When this whole thing started, we weren’t going to do reviews. Then… we started doing reviews, but not really, under the ItsNotAReview moniker. Those “kind of” reviews changed into full blown reviews, as game publishers began sending us free stuff to look at. I mean, if we’re going to get it for free, the least we could do would be tell you all whether it sucks or not, right?
Well, here we are. At a crossroads. You see, for the most part, video game reviews are all about one thing. The almighty review score. That’s all publishers, PR people and the vast, vast majority of readers care about. When people go to a “review site” the first thing they look at is the score and then they might look at the actual review. So, we’ve decided to become one of the herd.
Check out our new “review” scoring system, after the jump.
It’s hard to come up with an original scoring system. Giving a score out of 100 or even 10 just invites too much parsing and BS to be useful, especially since we’d just ending up giving games a 7,8,9 or 10anyway because we’re lazy, unpaid fanboys. The “letter” system is also taken… I actually like that system, maybe that company will go out of business and I can swoop in and steal it… Nah…
In the end, there’s really only one thing that makes sense. Do we recommend it or do we not recommend it? So, we’ve adopted an awesome and convoluted TWO STAR system! One star means not recommended, and two stars means recommended. There, you get the score and everybody is happy.
Look for our awesome TWO star ItsNotAReview reviews in the future, as we slide further and further down into video game hell.
Here’s my middle finger Metacritic. Extrapolate that!
My middle finger gets two out of two stars.
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This article gets two stars; and a bonus award for the dig at 1up
Didn’t Lono post this a little early? It’s not quite Friday yet. ;-]
I think it’s fine but in all honesty I think it should be 1 star is recommended and 0 stars is not recommended. I think it could possibly be confusing if someone sees 1 star, they might think that it’s semi-good. That’s my $.02 take it for what it is.
The “rating” system is absolutely for real.
Where was the Humpday Update Lono?
Now, I wonder just how long it’ll be before 1 star is no longer good enough and 2 stars is too good so games start getting between 1.2 and 1.8 stars
@ dankster.
That’s what I thought too. I like the fact that SG does the “Itsnotareview”. It makes fun of all of those high and mighty “We gave it 5 stars because we are gaming expert” sites.
Well reviews are personal anyway so awesome TWO STAR system is pretty much as deep as one review can go. You either recommend others to try it out or you don’t.
What goes for absolute “score” metacritic and gamerankings type of web sites are best bet to get absolute truth when comparing games to each other. They have their flaws but hey at least they are statistical…
And lets be honest only reason for inventing ranking systems is to compare two or more products.
Haha! It’ll be like listening to Captain Pike talk with his beeping wheelchair.
Beep. Beep.
I think it should be 1 star or no stars. It could be confusing if someone saw one star, they may think that the game is half good. Just a thought though. It’s your site dude, do whatcha gotta do.
i dont understand, if the people are look only for the score and ignore the details, why its your problem not theirs???
a score is like the cherry on a sunday, extra but can sometimes make the final decision.
would some one tell me whats wrong with that?
as for the 2 stars system you are talking about lono, well i appreciate the efforts, but it would be absolutely meaningless, exactly as a green cherry on a strawberry sunday!!!
Two Star System!????? wtf
Thats the most ridiculous and brilliant thing ever haha
Hope that it will really work in the end O_o
If a game’s not worth recommending, should it even get a star. Surely one star is ‘recommended’, two stars is ‘you need to buy this game now on pain of death’ and ‘not recommended’ could be an unhappy face, or a slop bucket. Or a picture of Zombie Dave.
It’s simple, effective and individual. And it’s an added bonus to those who can’t be bothered to read through the full article! Hooray for the Two Star System!
Eh. I think it would be too much of a pain to explain to the uneducated that two stars is a GOOD score.
Stars are shiny and shiny things distract me.
Eh, I don’t know if I really like it all that much. I mean, I guess the system is broad enough that even when games get a 7/10 or something in your head, that they get “2 stars” or something, but that could be a good thing and a bad thing if you didn’t say in a review that the game was being recommended, but said how much (rent, buy, borrow, ect.).
But then again, it really isn’t up to us. By the way, how did this new system get chosen?
How about instead of stars, you use the sarcastic gamer “Meh” face. that’ll make it even more original, and people wont confuse it with the already well known “out of five” star rating system
Lono, i hope you get to review killzone 2. i know that if you give it two stars (or two Meh’s) it’ll be good. plus you can win back the fanboys, coz thats so important to you
I say – three zombie Daves is a perfect score, highly recommended.
Two Zombie Daves is a good game, also recommended.
One Zombie Dave gets a game, that is rental only, a game for a few evenings. Not recommended to buy.
No Daves means ‘avoid it as hell, highly not recommended, even for a rental.
But then again, having no score system means people will have to read through all of the article to get an idea about the game, or at least the conclusive part, which is a better thing altogether.
