It doesn't just happen here...

[Clinton R. Nixon]

Here's a concept that will never take hold:

What if someone, when sitting down to review a game, read it alone, thought about it, and then wrote the first part of the review? Then they constructed a scenario or whatever, got together a group, and ran the game, then finished the review.

You might end up with a review structured something like this:

Review of "Some Game"
- Initial thoughts
  - System
  - Setting
  - Notes on book's appearance
- In Play
  - System (and what I didn't see while reading it)
  - Enjoyment of game (and viability)
- Conclusions

[Mytholder]

I've vague memories of a Tastes Like Phoenix review (or reviewers) that ran along those lines. It's probably the best of both worlds, but it's very time-consuming.