I like stars more... you can give games perfect scores without feeling silly, and when you give them the equivalent of a 7.0 it still looks fairly positive (as it should).
Stars are fine, but I'd rather have no ratings at all. People are too score inflated, if something doesn't score over 8.0, it's a bad game in their eyes. A review should be enough and help you decide or atleast get a sense of what the reviewer thought. A score should just be a guide-line along with the review. Scores are ruining the industry, just look at Metacritic. It's just statistics and it doesn't mean much, but look at how companies look into that! It's all about the metacritic scores and all that, it prevents good games from being made it they don't score this and that on metacritic, and the fact that metacritic just translates odd scores that don't fit into say 100 points, they just mash 'em into their own 100 point scale.
It's just dumb. What happened to common sense anyway? So yeah, less scores! More emphasis on reviews and reading the reviews. Not scrolling by and looking at the score!
Ya I think most sites put too much emphasis on the actual number, and in the end a large part of a review is the reviewer's personal preference, leading to vastly different number scores.
I prefer the stars, because it gives you a general idea. An impression, rather. When you get into decimals and stuff I start questioning why one game was worth 0.5 points more than the other...
Think of it like this: There will never be a perfect game. But plenty of games with a 5-star rating! If you want details, you should look for them in the text and make your own evaluation, rather than measuring numbers on a decimal scale and basing your own impressions of that.
The review is the most important part of a err... review. Surprisingly enough. The 'rating' is only indicative of the quality of the game in comparison to other games of similar type, on the same site, by the same reviewer, in the same timeframe. So something as detailed as a points scale system can sometimes be very unfair. By creating an emphasis on the review and a small rating scale, there's less room for confusion and differences in opinions.
"Stars are fine, but I'd rather have no ratings at all. People are too score inflated, if something doesn't score over 8.0, it's a bad game in their eyes. A review should be enough and help you decide or atleast get a sense of what the reviewer thought. A score should just be a guide-line along with the review. Scores are ruining the industry, just look at Metacritic. It's just statistics and it doesn't mean much, but look at how companies look into that! It's all about the metacritic scores and all that, it prevents good games from being made it they don't score this and that on metacritic, and the fact that metacritic just translates odd scores that don't fit into say 100 points, they just mash 'em into their own 100 point scale.
It's just dumb. What happened to common sense anyway? So yeah, less scores! More emphasis on reviews and reading the reviews. Not scrolling by and looking at the score! "
but the thing is that most people don't have time or patience to read a review to its entirety, they just want to see the score and base their decision on that
"I like stars more... you can give games perfect scores without feeling silly, and when you give them the equivalent of a 7.0 it still looks fairly positive (as it should). "
I agree, i think 5 stars is something that shouldn't be misheard from a game because some games are really pretty good.
5 stars is good. Numerical systems rely too much on personal opinion. Even if a game is not your type of game, most people will agree where on a 5 point scale it would go. A 100 point scale, or even a 10 or 20 point scale leaves too much up to personal opinion.
I think the stars are good, numerical values are too definite - the stars make it harder to make a decision about a game solely based on a "score", which is a good thing.
As the help page says, other genres of publications use the 5 star rating, such as Rolling Stone, and it works just fine. I think it works just as well for video game related reviews.
"As the help page says, other genres of publications use the 5 star rating, such as Rolling Stone, and it works just fine. I think it works just as well for video game related reviews. "
Exactly. There are some decent (or used to be decent) reviewers that use the 5-point system, and it works just fine. I say 9 and 10's should reprersent the 5th star
I hope for the sanity of forum goers that they stick to the 5 star rating system.
At least when it's a score out of 5 the vast majority of people could agree that it's the right score, give or take 1 for personal opinion. As soon as that metric becomes out of 10 then people start whining that it should be 0.5 higher or 3.0 lower etc. Don't get me started on 'perfect scores'. Why people have this inane idea that as soon as a game hits 10/10 it suddenly has to be God's gift to gaming and any minor infraction means it "should have been 9.5". And anyone who says "the most any game should get is 9.5 cause 10 means it's perfect ololol" is a fool and should be shot. It's a numerical rating out of 10 damn it, meaning the maximum achievable score is, shocking enough, 10! It doesn't mean the game is perfect, it means it's warrents to be placed above the rest of the 9s and 9.5s. That's how the system works. A game could be worth 11/10 but the highest is 10, and so that's what it got.
/rant
Seems I did get started on perfect scores, nevermind.
Stars are better, if only to prevent "OMG an 8.8??!?!" debates. It's just dumb to place so much emphasis and importance on a number. A simple 5-star system makes it easy to see if a game is bad, decent, good or very good and places more emphasis on the actual text. If you need a number to tell you whether to buy something or not, well... I don't know what to tell you.
i think they should leave it at 5 stars because i dont think an opinion of a game can be turned into a number. and 5 star just tells you wat you need 2 know
No stars: Sucks so hard that you are looked down upon after purchase. 1Star: Craptastic and should not be played for more than a minute. 2Star: Bad and should not be played unless you are a huge fan of the series, or bad games. 3Star: Average and basically a rental, or again buy if you are a huge fan. 4Star: Good and should be tried at least once. 5Star: A must buy AAA title that rox your sox off in the bedtime!!!!!11
Of course this is my take, but I believe it works quite well. There are also half points if they are just a wee bit less of what you'd expect from the solid stars.
The problems with numbers is that there is too much room that is not used. What exactly is a 5? Is it horrible? Then what is a 1? Compared to 1.2? It really doesn't tell people how great or OMFGSUCKYWTF a game is. It is just a number. I mean, think of it this way, even grades in college are A,B,C,D,F. 5 Letters with '-' and '+' if needed. Coincidence? I think not!
IDk, i think that if you use a 10 point review scale then it allows for more discrepancy between scores for games, but then again people these day do take scores to seriously and they need to reed the review instead of just looking at the score.
I dont think you guys are getting it Theyre not trying to tell us how good the game is, theyre telling us how likely we are to enjoy the game and about it, from what i read on wiki lol. I sure prefer the GS, GT or IGN rating scale but since this site uber pwns, il learn to cope with the 5 stars scale
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