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The story
The Metacritic user score for Marvel’s Wolverine, the PS5-exclusive title developed by Insomniac Games, has been swinging wildly over a short period — 6.4 → 6.7 → 6.4 → 6.3 → 6.8 → 7.0 — sparking discussion on 5ch’s “Hardware/Industry (Geha)” board. Posters noted that every time the score dipped, a surge of 10/10 ratings from brand-new accounts would push it back up, and the thread increasingly floated the theory that this reflects “organized manipulation by Sony.” Around the same time, the score for the Chinese game Wan Zi Qian Hong (万紫千紅), seen as a rival title, also dropped from 9.3 to 9.0, leading some to speculate — without evidence — that it was retaliatory downvoting. Who exactly is behind it remains unidentified, and opinions in the thread are divided.
What people said
Meanwhile Wan Zi Qian Hong has been hit with a barrage of suspiciously low reviews, dropping all the way from 9.3 to 9.0.
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6.7 (Sony's new-account 10/10 bombing campaign begins)
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6.4 (Sony's rigged scores get deleted)
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6.3
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6.8 (an enraged Sony unleashes new accounts dropping 9s and 10s)
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7.0 (the instant it hits 7.0, new accounts giving 8s and 9s spike)
That's the timeline. Even while low scores kept coming in during that same window, they kept spamming new-account 10/10s hard enough to override all of it — that's not normal.
Isn't this insanely bad??
Why isn't this getting bigger overseas — accounts endlessly dumping 10/10s like this?
Since Metascore submissions are free, bots can manipulate it as much as they want.
If they've got time to pull off manipulation like this, they should spend it making a better game.
Are they an anti or something?
"Because it's just so frustrating! 😭 I preordered it and bragged to everyone about what a hardcore gamer I am!"
We don't actually know if it's Sony, but
Sony's got a track record of pulling this kind of manipulation before, multiple times,
so of course they're suspected.
They've even gotten caught doing it in obvious ways before lol, they really don't think it through.
The PlayStation crowd really is the absolute bottom of the barrel.
all they end up with is 'a bad game with a suspiciously inflated user score' lol
They've completely stopped caring how it looks.
I've been watching this closely — after that first small round of deletions, seems like they adjusted their approach,
because none of it's been getting deleted since, it just keeps piling up.
I've had every recent change saved in screenshots.
They sold off their integrity too.
I've got it!!
I thought it was odd that the shilling slowed down once it got around 7.0, but
there's a contract clause where Marvel penalizes them if the user score drops below 7.0!!!
That's why they're so desperate to defend that 7.0 line!!!
The moment it hit 7.0, 9s and 8s started increasing — from here on it's a cover-up operation.
Surely this can't actually be someone's paid job.
No, it definitely is someone's job.
The whole 'die-hard game fanboy' thing doing this on their own is a fantasy.
If that were real, you'd see the same behavior happening around Nintendo or Xbox too, but it never does.
This has always been a phenomenon unique to the PlayStation crowd.
European sales: "Wolverine bombs, down 60% in sales from Spider-Man 2 😭"
https://krsw.5ch.io/test/read.cgi/ghard/1789973648/
if it were actually Insomniac staff doing this themselves, there'd be no reason to also tank Wan Zi Qian Hong's (FE) score,
so I really can't see this as anything other than Sony — or rather SIE — behind it.
Also, the fact that they've barely deleted any of it and are just leaving it up is beyond trashy.
Maybe once things die down a bit, they'll mass-delete them all at once to soften the impact.
That's exactly why it's usually done through third-country or underground communities, using disguises and impersonation.
The companies that do it openly and brazenly are the ones from countries where ethics and international norms are broken — like China or Israel lol.
This almost feels like it's begging people to go blame Sony.
I mean, sure, Sony has a track record so it's no surprise they're suspected, but keep that other possibility in the back of your mind too.
If it's Sony, they'd do it.
No question about it.
They've built that kind of history for themselves,
so honestly, can't really argue with that.
They just quietly buried Concord and Saros without a fight, though.
The major retailer chart had it sitting at a 60-something ranking, which looks like it's right at Sony's rock bottom.
There's been no early sales report at all.
There's this vague 6-million-unit quota tied to the Marvel deal,
and development costs so high that anything less than full price puts it in the red.
If this desperation gets bad enough,
Marvel might end up refusing to license any future games besides Spider-Man.
Of course it's different from their in-house projects — Marvel's involved and there's a sales quota attached.
Background and Key Points of This Debate
Anyone can post a Metacritic user score just by registering an account, and since the platform doesn’t disclose its aggregation methods or fraud-detection criteria, a sudden flood of very high or very low scores in a short window naturally invites suspicion of manipulation. In this case, no evidence has been presented that Sony’s head office (SIE) is directly involved — the thread itself offers several competing theories, from “maybe it’s Insomniac” to “maybe it’s a third-party overseas community,” without reaching a firm conclusion. The claim that “there’s a contract clause penalizing them if the user score drops below 7.0” is likewise unsourced speculation. Whether the wave of negative reviews hitting the Chinese game Wan Zi Qian Hong around the same time was retaliation or just coincidence also hasn’t been confirmed. The score’s wild swings are an objective fact verifiable on Metacritic itself, but most of the explanations for why it’s happening are speculation from the 5ch thread — worth keeping that distinction in mind while reading.
※This article is compiled and summarized from the 5ch (Hardware/Industry (Geha)) thread “Wolverine’s Metacritic user score climbs from 6.3 to 7.0 after relentless 10/10 bombing from new accounts!“
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