Should there be a Quick Look voting mechanic?

I was going to vehemently vote no at first, but that's an interesting idea. Maybe.

I would say maybe restrict it to only allow premium members to vote to try to prevent any abuse. I'd also say that they probably shouldn't follow it rigidly (i.e. if an anime game (or something, whatever) that they have no interest in is at the top of the list and they begrudgingly look at it just to not try or talk bad about it for 25 minutes then that QL helps no one who actually voted for it wanting to see what the game is like), but use it more as a way to tally suggestions.

Overall, though, it's a neat idea.

The whole point of having this great editorial staff is to depend on their opinion what should be presented to us. That's the whole point.

Putting the power of selecting which game should be QL'ed would end up in having Quick Looks for dumb shit. People will always choose the dumbest answer. See: any voting for games during live shows. Always a bad time!

Maybe if it was more general like "I think the crew should look at this game" but not necessarily specific to quick looks (e.g maybe just play it on UPF).

Presumably staff could currently attempt to gauge interest in various games by forum / wiki activity but having an explicit bit (I don't want to call it a "like button" but it would be basically that) for each game might be nice.

It's not a bad idea, though I dunno that the site needs it really. Couldn't hurt I guess!

Long Thoughts:

All that said - I have heard the staff say they are quick looking a game because someone suggested it in a PM, so, who knows. Give it a shot.

I like the idea. I might suggest they keep the numbers hidden so that they still ultimately pick and choose as they like, but it could be a helpful tool for them in times where they're stumped for something to do.

I agree with the others, having a simple way of giving suggestions of games for them to check out would be interesting, but it's also kinda weird and I can think of many ways of the system to be abused if it would be a straight up voting/liking system (think of all the kickstarter or greenlight games that would put out announcements to their backers saying something like "Hey everybody, sign up on Giant Bomb and vote on our game to be quick looked!"). The times they've have taken votes during live streams (or when they did that "What games have me missed?" poll which didn't accept the majority of the games released that year), the results haven't been great, as people usually just vote on joke games, instead of stuff that would be interesting to cover, so there would have to be a way to control for that.

Maybe some kind of nomination system where the wiki mods or something (if they aren't already overloaded with stuff to do) would go through the nominations before forwarding them to the staff could work. Like how call-in shows usually have people screening their calls before they are forwarded to the host.

Yup, No is the right answer here for reasons mentioned.

There are certainly places where crowd sourcing ideas for what to do is correct. The bigger gaming websites should absolute base what they do on what the majority of people want to see.

GiantBomb though? They fall squarely into the space of "We are a group of personalities that happen to express ourselves through video games". Telling them what to QL is essentially forcing them to do things because we say so, rather then because they want to do them..which I think would eliminate a great deal of what makes Giant Bomb what it is.

Again, its not a terrible idea to listen to your audience. But I feel this same way about say Lets Players on youtube. Those that do the games they want because they find them fun tend to go well. The moment they turn too "what do you guys want me to do" They end up facing unreasonable expectation, burn out and general "We expect you to work for us, instead of sharing something you were already going to do for fun wth us since you want too".

The best method of suggesting a game to the editors is probably to tweet them directly or send them a PM, especially if you feel like something's going to be overlooked.

Just speaking from past UPFs and such where we let people decide on the next game based on polls, we get a lot of crappy games voted to win just because people think it'd be amusing, as has been mentioned above. A lot of time bad games are just bad and not very much fun to watch being played, quick look or no. And when something magical like Barbie's Dream House Party comes down the pipe, generally word gets around just through word of mouth.

Plus I'd worry about marketing people trying to run Twitter campaigns to brigade a voting system like this to get us to look at Kardashian Mobile Game #34.

I think opening it up to the entire catalog of games would be nothing but trouble. If anything, maybe have the editorial staff set up a poll of potential games they're looking into QLing in the coming future. The list would most likely be the kind of games that don't have the same amount of attention that regular AAA releases do but would be potentially interesting to investigate. That would at least give the ability for the community to show how much interest they may have in the selection.

I only wish there was when Vinny and Alex Quick Look some truly terrible indie shovelware from Steam and I think "man this time could have been used more wisely." Ultimately I rather them just pick and choose what they want. I mean I took @rorie's advice a while back (before he gave it..) and tweeted Vinny about taking a look at Satellite Reign because it looks really interesting - like a proper modern day Syndicate. That said I also realize Vinny probably gets thousands of random tweets every day, half of which are probably people going "BUFU LOLLL" so I understand if I don't really get a reply back from him about it.

If it's premium members only and there is absolutely zero expectation they will pay any attention to it, then sure. Otherwise noway.

No, sounds too much like a "Like" button and I don't see much worth in that.

I like the spirit of the idea, but it isn't really practical, is open to abuse, and is kind of redundant given the availability of the staff via twitter, PMs on the site, and even emails.

Giant Bomb plays what Giant Bomb wants to play and that's the way IMO it should stay.

Nah, it's unnecessary. I voted no because this idea would require a lot of work on the engineers, and the crews, part and I don't think it's a necessary burden to add. They are fine choosing stuff on their own. They don't need my input.

Rorie advised already in this thread how you can request a quick look if you actually want them to. They aren't picky- if you think they're over looking a game just point it out to them. If they don't quick look it it's because they aren't interested. It's really that simple.

Obviously, we don't know the mysterious way that games are selected to be quick looked...

