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Valve battles review-bombers by introducing review histograms

D

Durante

Member
Par Score said:
Why even include that second option unless you want to encourage and facilitate this behaviour? Why?
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Because it allows you to rapidly inform yourself about what caused the unusual pattern in the reviews. As they explain in their blog post.

KScorp said:
This seems like a great feature.

Users now see that there was a review bomb. Users can then read reviews specifically from that period to see what was going on. Users can then decide how much weight to give to the bombers.

Review bomb occurs due to something completely unrelated to the game? Users can ignore/exclude it.
Review bomb occurs due to something "terrible" happening to the game? (Features removed, awful support, devs abandoned it in unfinished state, etc) Well great, now users can see that the review bombing is actually very relevant to the product!

So basically, I don't think this feature "empowers" bombers. It empowers users, who can now choose to empower bombers.
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Exactly.

Rosa Lilium said:
What the heck?

XgOePpw.jpg
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Now this is an issue that should be fixed -- the algorithm apparently isn't smart enough at determining what an unusually high volume constitutes in cases like this one.
 
A

Abilidebob

Member
I don't think I've read a thread on Neogaf about Valve/Steam for over a year that the vest majority of first posts aren't drive-by shitposts.
Does Valve do a bunch of idiotic, questionable decisions? Absolutely.
Is a part of Neogaf just sitting there, hyperbole in hand, just waiting for the next thread to post their hot-takes? Oh hell yes.

I sincerely can't wait for when they show some Artifact gameplay, just to have some fun reading the thread that will appear here.
 
J

JP_

Banned
Regular people wondering if they are interested will most likely glance at the mixed reviews and move on to next game as they casually browse -- expecting them to analyze graphs to decipher why it has mixed reviews is probably asking too much of most consumers.

The people review bombing will almost certainly look at the graph to measure their effectiveness and post screenshots of it to rally their hordes.

So... I'm thinking it'll do more harm than good if it has any effect at all.
 
M

mas8705

Member
I'm just trying to figure out why it took so long for this to get implemented considering previous circumstances.

Hopefully examples can be made of those who try and do these review bombs just for the sake of just dropping a negative review. Just hope it doesn't spiral out of control (although in all honesty, we are probably well past that point).
 
Z

Zia

Member
In typical Valve fashion it's something cool but based on the now busted-ass pages it's something unfinished, and was intended to release with the upcoming UI refresh.

Looks like a dumpster fire but kudos to Valve for doing something constructive, regardless of the reasoning.
 
J

Jimrpg

Member
This doesn't help at all.

What Valve should do is have two sections of feedback. One is a review that you can only access after getting a certain achievement (finish a game or whatever the dev decides).

The other is just a standard feedback message if people have purchased it.
 
I

Ionic

Member
Valve could cure cancer and people would be yelling about how they didn't do it soon enough or aren't doing it the best way possible. Review bombing is something that happens on all kinds of storefronts. At least somebody is trying to address the issue.

arbok26 said:
One is a review that you can only access after getting a certain achievement (finish a game or whatever the dev decides).
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Somebody having to meet a developer specified criteria to have their review considered valid is ridiculous for a number of reasons.
 
L

luulubuu

Junior Member
JP_ said:
Regular people wondering if they are interested will most likely glance at the mixed reviews and move on to next game as they casually browse -- expecting them to analyze graphs to decipher why it has mixed reviews is probably asking too much of most consumers.

The people review bombing will almost certainly look at the graph to measure their effectiveness and post screenshots of it to rally their hordes.

So... I'm thinking it'll do more harm than good if it has any effect at all.
Click to expand...

That's the thing, it reads more like a gamer intesive tool, if you don't really care or have limited money you wouldn't get a game with problematic bars, that's for sure

Abilidebob said:
I don't think I've read a thread on Neogaf about Valve/Steam for over a year that the vest majority of first posts aren't drive-by shitposts.
Does Valve do a bunch of idiotic, questionable decisions? Absolutely.
Is a part of Neogaf just sitting there, hyperbole in hand, just waiting for the next thread to post their hot-takes? Oh hell yes.

