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FOUR STARS...FOR WHAT ??
Posts
amerk
2539
amerk
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CloseRemove the rating from reviews, problem solved, or at least hide it within the review to encourage people to actually read the reviews first before deciding whether to play a game or not.
That way, people don't just judge a game by what one person rated it, without going in and reading the review for themselves. There have been several games that I enjoyed that had low star ratings. Had I decided to not play the game because of the rating, I would have missed out. Instead, I chose to go into the reviews and read what made it get a low star, and discovered some of the things people had issues about, didn't bother me too much.
The problem I think is that too many people search for games based on a star-rating (but never actually read the reviews for themselves), and then get mad when a 5-star rated game turns out to be trash and the rate was unjustified, and likewise for the 1-star game they passed up because some angry troll decided to trash the game.
Remove the rate or hide it in the review itself. Then people are at least visiting the review before making a decision. Sure, if you hide it within the review, some will probably visit the review page to get the total score and exit again without reading the review; but others will hopefully figure that since they're there, they may as well read what somebody wrote.
That way, people don't just judge a game by what one person rated it, without going in and reading the review for themselves. There have been several games that I enjoyed that had low star ratings. Had I decided to not play the game because of the rating, I would have missed out. Instead, I chose to go into the reviews and read what made it get a low star, and discovered some of the things people had issues about, didn't bother me too much.
The problem I think is that too many people search for games based on a star-rating (but never actually read the reviews for themselves), and then get mad when a 5-star rated game turns out to be trash and the rate was unjustified, and likewise for the 1-star game they passed up because some angry troll decided to trash the game.
Remove the rate or hide it in the review itself. Then people are at least visiting the review before making a decision. Sure, if you hide it within the review, some will probably visit the review page to get the total score and exit again without reading the review; but others will hopefully figure that since they're there, they may as well read what somebody wrote.
Mobh
4
author=Darken
i hear metacritic 1 sentence user reviews are great because its not like a buttmad controversy meter. not at all
I don't know how much traffic this site gets, but I assume Metacritic is in a whole different league. I know things have gotten nasty there with astroturfing and all, but most developers on this site are hobbyists making free indie games, not huge companies with profit to make. I guess it comes down to whether you trust the community to play fair.
author=SnowOwl..except when someone with a vendetta against you because you denied their game on RMN goes to GameJolt and 1 star rates all of your games there within 5mins out of spite, and there is no indication who did it or why because they don't have to justify their rating at all. Not that that has happened or anything.
Gamejolt does it and it seems to work there (http://gamejolt.com/games/best/). Why wouldn't you be able to use a like system for video games? Every other type of media does it, and just because video games are usually interactive that doesn't really change anything.
User ratings without reviews was something I considered strongly at one point, but then decided against because the potential to abuse was too high (as evidenced by GameJolt's implementation). We have mostly RPGs here, which take longer than most any other game to play - our review system is reflective of that, and I don't think that's a bad thing. These games take a long time to make and to play, and thusly reviews are expected to be more substantial before a rating has merit.
I don't like a 5 star rating myself - I would have went with 4 stars (I feel it encourages the person to say either Yes I liked it (3 or 4 stars) or No I didn't (2 or 1 star) with less evident middle ground, but still with the granularity.
Also, I need to figure out a good way to deal with reviews for Demos vs Full versions of the game, and episodic games... and also to deal with reviews for games for which the creator up and quit RMN because butthurt (and now the reviewer's review is "lost"), and also considering a "Was this review helpful?" kind of thing, to promote GOOD reviews.
SnowOwl
5188
author=kentonaauthor=SnowOwl..except when someone with a vendetta against you because you denied their game on RMN goes to GameJolt and 1 star rates all of your games there within 5mins out of spite, and there is no indication who did it or why because they don't have to justify their rating at all. Not that that has happened or anything.
Gamejolt does it and it seems to work there (http://gamejolt.com/games/best/). Why wouldn't you be able to use a like system for video games? Every other type of media does it, and just because video games are usually interactive that doesn't really change anything.
There are reviews that slip through that are negative for arbitrary reasons too. At least if it's easier to give a score, my hope is that those types of scores will be lost in the crowd of scores. I guess it's possible to abuse, but you can easily write a negative 1-star review and still get it accepted too, and that will probably have a greater effect on the score (since there are fewer reviews).
Damn, sorry if I created a monster :(
Basically, all I was trying to do is participate in this site a little more.
