I'm honestly fine with 7/10 as average. The problem is that now we've gotten to the point where 8 is bad, 9 is expected, and t10 is necessary for most games with hype.Legion said:I wish you'd went into more detail about why you like them, you mentioned they were fun and you liked debating them, but didn't really go into the reasons.
Personally I don't mind review scores. I just dislike the way 5/10 should mean average, but most people tend to think 7/10 is average and everything below that is bad. Obviously like you said, that's peoples problem, not the scores themselves.
I'd written out a whole response here before realising what the inherent problem with this argument is: we're confusing our definitions of "average". You're essentially arguing past each other because you're operating under different assumptions of what "average" means/should mean.Xanadu84 said:I'm rather irritated with that point. 5 does not have to be average. 5 just happens to be the middle number. I don't know about how you get graded but for me, if I scored a 50 on a test, I'm not going to complain that I failed because 50 is, "Average". To say that a 7 or 8 is average is EXACTLY as arbitrary as saying that 5 is. No, 5 is not inherently average. What is average is dependent on the kind of scores most games get. If average games get 7.5, then 7.5 IS average. Like...you know...by math.Another said:I don't mind review scores, if it's a true scale score system.
In a scale of 1-10, five is average. Not 7 or 8. 7's and 8's can still be really good. Iv'e enjoyed a fair few games that have received such.
I do, sometimes. My post was more of a critique of Jim's video making, which comes across as lazy. About 5-10% of them is pretty damn funny and the problem is I don't know which 5-10%, which means I have to watch the whole thing so I don't miss anything.mjc0961 said:...Then don't. This may come as a total surprise to you, but you don't have to watch the video just because it's there. You can open a new tab and just listen to the words while you look at something else. You can minimize the browser, turn off your monitor, or get up and do other things in the room while the audio plays.Blood Brain Barrier said:Jim should do audio clips rather than videos. I don't need to watch streams of clips from Japanese games I don't care about while at the same time listening to completely unrelated streams of Jim's occasionally funny/entertaining monologues.
Meanwhile, those of us who like the video, especially when it's a situation where the game clips help drive the point home (such as "Monster Boobs And Plastic Children", where I never would have known that the volleyball game he was talking about was that creepy if he hadn't been showing clips throughout the episode), can still watch them instead of having them taken away because the almighty Blood Brain Barrier dislikes them.
I wish I knew the exact psychology on it. I might ask some teachers and psych majors the exact reasoning behind it.DVS BSTrD said:It's weird how a 3/5 still sounds like a good game but a 60/100 is usually passed over. I guess with little numbers it's easier to focus on the fact that it still has 3 points instead of it not having those last 40.Bocaj2000 said:My compromise has always been to use X/5 instead of X/10 or X/100. When it's X/5 it's easier to interpret 3/5 as average than 5/10 or 50/100. It makes the review feel more like a suggestion than a grade on a test.
Just want to point out that my definition is either the mathematical definition when scores are representing some sort of representation of quality, or the colloquial definition of middling in terms of quality. 5 is "Average" only insofar as it is the average of all the integers in the set. Which is completely arbitrary, because we are talking about game quality, and not arithmetic. Its an easy enough assumption to make initially, but reality has demonstrated that it is clearly wrong.Xelanath said:I'd written out a whole response here before realising what the inherent problem with this argument is: we're confusing our definitions of "average". You're essentially arguing past each other because you're operating under different assumptions of what "average" means/should mean.Xanadu84 said:I'm rather irritated with that point. 5 does not have to be average. 5 just happens to be the middle number. I don't know about how you get graded but for me, if I scored a 50 on a test, I'm not going to complain that I failed because 50 is, "Average". To say that a 7 or 8 is average is EXACTLY as arbitrary as saying that 5 is. No, 5 is not inherently average. What is average is dependent on the kind of scores most games get. If average games get 7.5, then 7.5 IS average. Like...you know...by math.Another said:I don't mind review scores, if it's a true scale score system.
In a scale of 1-10, five is average. Not 7 or 8. 7's and 8's can still be really good. Iv'e enjoyed a fair few games that have received such.
Anyway, I'd love to discuss this further, but writing that original post really took it out of me. Yawn.
I don't know if 2.5 stars is considered below average on the Escapist. It's just that there are so many games above average, why would you waste your time with one that was only barely up to par? (Come to think of it, this would explain the 7/10 scores, too)Lvl 64 Klutz said:It depends on how you look at the 10 point grading scale. If you look at it like an academic grade, then 7/10 *should* be the average/mediocre game. That's how most reviewers see it, even. Just look here on the Escapist where 2 and a half stars is usually accompanied by a "don't bother" recommendation and anything below that is pretty much considered garbage.Legion said:I wish you'd went into more detail about why you like them, you mentioned they were fun and you liked debating them, but didn't really go into the reasons.
Personally I don't mind review scores. I just dislike the way 5/10 should mean average, but most people tend to think 7/10 is average and everything below that is bad. Obviously like you said, that's peoples problem, not the scores themselves.
,Bocaj2000 said:I wish I knew the exact psychology on it. I might ask some teachers and psych majors the exact reasoning behind it.DVS BSTrD said:It's weird how a 3/5 still sounds like a good game but a 60/100 is usually passed over. I guess with little numbers it's easier to focus on the fact that it still has 3 points instead of it not having those last 40.Bocaj2000 said:My compromise has always been to use X/5 instead of X/10 or X/100. When it's X/5 it's easier to interpret 3/5 as average than 5/10 or 50/100. It makes the review feel more like a suggestion than a grade on a test.
Duke Nukem Forever. Trust me, and the rest of the world, in saying this: Do not get it. It starts out ok with "Well, that's a bit of a novel idea, this really isn't as bad as people say it is", but less than halfway through the game you'll change your mind =/.daxterx2005 said:Did I just see a game where you were throwing turds at a toilet.....?
I'm surprised that Jim didn't go over this argument, or is it because its the only sensible one against scores, and Jim likes his strawmen?muffinatorXII said:i don't really have a problem with scores it's just that they make no sense. first of all i don't believe a complex opinion can be quantified numerically and if it could you would have to decide on a universal scale to use it on, which also makes no sense because different people value things differently.
and there is this weird thing right now where 7/10 is average