HOW SHOULD WE JUDGE GAMES?

Yeah, It Moves went a little overboard with the spooky face picture overlay. But I think the bed scenes--which were gameplay-free, unfortunately--were nerve-wracking as fuck, and this would be a good example of when aesthetics, sound design, and story are providing an engaging experience despite no gameplay. Miserere and Rust and Blood both had some pretty intense horror gameplay moments, though.

Edit: Also, I agree 100% about that Sequelitis. Ocarina of Time hasn't aged as well as Link to the Past, but it's still a solid game.

author=SnowOwl
Guess I'm just shit at making gameplay engaging (I already knew that though). Next game: 30 hours of text.

Speaking of horror. How would you judge a horror-game that didn't scare you at all, yet the gameplay was good? How about if the gameplay was bad but it was really scary?
Which one is the best of those two?

What about for example a comedy game that is not funny, but again the gameplay is great? The opposite?

You don't need to get defensive, just learn a little bit about game design and do better.

And the bottom line for your all-or-nothing questions is that if you can't do both, don't do either.

@SnowOwl: That sounds like it'd have to be a case-by-case thing. I think a lot of the Resident Evils fall into this category. Like Resident Evil 4 is a pretty fun game, but it's not horrifying. It's fun enough that you don't feel cheated by it not being horrifying. Or, with comedy, Disgaea is more or less a comedy game, but the humor falls flat for me most of the time (definitely a few exceptions). However, that game has some fucking great mechanics.

Conversely, I played an IGMC entry that had a cool mechanic where you had to do a timing event while running from a monster; it got my adrenaline pumping and my timing got worse because of it, which I thought was kind of slick. The only problem was that you had about two seconds to get the timing down, meaning you would often get killed even if you weren't being thrown off by your state of mind, and you would die so many times that death lost its power. The mechanic effectively killed the horror.

I guess I'd say that good mechanics could make you not care if the game doesn't deliver on the promises of its genre, but bad mechanics could spoil a game that does deliver good scares/laughs/whatever. Your games tend to keep the gameplay far enough in the background to where this never happens, Snow Owl, which is part of what makes your horror effective. Don't feel pressured to tack on gameplay when you're still making effective horror. However, if you get ideas to make gameplay work with the horror, then that's a potential home run.

author=Blindmind
For example, would you judge the original Star Wars film on its VFX merits in contrast to today's Hollywood? Of course not. It would be evaluated in the context of 1977 Film.

Hm, amazing prop and set work versus lots of often obvious green screen effects. Tough call. Would be easier if we narrowed down the comparison from the broad 'today's Hollywood.'

But I can honestly say that any film that comes out today that uses actual sets instead of "stand on this green platform in front of this green wall" would get some points for it. It helps the world feel a little more real.

My point with this is that you don't need the shiniest, newest visual techniques to look great. There's a reason some games (admittedly, usually portable ones) still use sprites.

author=CashmereCat
@Artbane You're right about percentage weightings not accurately reflecting the quality of the overall product. Sometimes a game is greater than or less than a sum of its parts.

@Liberty The only thing about judging how much fun you had is as so: do you also judge from an unbiased point of view how great the game is? e.g. you might have a ton of fun playing Flappy Bird but you might not classify it as a great game simply because it's overly simple and has been done before. Whereas you might rate highly a game that you may not enjoy but you can appreciate is a great game because it's incredibly innovative and clever but you might not be into the genre of visual novels per se.

Edit: Is there such a thing as illegitimate criticism? E.g. "This game's story contains a talking dog and I don't like it therefore it sucks", or "This game contains turn based battles and I don't like waiting 0/10". What qualifies as bad criticism? Is it when personal biases get in the way of your judgment? But reviewers need biases to define what's a good game and what isn't, even if the bias is: 'games should be entertaining'. So when does such a bias become harmful?