There are many games I've played which I did not really enjoy but I'm sure others liked a lot so I would not have rated it. On the other hand, I played a few that I really, really enjoyed and wanted to boost that games rating and play by others for all the effort the developer put into creating the game.
There was one game I played that I could not get over how much I enjoyed it and could not wait till I got to the next screen to see what happens. That game got several good reviews but one poor review which robbed it of its rightful place within the star rating. I would have loved to have reviewed that game and given it a boost but did not know how to do it and even if I could have, maybe would not have spent the time to do so. Just me and my laziness when it comes to essays. God, can't tell you how terrible my marks in English class were.
Liking or not liking a game by posting in summary section just gets lost unless the developer reads the comments.
Again, kentona the Great, sorry if my post is giving you a headache :)
Basically, all I was trying to do is participate in this site a little more.
There are many games I've played which I did not really enjoy but I'm sure others liked a lot so I would not have rated it. On the other hand, I played a few that I really, really enjoyed and wanted to boost that games rating and play by others for all the effort the developer put into creating the game.
There was one game I played that I could not get over how much I enjoyed it and could not wait till I got to the next screen to see what happens. That game got several good reviews but one poor review which robbed it of its rightful place within the star rating. I would have loved to have reviewed that game and given it a boost but did not know how to do it and even if I could have, maybe would not have spent the time to do so. Just me and my laziness when it comes to essays. God, can't tell you how terrible my marks in English class were.
Liking or not liking a game by posting in summary section just gets lost unless the developer reads the comments.
Again, kentona the Great, sorry if my post is giving you a headache :)
Don't be silly, Linkis. Discussion isn't an issue as long as it's kept friendly-like with talk on all sides. This is a good topic to talk about so don't fret about it.
That said, I'm against allowing short reviews. Not only because you should put effort into something that nets you MS (and can change not only the overall rating of a game - thus requiring you to justify that change - but also add/remove MS from the creator of the game in question as well). Add to that that all we ask is for a competent piece of about what - 300-500 words? That's not much to ask at all, really. I've written longer game descriptions. ;p
And holding them to a standard of writing? What, like we do with game descriptions, articles and other written pieces that net you MS? Scandal!
Frankly, I feel that if you're getting a 'reward' for doing it, it deserves a bit of effort put in. There are tutorials available for those who don't know how to write a review - hell, just looking at/reading another review helps with that too. All we ask is that it's of sufficient (pretty short, really) length and standards - and at least give some justification if you're going to give the game high or low stars (4.5-5/.5-1.5) so that the bitching is kept to a minimum.
(Because God forbid we get really short one-line 'reviews' that give 5 stars and basically say "Game was good. I really liked it, it was fun." And no, that's not a joke, we have gotten quite a few 'reviews' like that come through the queue. Justifying that with a game that's very not a 5-star game is just asking for trouble. And mayhem. And general bitching.)
That said, I'm against allowing short reviews. Not only because you should put effort into something that nets you MS (and can change not only the overall rating of a game - thus requiring you to justify that change - but also add/remove MS from the creator of the game in question as well). Add to that that all we ask is for a competent piece of about what - 300-500 words? That's not much to ask at all, really. I've written longer game descriptions. ;p
And holding them to a standard of writing? What, like we do with game descriptions, articles and other written pieces that net you MS? Scandal!
Frankly, I feel that if you're getting a 'reward' for doing it, it deserves a bit of effort put in. There are tutorials available for those who don't know how to write a review - hell, just looking at/reading another review helps with that too. All we ask is that it's of sufficient (pretty short, really) length and standards - and at least give some justification if you're going to give the game high or low stars (4.5-5/.5-1.5) so that the bitching is kept to a minimum.
(Because God forbid we get really short one-line 'reviews' that give 5 stars and basically say "Game was good. I really liked it, it was fun." And no, that's not a joke, we have gotten quite a few 'reviews' like that come through the queue. Justifying that with a game that's very not a 5-star game is just asking for trouble. And mayhem. And general bitching.)
amerk
2539
author=kentona
Also, I need to figure out a good way to deal with reviews for Demos vs Full versions of the game, and episodic games... and also to deal with reviews for games for which the creator up and quit RMN because butthurt (and now the reviewer's review is "lost"), and also considering a "Was this review helpful?" kind of thing, to promote GOOD reviews.
What about archiving reviews for demo's that have become complete and for games that have disappeared? That way the review isn't lost, but not impacting the full game's score either. Another ideas is to not allow for scores to be chosen for demos, but only full games. That way, the review still appears in the full game, but no score to impact the actual completed game.
