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"It's hard to find the balance when you are in love.
You're lost in the middle cause you have to decide between mind & heart."
― Enigma
You're lost in the middle cause you have to decide between mind & heart."
― Enigma
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FOUR STARS...for what ??
C'mon, people. Including a written score in a comment is not a sincere alternative. -_- Would we be making this much of a fuss over something we already know we can do, and even sometimes do? ((For example, I mini-reviewed and scored all the Cook-Off contest games. Something I did to see if I could keep up with an event and remain fair, so maybe I could help judge one someday. *wink*)). No, we want this because we want to make a difference - a true difference. If we're not "cool" enough to effect the main rating, then we settle for a popular rating. But it needs to be no less official a rating than the main one... xP
What if people want to change their vote? Simple, allow them to change it. What's the problem? Ratings from reviews can be changed, can't they? Not to mention updating reviews is not a thing we enforce. This too is an issue that has been brought up countless times before: outdated reviews drag down the score of games.
What will stop people from creating multiple accounts and vote? The same thing that stop people from creating multiple accounts and submit reviews that makes their games look better than others. Someone was banned recently for trying that trick. The people that can see the Matrix can tell if you're cheating the system and ban your IP.
When download numbers were being cheated we didn't forfeit download counts entirely, did we? We weren't: "Ugh! Look at this unimportant number and all the trouble it causes! Kill it! Kill it with fiyaaaa!" No, we simply punished the people responsible and made sure download counts were never abused in the same way again.
Also, any numbers you send our way are pure speculation. To be fair so are any numbers we send your way. But we are in no position to prove anything. However, you are. Implement the system, watch it fail, rub it in our faces for the rest of forever... I'm willing to bet that if you take the risk you may be surprised by the actual outcome.
_
Now, to counter an argument from my own side. xD I don't care about the popularity of games. I think we can already gauge that by looking at the front-page, like Liberty said, or simply looking at the amount of subscribers, page-views, downloads, etc, a game has. And searching games through these criteria is already possible. So maybe I'm not really understanding what the purpose of this idea is, but it doesn't look like a real alternative for what we're discussing here.
_
But while we are in the realm of crazy ideas. How about this? ...Being able to rate a game you review is not that much of a reward. It's pretty discouraging, actually. Because like I've said, no one reviews all the games they play (And I'd like to put emphasis on this because it's not getting through. xD) However, I can see myself push myself to write a review for the games I liked the most in any given period of time, if that grants me the privilege of rating all the others.
This way you get more reviews, you get more ratings, you get the certainty that a person is not the type of dimwit that would score a game just because the gamepage looks pretty, and everybody is frikking happy for once... Now it would be just a matter of setting a seasonable quota and a reasonable period of time time. A review per month, maybe?
What if people want to change their vote? Simple, allow them to change it. What's the problem? Ratings from reviews can be changed, can't they? Not to mention updating reviews is not a thing we enforce. This too is an issue that has been brought up countless times before: outdated reviews drag down the score of games.
What will stop people from creating multiple accounts and vote? The same thing that stop people from creating multiple accounts and submit reviews that makes their games look better than others. Someone was banned recently for trying that trick. The people that can see the Matrix can tell if you're cheating the system and ban your IP.
When download numbers were being cheated we didn't forfeit download counts entirely, did we? We weren't: "Ugh! Look at this unimportant number and all the trouble it causes! Kill it! Kill it with fiyaaaa!" No, we simply punished the people responsible and made sure download counts were never abused in the same way again.
Also, any numbers you send our way are pure speculation. To be fair so are any numbers we send your way. But we are in no position to prove anything. However, you are. Implement the system, watch it fail, rub it in our faces for the rest of forever... I'm willing to bet that if you take the risk you may be surprised by the actual outcome.
_
Now, to counter an argument from my own side. xD I don't care about the popularity of games. I think we can already gauge that by looking at the front-page, like Liberty said, or simply looking at the amount of subscribers, page-views, downloads, etc, a game has. And searching games through these criteria is already possible. So maybe I'm not really understanding what the purpose of this idea is, but it doesn't look like a real alternative for what we're discussing here.
