Gaming When did 8/10 become a bad score?

We have a tendency only to play/read games that appeals to us. So that's one thing. It's like people who watch chat shows watch the ones that they agree with.

Results in us only ever seeing 8s, 9s, 10s in the reviews.

What we need to do though is publish more reviews about **** games and show how many sub 8 games there are. Then people will be like 'OMG a 7 in a pile of 3s and 4s! I'll take it!'

Kinda like if you stack loads of 3s and 4s of women in a room then a 6 comes along and your like, 'yeah I'll tap that.' Have I gone too far yet?

 

To be honest marking a game is like marking a childs work - you can write all the formative feedback you like, but at the end of the day they look at the number then find out what everybody else got. 8/10 I consider a very strong score, and nothing hacks me off more in my job as a teacher when someone questions why a student only got an A as opposed to an A*.

If bit-tech wants to take itself to the forefront of reviewing, getting people engaged with what you are writing or rather more with the nuances of the game itself - then dont give scores out of 10, give a list of pros and cons or a brief summary only.

 

One website like only gives 4 verdicts...Buy it, Rent it, Try it, and Skip it.

 

Nothing annoyed me more than my uni lecturer asking me what i'd got on a particular piece of work...

'69%', [1% off 1st territory] I said...
Oh that's a shame, I thought it was work at least 75... was her reply...
*under breath* evidently not as you're the one that marked it...

But [back on topic] you do get the impression that a lot of the devs themselves are more interested in the score than addressing any criticisms put their way in the preceding review. A high score massages their ego and tells them they did a good job in that void between release and the first set of sales figures.

 

It's funny that this was posted. Just today I was looking at buying a new game - Kingdoms of Amalur: Reckoning. I read the reviews and watched some gameplay videos and on one of the vids there was a huge fuss over a 9/10 score and how it scored so low because of Skyrim.

I pee'd a little reading that.

 

One of the better systems, although still open to individual taste issues.

I hardly ever bother with 'scores' at the end of reviews. I've been burned in the past with games that score brilliantly and I absolutely abhor, then other games that don't score well that I enjoyed.

But to answer the question posed...

8/10 became a bad score when magazines and gaming sites started biasing reviews into the "7 and up" system.

 

Anyone remember The One Amiga?

They had a decent policy on this. The average game scored 50%. Even then, that was considered outrageously harsh, even though they explained their approach in a paragraph at the beginning of the reviews section every month.

 

I think bit tech does that too, I think? Seems like the best approach to me. Usually if I'm reading a review of a game I'm not going to buy, I just skim read it and then check the score out. But if it's a game I'm going to spend my money on, I read more than one review thoroughly and I pay attention to what they say, not the score.

With games like Amalur for example, it seems like a great game but I know it's just not for me. It's a hack n slash, rolling around shooting lightning and blasting everything to pieces, in a kid friendly fable type world with characters that talk to you like a 10 year old. So technically it could be a great game and worthy of a 9/10, but I know that I would hate every minute of it.

 

http://www.bit-tech.net/gaming/pc/2011/11/10/call-of-duty-modern-warfare-3-review/1

almost entirely positive feedback for you lambasting this mediocre game that most would be pushed to tell part from 2. your score = 55%

http://www.metacritic.com/game/pc/call-of-duty-modern-warfare-3

all the big name review sites in the 90's, average score 79% critic and 21% user (ok thats just trolling, games worth at least 50%). notable is almost every top review issues caveats about how it hasn't moved on from mw2 or even 1 and the game is unsurprisingly identical to it's predicessors but justifies it's score by saying it (tellingly) has a large following so it's all good.

but yeh, the scoring thing - a sub 80 metcritic makes me think twice personally or put it on the 'wait till cheap' pile and personally i don't have much distinction between any score under 60% which i read as "fail" regardless. too close ties between reviewers and publishers inflate numbers for marketing and any site that gives more realistic reviews won't get the hits - reviews seem as much positive reinforcement for a generation unable to decide wether something is good themselves as an aid to purchace.

 

This is something that is, in my opinion, generally happening.

• In (online) Shopping (Try rewarding a seller 4/5 stars on Amazon...you're likely to get bribed/hatemail/sued etc.)
• In schooling (only the top 10-20% performers are interesting for employers/Uni's)
• Cars (less than 5 stars in NCAP? tsktsktsk)

 

Maybe it is because more games are being released/ development cycle has increased so that the same engine is rehashed allowing for more fine tuning to make it appear better and more polished?

 

And this is the site that gave the painfully mediocre Need for Speed: The Run 90% from memory... ; )

It's fair to say that every site and magazine is guilty of overrating games at some point. It's why I only trust certain sites such as EG, Edge and GameSpot and not IGN or particularly Bit-tech (sorry guys, your other PC related stuff is awesome though).

 

What... the... hell...

I don't mind Eurogamer too much but Edge and Gamespot?!!
Bit-tech reviews at least tend to be based on, y'know, thought and reason...

 

most people today are simple. they need simple reviews with lots of pictures and a 9 or 10 to buy so they can say its better than all the games with 8 and below. One of the critics i used to always use, i absolutely hated, they had such opposite views to me that i knew if they liked it, i would hate it and vice versa. what most people dont realise is critics are human, and their reviews are personal opinions expressed in a professional format. for me it takes time getting used to a reviewer so i can see how they approach things and view other things, so i know where our opinions match or dont.

 

RPS, while not primarily a review site, does scoreless reviews precisely to avoid fixation on a number, and thereby stimulates some great debates about the actual review. It's hard to believe no-one has mentioned them, or asked for a quote for the article...

 

nice read, I can't believe people are arguing over scores nowadays though

 

I did mention them in my post earlier but not to worry.

There's no there site I've found that has a scoreless review system with the quality of writing that you find at RPS.

 

Why is it totally useless? It gives an indication of how well the vehicle stands up to accident impact, not just in a hand-wavy way, but a quantified measure, conducted in scientific fashion. Even if you don't like the scores (which do follow a rigid framework based on actual results rather than feelings), the identification of cars which have weaknesses in terms of crash safety is a laudable goal. Several manufacturers have used the data given to them by the NCAP testing to improve their vehicle's safety.

It doesn't indicate exactly how safe a car is out there in the real world, but it gives people an indication if a car has a score of 68 rather than 38.

 

Krikkit, there are 26 different crash ratings throughout the world. Why doesn't NCAP do them all and give us a real judgement against real world scenarios.
It's because our law means they do not have to. Please go and read how they test and think of all the accidents on the motorway. It is other countries tests that help with that not NCAP.

Still off topic though!