I also like the idea of a "helpful" feature for reviews. The more helpful a review was, the higher up in the list, which may be more beneficial than ranking it by the score.
Also, I did have this sort of idea, which is inspired by suggestions in previous discussions:
What about creating a semi-review template that people can use? It'd have basic Q&A to fill out with a score. Some people either can't be bothered to write a full review, or don't care to write one for a game they weren't particularly fond of, or didn't spend a lot of time on. And then there are very short games where a full review would be too hard to write.
So they can fill this template out, apply a score, and call it good. The caveat being, they'd only get like 5 or 10 MS points, instead of the 50 given for full reviews.
Something like:
*What did you like most about this game?
*What did you like least?
*How were the game mechanics? Were there problems playing the game? (check NA if not applicable)
*How was the story? Was it well written or full of misspellings and grammar mistakes? (check NA if not applicable)
*How was the mapping and level design? (check NA if not applicable)
*What score would you give this game?
Make each category required to be filled out to be approved.
Even if a full fledged review is more ideal, there are times when it's not possible to write one, and in those cases the developer has to rely on comments instead. This way, even if somebody is too lazy to do a review or simply can't, the developer is getting feedback they can use.
Davenport
5200
author=amerkI tend to agree with those points.
Remove the rating from reviews, problem solved, or at least hide it within the review to encourage people to actually read the reviews first before deciding whether to play a game or not.
That way, people don't just judge a game by what one person rated it, without going in and reading the review for themselves. There have been several games that I enjoyed that had low star ratings. Had I decided to not play the game because of the rating, I would have missed out. Instead, I chose to go into the reviews and read what made it get a low star, and discovered some of the things people had issues about, didn't bother me too much.
The problem I think is that too many people search for games based on a star-rating (but never actually read the reviews for themselves), and then get mad when a 5-star rated game turns out to be trash and the rate was unjustified, and likewise for the 1-star game they passed up because some angry troll decided to trash the game.
Remove the rate or hide it in the review itself. Then people are at least visiting the review before making a decision. Sure, if you hide it within the review, some will probably visit the review page to get the total score and exit again without reading the review; but others will hopefully figure that since they're there, they may as well read what somebody wrote.
How about this: "Short" review (clicking star, perhaps with short comment) won't net ANYONE makerscore while long reviews 9as they are now) will? Then we'll have best of both worlds.
And I agree that when anyone will be able to rate game, "revenge" scores will drown in the sea of accurate ones.
And I agree that when anyone will be able to rate game, "revenge" scores will drown in the sea of accurate ones.
I may be missing a lot of good games :( so will have to check the categories more.
But I tend to stick with RPG, Advent. and Action.
I also click on ether Full Game List OR New Games.
Then if I see a game that interests me I will check out the screenshots. If they look good to my silly brain, it gets downloaded :(
OH, I will also let the Coach pick some for me :).
Not sure why, but every so often I will come across a game that's been around for a few years and I've NEVER seen it listed before....wonder why.
But I tend to stick with RPG, Advent. and Action.
I also click on ether Full Game List OR New Games.
Then if I see a game that interests me I will check out the screenshots. If they look good to my silly brain, it gets downloaded :(
OH, I will also let the Coach pick some for me :).
Not sure why, but every so often I will come across a game that's been around for a few years and I've NEVER seen it listed before....wonder why.
amerk
2539
author=Linkis
Not sure why, but every so often I will come across a game that's been around for a few years and I've NEVER seen it listed before....wonder why.
It's the downside to hype, unfortunately. The longer a game's production is carried out, the more attention it seems to get, even if the game fizzles and turns out to be a dud.
Meanwhile, other games (some of which are really good) fall by the wayside.
Lowering your standards for RM games can help. I've learned to appreciate many of these games as the under-developed brother the SNES never knew it had, and as a result I can get around that some of these games are somewhat good in their right, even if they will never compete with the likes of Final Fantasy VI, Chrono Trigger, or Lufia.
What I find good, though, is subjective. At the time, I really enjoyed the Eden Legacy series, even though many people belittled them. Likewise, I felt A Blurred Line was way over hyped for what I felt was slightly above average... I'll probably be burned for heresy for writing that.
RyaReisender
200
Several suggestion from me:
1. Number of reviews should also have an effect on the total score. Like for example pretending each game has a 0/5 review set by default. So if it just has one 5 star review it's still just 2.5. If it has two 5 star review it's 3.3 and so on.
