Poll: Are scores an important part of a videogame review?

[PainInTheAssInternet]

Opinions on a game are too nuanced to be expressed numerically.

A basic example is a multiplayer-based game that also has a singleplayer mode that contributes to multiplayer content. If the singleplayer is bland and forgettable, that would logically lower the score. But what if the multiplayer is amazing and the contributions made to it from singleplayer are negligible?

 

[Mikeyfell]

Putting a numeric score on a review diminishes the merit of the whole practice.

I mean there is a really simple thought experiment that proves my point.
Think of any 2 things that you like for different reasons.
Any...
Porn and Beethoven's fifth. (For example)
now rate them on a scale from 1 to 10.

What are you scoring them on? Okay maybe that's not fair. But think of any 2 video games that you would give a 10 out of 10. Are they exactly the same? Well then your rating scale is worthless.

saying "I like something this much" isn't a review. The only time a scoring system is appropriate is in the context of a tiered ranking system.
Saying "I give Destiny a 10/10" or "I give Destiny a 5/10" means nothing
saying "I'm going to rank all the Bungie games and Destiny falls into the top tier, or the bottom tier" at least means something because it has a distinguishable context.

A review is not a recommendation.
A score is a recommendation, it's Yay or ney's restarted cousin.
I might ask someone who's opinion I trust "will I like Destiny?" I would never ask anyone "Give Destiny a score." But that's besides the point.
And it pisses me off when reviewers have to cram things into their phony baloney arbitrary ranking system for the sake of convenience. You'd think someone who does reviews for a living would understand that not all consumers of media are the same

 

[Ticklefist]

Absolutely. People have a reluctance to make apples to oranges comparisons. Ask if Skyrim is more fun than Dishonored and you're going to run into people that refuse to answer the question because the games are different. The score is the simplest way to bypass that and answer the actual question: Which of these is more fun?

 

[DrOswald]

Scores are a good thing. But the scoring system needs to be simple. For example, 1 = anything not worth playing, 2 = half decent, 3 = good, 4 = great, 5 = amazing. This is important for reasons:

1. I don't care to read 2 pages of writing to find out the game is bad. My time is more valuable than that.

2. I may not want my experiences of a game colored by the opinions of the reviewers. What I want sometimes is a context free assessment, which makes the most sense as a score.

3. It helps me understand a reviewer quickly: what type of games do they like, where do we agree and disagree? I can't read dozens of reviews to gain context, I don't have that sort of time, but I can look over their past reviews and get a good idea of how we are aligned. I can even pick out notable reviews (perhaps a place where we disagree) to take a closer look.

4. It helps compare reviews more easily. When I want to buy a game I typically find 3 reviews for it: a pro review, a con review, and a middling review. This helps get a much more complete picture of the quality of the game and the reasons why it is good or bad and helps me to more accurately predict what I will think of it.

 

[FootloosePhoenix]

I think they can be useful. Not nearly as useful as the rest of a review, but useful sometimes, yes. I never bother with reviews anymore though, to be honest. The best way to judge if you're going to like a game, without actually playing it of course, is to watch gameplay footage. I also have a few friends/acquaintances whose opinions on games tend to match up pretty well with mine, so if they're enjoying a game and recommend it to me, I'm a lot more likely to give it a go than if I read a glowing review by someone I don't know. Because at the end of the day, unless we're talking about bugs or whether the graphics could have been shinier, we're judging the value of art and its content, and that's a very personal, subjective matter.

Reading reviews is something I might do to gain insight into different opinions, but to closely inform my decision-making process in what games I buy? Nah. I seem to do pretty well without them.

Captcha: Don't count on it. Exactly, it agrees with me.

 

[happyninja42]

Scores are a good thing. But the scoring system needs to be simple. For example, 1 = anything not worth playing, 2 = half decent, 3 = good, 4 = great, 5 = amazing. This is important for reasons:

1. I don't care to read 2 pages of writing to find out the game is bad. My time is more valuable than that.

2. I may not want my experiences of a game colored by the opinions of the reviewers. What I want sometimes is a context free assessment, which makes the most sense as a score.

3. It helps me understand a reviewer quickly: what type of games do they like, where do we agree and disagree? I can't read dozens of reviews to gain context, I don't have that sort of time, but I can look over their past reviews and get a good idea of how we are aligned. I can even pick out notable reviews (perhaps a place where we disagree) to take a closer look.

