Kill Screen writers Jamin Warren and Michael Thomsen debate the game review process and the importance of finishing games. I found both sides of their argument strong, especially this point by Mike on why finishing games prior to writing a review is so important:
I compare it to taking an assignment to climb Mount Everest. Nobody wants to read about me getting to the base camp. There’s Into Thin Air; there’s a long history of people writing very well about failure. But if you take the game as Everest, the review should be an account of getting to the top of Everest. What did it cost you; was it an easy hike not in terms of difficulty, but in terms of your own creative endurance? How quickly were you bored with it; how quickly did it become rote and repetitive; how much of a surprise was there in the ending; how much meaning came out of the boredom?