game isn't fun for ME and the best thing I can do is share that opinion (with reasons why).

 I playtest nearly every MMO that is FTP or has an open/closed beta. 

What seems to  be a fair assement to me is to play until the first 

character or game changing event. This however is a hard concept

to define because it is different for each game but once you

understand the concept it's easy to apply accross other games.

For example, in WoW, it would have been until you get your

mount when they were at 40. For something like Spellborn

it would be playing until you've left the starter (free) areas.

For other games, say one, that lets you craft your first mega

item at level 20, then slightly past that would be the threshold.

From all the playing I have done one thing I can say for sure

is that most MMO companies, especially translations,

are terrible at the "start game". It is quite obvious that these

devs have never done any usability testing like one would 

do for a regular application being built. One would think

someone would get this by now, but no, most of the

intros are either WHUMP YUR THERE, boring or filled

with too much information to be taken in at once.

It depends on how bad the game is.

Some games scream at you that they are absolutely, 100% horrid in the first 30 seconds.  Warhammer was one of those games for me.  I couldn't stand to look at it, much less play it.

When I first started playing WoW, I was a tad underwhelmed, but I gave it more time because my friends were playing it, and I ended up really liking it and have been playing it on and off since a year after launch.

Originally posted by porovaara

 I playtest nearly every MMO that is FTP or has an open/closed beta. 

What seems to  be a fair assement to me is to play until the first 

character or game changing event. This however is a hard concept

to define because it is different for each game but once you

understand the concept it's easy to apply accross other games.

 

For example, in WoW, it would have been until you get your

mount when they were at 40. For something like Spellborn

it would be playing until you've left the starter (free) areas.

For other games, say one, that lets you craft your first mega

item at level 20, then slightly past that would be the threshold.

You would still have to be very twisted to play WoW or any game for that matter to level 40 just to try it out. People who don't like WoW at level 10 won't like it any more at level 40.

I haven't heard of any game which someone doesn't like at lvl 10 and then suddenly thinks it's awesome much later. 

 Heh you are right, level 40?! My brain is playing tricks on me. 

Instead, for WoW, until you've unlocked your second tier of talents.

You can have a valid opinion anytime, regardless of how long you've played a game.  If you don't like it, or can't get into it, then you don't like it.  It's your opinion and yours only.

But if you want to be vocal about it on the forums/blogs/websites, then make sure you be honest about it.  Don't pretend to talk about things yuo don't know, such as endgame or content you've never even seen.   I think it's perfectly fine to say you couldn't get into a game.

Originally posted by Sovrath

Originally posted by slask777

pfft...5 minutes or 5 months. Doesn't make a squat difference. If the game doesn't manage to catch my interest in some way, its a crappy game. I hate this endgame thing people say you have to experience before you're qualified to have an opinion about a game. It's bollocks. If the game is shit at the beginning it's most likely shit at the end too. Someone mentioned Morrowind. That game managed to catch me at the beginning. I know rpg's usually go slower, but the atmosphere in that game was excellent and something you pick up the first 5 minutes of gameplay.

 

 

 

Is  it fair to the game? Well I think it doesn't matter. It could be the greatest game in the world, but if I don't want to do what they ask and I am not intrigued enough to go on then for me I would just do something else.

 

 

QFT.... I agree with this sentiment 100%.
 

Remeber the scene in Jerry Maguire where Renee tells Tom "You had me at hello"   I kinda feel the same way about a game, if you don't have me at hello, I'm done with you, but if you get, then you've got me for a good long while.

Id say if you are not having any fun 1/3rd into the game then its safe to assume it wont be worth your time to go tru another 1/3rd of crap to hopefully get to the last 1/3rd which "Maybe" fun. So for me, after I reacha bout 1/3rd of the way I quit if I am not having fun. Granted I endup not having fun a lot for this...

It depends on the game.  If a game is endgame focused, then near end game.  If a game is not your cup of tea, and you can't stand playing it, just keep your opinions as opinions.  Validation only works for those that try to find both good ad bad in a game.

There are no such game that is worthless all around, there will at least be one redeemable point.  However, just one usually won't make it a good game anyways.

Usually if you see people saying things in the extremes such as "perfect" "worthless" or anything similar, you can basicaly ignore those as only opinions that doesn't have much validations to it.

Much like reali life, the smart ones are the ones that aren't extremists, but somewhere in the middle.

Edite:  Actually there are games that gets better and better as you play, those are also the games that keep you coming back like crack cocaine.  Best example: FFXI  If you can stand leveling your first job to 75 and do the story, it will make you very addicted.  However those that just want a easy game should just go away, FFXI is not for kids or jerks.

Since a few people feel that they are entitled to "pushing the envelope" gameplay if they are paying a monthly fee. Let me reiterate, and this was explained by another person not myself, take what you think you are entitled to, then take less than 5% of that. That is what you are truely entitled to. If you don't like the game don't pay for it. If you don't want to pay for the game, wait for a free trial. Your opinion will be your own, you are not entitled to the end all be all MMO, just because you pay a meesely $15. Now if you were spending a few million dollars, then I can understand that you would be royal pissed if you didn't like the game. In that case I would not argue with you.