4. It helps compare reviews more easily. When I want to buy a game I typically find 3 reviews for it: a pro review, a con review, and a middling review. This helps get a much more complete picture of the quality of the game and the reasons why it is good or bad and helps me to more accurately predict what I will think of it.

The problem with a scoring system is that it doesn't express why it's good/bad. Aspects of the game that you might enjoy, might be bits that drive me up the wall personally. And thus, your scoring system doesn't really accurately reflect the quality of the game in any way that can be translated well to others. That's why I prefer an actual discussion about it. Describe the various aspects of the game, tell me why you like/dislike them, and give examples of why it's bad/good. This way, I can more accurately assess your score in relation to my own rating system. Just saying "the gameplay is good" doesn't really inform me about it. But if you say something like "The gameplay is very engaging, because it's a tense blend of stealth and bursts of frenetic combat, wrapped up in this very well built control system." That gives me way more data on whether or not it's a game for me. I can then say "meh, I hate sneaker games, I'll pass" or "OOH! I love being the Shadow that Flaps in the Night! Sign me up for this game!"


All that being said though, it's still a matter of personal taste and opinion, which can vary a great deal. I find reviews to be a helpful first filtering layer when it comes to choosing a game, but not the final decision on the matter at all.

 

[DrOswald]

Scores are a good thing. But the scoring system needs to be simple. For example, 1 = anything not worth playing, 2 = half decent, 3 = good, 4 = great, 5 = amazing. This is important for reasons:

1. I don't care to read 2 pages of writing to find out the game is bad. My time is more valuable than that.

2. I may not want my experiences of a game colored by the opinions of the reviewers. What I want sometimes is a context free assessment, which makes the most sense as a score.

3. It helps me understand a reviewer quickly: what type of games do they like, where do we agree and disagree? I can't read dozens of reviews to gain context, I don't have that sort of time, but I can look over their past reviews and get a good idea of how we are aligned. I can even pick out notable reviews (perhaps a place where we disagree) to take a closer look.

4. It helps compare reviews more easily. When I want to buy a game I typically find 3 reviews for it: a pro review, a con review, and a middling review. This helps get a much more complete picture of the quality of the game and the reasons why it is good or bad and helps me to more accurately predict what I will think of it.

The problem with a scoring system is that it doesn't express why it's good/bad. Aspects of the game that you might enjoy, might be bits that drive me up the wall personally. And thus, your scoring system doesn't really accurately reflect the quality of the game in any way that can be translated well to others. That's why I prefer an actual discussion about it. Describe the various aspects of the game, tell me why you like/dislike them, and give examples of why it's bad/good. This way, I can more accurately assess your score in relation to my own rating system. Just saying "the gameplay is good" doesn't really inform me about it. But if you say something like "The gameplay is very engaging, because it's a tense blend of stealth and bursts of frenetic combat, wrapped up in this very well built control system." That gives me way more data on whether or not it's a game for me. I can then say "meh, I hate sneaker games, I'll pass" or "OOH! I love being the Shadow that Flaps in the Night! Sign me up for this game!"


All that being said though, it's still a matter of personal taste and opinion, which can vary a great deal. I find reviews to be a helpful first filtering layer when it comes to choosing a game, but not the final decision on the matter at all.

I didn't mean to imply that scores should be in exclusion to that type of analytic point by point review. My point is more that the score works to augment and improve the point by point analysis. In my point 4 I say that I seek out 3 different reviews that often differ in their ultimate assessment. This is so I can find out why from each of the 3 view points. A positive review will tend to gloss over flaws I might find game breaking, while a negative review will often overlook points of high quality that I might be willing to power through the bad for.

If we had to have one or the other I would definitely choose to have analysis reviews. But putting a point value is so easy and improves the usefulness of the review immensely.

 

[Michel Henzel]

To me the score is the least important part, and I would even go as far to say that, to me, they are completely irrelevant. I could not care less that this game got an 9 and that game got a 6, I want to know why. A number does not tell me anything in terms of reviews.

 

[Darth Rosenberg]

This is Sterling's piece: Review Scores Are Not Evil [http://www.escapistmagazine.com/videos/view/jimquisition/6582-Review-Scores-Are-Not-Evil].

