Metacritic Brings Down The Hammer On "Review Bombers"

[Glademaster_v1legacy]

If they do it for 0s with little to no content they should do the same for 10s. Most users scores are more accurate than the reviewer scores are anyway as the fan boys tend to cancel each other out and you can read reviews by other players that are closer to your own opinion.

 

[Sonic Doctor]

Dragon Age 2 was a huge mess, and I think brought a lot of this to a head because it showed a HUGE differance between paid-off reviewers, and actual fan reception. It was a case where the people who hated the game outnumbered the fanboys by a substantial number. I think this shocked "big money gaming" which is why you have it working through sources like "Giant Bomb" to pressure the independant rating systems to become biased in the favor of the industry.

What paid off reviewers? Because I was so appalled at the horrible user reviews for such a wonderful game like DA2, I read every single user review as well as the professional ones.

The majority of the professional reviewers were on par with it and it averaged out to a fine score between 79 and 82 across the platforms. There were a few "professionals" that let nostalgia from the first game cloud their reviews and scores, giving quite biased reviews.

On the user review side, scores from 0 to even 2's were invalid, at least 99% of them. They rated the game only in comparison to DA:Origins. They didn't like dialogue, fresh party characters, graphics(don't see where that comes from), different style of storytelling, and slightly changed combat, so oh no it gets a bomb type of score. They didn't grade it how it stands on its own.

When I review a game, if it is playable from start to finish it gets at least a three, because those first few points fall in the range of playability based on will the game run to completion. The next 4 points are based on how the game plays on its own if I'm not considering it a part of some franchise. If the game is part of a franchise, that is where the final 3 points play.

I gave DA2 a 9/10, one point lost because of the small amount of dungeons, I felt everything else was perfect. It gained all the points for the comparison section, because I felt it vastly improved upon the things I saw as errors in DA:O(Dialogue, leveling, combat, and bland/cliche party characters).

 

[aegix drakan_v1legacy]

0_o Waitwaitwaiiiiiit!!!

WHO THE HELL WOULD BOMB BASTION'S SCORES?!?!? BASTION WAS EFFING AWESOME!

.......Whoever bombed it with 0s and 2s is a massive jerk.

 

[Twilight_guy]

This just in: people on the internet are assholes and idiots. In other news, the sky is blue, water is wet, and birds go tweet. Turn in at 11 for our special report on Antarctic, cold or not?

It's nice to see them try and clean up their website but inevitably stupid because any review founded upon random input from generic people is going to be a mess. It's a mess getting reviews from people who are paid to review and know how to review its far worse when you just poll random people.

 

[b3nn3tt]

If they do it for 0s with little to no content they should do the same for 10s. Most users scores are more accurate than the reviewer scores are anyway as the fan boys tend to cancel each other out and you can read reviews by other players that are closer to your own opinion.

You'd imagine that if people who were planning to rate a game 0 are put off by having to actually write something, then those planning to give games a 10 would be as well.

I think this is quite a good idea, especially if one of the requirements is that people actually write something. This is especially true if there is a minmum amount that has to be written. I hate it when someone has reviewed something without giving any indication of why they've given it that score. Even a cursory argument is better than nothing.

 

[Sylocat]

I just ignore the user scores and only pay attention to the critic scores, regardless of how well-moderated the user scores are. But many other people don't, and props for pointing out that malicious review-bombing can be devastating to smaller indie developers.

Granted, no filter system is perfect (even with human oversight), but a good way of weeding out the malicious reviews is to clearly state what 0/10 reviews are FOR, and then look to see if the written accompaniment to the reviews doesn't match those criteria. For instance, whether something is "derivative" is subjective, but "derivative" is not a valid reason for a 0/10 review, especially if it's the worst flaw the reviewer can think of.

 

[Zhukov]

The clever thing to do would be to delete any review that gives a 0 or a 10, but don't tell anyone you're doing it.

Instant fanboy reduction right there.

 

[TitanAura]

Good. Now ban all of the reviews that give 10 games a year perfect scores.

 

[Hungry Donner]

The best way to fix metacritic, and other review aggregate sites? Close them down. These things are a blight.

