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Can we move to 5 star system for game scores finally, pretty please
- Thread starter Arthea
- Start date
CaviarMeths
Member
5-point scale with no zeroes or half points would work if utilized intelligently. 3/5 is average, not necessarily good, but could pretty safely be recommended to genre fans. 1/5 is terrible, but playable. If a game has significant technical issues that render the game unplayable, it doesn't need a score. It just needs a "don't buy this shit." But of course none of that works without the body of the review for context.
It's OK to end the year with a mountain of 3s and 4s. Most games from a major studio are average to good games anyway.
It's OK to end the year with a mountain of 3s and 4s. Most games from a major studio are average to good games anyway.
Imp the Dimp
Member
Huh, how is 5/10 average?
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If anything, it's below average by your standards.
SmokedMeat
Gamer™
That's how Gamepro magazine was when it debuted.
People can't even read past the title of a thread here.
Baron Doggystyle von Woof
Member
I totally agree with OP.
1 star - Garbage
2 stars - Shit, but playable.
3 stars - mediocre.
4 stars - Good game.
5 stars - must play, top tier game.
1 star - Garbage
2 stars - Shit, but playable.
3 stars - mediocre.
4 stars - Good game.
5 stars - must play, top tier game.
orthodoxy1095
Banned
No thanks.
A ten point scale is the perfect amount of granularity for reviews.
A ten point scale is the perfect amount of granularity for reviews.
PuppetSlave
Member
No I think we should move to color gradient based squares. Then we can bicker over which game got slightly more red in it's square.
mcz117chief
Member
I am going to say this one last time.
The review score system is NOT the problem.
The fact that we mostly only bother with good games IS the "problem".
Most scores are 8+ BECAUSE most games we play today ARE 8+.
If we moved to a different score system it wouldn't change ANYTHING.
You got it?
The review score system is NOT the problem.
The fact that we mostly only bother with good games IS the "problem".
Most scores are 8+ BECAUSE most games we play today ARE 8+.
If we moved to a different score system it wouldn't change ANYTHING.
You got it?
Imp the Dimp
Member
No, I don't. What is a 8/10 game lol? Compared to what? Surely, review scales should scale with the quality of contemporary games?
MasterForm
Member
I think he's using an 11-point scale and including zero. 5 would be the average in that scenario.
Daily radar had the best system 15 years ago - direct hit - hit - miss - dud. No math involved there either and by bypassing a 3/5 while also eliminating half points , critics are forced to decide between a 2/4 and a 3/4 which meant far more accurate scores. No one looked at a 3/4 as a bad score back then. Of course it helps when you take numbers out of it. Also because meta critic exists , you'd need to tell them to convert in a manner similar to other sites so the 4 points on the scale might equal roughly a 1/10,4/10/8/10 and 10/10.
Birgitte2004
Member
I don't buy for a second that review scores average high because only good games get reviewed. My mind is literally blown that anyone actually believes that.
You can't blame the user of reviews when it's not the users fault that, historically, review scores are slanted so high that 3/5 to most reviewers is pretty bad.
Am I really supposed to ignore this and give it my own meaning just because that's how it should be?
You can't blame the user of reviews when it's not the users fault that, historically, review scores are slanted so high that 3/5 to most reviewers is pretty bad.
Am I really supposed to ignore this and give it my own meaning just because that's how it should be?
how it is not a problem when it doesn't work and most of that scale has no uses at all literally for years now?
I don't know what problem is, if that is not a problem.
We would change from one nonworking system to working one. It is a good change in my books.
As I said before, I wouldn't mind losing scores altogether, but that's not gonna happen, so why not make it better?
I'd prefer this as well. But I haven't based my purchases on review scores for YEARS and plan to continue to watch videos/form my own impressions before buying.
Imp the Dimp
Member
How is 3/5 6/10 in his 11 point scale then?
mcz117chief
Member
I already explained it in my 1st post (#67) and a little bit in my 2nd one (#111), so I'll post the 1st one again
The only "problem" is that we have far more percentage of good games then we used to have, coupled with the fact that bad games get no exposure and thus aren't reviewed so we only see the good games that generate hits and those are all 8+ games. What would be the point if IGN or some other big journalist did a review for every steam greenlit game? Nobody cares for the bad ones and the good ones get around and those are the ones that get reviewed and again get 8+ ratings.
Your system would just mean that every game out there would get 4 or 5 stars, it wouldn't magically make everyone review shitty games. Only a high profile, highly expected game that really blows gets low ratings and there aren't (luckily) that many of them. Rejoice in the fact that there are enough great games around that you don't have to bother with shitty games for the rest of your life.
Karak's system is the best, buy/wait for sale/never touch it again. Then again I love him because he is not afraid to dig deep into dirt to get us some incredibly poor or incredibly underappreciated games.
An 8+ game is one that looks good, plays good, performs well and is fun, aka most games you get to play.
gollumsluvslave
Member
Personally If I was forced to rate a game I'd go a bit different, based on what I would value most and what I think other people would find most informative, and i'd likely use a 5 star scoring across the board
E.g my most recent game completed would be Inside, which I would 'rate' as follows
Gameplay : 4/5 - great puzzles and near-perfect controls.