_
But while we are in the realm of crazy ideas. How about this? ...Being able to rate a game you review is not that much of a reward. It's pretty discouraging, actually. Because like I've said, no one reviews all the games they play (And I'd like to put emphasis on this because it's not getting through. xD) However, I can see myself push myself to write a review for the games I liked the most in any given period of time, if that grants me the privilege of rating all the others.
This way you get more reviews, you get more ratings, you get the certainty that a person is not the type of dimwit that would score a game just because the gamepage looks pretty, and everybody is frikking happy for once... Now it would be just a matter of setting a seasonable quota and a reasonable period of time time. A review per month, maybe?
FOUR STARS...for what ??
With all due respect, Rave, your one-liners and ultimatums don't really help the situation. We need real arguments here. No worst case-scenarios or over-simplifications of the opposite side (Two wrongs don't make a right). We need people to realize the merits of a more inclusive community, not to come across as the very lunatics we need to keep at bay. xD
_
I didn't want to post again, but since I'm here, I may as well weight in on a couple of things. Bear with me, I'll edit this post later on.
Edit: First of all I want to thank Piano, for engaging the discussion more at our level. I agree that there are better ways to be inclusive than others. I don't think anyone is here to argue that (As you can see, we're more than willing to compromise). But we need people to participate. Otherwise we won't be able to figure out the way that most benefit us all... I think your idea is perfect to test the waters. This way if the system doesn't work it can be removed at no great expense to the site.
Amerk misspoke when he was talking about the number of reviews. It's only natural that the number of reviews will increase with the number games and the number of users joining the site. But he was dead-on about the gap between the number of games and ratings, and the presence of biased ratings affecting games for years to come. But these numbers are likely to increase too, and we'll need to address that at some point or another. It's better if we start thinking about it now.
Everyone can benefit from this. Even people who regularly writes reviews can benefit from this. Because as it has been pointed out, not even them can review every game they play and there's a huge gap to close... Or is the judgement of frequent reviewers not to be trusted? Is the judgement of regular users not to be trusted? Is the judgement of the average rmn'er not to be trusted? Really? Because, the people we need to be wary of are usually a minority, and with the proper enforcement we can further reduce their impact.
The thing about those "big businesses" I was talking before is that they don't benefit from quality control, they benefit from more content, more clicks, more sales. That's why abuse in those sites is more noticeable. But we, in the other hand, we care. We care a great deal. And this too is why there's resistance to try out new things. It's "the evil we know." ...But if we try we can make this work!
What is that thing that all the cool kids are doing these days? "Hashtag"givechangeachance? xD Yeah.
_
I didn't want to post again, but since I'm here, I may as well weight in on a couple of things. Bear with me, I'll edit this post later on.
Edit: First of all I want to thank Piano, for engaging the discussion more at our level. I agree that there are better ways to be inclusive than others. I don't think anyone is here to argue that (As you can see, we're more than willing to compromise). But we need people to participate. Otherwise we won't be able to figure out the way that most benefit us all... I think your idea is perfect to test the waters. This way if the system doesn't work it can be removed at no great expense to the site.
Amerk misspoke when he was talking about the number of reviews. It's only natural that the number of reviews will increase with the number games and the number of users joining the site. But he was dead-on about the gap between the number of games and ratings, and the presence of biased ratings affecting games for years to come. But these numbers are likely to increase too, and we'll need to address that at some point or another. It's better if we start thinking about it now.
Everyone can benefit from this. Even people who regularly writes reviews can benefit from this. Because as it has been pointed out, not even them can review every game they play and there's a huge gap to close... Or is the judgement of frequent reviewers not to be trusted? Is the judgement of regular users not to be trusted? Is the judgement of the average rmn'er not to be trusted? Really? Because, the people we need to be wary of are usually a minority, and with the proper enforcement we can further reduce their impact.
The thing about those "big businesses" I was talking before is that they don't benefit from quality control, they benefit from more content, more clicks, more sales. That's why abuse in those sites is more noticeable. But we, in the other hand, we care. We care a great deal. And this too is why there's resistance to try out new things. It's "the evil we know." ...But if we try we can make this work!
What is that thing that all the cool kids are doing these days? "Hashtag"givechangeachance? xD Yeah.
FOUR STARS...for what ??