Like I said in the first post - the rest do count, definitely, but fun factor is the main weight for me. (And yes, I try to keep it unbiased. Had a lot of experience with that one this year. XD )

When writing a review I tend to break it down in to parts - Graphics, Sound, Gameplay, Writing - then break those down into parts (Mapping/Huds/Atmosphere, Music/Sound/Atmosphere, Bugs/Battles/Puzzles/Mechanics/Balance/etc, Story/Characterisation/Mechanics) depending on the type of game. Of course, I don't really use those as headings - I just touch on them as I write.

The end score will be composed of a 'score' for the main headings based on the different subs. That score will then be adjusted to fit whether I had fun with the game or not. I don't tend to show my scores for the headings, only the end score.

Basically, it's what I did for the Indie game contest (though in that it was more involved score-wise, with removal of points for issues).

The headings are the technical, unbiased side and my bias comes in with the fun factor.


As for the scary/non-scary horror game, it depends what the creator was aiming for. Stray Cat Crossing, I did not find scary at all (well, there was that one jump scare but that was more about shock) but the game is pretty good. I don't think the creator was aiming for scaring you, but instead aiming for unsettling you - and I was fine with that.

That said, what some find scary, others just don't. I know for fact that Nessy meh'd her way through Outlast, even though a lot of people consider it scary. It's different for a lot of people and reviews are going to reflect that moreso in the case of a game that is meant to emotionally connect to you in some way (sad games, scary games, games that depend on eliciting emotion). Some, though, will show better than others in engaging a wider audience and even if you don't get scared yourself (or emotionally involved) there are, at least, other areas to focus on.


I think it's fine to judge old games by today's standards (even if some of today's standards should go die in a fire. Yes I'm looking at you, the belief of RTP being bad. Fuck off.), but make sure to point out to the audience that you're doing so - a lot of people won't realise without context and thus deem the game as not worth playing (if it doesn't hold up - no matter if it's a good game despite it's flaws).
Then again, there are a lot of older games that do live up to today's standards still (hello Sunset over Imdahl, you wonderful piece, you~) and that deserves to be pointed out. The mark of a great anything is to see how well it stands up to the standards of times in which it was not created.

author=SnowOwl
Guess I'm just shit at making gameplay engaging (I already knew that though). Next game: 30 hours of text.

Speaking of horror. How would you judge a horror-game that didn't scare you at all, yet the gameplay was good? How about if the gameplay was bad but it was really scary?
Which one is the best of those two?

What about for example a comedy game that is not funny, but again the gameplay is great? The opposite?

I would say bad gameplay, scary > good gameplay, simply because the way you tend to design horror games is all around that area of suspense. There often is a story involved, but it is there to guide you along and only rarely very interesting or symbolic by itself. Horror games are also games that are allowed to have a lower tempo than other genre, because it can enhance the experience. It will be annoying if that suspense isn't achieved, though.
There could be exceptions, of course.

I'm not counting "unsettling" as different, because it's part of scary, suspension and the field associated with it.

As well as bad gameplay, funny > good gameplay, not funny
For similar reasons. I understand gameplay can be fun, but there are plenty of games and genre out there for enjoying fun gameplay or fun battles.
It is high likely that here, too, the focus is more on setting up comedy rather than anything else (which is why it has been the focus to begin with) - so even if the rest ends up being fairly well, it will most likely still not reach great heights in these areas.

Disgaea for example is all about exaggeration .. some entries I find very funny, others not at all - yet the mechanics themselves are all about exaggeration as well. lvl 9999, lvl spells, items, incarnations, x-possibilities.
And while the system is very elaborate and quite fun, it does turn into a grindfest - and personally, I find the latest entries have too much added.
They did a good balance, though. There is far more optional content than pure story .. so if you enjoy the system, knock yourself out. Otherwise just go with the story and be done with it.

If you yourself have a good enough grasp of what the intended genre was, even if you don't personally like it but can see where the game did those things well, then you can probably do both.