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Forums - Website Topics - How should VGChartz score its reviews?

 

How should VGChartz score its reviews?

Keep the current letter g... 244 13.49%
 
Score out of 100% using each point. 787 43.50%
 
Score out of 10 using half points. 349 19.29%
 
Score out of 10 using whole points. 103 5.69%
 
Switch to a 5-star system. 88 4.86%
 
Don't use grades at all, just text. 238 13.16%
 
Total:1,809
ZenfoldorVGI on 25 November 2008
TheSource said:

Just say "worth a buy", "worth a rent", "wait til its cheaper", "play if your buddy has it", "avoid like the plague"

To hell with nuance.

 

I agree. Numerical scores can be confusing and inaccurate with more than 1 reviewer, and mean absoultely nothing. When it comes to recommendations, the more vague you are, the better.



I don't need your console war.
It feeds the rich while it buries the poor.
You're power hungry, spinnin' stories, and bein' graphics whores.
I don't need your console war.

NO NO, NO NO NO.

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TWRoO on 25 November 2008
Machina-AX said:
TWRoO said:

Make it as simple as possible, we don't want all the "this game got 1% more" stuff.

I like the EGSU method which we used to get awarded before SATs (exams in year 9 (13-14yo) )

EGSU =

Excellent
Good
Satisfactory
Unsatisfactory

Except perhaps add an extra level on top "Outstanding" or another level below instead. ("Terrible" ?)

@Machina... why do they need to be compared to other review sites.... the reviews should stand on their own and shouldn't be converted to percentages by aggregate review sites like Metacritic... reviews are a means for people to understand if a game they were interested in is worth buying, not for comparing 1 game to another because it comes down to opinion way too much then.... just because a reviewer liked Halo 3 more then Resistance (and thus gave them 95% and 85% respectively) doesn't mean the purchaser would like Halo 3 more.

An EGSU system prevents us getting on averaging sites, unless you have conversion guidelines, in which case why not just cut straight to the guidelines?

Now you may argue, as you seem to do here, that those averaging sites are pointless and we shouldn't want to join them, but I don't agree with that. If we get our reviews on their sites that would be a great accomplishment for a small but fast growing site and community like ours.

It would lead to considerably more site traffic, more members and more revenue for the site. There is great potential for good knock-on effects across the board. It would open up more avenues for access to key figures and companies within the industry. That means more previews, exclusive content like interviews and screenshots, more beta impressions and more review copies (which in turn means reviews get up quicker and are therefore more relevant).

 

MetaCritic and gamerankings don't even use what is a long running and trusted magazine: Official Nintendo Magazine for a review source (despite using some official PS and XB mags).... I doubt VGC will be added anytime soon.

However I do believe MetaCritic and such ask for confirmation from many reviewers about what score out of 100 they would have given (and if they don't give one then MC just makes one up based on the content) so if they do put VGC up that could happen, I just think advertising what is such an annoying method of reviewing is only going to show us up... many people on here agree that most reviewers (minus some who seem reluctant to try the Wii with an open mind) seem to be slowly increasing score for what are only Good games.

So should VGC get published there, we would either have to follow that pattern of giving 70 and 80 to games that are not so great (which would then lose us credibility because many of our Wii reviews would be higher than the majority of others, even though PS3 and 360 are inline) or go by a proper pattern of having a decent game (Good) at about 50%, which would probably lose us more credibility.

 



zexen_lowe on 25 November 2008

I'd like a percentage grading system, but whatever you do, please remove the letter grading system, you have to think on countries that don't use it, I have no idea if a C is good or bad, or how good is a B+, what letter means "bad", the letters don't tell me anything (other than anything that has an A must be good).
Really, any other grading system would be better than letters for me




Thatmax on 25 November 2008

0 - 100% system has always been my favorite by far, please go with it : )



Phendrana on 25 November 2008

The problem with letter scoring is if you end up on averaging sites, your letter grades are up for interpretation. A C on metacritic is a 50, while on gamerankings it's a 65. Personally I think a C should translate into a 70-75. There's a lot of discrepancy.

Letter scores or TWRoO's system are both good if you don't care about averaging sites. Otherwise the 1-10 scale with .5 increments is decent without trying to be too accurate.

Maybe even something along the lines of a "between" score. It would take away some of the inaccuracies of giving an absolute score while giving averaging sites a good idea of how to list it.

For example, Resistance 2: 80 - 85



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Elite1 on 25 November 2008

Switch to a 5-star system with only whole numbers, like X-play.



Don't Worry.....Be Happy

 

Valkyria00 on 25 November 2008

Rate the game with the following words.

Terrible - Bad - Good - Great - Amazing.

#'s are really flawed. Majority of people who see 6-7 they think garbage which is not the case. I made a thread about it while back. I personally think this is the best way to score games.
Grades can be broken into a 1-10 scale and so can these words but then agan Good soudns better than 6-7.



BHR-3 on 25 November 2008

score out of 100%

but i think doing reviews will change the direction of the site wen i first found this site back in mid 07 i liked it's unique approach with all the graphs and being bout hd and sw sales mainly
sometimes it's better not to do wat everybody else is doing and have all this cluster take away from the main point of things



                                                             

                                                                      Play Me

Strategyking92 on 25 November 2008

Could i recommend a:



BUY-RENT-AVOID


system?



And that's the only thing I need is *this*. I don't need this or this. Just this PS4... And this gaming PC. - The PS4 and the Gaming PC and that's all I need... And this Xbox 360. - The PS4, the Gaming PC, and the Xbox 360, and that's all I need... And these PS3's. - The PS4, and these PS3's, and the Gaming PC, and the Xbox 360... And this Nintendo DS. - The PS4, this Xbox 360, and the Gaming PC, and the PS3's, and that's all *I* need. And that's *all* I need too. I don't need one other thing, not one... I need this. - The Gaming PC and PS4, and Xbox 360, and thePS3's . Well what are you looking at? What do you think I'm some kind of a jerk or something! - And this. That's all I need.

Obligatory dick measuring Gaming Laptop Specs: Sager NP8270-GTX: 17.3" FULL HD (1920X1080) LED Matte LC, nVIDIA GeForce GTX 780M, Intel Core i7-4700MQ, 16GB (2x8GB) DDR3, 750GB SATA II 3GB/s 7,200 RPM Hard Drive

Torillian on 25 November 2008

Percentage, assuming I get a vote....and that it counts....hey I might get 2 or 3....I mean shit.



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