The fact that there are people with uneducated opinions is, well, a fact. But this is something that has been acknowledged from the start. The purpose of this exchange -and something that everyone is so conveniently ignoring- is to figure out ways in which we can sweep those people under the rug and still benefit from having a wider pool of opinions. Quality control and accessibility are not mutually exclusive - We can have both. All I want is for you to lower your shields a little and entertain this idea.
Besides, pointing out the failure of such systems in other sites is not really evidence that the exact same thing will happen here. The thing about any big site you can think of is that, well, they're essentially big businesses. Rmn is more like a Mom and pop store; A close knitted community, not too big yet to be as apathetic, not too small not to take itself seriously. I truly believe we could pull something like that here... This "people aren't smart" approach is just not healthy, no matter how true it may be. =/
But what I find the oddest thing is that the argument against this idea is the prevention of something that already can and does happen. For example "I died to the X boss. Two stars!" is a review for Star Stealing Prince. The review paid marginal, begrudgingly attention to the game's merits and just larked on how the game was "unplayable" and stuff. Yet, despite this flaw, the review still got through. *shrug*
Now, the benefit of games like Star Stealing Prince is that they have reached a huge audience, and among all those people -among that sort of popularity- it's only natural that the number of people willing to review the game will statistically increase, and help offset the disagreeable opinions. But this is a luxury not every game can afford. And it has been tried and proved that neither you or I will go out of our ways to review every game we have played... So, I think there's something to be gained from this.
But anyway, I think I've already said everything I wanted to say at this point. We can always follow this discussion at a latter date... xD
Edit: "Count" yes, but that's not exactly review material. The idea is to allow more voices to "count" but without compromising reviews.
Edit: I just hope everyone can see the glaring discrepancy of saying reviews work as intended and then ignoring when they don't. =/
Besides, pointing out the failure of such systems in other sites is not really evidence that the exact same thing will happen here. The thing about any big site you can think of is that, well, they're essentially big businesses. Rmn is more like a Mom and pop store; A close knitted community, not too big yet to be as apathetic, not too small not to take itself seriously. I truly believe we could pull something like that here... This "people aren't smart" approach is just not healthy, no matter how true it may be. =/
But what I find the oddest thing is that the argument against this idea is the prevention of something that already can and does happen. For example "I died to the X boss. Two stars!" is a review for Star Stealing Prince. The review paid marginal, begrudgingly attention to the game's merits and just larked on how the game was "unplayable" and stuff. Yet, despite this flaw, the review still got through. *shrug*
Now, the benefit of games like Star Stealing Prince is that they have reached a huge audience, and among all those people -among that sort of popularity- it's only natural that the number of people willing to review the game will statistically increase, and help offset the disagreeable opinions. But this is a luxury not every game can afford. And it has been tried and proved that neither you or I will go out of our ways to review every game we have played... So, I think there's something to be gained from this.
But anyway, I think I've already said everything I wanted to say at this point. We can always follow this discussion at a latter date... xD
Edit: "Count" yes, but that's not exactly review material. The idea is to allow more voices to "count" but without compromising reviews.
Edit: I just hope everyone can see the glaring discrepancy of saying reviews work as intended and then ignoring when they don't. =/
What are you jamming to?
[Poll] Your favourite magic element!
Dark (Like my soul //_u). Because it's usually a very powerful element, only weak to holy and derivatives; and because it usually has the best animations. Dark magic have probably the most visual variety of all kinds of magic (they can even look like other elements) and if they're coupled with arcane symbols and such, the better. I'm a sucker for that kind of stuff. =P
FOUR STARS...for what ??
I can't think of any single situation where allowing more voices to be heard it is not a good thing. Of course, there's the concern that not everybody is going to use their voice adequately... But for one I can't believe that I, as the "wet blanket" I'm known to be, have more faith in the rmn userbase as a whole that some of you. xD Not to mention that ways to help quell those concerns have been suggested, and I'm sure there's plenty more to think of. But you're just too bend on your "It's my way or the highway" ...ways.
Ratings by themselves may not seem like a significant piece of information, but they're still an important piece of information. Try to remove them and see what happens. And in their current form, attached to reviews, they're being underutilized or even abused. Maybe if you were to really put your money where your mouth is, if you really enforced review standards, if you really cared for other people's games, then perhaps people like me wouldn't feel so powerless. Because it shouldn't be possible to rate a game zero stars out of spite for what a game represents: "This game is utter trash. 0/10." And like that there are plenty, albeit milder, examples.
