While I agree with more or less everything Jeff said about Fire Emblem, the way in which it was discussed is a pet peeve of mine in video game coverage.

I think that Jeff has an overall positive response to this game. But he spent a disproportionate amount of time talking about how bad it is at certain things.

To break it down:

Roughly 40 seconds spent on a basic description of the game.
3 minutes talking directly about how bad the story and presentation is.
1 minute talking about how Ni No Kuni and Valkyria Chronicles are better than Fire Emblem
1 minute talking about how JRPGs in general and Fire Emblem specifically, are bad with story.
And then a bare 1.5 minutes talking about what he actually liked about the game.

Now, as I said, I don't disagree with the substance of what was said. And I'm not saying that you shouldn't talk about the things that don't work in a game. You absolutely should. What I'm saying is that the way you talk about a game should reflect your overall impressions. If you think that the game is awesome and you dig it and the bad story presentation is a minor issue, then the ratio here should be flipped. 90 seconds talking about why the story didn't work and then 5 minutes talking about what you loved about it. The way that it was discussed makes it feel like the story is a HUGE problem with the game because of the amount of time devoted to it, despite the fact that you do say that it is an awesome game.

To be clear, this is not something that is specific to Jeff. I see it all over games coverage. Particularly in podcasts where people are speaking extemporaneously. And I understand that it's an unscripted conversation, so these things happen. All I ask is that you try to think about this from time to time.

Thanks.