What's wrong with number scores in reviews?

[ThaBenMan]

As anybody who has been around the Escapist for any appreciable amount of time knows, number scores in reviews are roundly reviled. May I ask, what, exactly, is wrong with them? I think a score from 1 to 10 works pretty well - I will usually not play a game at all if it recieves an average score lower than 6. It is pretty bad if there's no actual review and just a number, but a number appended to a review? I see no problem with it.

 

[October Country]

If reviews have scores on the end, (some) readers might tend to focus more on the number than the actual review. That is a problem because the review contains comments that are much more useful to the reader, like what aspects of the game are good and what are bad and then you as a reader and gamer can see if you have a similar game taste as the reviewer and then decide. A review is after all a subjective piece of writing, it contains personal opinions and responses to a game. Giving a game an absolute score implies an objective standpoint which just isn't the case with a review. In my opinion a review is a piece of advice on whether or not to buy a game, and a score seems more like a judgement.

So leaving out a score forces the reader to read all of the review and contemplate the pros and cons of the game in stead of just looking at the score and the immediately turning it down if it gets a lower score than 6.

 

[Jandau]

Because sometimes it's not so easy to boil down a game to a simple number. The may be a ton of pros and cons, but if you reduce it to an arbitrary number none of that matters anymore since the general audience will just check what has the biggest number this month/week/year.

This becomes especially pronounced as you go into the decimals. The 8.3 game is by default considered better than an 8.1 game, though the few decimals are mostly due to the reviewers mood at the time of grading.

Numeric grades from, say 1-5 (no decimals) are fair enough since they allow you to classify the game in a certain general quality category, but then again the reviewer could just say "It's good", "It's crap" or "It's meh"...

 

[jthm]

Because numbers are an utterly arbitrary way of ranking anything. A 5.3 is not a description of a games faults and virtues, it's just a number. If you've played games for any period of time, you know what is good and what is not about a game. At no point in a game has anyone ever sat around and thought "8.1!" when some enemy jumps out and bites their head off. Likewise, you've never played a game with disappointing visuals and thought "man, these are 6.2". You've more likely thought "man, these graphics look like shit."
That's why.

 

[SomeBritishDude]

A number can mean anything. For instance, what does a game with a 10 mean? Is it a perfect it game with no issues, or is a game so good that the not so great aspects make are made up for?

Its just a number, and its not going to tell you whether your going to like this game or not.

 

[Neo Kojiro]

I suppose an additional fact is that most people don't take the reviewer into account, but just stare at the number like it's some almighty rating; if your game preferences don't match with the guy what banged out the number, then it hardly has any relevance to you.

I got nothing against number ratings, myself, but i still question how close i am in preferred gaming to the reviewer in question, and thus i seldom pay attention to reviews to begin with.

 

[October Country]

Reviews are the problem, not numbers.

A badly written review without a number is ten times worse than a badly written review with a number.

Is that so?
If a review is badly written that implies incompetence on the reveiwer's part and adding a number at the end of the review doesn't make it a better review. If a review isn't well written or talks about important parts of the game, I wouldn't take it's advide, and I certainly wouldn't think that a number made any difference. After all, any anonymous guy with a working internet can put give a game a score, but it takes more intelligence and knowledge to actually write a review and give good arguments for your standpoints.

 

[fedpayne]

I rate this thread 3.9

It is pretty bad if there's no actual review and just a number, but a number appended to a review? I see no problem with it.

What is your explanation for this? If a number on its own is nothing, why does it further a text review? Why do you want to read a 5 after you've already read 'this game is pretty bad, with some nice touches that fail to make up for it'.

It's all subjective anyway. A critic can say that she liked a game, and give her reasons, and those reasons might convince you, and the fact that she says that it is a good game pushes you over the edge. But if she says all these reasons she thinks it's good, for instance, she likes it because you can ride a horse, but you think 'I hate riding horses, that would make it a bad game', then your review would be quite different. Numbers are black and white; they suggest that the game is something. Text maintains the subjectivity, and stops contradictions, like one critic giving the game a 7 and the other a 6. That makes no sense, but if one said that she liked the ability to ride horses, and the other says he thinks it would have been better not to have to ride horses, then that does make sense.

 

[51gunner]

Numbers are bad because they're usually quite arbitrary. Upon playing a game, I've never really thought "These graphics deserve an eighty percent, the story a ninety-five, but the controls lose a few points and dip to a sixty-four."

It's difficult to go from a subjective review to an objective number. Also, I find a lot of reviewers seem to work on a scale from six to ten rather than zero to ten. Remember: a grade of 6/10, or 60% is still a passing grade. I don't give that out to a game that annoyed me.