Also, the idea that there will be less reviews if scoring are made more accessible is one that I just don't see supporting evidence for. Something that people need to understand is that those who are write reviews right now are doing so out of their own volition. If it were true that keeping the score as a "reward" is helpful to encourage more reviews, I would have more reviews to my belt, LockeZ would have more reviews to his belt, Liberty would have more reviews to her belt (Even though she totes could =p). etc.......
But no. People write reviews do so because they can/want/enjoy writing reviews. There's always going to be people who write reviews periodically like Addit, enthusiast newcomers like Cashmere, pro-active people who organize/participate in Review based events like Liberty. And there's always going to be your average joes who writes reviews whenever they goddamn feel like it, pm everybody else. There's not going to be a significant decrease or increase in reviews no matter what you do or stop doing.
Also, also, c'mon. It's not just "lazyness". Allow me to put things into perspective. Let's say that to rate games you have to draw a piece of fanart. This is something that I, who has some experience and -very important- like doing, could do in a few minutes to a couple hours. But for anyone else it could take significantly longer. And I could write tutorials to make the task easier for you. And I bet you could do it. I mean, drawing something is not like super hard. But assure you that at some point, while you're struggling drawing a stick figure, you would be thinking: "Why do I have to put up with this? Why can't I use this time to play more games instead?" xD
So it's not like 300 words is too much. This very post is longer than that. I've written comment-reviews longer than that (link), I have a few draft reviews sitting on my hard drive longer than that. But as a non-native English speaker, who is not very good with words in his own language to begin with, writing a review for every game I play is something that I just cannot afford doing (no one cans, really). But this does not mean I or anyone else lack the ability to rate games fairly, and I would very much like if we were allowed to do it.
Like I said, there are ways to address any possible "worst case scenario" you can think of; you just need to be willing to discuss them.
Ratings by themselves may not seem like a significant piece of information, but they're still an important piece of information. Try to remove them and see what happens. And in their current form, attached to reviews, they're being underutilized or even abused. Maybe if you were to really put your money where your mouth is, if you really enforced review standards, if you really cared for other people's games, then perhaps people like me wouldn't feel so powerless. Because it shouldn't be possible to rate a game zero stars out of spite for what a game represents: "This game is utter trash. 0/10." And like that there are plenty, albeit milder, examples.
Also, the idea that there will be less reviews if scoring are made more accessible is one that I just don't see supporting evidence for. Something that people need to understand is that those who are write reviews right now are doing so out of their own volition. If it were true that keeping the score as a "reward" is helpful to encourage more reviews, I would have more reviews to my belt, LockeZ would have more reviews to his belt, Liberty would have more reviews to her belt (Even though she totes could =p). etc.......
But no. People write reviews do so because they can/want/enjoy writing reviews. There's always going to be people who write reviews periodically like Addit, enthusiast newcomers like Cashmere, pro-active people who organize/participate in Review based events like Liberty. And there's always going to be your average joes who writes reviews whenever they goddamn feel like it, pm everybody else. There's not going to be a significant decrease or increase in reviews no matter what you do or stop doing.
Also, also, c'mon. It's not just "lazyness". Allow me to put things into perspective. Let's say that to rate games you have to draw a piece of fanart. This is something that I, who has some experience and -very important- like doing, could do in a few minutes to a couple hours. But for anyone else it could take significantly longer. And I could write tutorials to make the task easier for you. And I bet you could do it. I mean, drawing something is not like super hard. But assure you that at some point, while you're struggling drawing a stick figure, you would be thinking: "Why do I have to put up with this? Why can't I use this time to play more games instead?" xD
So it's not like 300 words is too much. This very post is longer than that. I've written comment-reviews longer than that (link), I have a few draft reviews sitting on my hard drive longer than that. But as a non-native English speaker, who is not very good with words in his own language to begin with, writing a review for every game I play is something that I just cannot afford doing (no one cans, really). But this does not mean I or anyone else lack the ability to rate games fairly, and I would very much like if we were allowed to do it.
Like I said, there are ways to address any possible "worst case scenario" you can think of; you just need to be willing to discuss them.
FOUR STARS...for what ??
author=Liberty
I think that it's definitely something we're going to have to bring up at the next staff meeting - that's for sure. The system is flawed, we all recognise that, but the ways suggested so far don't really work in practise so we're going to have to look at a new way to do it...
