How important is product presentation in a review?

[Psion]

Since the recent reviews thread emphasize that some of you really hang a lot on the score of a review, I thought I'd bring up an issue that a review I am working on right now. How important is product presentation (artwork, gutter art, layout, etc.) to the final evaluation of a product.

Because for me, presentation is a secondary consideration compared to some other reviewers, but still not inconsiderable. I think that good presentation and appropriately chosen and illustrated products can help bring a concept to life. But for me, this has explicit limits. A very pretty but fundamentally non-functional book is still a non-functional book to me (any guess which book I specifically have in mind when I say that? )

So what do you think?

 

[KB9JMQ]

To me presentation only comes to mind if it is terrible.
If I don't notice it, then it is probably ok.
I will say if it has great presentation it does bump up my opinion of it a bit.

 

[Hairy Minotaur]

For me presentation and organization are nearly the same. If it's organized well, then the presentation is there as well. If it jumps around a lot and the art doesn't go with the page's content, then the presentation just isn't there.

 

[Wombat]

I'm not precisely certain what is meant by "presentation".

Do you mean the physical layout of the review? The fonts used and colours in the background?

Do you mean spelling, grammar?

Do you mean the "voice" of the reviewer?

 

[Psion]

I'm not precisely certain what is meant by "presentation".

Do you mean the physical layout of the review? The fonts used and colours in the background?

Do you mean spelling, grammar?

Do you mean the "voice" of the reviewer?

I mean appearance of the product. I do not mean spelling and grammar. I do mean things like artwork, table layout, proper font usage (note to publishers: in the publishing trade, using san serif fonts as body text is considered a bad thing), gutter art, and watermarks.

 

[Finster]

Art in a publication is important for two reasons. First it entices a potential purchase of the product. Second, it helps to convey ideas that would require lengthy explanation (a picture is worth a thousand words).

So I would have to answer that it is important to the publication to have good artwork among other factors.

The customer in the game store, book store, or comic store may not have the luxury of reading through a book carefully before purchasing. It is up to the easily seen and grasped artwork (maps, illustrations, and even layout) to let the potential buyer know what the book is about before they drop their cash on it. Good art can prompt a purchase, but that is not all that critical to a book's overall evaluation from a reviewer's perspective. But a pretty shelf warmer is still a pretty shelf warmer.

The importance of art from the consumer's (and by extension the reviewer's) perspective is the utility of the art. Are the maps accurate, do the pictures match up with the text, and is the layout easy to read. These, I think, are important to the product's final evaluation.


Outside of both these points lie one other factor that art brings to a product. It's cool! This is a much more difficult quality to quantify, and varies between individuals too greatly to have an impact on more than a small group of people in a meaningful way. But it is still there.

People purchase "Coffee Table" books. More often than not, these books are filled with photgraphs of brightly colored things, but I myself have purchased some of the art anthologies from TSR and Wizards. These books have next to zero text, but are still great books to have around. Their utility lies strictly in my enjoyment, and the inspiration I derive from them. YMMV of course.

 

[Gundark]

Art is huge for me. Even if the crunch and fluff of a book is supurb poor art wrecks it for me.

For me if the art is too sucky I won't even look at the book

for example : http://statesecretsrpg.com/

The RPG might be mana from heaven but the art is brimstone from hell... I'll pass it up.

 

[WayneLigon]

There's an law in comics: Bad writing can be saved by great art but great writing will never save bad art. For a game product, it's not quite that simple. Great art can enhance a product to no end. Bad art can diminish the enjoyment I get from a game product but not to the extreme degree that bad comic art damages a comic.

Sometimes art is required. Any monster book needs to have art for each monster, period. Bad monster art will cause me not to use that monster unless I can find a substitute. The embarassing pig-headed orcs of 1E are a good example. I never liked them. I thought it was silly and done that way so as to avoid copyright issues - I never seriously beleived anyone actually used orcs with pig heads. The clean line drawing in the MM just says 'man, these things are stupid'. Yet I've seen evocative depictions of pig-headed orcs that made me want to go use that monster. If you're going to splurge anywhere, splurge on the art.

Layout is something I want touched on in a review. If you're talking about a 96-page book that, save for wide decorative margins and generous white space, should be a 50-page book, then I want to know it so I can spend money elsewhere.

Watermarks almost guarentee that I will not purchase the product unless they are used very sparingly and do not interfere with either me following the text or with photocopying a page. WW's Eastern subsections of their various OWoD game lines are a prime example of what not to do. I strongly suspect that I would have been very interested in the contents of those books if I could have actually read the text. If they're there, I want to know about it.

 

[WayneLigon]

for example : http://statesecretsrpg.com/
The RPG might be mana from heaven but the art is brimstone from hell... I'll pass it up.

That's pretty god-awful. Art of that level would probably keep me from buying that game or even checking out the rules in the store.

 

[Ghendar]

To me presentation only comes to mind if it is terrible.

Yeah, that's it. Otherwise it's not much of a consideration to me.
More interested in the words than the pictures.