So it’s up to SG staff to decide, whether the change is positive thing, or will it do more harm than good….
I’ll find a way of breaking the system
“Three-zombie-daves” is a lame compromise^^
I mean it´s about doing something original!!!!
Two stars; recommended or not recommended;
thats radical and thats the idea of the rating system
If a game is two stars, the difference between whether the game would be a rent or a buy would be in how the reader perceives the review, which means that it will be up to the reviewer to be that much more thoughtful in their review.
Were not here to determine your spending habits, but we’ll tell you why we rec0mmend something or not.
I can’t believe that you guys sold out to the scoring system! I like the fact that they are “It’s Not A Review” because that was unique to the site, and the review score is something you guys should be against. I wish it was friday already.
@Kaworus:
Yeah, I thought it might be friday also. Just seems like we should keep what is unique to the site, that is what makes it so great.
@Kaworus
I wouldn’t call it selling out so much. It’s basically just giving a picture to what you’re reading in the NotaReview anyway. They’ve always been pretty clear about whether a game is good or not.
That said, maybe just a “Thumbs up” or “Thumbs down” would be even simpler.
@DeathByWaffle”
True, true… because I don’t think I’ll like the whole concept of rating on this site at all…
If there’s only two levels of rating, the thing loses it’s point in my eyes. Just say it then : ” I recommend it or I don’t ” in the last sentence in the article, like before. Problem SOLVED.
@Nexus
“If there’s only two levels of rating, the thing loses it’s point in my eyes. Just say it then : ” I recommend it or I don’t ” in the last sentence in the article, like before. Problem SOLVED.”
How can you accept SAYING “Recommended or Not Recommend” but not the stars. It’s the EXACT same thing. So in all reality, you’re against the VISUAL representation of the approval, am I wrong?
instead of stars, you guys should rate games with trademark SG “Meh” faces. that’d be funny.
Please feel free to digg this, looks like somebody already put it up. Thanks Chuckie J!
To all, the feedback has been excellent. To the people that don’t like “rating” or “scoring” systems for game reviews, I think our stated system, isn’t really a scoring system at all. It acknowledges the place, good or bad, that review scores have in video game enthusiast press and how we’ve taken that and simplified it to a point to where our “score” is just a simplified version of buy it or avoid it and at the same time, does it in a general “sarcastic” way.
I hope that clears some things up. Keep the feedback coming though, good or bad.
I’m surprised you went with a star system for scoring. When I think of Sarcastic Gamer your non-smiley logo is the first thing that comes to mind. I would have gone with a green SG logo for buy and red for not buy.
Wait, then people would think the red logo shirts are a no buy. Nevermind.
http://www.sarcasticgamer.com/forums/blog.php?b=2001
If you wanted a rating system, why not talk to one of your bloggers? He came up with an amazing one… and one I use myself now, actually.
Very nice. Glad to see something new. I dugg this already.
@iFester
Ha, yeah, red = bad!
Anyway, so did you guys listen to the last Red Sho…. wait a second…
@SaintMantooth: I think this is maybe a reaction to the Edge review and our outlook on the video game landscape. I think that our conversations about the Killzone 2 reviews and other things going on right now sparked the idea of sort of lampooning the entire process by going with a two star system, which, if you take a step back, isn’t really even a “system” at all, or any different than what we had been doing with our reviews.
I understand, its business. You WILL NOT get review copies, or if so very sparingly if you do not do reviews. This is the only thing game companies/pr care about and is how they make their money. It only makes sense. I have mixed feelings about them in general since reviews or so subjective.
One star is bad, two is good? Seems a little obtuse to me… I personally think it would make much more sense to go with a simple “buy”, “rent”, or “pass” model.
But whatevs. As long as SG avoids the trap of using a numerical scale, which inherently encourages comparing one game score to another, then I’m cool with whatever you guys choose.
I think we were going for obtuse. I guess people aren’t getting that…
I’d vote for the ‘pass’ ”rent’ ‘buy’ model too.
Haha… everyone has an opinion.
@Lono
No, we get it. I think it’s awesome. The one’s who aren’t getting it simply aren’t the true sarcastic gamers. To me, it’s REEKING of Sarcastic Gamer style and uniqueness. It gets two stars from me.
HOWEVER, I must say, there should be some type of visual representation, instead of just ’saying’ it gets two stars
I say congratulations for coming up with something new and inventive. No matter what your idea is someone will always “know” how to make it better. I personally like the idea and am glad you are staying true to the site while staying away from the endless amount of people who will nitpick your score till there is nothing left but a sad little shadow of a writer who just tried to voice his opinion.
the visual representation is coming.
No, I get it, but I think it would be too much from a logical standpoint, to help the “others” get it. I’m just thinking about you guys having to explain it all all the time!
I like the way Hustler magazine rates the movies that it reviews. I’m sure you could copy it.
but really wheres the fun in copying