The thing is, when has any suggestion been put into actual practice for us to see if they work or not? Never. Any time an idea is put forward, it is promptly shoot down with just other ideas; opposite ideas. And at the end of the day we're all so fed up with the discussion that we'd rather turn a blind eye on these issues, rather than to work on possible solutions.
Seriously. Nothing said in this thread is something that has not been mentioned before countless times, for the past, what? 4-5 years? I find it very difficult to believe that in all that time, these issues have not been discussed at a staff level... Also, we want to feel part of the decision making process, not just hear a "We decided against it" coming from the top.
_
All ranting aside. The first thing we need to realize is that no system is perfect. There will always be room for abuse regardless of any system we adopt. The only difference between a successful system and one that fails miserably, is how vigilant we are, as community, to prevent it from being abused... But right now, the community has a very limited "tools" to make a difference.
So, yes -before anyone mentions it- even our current system could work wonders if only people were to write more reviews. But the thing is -and I've said this before- that you can twist people's arms to accomplish this. People who don't find joy/don't have time/don't have the skill to write reviews, are never going to write more reviews that are being written right now. Specially if we expect for the quality of reviews to go up, instead of down... So at the end of the day, is easier to change the site than to change the people.
On the flip side, any change done to the site falls upon the shoulders of just 2-3 guys. Not to mention that the architecture of the site may prevent for any real change to take place. This is VERY important to keep in mind. But it should not stop us from discussing alternatives. How viable those alternatives actually are, how long could they take to be implemented, etc. (No one expect change overnight, but we're long overdue for change to start happening). Improving the site's functionality is everyone best interest.
_
All ranting aside (for realz this time... or is it?). Let's talk alternatives. (Most of this has been said, but I just want to state my opinion)
I think ratings and reviews should be separated. From what I gather from this thread, this idea has finally gained enough traction for us to consider it seriously... Make it so we can see who has rated what games and what scores they have given. Perhaps even what individual score has been granted to each of a game's department (Writing, graphics, etc.) together with a small reason behind said score (ie: Graphics: 2/5 "The game mixed several graphics styles"). And before anyone says anything cute: No, this is not meant to replace or compete with reviews. This is just so ratings by themselves provide a modicum of information to the developers, and so we can use this information to ensure the fair use of system. For example, if we notice someone is giving unfair scores to competing games, we can report it. Or perhaps even allow us to thumb up/down any scores ourselves to further offset any possible biases.
Also, stars need to be replaced for a less subjective metric, because not even four stars cut it, specially if we'll still be able to give half-stars. For example, right now if you by the literal meaning, "average" means 2.5 stars; but if you go by the colloquial meaning, it is 3 stars. And this sort of discrepancies will be inherited by a four stars system... No, you need to spell these things out for people. Something like: "Bad, regular, good". Anything from three to ten stages could work. Anything but a binary, please! xD
As for reviews, you know all for raising their standards. The current minimum is too low for a review. But more than word count I think we should focus on content. It is very easy right now to find a review that lacks in content in one way or another, even if they're several paragraphs long
Well, I guess that's all, from the top of my head. But obviously, these subjects are too nuanced for any single person to cover everything.
GIRLS JUST WANNA MAK GAM.
O.M.G. O_O And I was just listening to that song in a loop because I'm basing a character's design on Pop stars from the 80's...
Get out of my head!!! xD
Get out of my head!!! xD
Bought Bravely Default for something to do during the night after work, only to be completely put off by it right away. 40$ just... Flush.
author=wildwes
Not pressuring you to play more or anything, but... I usually hate grinding and I'll admit, BD has plenty of it. However, it makes grinding so easy that I almost feel enjoy it somehow. Just turn encounters up as high as possible and set everyone to Brave 3 times and use normal attacks or weaknesses and boom, everyone's shot up a couple levels in 5-10 minutes. Plus it gives you bonuses to EXP and JP for getting through the battle in one turn or not taking any damage, which makes it go a LOT faster. So uh, yeah.
That sounds pretty cool indeed! Too bad I find the whole "kiddies save the world" thing to be a bit overdone for my taste. That, and I don't own a 3DS =(
Games - Tester
Games - Other