Looks : 5/5 - beautiful in every way, almost flawless.
Sounds : 5/5 - amazing sound design
Story : 5/5 - rarely does a game tell such an open ended story so well and leave you pondering what it all means.
Longevity : 2/5 - some collectibles and achievements, and although definitely likely to replay the initial appeal is likely to be lost on subsequent replays
Slant : 5/5 - I loved Limbo, and cinematic platformers and was always likely to like Inside.
Overall Experience : 5/5 - Everything comes together to create what I think is a modern masterpiece, and any gamer should play.
A few old PC mags used to rate this way and I always found it far more informative (obviously read the review, but sometimes I would use the breakdown to focus on things I was most interested in.
Don't really like scores too much though, prefer the text, or things like Buy If... Walk On By If...
E.g my most recent game completed would be Inside, which I would 'rate' as follows
Gameplay : 4/5 - great puzzles and near-perfect controls.
Looks : 5/5 - beautiful in every way, almost flawless.
Sounds : 5/5 - amazing sound design
Story : 5/5 - rarely does a game tell such an open ended story so well and leave you pondering what it all means.
Longevity : 2/5 - some collectibles and achievements, and although definitely likely to replay the initial appeal is likely to be lost on subsequent replays
Slant : 5/5 - I loved Limbo, and cinematic platformers and was always likely to like Inside.
Overall Experience : 5/5 - Everything comes together to create what I think is a modern masterpiece, and any gamer should play.
A few old PC mags used to rate this way and I always found it far more informative (obviously read the review, but sometimes I would use the breakdown to focus on things I was most interested in.
Don't really like scores too much though, prefer the text, or things like Buy If... Walk On By If...
exactly! we would be constantly using 60% of 5 star scale on constant basis, and it covers all what we need, while we use 30% of 10/10 scale at best.
That's what not working scale means, when it has very little to no use and there are better alternatives.
I don't see how buy/wait for sale/never touch it system works at all, I'm not talking about personal like (thumbs up)/don't like (thumbs down) system, which has its uses, true) but about a review system. Unless you have exactly the same taste as person using this system, it does not work, it can't. steam has thumbs up/down system (it lacks neutral position though), and it kinda works when we are talking about millions of people but steam reviews still work in a way that you have to read them, that's no score, that's more like a pointer, which games can be looked deeper into.
While aggregate review scores are used by itself, even review scores of gaming sites are being used as such and that's what we are talking about, covering all bases and having comprehensible useful review score system.
Well that's your interpretation. Mine is "your mileage may vary, read the review and see what you think"
Polioliolio
Member
A system based on how smooth of a poop the reviewer had the day after playing.
BigBoss007
Member
You only need to find a reviewer you can trust.
That's the way.
That's the way.
I always got the impression that most reviewers would rather not have the scores at all, because they tend to be more trouble than they are worth. It makes sense to keep cutting down the numbers available until people are forced to actually read the review to get a full picture.
Until the no-score future, I feel like four stars works well enough. 1 is bad, 2 is mediocre, 3 is good and 4 is great.
Until the no-score future, I feel like four stars works well enough. 1 is bad, 2 is mediocre, 3 is good and 4 is great.
Sheriff_Battlesnake
Banned
Giant Bomb has the right idea.
mcz117chief
Member
I'm not even sure if somebody would use 3 stars, maybe they would, who knows. It doesn't really change much, only popular games will be reviewed and all those are good regardless of their score except for very rare cases like the Batman game that ran terribly on PC.
Karak's system is good because it simply tells you. The game is absolutely worth the asking price now = buy. The game is good but not THAT good so wait for a price drop and a couple of patches before you get it = wait for sale. The game is not really worth your time and money, there are hundreds if not thousands of better games out there = never touch it again. Now couple that with his in-depth reviews which talk about everything and you really can't have a much better system.
Strangelove77
Member
No scores, full review, and a small list of positives and negatives for those who don't like reading.
I agreed with you until this statement
That quite literally breaks the scale again, and will have people argue and upset over why one game got a 4.6 and another a 4.4, or why a game was JUST shy of a 3 with a 2.9.
A simple five star system with no half stars would be ideal. But I'm still in the "no score" camp. I actually prefer Kotaku's and Eurogamer's approach.
That quite literally breaks the scale again, and will have people argue and upset over why one game got a 4.6 and another a 4.4, or why a game was JUST shy of a 3 with a 2.9.
A simple five star system with no half stars would be ideal. But I'm still in the "no score" camp. I actually prefer Kotaku's and Eurogamer's approach.
DistortionOfReality
Member
See, I know it's an unpopular opinion around here, but this is why I really like Kotaku and go back there all the time.
They even did away with the Buy/Don't Buy/Wait system and to be honest it's better than ever. You get a much more nuanced idea of what the game is like and how it will appeal to you when you read a whole, measured article, rather than just weighting everything on some arbitrary number at the end.
They even did away with the Buy/Don't Buy/Wait system and to be honest it's better than ever. You get a much more nuanced idea of what the game is like and how it will appeal to you when you read a whole, measured article, rather than just weighting everything on some arbitrary number at the end.