2. Make RMN differentiate between 0.1 score steps. Right now all 4/5 games are considered equally good, it doesn't make any difference whether it's 3.8 or 4.2, but for players that difference is huge (as 3.8 average often means it's already a rather average game while 4.2 is a really good score).
3. Review should be required for score, but it should not be necessary to write an essay. Really even if a reviewer is writing a lot it does not say ANYTHING about how well thought out the score is. A person can talk 3 pages long how much he hated one aspect of the game and give it just 1 star without actually considered all the other parts of the game at all.
I think as long as the review shows that the score really reflects the reviewer's opinion, it should be allowed.
The shortest possible review I could imagine still being allowed was something just rating all the categories of an RPG with one or two sentences as explanation like this (imaginary review):
1. Number of reviews should also have an effect on the total score. Like for example pretending each game has a 0/5 review set by default. So if it just has one 5 star review it's still just 2.5. If it has two 5 star review it's 3.3 and so on.
2. Make RMN differentiate between 0.1 score steps. Right now all 4/5 games are considered equally good, it doesn't make any difference whether it's 3.8 or 4.2, but for players that difference is huge (as 3.8 average often means it's already a rather average game while 4.2 is a really good score).
3. Review should be required for score, but it should not be necessary to write an essay. Really even if a reviewer is writing a lot it does not say ANYTHING about how well thought out the score is. A person can talk 3 pages long how much he hated one aspect of the game and give it just 1 star without actually considered all the other parts of the game at all.
I think as long as the review shows that the score really reflects the reviewer's opinion, it should be allowed.
The shortest possible review I could imagine still being allowed was something just rating all the categories of an RPG with one or two sentences as explanation like this (imaginary review):
Graphics 3.5/5 - Uses default RTP, but mapping is nice so I'll put it above average.
Music 1/5 - Game didn't have any music or sound effects and I felt it could really need some.
Gameplay 2/5 - Gameplay outside of combat is nice, but battles are really boring and the balance is horrible.
Story 4.5/5 - Really interesting story, it was probably the only thing that really kept me going.
Total 3/5 - Game is mostly ruined by lack of sound and really tedious and unbalanced battles, but the story is really good and the mapping is nice. Together it adds up to average.
author=RyaReisender
2. Make RMN differentiate between 0.1 score steps. Right now all 4/5 games are considered equall good, it doesn't make any different whether it's 3.8 or 4.2, but for players that difference is huge (as 3.8 average often means it's already a rather average game while 4.2 is a really good score).
I really like this idea, and I suspect it won't be that hard to implement.
author=amerkYou bastard!
Likewise, I felt A Blurred Line was way over hyped for what I felt was slightly above average... I'll probably be burned for heresy for writing that.
Wow this topic got serious haha. I still feel it's fine the rating/review system for the site we have. I mean yeah if we had a bigger audience their definitely would be issues, but for what's on offer and the kind of stuff were selling here the system works.
It is a shame that a lot of games fall through the cracks. But we can't be expected to have everyone who is in the community contributing towards reviews. Hell I'm sure at least half the people that come to the site are just here to either play games or have somewhere to host/show their own.
amerk
2539
author=RyaReisender
1. Number of reviews should also have an effect on the total score. Like for example pretending each game has a 0/5 review set by default. So if it just has one 5 star review it's still just 2.5. If it has two 5 star review it's 3.3 and so on.
I don't really like this idea. You're still going to wind up with the same problem, that many of the old games have lots of reviews given in a time when reviews were prominent, and most of the new games only getting one review, if they're lucky.
Even grandfathering in so that it only applies to new games going forward, if one game scores an average of 3 across the board for 5 reviews, another game only gets two reviews (each scored at 4), the first game is going to have an average score of 3 and come off looking better designed and polished than the second one (with an average of 2.7) only because the second one couldn't get the same amount of reviews.
Punishing a game because people are too lazy to right a review doesn't seem to be the answer.
author=RyaReisender
2. Make RMN differentiate between 0.1 score steps. Right now all 4/5 games are considered equally good, it doesn't make any difference whether it's 3.8 or 4.2, but for players that difference is huge (as 3.8 average often means it's already a rather average game while 4.2 is a really good score).
I like this idea. Being able to decide on a point system helps. I recently did a review or a game that scored at 2.83 (based off my own metrics). It had a really good story, but everything else was subpar. So I either had to decide to lower it to 2.5 which I felt was too low, or 3 which I felt was too high. I wound up going with 3 because it felt wrong lowering a score more than what it should be.
author=RyaReisender
3. Review should be required for score, but it should not be necessary to write an essay. Really even if a reviewer is writing a lot it does not say ANYTHING about how well thought out the score is. A person can talk 3 pages long how much he hated one aspect of the game and give it just 1 star without actually considered all the other parts of the game at all.
