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Originally Posted by
chessage
I wouldn't say that entirely. "Side-by-sides" look like a snap to write. What's easier than writing a comparison of two versions of your favorite game that you know very well?
It's not as easy as you think. Every aspect of both versions must be examined to ensure that the comparison is fair, and even their release histories must be researched and taken into account for context and accuracy. That doesn't even take into account having to take screen shots and convert audio samples of both. It's not as simple as just tossing together opinions of both versions.
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Two years is more than enough time to make-or-break something. How old will the "Double Take" series need to be before you judge whether it succeeded or failed?
It's not a matter of how old a series is. There is no pass or fail with any features series, but compare it to say, our Stories from the Book of Genesis series, which is much older, and you can see the difference. The SFTBOG has had twelve submissions since the first DT one went up. It just has more familiarity with readers, that's all. Hopefully, people will start submitting more DT articles.
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I'm not feeling it. It's just not my kind of feature. There is greater satisfaction in reading game reviews.
A perfectly valid OPINION.
Ya RLY!
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The Moonwalker "Double Take" comes off as a second review, but the one you made for Altered Beast acts as a tribute to the games very existence up against titles released by Nintendo and NEC around the same time. Not very congruent in purpose.
That's because two different writers had two different experiences with two different games. How can you assign a unilateral function for both?
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They don't seem to know what they want to be: either a second "Review", a game tribute, or a mixture of both.
Maybe they're all of them or only some; it depends on what the particular writer wants to express. You're assigning the same criteria to these articles as you are to reviews. As though there's some checklist that each must comply with in order to be acceptable. When dealing with opinions, that's simply not possible.
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Of course not, I never said said that.
No?
You said:
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The faction of readers that hold the largest agreement.
Appealing to the largest majority isn't an attempt at consensus or permission seeking? So when someone sits to write a review, they have to consider a score that everyone will like or risk getting their work booted off? What happened to individual criteria?
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When they are composing it, yes, but when the public finds it unjust the author's opinion becomes more fitting in the reader commentary than in a fully representational position as a Sega-16 review.
Again, you're being arbitrary about this. Who gives anyone the right to determine if someone's opinion is unjust or fitting? You're also mistaken, as are all those who consider our scores being used for sites such as game rankings, that review scores are some kind of official Sega-16 stamp of approval or rejection about a particular game. Game Rankings, Game Stats, and all those other sites use our review scores of their own accord, without ever asking me or requiring any specific criteria at all. If our scores are good enough for them, I don't see what all the hubub is about.
Our reviews and features, hell, the entire point of the whole site, is to inform and create awareness. I don't care if someone agrees or doesn't about the score to Snatcher or Super Thunderblade. If they go and play the game and think "that dude's fucking nuts for scoring it that way" or "that review was spot-on," then eother way we've succeeded, because they've played the game. People place waaaaay too much importance on that stupid little number at the end of reviews.
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When there's a "Review" that 24 people hate and only one person likes, I think I'll side with the 24 and replace the "Review" with one that isn't fan-boy acclaimed.
... and that one person could come back for that "review" and those who advocate its removal and cite Ghandi: "Even if you are a minority of one, the truth is the truth." Who's to say his opinion is wrong? It seems more to me that he's just around 24 people who think different.
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If it's thoroughly hated by a LARGE MAJORITY, why should it stand in an upstanding and prominent place? Authors will learn to level their bias if they actually get a demoted "Review". Need I remind you, demotion should not be an easy thing to do. The bar should be set very high so "Reviews" are seldom demoted and only the absolute worst will ever have a chance of being sent down. There will be no revolving door of "Reviews" going in and out constantly.
Trust me, no one will level any bias at all. More than likely, they'll get mad and stop submitting articles altogether. No one likes to be voted out, and considering that no one is paid for anything they submit here, they have no obligation to submit anything. The fact that I proofread all articles personally doesn't deter fanboyism in writing, and you'd be surprised at the amount of articles I've rejected due to innaccuracies or lack of research. A lot of those people simply have never submitted again.
You're adding a whole unnecessary level of bureocracy to something pretty simple and straight forward.
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How many times do I need to say "majority"? I'm not talking "one man hate note", I'm saying "gigantic landslide vote". I'm fully aware no one is 100% happy with any score, but when people are 95% unhappy with a score, I find it necessary to replace the "Review".
I don't. Everything doesn't need to be done in a committee. Since the site went up, I've:
- added forums with specific threads for each article.
- added the reader score feature and 400 character comment feature.
- added Double Take articles for those who want to express themselves on a game already reviewed.
I think that's a fair amount more of reader participation than most sites, and I simply won't have people replacing other people's work because they don't agree with the score. There are more than enough means to express displeasure already.
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Originally Posted by
Phosis
A review is essentially an article written from the point of view of a specific individual. It is not meant to reflect the opinions of many, it is meant to reflect the writers opinion on the thing he is reviewing.
This.
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By removing reviews where the mass audience is not in total agreement, you are sacrificing the integrity of the writer. Not only is it insulting, but it is also pointless. By saying a writer is misleading an audience is fallacy as well, as that suggests that the reader is unwilling to try the items being reviewed for himself, and simply listen to whoever says what.
The problem is that people are assuming that the writer is trying to lead the audience at all. He shouldn't have to cater to anyone else's opinion when reviewing anything.