If an example would help you: a lot of reviewers and such have done reviews of Big Rigs: Over the Road Racing. This game is widely touted (for good reason) to be one of the worst games of all time. It's still gotten scores as high as 1/10 and 1/5, despite not even working. One of five maps crashes the game, you can't collide with anything (not even houses), opposing trucks don't even MOVE (a later patch added some AI, but they always stop before finishing the race), you can accelerate infinitely in reverse yet stop on a dime, sometimes victory conditions can be met before you even start... this game deserves NO points, yet it still recieves some.

I don't think numerical scores are bad in and of themselves, it's more the people who use them that make them bad.

 

[qlpoth]

Numbers are also unnecessarily difficult. You can spend hours writing up a perfectly worded review, saying exactly what you did and didn't like about a game, and then reach the end and still not have any clue what number to give it. I ran into this a lot when I was doing movie reviews in the olden days. I had to constantly go back and look at what my rating criteria were, what I had rated other movies that had a similar entertainment value, etc. This is probably just because I am obsessive compulsive, but I'd already said what I had to say. finding a number to associate with it was just a PITA.

 

[johnman]

I've noticed recently that the system doesnt often work. Games that the reveiwer states are average are given score of 6 - 7. When an average game should be given 5.

 

[Phase_9]

The number is an excuse to skip the entire article like the lazy moron most people are. Just read the review. That way you know HOW the game works and WHY it might appeal to you, not that it was given an '8' by someone you don't know nor care about. Plenty of 6-8 score games may not appeal to a lot of people because of the genre or way it works. Just because I thought Kingdom Hearts was good doesn't mean everyone will, so if I ever review it, I would rather talk about the pros and cons of the game and who the game might appeal to rather than the graphics (ugh, enough already), soundtrack (mute the TV, blast AC/DC, problem solved), etc. JUST TALK ABOUT THE GAMEPLAY FOR THE LOVE OF GOD! I couldn't give a flying fuck if the game isn't realistic-looking, I just want a game that is fun to play. When gameplay is only one of many things being factored into a numbered review, then everyone involved gets screwed.

A. Focus on gameplay and B. Talk about who might like the game and why they might like it, don't give it a number so that lazy assholes can skip the article, let them buy cheap garbage on their own, they usually get it right.

 

[Hippobatman]

When reviews conclude with numbers, I tend to just scroll right through it without reading it. With the exception of games I really have been looking forward to.

I guess you get the most out of a review if you actually take your time to read about the pros and cons, and then make your own decision. Whether you buy it, rent it or don't give a damn.

 

[Brokkr]

I don't have a problem with using numbers, as long as the reviewer does a good job and isn't relying totally on the number. However numbering systems should only include ratings of out of 5 or 10. When a reviewer rates the sound design in a game as a 8.4, it is ridiculous. That kind of number was pulled out of someone's butt.

 

[Ronwue]

There is absolutely nothing wrong with numbers in reviews as there is nothing wrong with the lack of numbers in reviews. You have a choice of what type of review you want to read. What is so bad about choice?

 

[ThaBenMan]

I rate this thread 3.9

It is pretty bad if there's no actual review and just a number, but a number appended to a review? I see no problem with it.

What is your explanation for this? If a number on its own is nothing, why does it further a text review? Why do you want to read a 5 after you've already read 'this game is pretty bad, with some nice touches that fail to make up for it'.

A 3.9 out of 5? Pretty good, thanks

My reasoning in that quote above is that yes, I understand there needs to be an actual review in words with substance, but why not have the number too? I just think it's a useful tool that just adds a little something to the review.

And another thing - everybody is throwing around the word arbitrary. I just disagree, I guess. You should read the review, but it can be useful to have that number at a glance.

 

[ultimasupersaiyan]

I think scores for games isn't necessary. A review in my opinion should just tell you about the game and describe any defining point's about it. In short a synopsis of the plot,major features and how it works. Scores cloud judgement on games and since almost every place allows you to return the game if you didn't like it within a week or something then scores are pointless. If I listened to reviewer scores I'd have less games lol. The reviews on The Escapist are good in my opinion and are better then Gamespots by a long shot.

 

[DirkGently]

As Yahtzee himself said, you can't boil a complex opinion down to a number from 1-10. Looking at a number does not tell you *why* that game got that number, just that it was given a number. People then look at that number, and assume that's accurate and valid and proceed to tell people their opinion on that game, argue for it, against it, or whatever solely on the score it got from some reviewer. The only scores I'll give a vague look at is meta-critics, but even then, considering that's an average of everyone else's scores, I'm wary of it.