I sincerely can't wait for when they show some Artifact gameplay, just to have some fun reading the thread that will appear here.
Click to expand...

People having the right to be mad a company that had done wrong things in the past? MY GOD NEOGAF, YOU CAN'T BE SERIOUS.

And that Artifact last phrase can't be serious after calling out hyperbole, hahaha

My god, how embarrassing.
 
W

Wensih

Member
RoboPlato said:
How does this help? It only visually organizes when it starts getting review bombed and does nothing to discourage or prevent it.
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It's helpful to understand whether the game has always been a stinker, if the game is being criticized due to a the introduction of a broken patch, fixed after post release patches, or due to some social issue after the game. Games are no longer a static product, so having a histogram of perception seems like a good implementation, even if it's also a way to combat the tanking of reviews for political/social motivation.
 
A

Armaros

Member
Ionic said:
Valve could cure cancer and people would be yelling about how they didn't do it soon enough or aren't doing it the best way possible. Review bombing is something that happens on all kinds of storefronts. At least somebody is trying to address the issue.



Somebody having to meet a developer specified criteria to have their review considered valid is ridiculous for a number of reasons.
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And you know instantly that the same people in this thread would claim Valve is assisting in anti-consumer practices by letting devs limit reviews and criticism.
 
S

supergiz

Member
This still doesn't protect small indy devs who are targeted by review bombs. Especially with ones that rely on moderation.

Have a small social game and piss off the racist YouTube community b/c you banned one of their big streamers from your game? Those kind of games are pretty much never recovering from that especially if it happens early on.

Still a great start and it's nice to see it's something they are paying attention to.
 
B

Brakke

Banned
Valve is cowards. This would be a useful tool to give to a goddamn full time moderation team. You can't just ship this to world and consider the job done.
 
M

MUnited83

For you.
Brakke said:
Valve is cowards. This would be a useful tool to give to a goddamn full time moderation team. You can't just ship this to world and consider the job done.
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i'd love to know the size you think a full time moderation time would be. Do you realize how many games and reviews are put on Steam per day? Not to mention the number of posts on the Steam forums.

arbok26 said:
This doesn't help at all.

What Valve should do is have two sections of feedback. One is a review that you can only access after getting a certain achievement (finish a game or whatever the dev decides).

The other is just a standard feedback message if people have purchased it.
Click to expand...
Genius fucking idea, now all that shitty devs have to do is require a achievement that takes longer than the refund period.

Par Score said:
Oh my god.

Valve.

Not all problems can be solved by data and algorithms! This is a complete joke.



It's practically designed to do just that:

099797f087.png


Note how the review bomb is highlighted, and that you can Exclude the reviews from the bomb or choose to View Only those reviews from the bomb.

Why even include that second option unless you want to encourage and facilitate this behaviour? Why? Why include something so incredibly, stupidly counter productive to your professed intended outcome?
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The intended outcome is having your consumers be informed, which this achieves. The second option is useful because you can track and see what the review bombs were about. Did you not bother to read what they said?
 
B

Brakke

Banned
BernardoOne said:
i'd love to know the size you think a full time moderation time would be. Do you realize how many games and reviews are put on Steam per day? Not to mention the number of posts on the Steam forums.
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You don't need to read literally every post. You create tools to put things on a queue and you create tools (like this one) to make processing that queue efficient. Steam isn't anywhere the scale of a number of services that *do* actively moderate.

And if you look around and realize that the platform you create can't possibly produce a non-toxic environment, then you gotta step back and ask yourself why you're even creating that platform. Follow news's lead and delete your comment sections if you can't keep them under control.
 
P

Phrozenflame500

Member
Brakke said:
And if you look around and realize that the platform you create can't possibly produce a non-toxic environment, then you gotta step back and ask yourself why you're even creating that platform. Follow news's lead and delete your comment sections if you can't keep them under control.
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For the toxic cesspool that are Steam Discussion Forums I agree. But these are reviews not comments, and for the vast majority of games the review system works find. You do not need to invest resources into moderating what is comparatively a minor problem.
 