That being said, you get an opinion about the game before you even play. That will already set the mood in how you will experience the game. You don't have to wait for end content to have an opinion. But a valid review, as someone else has stated, you need a good amount of time experiencing the game's many aspects, which can include end game. But if the game does not catch your fancy then don't play it. Stop paying and go somewhere else.

As long as you're open with how long you've played the game, any amount of playtime can generate a valid opinion.

So rather than say, "Lineage 2 sucks" I tend to be a bit more descriptive like, "The first 8 hours of Lineage 2, every single fight is nearly identical and few quests exist to vary the gameplay; it's a ridiculously tedius game."

Your opinion matters right away from the first time you log into the game world.You are there to play the ENTIRE game,the game does not start at any later on point,it starts right away.I do not think there is a game anywhere in the world that starts at level 20,they all start at level 1,if levels are used.

You will see what type of game world is used,you wil have a good feel for the game engine right away and a good feel for the mechanics.You will see all the player choices before you login,the classes will also be known before you login.

The ONLY things you will not see is all the spells and abilities until you actually finish a game,but that does not matter one bit because,EVERY game advances your spells and skills as needed,meaning you will gain new ones that correspond to the mobs you are fighting.If a game is ALL PVP,then  it is most likely a fail,especially if allowing players to advance over others ,merely by time in game,instead of actual player skill.PVE does not matter about time,because yo uare not competing,you are playing the game for yourself,at least i hope it is for yourself and not some bragging platform.

The one thing that needs to be said is that your opinion matters from day 1,however any opinions you give should be based on what you do know ,not on what you don't know.Example you should not talk about slow or tedious travel times,if the game allows faster easier travel a weeek or so into the game,something along those lines.You should not say things like the spells are awful in this game,when you may have only 1-3 spells out of the 50 possible.You should not say the mobs are too easy to kill,not knowing they might get increasingly harder as you level up,most games do allow easier kills in the first few levels.

Interesting question. If think it takes the time for you to trully say "I love/hate this game". Sometimes the fun comes after a while, but let's be reasonable - if the road isn't so much of a headache, then I'll give it a try. But if I'm not entertained at a minimum for some time, then I'm sorry, uninstallation.

Though I trully believe you must revisit games, to really have an opinion about it. Like EQ2 - first time, I didn't like it, couldn't go past the first 7 days of the trial. A year and a half later, I gave it another go, and couldn't drop it for 4 months - I really liked it. Perhaps it's how you approach the game, a combination of time, dedication to study it, mood...

But I really tried MxO and FFXI, for example. Read tutorials, talked to people in- and out-game, had friends to play with. Don't think they're for me. Just couldn't like them.
 

Going back to the original post.

I think alot of it depends on the game, I play'd WOW for around 8 months and felt I had a really good grasp of what the game was about, that being said I play'd FFXI for 2.5 years and while I got a good feel for the game. I didn't even get my main past level 50.

But on another example I play'd Wizard 101 for about a hour, and felt that I knew enough about the game.

If you don't have fun in your first couple hours, I'd give it about three play sessions (if you stop the game because you're not having fun after all three play sessions, then it's not worth playing anymore). If you're having fun playing the game in your first couple hours, one to two weeks.

The short version:

Answer for OP question - It depends on what concept of the game you want to give a valid opinion about, which should be limited to what you actually experienced in your time spent, otherwise your opinion will not really be valid, even less valid if it is based someone's else opinion.

No matter what, opinions will be distorted, heck, even reviews are. There is no such thing as reviewing a whole game, an opinion then is something even smaller, that's why you usually see trolls saying "WoW clone" as your generic hate opinion about a whole game they probably didn't experience even half of, yet they want to look complete and try to kill as much mechanics they can about the game for the unprepared reader.

The long version:

A valid opinion is something VERY subjective, not only because it is an opinion but because you will only be giving an opinion about something very specific (if you care about making it valid and not a hate/troll post).

If you play a MMO for one hour and then unistall because you disliked it, well, you can only give a valid negative opinion regarding the New Player Experience.

If you play a MMO until the level cap and then unistall because you don't find whatever the fun in the end game is, you can give a valid negative opinion regarding the End Game.

Anyway, these will still be just opinions, for others what should matter are the concepts of the mechanics itself, so they can somehow imagine if they will like the game or not, this will be even worse in forums as they may hate a game without even playing it because they assumed in a very distorted negative opinion about a game, they wouldn't like it, and then they proceed to give their own opinions based on what was already an opinion.

That's why when I talk negatively about a game, I try to talk what the concept is that I didn't like and then show my opinion.

For example, I can say I dislike Atlantica because of their license system and item mall. After tasting the licenses and then finding myself with a cost of $15 a month to cover these expired licenses I had for free that are so damn useful, I simply did not want to play the game anymore because I knew I would face more and more costs yet I had already found something that pretty much equals the game to P2P games, for me.