Seriously

I'm all for a "second opinion" feature where you vote for a score on any game that has been reviewed and it is displayed in the sidebar or w/e after 5 votes or so. Like the "you say" on gamespot?
Then maybe you'd have to post in the review discuss thread at the same time or have posted at least 10 times in the forum for it to work.

Obviously there's the problem with people having different views on what is an average score (I'd say 5/10, but most people seem to think it's 7/10) and which parts of a game are more important for the final score than others.. but sometimes the reviews on this site are so outta whack to me that I'd prefer to see an average, user-based score as an alternative.
You can't really argue that this isn't the way we define most things in the world, at least in the western, democratic societies of today.

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Originally Posted by Melf

I'm not arguing really, but I don't agree that you should base an entire review around just the number score at the end. If that were all that were needed, then our reviews would need be only a paragraph long at the most. I think the whole reason for them being comprehensive is to offer insight beyond just what a simple number can offer.

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I strongly disagree about your opinions on the numerical score system. The score is supposed to represent everything said in the review, just as the review is supposed to back up the score with the arguments contained within. If done right the scoring is just as important and valid as any other part of the review.
Personally if I don't find the beginning of a review interesting (well written, witty, creative) I often scroll down to the score, then I read the last paragraph expecting a summary which backs it up, and if I'm not satisfied with it I'll read the entire review.

On a side note I'd also like to have a link from the review to the discussion thread of each game, which I've asked for like 3 times now :)

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Originally Posted by Alianger

I'm all for a "second opinion" feature where you vote for a score on any game that has been reviewed and it is displayed in the sidebar or w/e after 5 votes or so. Like the "you say" on gamespot?
Then maybe you'd have to post in the review discuss thread at the same time or have posted at least 10 times in the forum for it to work.

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We're hoping to include a feature where only registered forum members can leave a reader rating, and this will hopefully boost our membership. It also prevents people from spamming the scores by submitting a bunch of times. 1 reader, 1 score. Once you log in, you'll be able to leave a score (1-10), as well as about 200-character comments (one per reader).

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Obviously there's the problem with people having different views on what is an average score (I'd say 5/10, but most people seem to think it's 7/10) and which parts of a game are more important for the final score than others.. but sometimes the reviews on this site are so outta whack to me that I'd prefer to see an average, user-based score as an alternative.

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The Review Manifest describes point-by-point what our scores mean, so an average here is definitely a 5. The problem is that it's absolutely IMPOSSIBLE to please everyone, and I'm so tired of this problem that it's the defining reason why we're going to overhaul the system. Hopefuly, this will please as many people as possible.

Another problem is that some contributors don't read the Manifest when scoring their reviews. I don't tell them what score a particular game should be, as that would be me imposing my opinion on them, but I tell them to look at their reviews and see if what's written accurately reflects the definition of the score. A lot of the reviews here that are "out of whack" were put up before we had the manifest, and their authors are no longer around or have changed their contact info. I think that just about every review we've put up after September of 2005 is decently scored. I've contacted some of the older review authors, like Jeremy Peeples, and asked them to go back and rescore their reviews based on the Manifest. That's why some people here noticed some scores had changed.

Heh, it's bad if we leave the scores wonky and bad if we change them... :(

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On a side note I'd also like to have a link from the review to the discussion thread of each game, which I've asked for like 3 times now :)

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This will be included in the new upgrade. I haven't done it already because I'm not too keen on going through and linking 400+ reviews manually. ;)

Using the IP address's for the second opinions should really help out. Hopefully we'll be getting less of these type of threads after the overhaul.

Is there an approximate date for the overhaul?

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Originally Posted by Melf

Hopefuly, this will please as many people as possible.

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Works for me. Thanks for the thorough reply!

For great justice.


"This will be included in the new upgrade. I haven't done it already because I'm not too keen on going through and linking 400+ reviews manually. ;)"

Heh, I can understand that but why not let your underlings do it? ;)

Actually, Ken pretty much does almost all the work in the way of site organization and the like. We may be staff but we're most likely never getting the proper permission to change the site around ourselves.

When we have the database ready, that might change, I'll talk with Steven about at least letting you guys submit box art and screen shots. I'd prefer to do the proofreading myself, but there's no reason you guys can't have more access.

Oh, I see.

Cool.

Followed this topic a bit when I was unregistered. Interesting. Lately there have been a lot of topics on various boards discussing reviews that have numerical value. I think some folks are just looking into things too deeply. It's been said in this thread by someone, I can't remember who, but the text is more important. The ratings should not be analyzed... they are that reviewer's personal opinion. Of course you will not agree with every score you see. Some people I've seen get REALLY worked up over this. I never minded reviews with numbers. In fact, I enjoy them, as it reminds me of the traditional old-school magazine style

Text and "style" of the review > the ratings -- that's how I approach reading reviews