H

Head.spawn

Junior Member
Brakke said:
Valve is cowards. This would be a useful tool to give to a goddamn full time moderation team. You can't just ship this to world and consider the job done.
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VibratingDonkey said:
Valve is a company with billions at its disposal. Instead of hiring people to moderate, here's a chart that challenges abusers to raise a bar and records their attempts.
https://waypoint.vice.com/en_us/art...-bombing-ignores-steams-longstanding-problems
Click to expand...


What would mods do in this case of review bombing?

Genuine question.
 
H

Hesh

Member
Hmm, wasn't aware that Firewatch was getting review-bombed. Went to check its Steam page just now and sure enough there's a big ol' histogram above the reviews now. However, when I clicked to exclude the reviews from the problem area of September 11-16 it loaded and then showed me the exact same reviews as before. It seems the "Exclude" button does not work at the moment.
 
C

CheesecakeRecipe

Stormy Grey
VibratingDonkey said:
Valve is a company with billions at its disposal. Instead of hiring people to moderate, here's a chart that challenges abusers to raise a bar and records their attempts.
https://waypoint.vice.com/en_us/art...-bombing-ignores-steams-longstanding-problems
Click to expand...

Yup. This is a good idea in the event that the review system is being used for its intended purposes, and that's great! It's not going to do anything about the horrible abuse being flung at both developers who didn't deserve the sheer volume of attacks sent their way while defacing their product page, as well as the vicious treatment of anyone who dares post a positive review while the review-bombing is still in progress.

One step forward, but with their eyes closed and their ears plugged to the greater problem surrounding why they made this move in the first place.
 
M

Messofanego

Banned
ctw0e said:
How will this help exactly?

If Valve does this, people will adapt and post a negative review without context instead, or just a simple "game sucks" review.
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Valve has enough money and manpower to delete those ones, too. Have a minimum word count, maybe. If Valve is interested in weeding out review bombing, then moderation of the reviews has to come into effect too.
 
B

Brakke

Banned
Nightwing123 said:
Nice to see Valve do this. Tho this won't completely fix the problem but it's the step in the right direction.
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CheesecakeRecipe said:
One step forward, but with their eyes closed and their ears plugged to the greater problem surrounding why they made this move in the first place.
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In what direction do y'all think this step takes us? The only direction, the only intention, this indicates, to me, is a total disinterest in taking any responsibility at all for the shit on their platform.

Is continuing to claim total neutrality a move forward or is it digging heels into the position they've had for ages?

ctw0e said:
How will this help exactly?

If Valve does this, people will adapt and post a negative review without context instead, or just a simple "game sucks" review.
Click to expand...

Congrats on defeating this "system", too.
 
M

MUnited83

For you.
Messofanego said:
Delete the reviews that are just outraging and have nothing to do with the quality of the game.

cCtV7C5.png

WeW6qnQ.png

K15TwvD.png
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Wouldn't change anything, people would just start posting basic negative statements instead.
"Nothing to do with the quality of the game" is also a pretty damn broad stroke. There are legitimate complaints that don't necessarily have something to do with a game's quality.
Messofanego said:
Valve has enough money and manpower to delete those ones, too. Have a minimum word count, maybe. If Valve is interested in weeding out review bombing, then moderation of the reviews has to come into effect too.
Click to expand...

Are they going to hire a mind read to be able to tell which reviews are because they legitemately didn't like the game and which ones aren't?
 
H

Head.spawn

Junior Member
Messofanego said:
Delete the reviews that are just outraging and have nothing to do with the quality of the game.

cCtV7C5.png

WeW6qnQ.png

K15TwvD.png
Click to expand...

Two things though:

1) Those are paying customers
2) What if they just change their posts to regular reviews and make them negative?

It's kind of a weird position because how do you differentiate between that and the influx of positive reviews that accrued during that time as well? Do you whack them all or just the negative ones? Would they go ahead and stop them from posting reviews altogether, just with that game, that developer etc etc? It seems way more complex than just whack them bad ones, because sure you could delete the obvious ones but they could just repost them with some bs reasoning added on.

That sounds like an insane undertaking to determine all of those factors.
 
