Inside the Jury Room: Claire Ferrin on Honest Critique and Exceptional Games

I love not only playing games, but also reviewing them, analyzing them, and providing thoughtful feedback. One of my greatest motivations for joining the jury panel was the opportunity to offer meaningful insights that can directly support the talented developers behind the games I love.

I discovered one of my new all-time favorite games while serving as a member of the jury panel! The game is called Nine Sols, and I had the pleasure of reviewing it across several categories.

It has a great story, incredible music, beautiful art, and some of the most fluid combat I have ever experienced in the metroidvania genre. The final boss took me five hours to defeat, but it was absolutely worth it. Everyone should play this game—it’s just that good.

I ran a YouTube channel dedicated to that very subject! I was tired of gaming publications that seemed to offer inflated scores, generic reviews, and potential bias from advertising partners.

A big part of my review process was refusing all sponsorships and rating games across the entire 1–10 scale, rather than the 5–10 range that many publications seem to rely on. I made it a point to keep my reviews direct and honest, and I am grateful to have secured that reputation among my viewers.

I maintain that same ethos when evaluating entries for the NYX Game Awards. I believe every developer deserves honest and fair feedback, regardless of the size of their team or the type of game they create.

When evaluating a game, there are many aspects I look for. Perhaps the first is a game's technical performance. You can create an outstanding game, but if it doesn't perform well or is riddled with bugs, it can really hamper the overall experience.

I feel it's important to communicate that not only to players who may purchase the game, but also to the developers, so they know what to focus on for future fixes or updates.

Yes! Totally unexpected, but I have honestly seen some of the craziest game UIs while reviewing entries as a member as a juror. And not in a bad way, either.

There are a bunch of developers out there really doing some unique work. It’s not an area I would normally have paid too much attention to, but have grown to appreciate through all the entries I have reviewed here.

Honestly, Bluesky has become a really good source for gaming news, especially if you're as into indie games as I am. A lot of indie developers have shifted to posting exclusively there, and the engagement I've seen between developers and players has been really impressive.

Outside of that, I still follow the major gaming events, receive daily press releases from all sorts of publishers, and browse many, many different subreddits (shoutout to r/games).

As someone who appreciates all genres and types of games, it's not often that I find myself playing something I know I won't enjoy, so I don't find that balance too difficult. That said, we all have personal preferences.

I believe my experience as a game reviewer over the past decade has helped me find the balance between understanding why something doesn't resonate with me and being able to explain why in a way that goes beyond simply saying, "I don't like this."

There have been times when I've found myself double-checking that an entry truly aligns with the category it's been submitted under. Taking that extra moment to reflect helps me evaluate each game as fairly and accurately as possible.

Sometimes that means playing a bit more of the game, and other times it means going back to games I've previously evaluated to see where they stack up. It can be challenging, but I also find that challenge to be incredibly rewarding.

My cheat code for this is that I don't really have any disliked genres. I play everything from first-person shooters and RPGs to platformers, rhythm games, FMVs, visual novels, action adventure games, puzzle games, and everything in between. I believe every genre has something valuable to offer.

The real challenge is finding the right words to convey that value to someone who may not be a fan of the genre.

For 2025 specifically, we had some really heavy hitters in the narrative department. I was genuinely impressed by the quality of the writing in many of the games I evaluated.

One trend I noticed was that some entries adopted mechanics commonly seen in mobile games, such as less intuitive user interfaces and gacha or FOMO elements. While these approaches may suit certain audiences, they weren't always the best fit for every game.

I like to think my time as a game reviewer has helped. The judging process is very similar to how I review video games for my own audience, and I've been doing that for over ten years! It can be tough to find the right words to describe a game to others, but that's part of what makes being a reviewer so much fun.

I've had a lot of fun evaluating games throughout the judging process, and it's been a rewarding experience to see so many creative ideas and talented developers represented.