NEVERSILENT'S PROFILE

Credit where credit is due, I applaud this article. It's informative, well-written and a good step towards a more competent review culture. Hopefully it will encourage more people to try their hand at reviewing. Good job, Liberty.

(P.S.: Some small nitpicking:

What, Was, Were, Why and How

I think you might have made some sort of typo here.)

A humble suggestion: Let's all try to calm down a bit and get this thread back on the constructive track. Throwing F-bombs at each other is not going to solve anything in any way.

author=amerk
maybe you can come up with a reasonable solution that will encourage more reviews.

Good call, amerk. Let me throw in an idea here: Does anyone remember the "Reviewrim" event from the beginning of the year? Now that was a blast and encouraged tons of reviews. It would be great to do something like that again.
I suggest organizing a similar event, but this time make it so that users sign up to review a certain game (or multiple games) while it is made sure that there are always at least 2 individual people "assigned" to a game. Then, they would each write a review for this game independently and be rewarded with an achievement or something similar. That way, there would never be a one-sided rating because every review would have at least one other review to balance it out.
Ergo: More useful feedback for the developer, a fairer average rating of the game, and an extra incentive for members to actually review games. What do you think?

author=Linkis
MAYBE, since the developers are the only ones who REALLY know what goes into a game should be doing the real reviews so the game maker gets a pros feedback and let the rest of us give a star review based on how we like or not like a game.
Those who don't know how to make a game can give a number of stars and an opinion in the post area if we want.

Thing is, Linkis, that most active members here are actually game developers themselves. Not all are professionals, mind you, but the majority are currently making games, which kind of defeats the point of your idea.
However, nothing stops you from posting your impressions of a game (or even a "rating") into the comment section of its gamepage. People usually look at those as well (at least I know I do).

I admit I'm a bit surprised by the poll results... The majority seems to prefer more serious than humorous (but not entirely serious) games. And I hadn't expected nobody would vote for either of the extremes, especially the "purely humorous" option. But actually, that's totally fine with me.

author=turkeyDawg
However, most of the things I've seen/played/read that are purely, 100% srs serious are often way too "try-hard" to the point that they'll often seem immature and become humorous for the wrong reasons.

Good point. There are of course some exceptions, but I agree in general. Games (or other media) that, well, take themselves too seriously often feel just so forced that they end up becoming ridiculous.
The same can be true for games that only focus on humour. Most of the time, they quickly start to lose their appeal because there's just no relevance to anything in them. At least, that's my point of view.

author=RyaReisender
The basic story is super serious and so many people, even main characters, die, yet in each episode there is at least one scene then makes me laugh. That's the perfect combination.

While I haven't read or seen "Game of Thrones" itself, this is exactly how I feel as well. I don't have a problem with being intellectually challenged or emotionally touched by a game (quite the opposite), but having close to no comic relief tends to make it both less interesting and less realistic. After all, humour plays a big role in our everyday lives, so it's hard to imagine why game characters should be super serious all the time.
So, well, pretty much what yuna said.

Thank you for your response, I'm glad you liked the review. I actually had planned to review this game for a long time, I just never got around to it before.

I was indeed positively surprised about the quality of the writing. You did a good job on that.

author=mtarzaim
Custom resources?!
I.. don't remember any worth of quoting. Maybe the pictures or the backgrounds?..
Oh well, thanks anyway. :)

Yes, exactly. There was this very neat floating effect for the pictures at the end which I thought was simple but brilliant. (I got a bad ending, by the way, I ran out of time before I could finish the last ruins.)

author=mtarzaim
Or read the walkthrough within the game directory.

I actually completely overlooked that. While I think some sort of indicator within the game itself would have addressed the matter more elegantly, not having noticed the walkthrough was a huge mistake on my part. I apologize - and I edited the review accordingly.
Could you maybe tell me how many different endings there actually are and how they can be achieved? I'm the type of player who would want to see and experience all of them (not only the "best" one).

author=mtarzaim

author=NeverSilent
- The one true problem of Life Precious, however, is this: It is bug-ridden.

That much?

Yes, that much. Sorry to say it.

author=mtarzaim

author=NeverSilent
I ultimately decided against giving a rating

You should give one.

I hope you will understand that I'm not going to do that. While I won't pretend my review style is perfect, I do take reviewing very seriously. I put quite a lot of thought into this and decided to leave out the final score for a reason. That reason is not that I want to deprive you of attention or Makerscore. It is because the game's potential clashes so violently with its overall bugginess that a rating just seems inappropriate. To me, in the current situation any score - no matter how high or low - would simply feel like a lie.

Again, I really want to encourage you to go and put some more work into this game to fix its weak points. You would be doing me, yourself and all potential players a huge favour.

Good luck with any future projects.

As we are probably all aware, the overall tone of a game can greatly influence how players percieve, interpret and value it. This is especially true for story- and character-heavy games as well as games with an untypical premise. While some games present themselves in a way that is clearly intended to make you laugh, other games address more serious matters that leave little to no room for comic elements.

Of course, these are only the far ends of the spectrum. There are numerous games that are in fact quite serious but still contain a fair share of humour, too. A good RPG Maker game example for this type would be To the Moon. The main theme of this game is a everything but funny, yet there are a number of scenes designed to amuse the player. Similarly, some games concentrate largely on the aspect of humour but have some seriousness to them as well. In Search of Immortality, for example, is such a game. Its focus lies mostly on odd characters and comic dialogue, but after a while it becomes clear it's not all just fun and games.

Personally, while I do enjoy laughing and joking around, I am in fact a rather serious person. This is why I especially value games that, in addition to being enjoyable to play, make me feel involved and give me something to really think about. My favourite type of game is therefore "serious with some humour" (which is not to say I dislike the other "types", this is just what appeals to me most).

So how about you? What are your preferences when it comes to the overall tone of a game, and why is that so?