A

AusRoachman

Member
Cant they just not allow reviews until you have played a game for more then 2 hours ? thus negating the refund policy.

So all the people who purchase it just to comment and then refund , cannot refund and all that money goes to the dev
 
Coreda

Coreda

Member
They should add a way to zoom in on the graph/adjust the max y-axis to the new highest value when you drag-select a region. As it is currently when there's a spike in the graph the tapered out smaller areas become hard to view (there are slivers of less than 1px for some, making it impossible to hover over with the mouse).
 
H

Head.spawn

Junior Member
AusRoachman said:
Cant they just not allow reviews until you have played a game for more then 2 hours ? thus negating the refund policy.

So all the people who purchase it just to comment and then refund , cannot refund and all that money goes to the dev
Click to expand...

I was thinking that could possibly work, but what about completely busted shit games, asset flip jank that people might not want to keep but might want to warn people of issues/content/compatibility issues etc etc.

It wouldn't affect me though considering I don't typically refund ever. Maybe it'd be worth the sacrafice though.
 
PLASTICA-MAN

PLASTICA-MAN

Member
This is wiser. A game could get bad reviews especially in early access if it lacks features or optimizations but after many corrections and additions, people minds may change so it will get better reviews. And vice-versa: sometimes updates break the game and make it unplayable.
 
Z

Zephyx

Member
Yoshimitsu126 said:
Pay or promote qualified moderators to combat silly firebomb reviewing too and you can save money and good PR in the long run.
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The problem with that is in the end, people are subjective. What may be qualified for Valve may not be qualified for you. Reviews are also subjective, whether positive or negative.You may have a mod with bias for a particular user or a particular game that may be using their power to manipulate what people see in reviews. Then how can you verify that? By paying more people to assure the quality of the moderators? It's a difficult system to moderate especially for a storefront this big. I cannot think of a possible solution as of now that would satisfy everybody. Lucky that I'm not Valve though.

Also, keep in mind that people who reviewed are paying customers (though this can be circumvented somehow). How do you penalize those users who write silly reviews? By suspending their account or banning them? By preventing them from reviewing any other product? It's hard to gauge that especially if there's a mod involved since the decision making of one mod may be different from another. You may also get angry with Valve for this mod not doing their job properly and there will be an equivalent backlash as with the current system in place. It's a dilemma that cannot be solved easily.

I like what Valve is doing in giving their users more tools to make their decisions correctly. It empowers you to make your own decisions and find out about the product you are about to purchase (which is what reviews are for). It may be a bit lacking for some but it's good enough for me in terms of the current review system we have in place.
 
G

ghostjoke

Banned
This is the best situation I could see. It lets people know that an issue has cropped while showing that it's 1) only recent, 2) not universal.

Also, LOL at the idea of introducing a subjective review board to the subjective reviews made by people with subjective opinions on what is worth of including in a subjective review. I disagree with a lot of the ways review bombs have been used, but give it a minute of workshop in your mind before just adding another layer to the problem.
 
H

HowZatOZ

Banned
Heh, Ark is mostly negative over the average timeline of its existence but still has mixed reviews. Can understand why, performance is basically where it was on launch yet content is great.
 
H

Hasphat'sAnts

Member
Head.spawn said:
That sounds like an insane undertaking to determine all of those factors.
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Valve makes enough money where it shouldn't count as an "insane undertaking" at all.

This is just them hording their wealth and not looking to hire people to do people jobs when they feel like an algo can do 80% of it.
 
TheRedSnifit

TheRedSnifit

Member
Abilidebob said:
I don't think I've read a thread on Neogaf about Valve/Steam for over a year that the vest majority of first posts aren't drive-by shitposts.
Does Valve do a bunch of idiotic, questionable decisions? Absolutely.
Is a part of Neogaf just sitting there, hyperbole in hand, just waiting for the next thread to post their hot-takes? Oh hell yes.

I sincerely can't wait for when they show some Artifact gameplay, just to have some fun reading the thread that will appear here.
Click to expand...

Steam threads are fascinating insights into the mentality of people who really, really need everything done for them.

Valve, tell me what reviews I should read. Valve, tell me what games I should play.
 
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