Why Video Game Previews Bother Me

Yeah, so this is just a little rant, but I felt like sharing.  It's Valentine's Day, and I should be cuddling my wife or baking heart-shaped cookies, but I'm too much of a geek for that.  I'm surfing the net and I've been checking out reviews for some video games I was looking to snag.  Unfortunately, this has reminded me of a troubling trend that I can't seem to wrap my head around.

Let's just start with an example and take it from there: I wanted to pick up the new Aliens game, which looked pretty cool and had received a ton of hype from various magazines and websites that offer up video game previews and reviews.  Now, the game is out, and it is getting killed.  I'm not trying to say that it isn't getting many good reviews, because as far as I can tell it isn't getting ANY good reviews.  This thing is being slaughtered.  This leads me to second-guess my decision to purchase the game, and it reinforces the notion that I'm only wasting my time when I try to scope out the video game landscape unless I rely on demos and word-of-mouth.

See, this isn't news to anyone who follows games, and it's incredibly frustrating.  Why is it that virtually every game is built up (sometimes over the course of a few years) with pieces that marvel over the stellar graphics and the innovative gameplay, only for most of these games to be released only to garner poor reviews by the same media outlet that was just in hype mode a few weeks ago?  Seriously, you'll read about cool visuals and intriguing mechanics, and then the review will come out blasting the poor graphics and the stale gameplay.  It's maddening.  I also scope out previews and reviews for the music I enjoy and the movies I watch, and I seldom see the same kind of behavior.

Does this irk anyone else or is it just me?