I think as long as the review shows that the score really reflects the reviewer's opinion, it should be allowed.
Reviews require to be approved, so this falls on whoever is modding and approving to ensure the review reflects the game over all, and that the score is justified and not biased.
We all change with experience; none of my current reviews reflects the reviews I first did, and my style of writing has changed. However, regardless of how good or bad we may have been, what we do write should reflect the score, and if not should be denied.
author=RyaReisender
The shortest possible review I could imagine still being allowed was something just rating all the categories of an RPG with one or two sentences as explanation like this (imaginary review):Graphics 3.5/5 - Uses default RTP, but mapping is nice so I'll put it above average.
Music 1/5 - Game didn't have any music or sound effects and I felt it could really need some.
Gameplay 2/5 - Gameplay outside of combat is nice, but battles are really boring and the balance is horrible.
Story 4.5/5 - Really interesting story, it was probably the only thing that really kept me going.
Total 3/5 - Game is mostly ruined by lack of sound and really tedious and unbalanced battles, but the story is really good and the mapping is nice. Together it adds up to average.
This is kind of why people have been asking for a template idea for smaller reviews. Bigger reviews can continue to receive the total MS points they do now, but smaller ones can be approved for less points (maybe 5 or 10). I see this as a win-win across the board:
1. The developer has a better chance of getting more reviews, even if some of them are less detailed.
2. The people who otherwise don't like to provide long reviews now can review and still get some points for it.
3. Games that otherwise wouldn't deserve a full 300-word review can now start generating feedback.
4. Even getting small reviews would help make the score more appropriate across the board.
5. No real extra duties for the mods, since they already have to approve reviews. They'd just need to decide if a review fits within the template or should be considered a full fledged review for MS distribution purposes.
I sure hope this discussion I started can help this site and the developers.
That Template idea would be great for players like me.
And if you think about it, there are really two kinds of people who would review games. Those like me, who could contribute their likes and dislikes but ALSO those who really KNOW how to make games and help the developers with ideas on how to improve a particular game or maybe just those games they create in the near future.
That Template idea would be great for players like me.
And if you think about it, there are really two kinds of people who would review games. Those like me, who could contribute their likes and dislikes but ALSO those who really KNOW how to make games and help the developers with ideas on how to improve a particular game or maybe just those games they create in the near future.
RyaReisender
200
Punishing a game because people are too lazy to right a review doesn't seem to be the answer.
Number of reviews are also an indication on how popular the game is, so it's usually true that a game with many reviews has a good quality even if there many 1/5 hater votes (see Amazon's rating system for example).
I like this idea. Being able to decide on a point system helps. I recently did a review or a game that scored at 2.83 (based off my own metrics). It had a really good story, but everything else was subpar. So I either had to decide to lower it to 2.5 which I felt was too low, or 3 which I felt was too high. I wound up going with 3 because it felt wrong lowering a score more than what it should be.
Maybe I should clarify this. What I mean is the total average score of a game after which you can sort. If I sort for score I want to see 4.2 score games before 3.8 score games.
When rating games I'm not sure if a human can even differentiate stronger than in 10 steps.
author=amerk
Bigger reviews can continue to receive the total MS points they do now, but smaller ones can be approved for less points (maybe 5 or 10). I see this as a win-win across the board:
1. The developer has a better chance of getting more reviews, even if some of them are less detailed.
2. The people who otherwise don't like to provide long reviews now can review and still get some points for it.
3. Games that otherwise wouldn't deserve a full 300-word review can now start generating feedback.
4. Even getting small reviews would help make the score more appropriate across the board.
5. No real extra duties for the mods, since they already have to approve reviews. They'd just need to decide if a review fits within the template or should be considered a full fledged review for MS distribution purposes.
Great idea and oh... uh...
author=Rave
How about this: "Short" review (clicking star, perhaps with short comment) won't net ANYONE makerscore while long reviews 9as they are now) will? Then we'll have best of both worlds.
And I agree that when anyone will be able to rate game, "revenge" scores will drown in the sea of accurate ones.
amerk
2539
Yeah, a small review template that nets only a small fraction of the makerscore seems favorable to a lot of people, and may help to encourage people to leave feedback that the developer can use.
Hopefully Kentona or one of the others can weigh in on this.
Hopefully Kentona or one of the others can weigh in on this.
