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If the publsiher ships copies for review, and if they ship these to the shelves for people to purchase, that's what gets reviewed. It's up to the publishers to decide what they want to push out the door.
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Jeff, just wanted to say I appreciate your reviews in that new-named rag. Been a CGW subscriber since the mid-80s, and of Computer Games for about five years. CGW has always prided themselves on only reviewing finished, shhipped games in the state the customer recieves them at the register. In the past year I can recall one (1) follow-up review after a major patch, and it was very short (1/4 page maybe.) Don't recall the title. I have seen, as you say you'll do, many reviews mention that a patch is promised, but what else can you say?
Others here have made valid business arguments that a launch is a complex animal--and it is, I've done them in packaged goods--but there is a trade-off in looking inside the firm for good logistics and revenue behaviors at the expense of product quality. To expect consumer demand to be equivalent with a broken game versus a finished game is to misunderstand basic microeconomics.
The trick, it seems to me, the sweet spot, is to post-pone those logistic and marketing decisions late enough in the cycle that product quality is a bit more of a sure thing than we're seeing here. It's hard. But there are trade-offs either way. As the saying goes you can pay me now, with penalty charges to pressing plants and shippers, etc., or you can pay me later, with lost demand as word-of-mouth spreads that the game is unfinished. Either way no free lunch.
Keep doing reviews as you do and I'll keep buying the mag.