Reviews are opinions, so really by writing the review you've already given it a score, whether you've shown it or not.

Well, literally - you've not given it a score, you've assessed it in detail and addressed pros and cons. A score is fine for a half a second glance re generalisation, but it tells you absolutely eff all.

At that point it's just a matter of making your opinion informed and well written, and being able to summarise whether you liked it or not.

Which you can do with a In Short/Pros/Cons way - which is almost just as quick to assimilate as a big ol' number.

In regards to what you'd rate Spec Ops, just think about the game as a whole. If some aspects of the game were better than others, then it's surely a matter of what aspects of a video game are more important to you. If you think narrative is more important in a video game, you'd rate Spec Ops a 10. If you thought gameplay was more important then you rate it a 6.

I'd be tempted to say a reviewer who scores Spec Ops down on gameplay fundamentally didn't understand the game, so to me that would be tantamount to a relatively thoughtless reviewer/critic.

Rating out of 5 is more flexible though.

Yeah, if I had to pick a system - Harry Hill stylee - then I'd go for 5. But that rather throws up another issue... 5 is 'better' because it's even more general (1's terrible, 5's either a masterpiece or just hugely recommended). But if you end up with a fairly loose, generalised system - why even bother at all?

In a way, all of this is rather academic, as for me, reliable feedback from people I know is always a better indication of whether I'd enjoy something. 'Reviews' are just a way to gauge one kind of reaction, but I read the text to understand that - a number adds, and tells me, nothing.

 

[StriderShinryu]

No, they aren't a necessary part of a game review. At all.

Yes, number scores can definitely cause issues because they don't accurately reflect the entirely of the experience and that is a major issue. The other issue, and perhaps the bigger one, is that there really is no way to objectively rate an experience with a simple number in a way that can be compared and contrasted between reviews like the number system is expected to do. Even two completely positive reviews can receive the exact same number score from two different reviewers but for totally different reasons. Let's look at something like a Call of Duty game. Maybe one reviewer loves the multiplayer and never touches the single player, so scores the game an 8. Maybe another reviewer loves the action packed tightly scripted story mode but never touches the multiplayer so scores the game an 8. Two 8s, two fans of the game, but given for totally different reasons. What numbers really do is force and enforce direct comparisons between reviews (and reviewers) and games in ways that they just don't benefit from in any way (in addition to, yes, boiling an entire perhaps 40+ hour long experience with many facets, peaks and valleys into a single number).

The other issue I have with numeric reviews is that it waylays discussion. By sticking a number at the bottom of a review, or by just making it a prominent component of the review in any way, it makes discussion of the review not about the actual review but instead about the number. It's all about how a certain number is right or wrong instead of actually discussing the game and the points, positive or negative, made in the review. Why discuss what we liked and what we didn't like about Game X and how that compares to the reviewers perspective when we can instead argue over why it got a 7 instead of an 8?

 

[Scarim Coral]

Kinda, I fine if it's out of 10 but out of 100 is unnecessary like eg the game got 73%? So the 7 is ok but the 3 is not? I admit I can make do with a simple summary as the verdit summing up if the game is any good or not and if it's worth buying it including is it said that certain people may like it more.

 

[Fishyash]

Well, literally - you've not given it a score, you've assessed it in detail and addressed pros and cons. A score is fine for a half a second glance re generalisation, but it tells you absolutely eff all.

The score told me how much the reviewer liked the game. The concluding opinion (that thing the whole review is supposed to explain) is hardly eff all. If I want to know why someone liked/hated the game, I will read the review, but if the critic doesn't want to tell me whether he likes the game or not from the get go by putting in a score, then I'm not going to be too interested in what he thinks.

Which you can do with a In Short/Pros/Cons way - which is almost just as quick to assimilate as a big ol' number.

I agree that they serve the same purpose but sorting something by a number is much easier to organise (and essentially tells the same thing) than a summary or a pros/cons list.

If I just started getting into RPGs, and wanted to find out one of the best RPGs to play, a really easy way would be to go on a review website and quickly filter out RPGs from best scored to worst.

Maybe I want to find a shit game to play, just for laughs, I can instead filter the lowest scoring games instead.

You can't do that with a list of pros/cons or a summary.