Actually, I do know how they are chosen. The site has always been open about it. They quick look the games they are interested in, and thusly what they think others would be interested in seeing. Vinny will often look over new games on Steam to see if anything would be interesting in a video. It's kind of random, but kind of not too. It's not all really that interesting or obfuscated of a process.

That's honestly what I love, and what I think was (and still is) so revolutionary about this site. The bigger games news places are irrevocably still part of the "preview" machine. And even with Danny and the film crew at GameSpot bringing some creativity to it, they're still beholden to cover all the big stuff no matter if they give a shit or not.

I'd always rather the GB crew let some games I like fall through the QL cracks, than have them lumber through countless mind-numbing titles, diminishing the whole experience for them and for us.

I'm here to watch them show me cool stuff. Not the other way around.

Nope, I just want them to produce content on stuff they find interesting. That may include good games, bad games, and everything in between. Occasionally they have done live shows where they take votes on what to play on steam and that's enjoyable but I think the site works because of the staff's ownership over what they cover.

Here's something that's not often said on internet forums; I agree with everything you just said!

That sounds very cool. Voting no would be silly. I can't say it would work, but it's a neat idea that would be pretty cool to see in practice.

I think that's one of the first signs of the apocalypse.

Oh well. Time to go get some rad goggles and weld a bunch of rusty spikes and sick skulls on a car I guess!

@rorie: Yes but what if that said mobile games rewarded you with pictures of adorable corgis?

As much as there are games I wish they'd look at, every time I've seen this kind of voting (like the What Did We Miss poll) it just ends up being the most boring and predictable list ever. Outside organized troll vote campaigns, everything that would get a significant amount of votes would likely be stuff that's already getting a lot of buzz, and thus either be something they're planning to take a look at in the future or something they've considered and passed on.

I only have a third of Vinny's followers and it's tough even for me to keep up with stuff.

While the idea has merit, I just don't like "if it gets votes" they are increasingly obliged to consider it. I can see a lot of "Ha Ha, lets make them QL some Japanese sex game." coming for that system.

I'd like to have the voting system, but have that system be for I'm interested in this game- period. Sort of a membership thermometer on all games and how we all feel about them. I think that alone is of use as a metric, yet they can still use it for whatever use they want. Knowing people are genuinely hyped to playing it themselves is more valid.

You might ask what's the diff kill-joy? I think it is a big difference, because we are less likely to vote in some "gag" game to get a humorous result. The one to-one nature of saying QLs is what voting "is for' seems ripe for poor choices.

Are there that many games you feel GB misses?

No, I think the GB team gets to choose what games will make the best quick looks. I trust them.

Remember what happened to the like the What Did We Miss poll for Game of the year they tried last year, instead of voting for stuff the bombcrew had missed were people just voting for the most popular games. I imaging your suggestion would led to a similar situation were only the mainst of steams would be looked at and we would miss stuff like botcolony

That's because UPF is a poor environment for getting a truly useful look at a game and your audience knows that. The vast majority of the time when there's one person playing a game, it captures the guys' attention for all of 1 minute before a conversation about wrestling or action movies starts. Which is fine - entertainment is what UPF is all about - but don't pretend you can provide useful consumer advice about a game in a situation where even the person playing it isn't likely to be paying much attention to it. Additionally, you allot what, like, 10 minutes max to each game in those segments? That's not particularly conducive to getting a good look at some games either. So you can't blame people for going for the comedy pick in an scenario that's unlikely to provide a useful look at a game anyway.

To that end, I don't see the UPF situation as particularly applicable precedent to assume that a suggestion box for "official", seriously treated Quick Looks would be similarly abused. Also, I imagine all the concerns of it being liable to vote rigging go away if you limit the voting to premium members only.

I cant recall the last time something slipped through the cracks. At worst the people I think would shine on a QL of a particular game werent the ones assigned.

At times, specifically when they say "there are no games in the x genre anymore" on the Bombcast, just after a bunch of them have been released. Most recently they said something along that line about RTS games, I guess. They quick looked Grey Goo, but around the same time we also got Etherium, SunAge, Meridian, Distant Star and the early access game Nightside.

@fisk0: I think that reflects the nature of Steam being straight up busted when it comes to surfacing real games versus the series of mobile ports and other crap that's put up there everyday. But like Rorie said earlier in the thread, if you feel they should take a look at something hit them up on Twitter.

I think the duders are in the best position to know what will and won't make for an entertaining quicklook. Maybe as a new feature. Something like the steam upf's where the community asks them to play stuff, but with a narrower field of games.

Initially I was going to vote no. However, the OP framed it in an interesting way. I think it has potential. But, I feel like it would unfortunately turn into a negative feature as people may begin to become angry when the GB crew doesn't consider games that loads of people recommended. Despite voting yes, I think I may lean to No.

Nope, could be abused to easily

If I voted on what I wanted to see, I wouldn't discover awesome new games. I just want them to show me what they want to show.

I feel like there are some interesting games they miss. It's the sad downside to having so much coming out all the time. I don't trust the community to find games either though (no offense community). I think the idea has some potential however. Like maybe every so often the crew could post a poll with like 10 games they're considering a Quick Look for, and the community could vote on which ones they're most interested in.

I'd like it, mostly because it'd be neat if the community started making itself quick looks, and this would give people a starting point.

@rorie: Yah I can believe it. I imagine having thousands of followers can make Twitter nigh unusable.