 

[sir.rutthed]

Why the fuck would you review bomb Bastion? That game is fantastic! Probably the same assholes that review bombed Portal 2 for their "Day 1 DLC". Ban those assholes, I say! And ya, mandating written reviews would at least let people see which reviews can be taken more seriously.

 

[RaikuFA]

Why the fuck would you review bomb Bastion? That game is fantastic! Probably the same assholes that review bombed Portal 2 for their "Day 1 DLC". Ban those assholes, I say! And ya, mandating written reviews would at least let people see which reviews can be taken more seriously.

because it is a popular indie game and that cannot exist to idiots

 

[Mallefunction]

I hate when this sort of bullshit happens. It happened on DA2 and it's downright confusing. But I guess it's the last recourse for disgruntled gamers when trolling forums no longer satisfies them. Poor games industry; the type of customers that buy their products are also the kind that sit around on the internet and ***** every time a game underwhelms them. Give it a reasonable score that matches its quality? Naah, I'll just slap a zero on it and accuse them of destroying all my most cherished gaming memories.

Pretty much this. I see the problems with most of the games I've played but people act like the games have beaten and raped their mothers. It's ridiculous.

 

[KarlMonster]

It should be noted that even during a bombing, people need to actually care enough to be following the source discussing the target, and agree with it enough to go through the trouble of acting to lower it's rating. That right there makes it fairly legitimate on something like Metacritic. Especially when you look at the opposite side, with fanboys who will do the same thing to lavish praise on a product that doesn't deserve it. You don't hear game producers complaining about users lavishing unqualified praise on a product. You also don't see Metacritic removing perfect 10 scores that don't include any justification... largely because no companies are going to complain about things that work towards making them money. ...
Overall I think Metacritic is pretty fair (or is when they aren't singling out reviews for removal) because "bombers" and "fanboys" tend to balance each other, especially when it comes to big titles.

I'll vaguely agree with you in principle, but this part isn't quite right. And I'll show you what I mean. Compare and contrast the following two statements:

"Hey! I really hate that guy! Let's go egg his house!" (break stuff, whatever)

"Hey! I really like that guy! Let's go wash his car for him!"

Both statements propose reasonable actions based on attitude (though probably hinging on the empathy with the immediate audience i.e. co-conspirators). Both statements suggest approximately equal amounts of work being done. However, one of those statements stands out as being a little out of place in our modern culture. Why is that?

I'm not going to wring out why this equals anything. Mostly because I'd end up bad-mouthing Anonymous again. Then people would accuse me of social meta-bombing - which I might as well use as another example. If you had to compare the number of times you heard people being criticized in their absence, with the number of times you heard people being praised in their absence, what would the ratio be?

Metacritic STILL is not the problem.

 

[legendp]

"The way to fix Metacritic user reviews is to simply require a written review and verify user accounts," he said. "If it was just some random blog I'd say whatever. But this is a major news review aggregator that should have better oversight and some standards."
(forgot how to quote)

this is what needs to be done, seriously as much as you may hate cod, halo or gears of war. do they really deserve 0's or is it just because you think they are more popular than game's you really like? whenever I review a game I try to be open minded and look at it as a single product not a franchise with a fanbase I hate

 

[Waaghpowa]

But Dragon Age 2 deserves A 4.2
http://www.metacritic.com/game/pc/dragon-age-ii

Yeah, that's the most honest, reasonable score for that turd I've seen in any review.

5/5 my aching ass. You still fail for that, Escapist.

Did you notice that the Escapist review score is no longer on metacritic?

OT: I agree with people with the 0's and 10 scores, delete those.

 

[Space Jawa]

So when are we going to see them delete the "perfect" 10 scores that are posted without comment in order to combat people who try to game the system the other way in an attempt to give their favorite games unwarranted misleading inflated scores?

 

[repeating integers]

This is understandable, but there's still the problem of games getting higher scores than they deserve. Ex: FFXIII.
How do they plan on fixing that?

With the thought police. Everyone must have the same opinion on everything, obviously.

Oh wait.

OT: Good. 0-bombing stops being funny after a while.

 

[E-Penguin]

I remember reading a metacritic-review about Mass Effect that simply said that it had seen better stories and more interesting characters in other games.

This warranted a "0" score.

I'm still dumbstruck whenever I think about it.

I support this decision wholeheartedly.