But but the faces are the wrong way round. How the hell am I meant to know what's going onJust switch to a ): |:system. I don't see why anything more is needed.
There is no problem with the review scale, the only problem is with how people use them. Using a 5 star system won't magically increase the diversity of scores given
Edit:
Edit:
I always imagine posts ike this were written with the poster in tears, sitting in a dark room staring at the low metacritic score for their favorite game.
What makes you think this would prompt a significantly higher number of people to read reviews than the current percentage. As a society, if we rate everything from movies to food to fucking healthcare quality, we can rate video games.
I've yet to see good arguments for removing review scores. Even press sneak fuck put out a fucking embarrassing article about it where his arguments involved a dev not getting a bonus and the nightmare scenario where a reviewer could be sad one day and score a game a point lower or something.
D
Deleted member 47027
Unconfirmed Member
lmao @ OP
"we can use decimals!" so it's basically 50 points.
I like a good "thumbs up/thumbs down"
"we can use decimals!" so it's basically 50 points.
I like a good "thumbs up/thumbs down"
Karak's system does not work, it implies that we buy (or should) every good game, we don't, we only buy those that interests us, even not so good if we like what we see/read about them. Not every good game is worth buying, nobody can possible buy all good games released these days, although some try, true, but we aren't talking about collectors here.
Only in depth reviews, vids, screens can tell us what to buy, yet again that's not what this thread is about.
It's about score system we use, that results in pages of talk (in every review thread) about said score consisting mostly of "7(=1) is garbage", "that's not what 7,8,9 means" and "only 8? no buy", etc.
I mean, why can't we face it as adults, 10/10 system outlived itself, time to move on, nobody knows how to use it properly anymore, or so it would seem.
If most games are good these days, and they are, having lesser scale to cover it only works to our advantage. Don't you agree?
now that would be progress!
linkandzelda
Member
Why not just move back to using the 10 point system properly. It can be done, some like Jim Sterling are managing to do so.
Scientist Supreme!
Banned
I would rather just get rid of scores so the actual content of the review becomes important.
Just switch to a ): |:
Colons on the right hand side!? What madness is this!?
Couldn't have said it better myself.
Loved the way CVG rated games on a scale of 1-5 back in the day. I don't understand the difference in quality between an 82% game and a 77% game anyway.
Giant Panda
Member
10 point scale for life.
Drama Zed Nod
Member
The reason the 5-star scale is better than the 10 or 100-point scale has nothing to do with objective numbers, since there's technically no difference there with decimals involved. It has everything to do with subjective association. The current scale is associated with school grades, giving the impression that anything below 80(a "B") is bad. On the other hand, the 5-star scale is associated with movies, which make full use of the entire scale. We already interpret "3 stars" as decent, if not good, whereas a 60 would be awful.
It has nothing to do with the numbers. It has to do with how we interpret them.
It has nothing to do with the numbers. It has to do with how we interpret them.
ScatheZombie
Member
Everyone should just adopt a version of the Double Toasted review system. It's basically a 5 star system, but each point is given a real value identifier. I suppose for games it would go something like:
Better Than Sex - Full Price - Wait for Sale - Rental - Some Ol' Bullshit
It's a 5 point scale, but it tells the reader/viewer exactly what the perceived value of the product is rather than some nondescript "3 stars".
The other 'problem' with game reviewers is they still haven't decided whether they want to be art critics or product reviewers and they constantly flip-flop back and forth depending on the game they're reviewing. Sometimes they'll overlook performance issues because the content is good. Other times they'll overlook quality content because a game runs sub 1080p/30FPS. Pick one and stick to it dammit. Either you are technical reviewers who focus on the quality of the product's performance or you are critics who are focused on the quality of content (or the completely undefinable 'fun factor') of the game. It doesn't matter which you choose, there is an audience for both - but individuals (and by extension, the outlets they write/review for) really, really need to be consistent in their focus, otherwise their reviews are meaningless because it's impossible to draw correlations and comparisons against past/other reviews since different products are being rated by different metrics.
Better Than Sex - Full Price - Wait for Sale - Rental - Some Ol' Bullshit
It's a 5 point scale, but it tells the reader/viewer exactly what the perceived value of the product is rather than some nondescript "3 stars".
The other 'problem' with game reviewers is they still haven't decided whether they want to be art critics or product reviewers and they constantly flip-flop back and forth depending on the game they're reviewing. Sometimes they'll overlook performance issues because the content is good. Other times they'll overlook quality content because a game runs sub 1080p/30FPS. Pick one and stick to it dammit. Either you are technical reviewers who focus on the quality of the product's performance or you are critics who are focused on the quality of content (or the completely undefinable 'fun factor') of the game. It doesn't matter which you choose, there is an audience for both - but individuals (and by extension, the outlets they write/review for) really, really need to be consistent in their focus, otherwise their reviews are meaningless because it's impossible to draw correlations and comparisons against past/other reviews since different products are being rated by different metrics.
Theonik
Member
Australian emoticons.