Poll: Is "average" a five or a seven?
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Reviewers all use different systems of rating so its hard to say for sure. Personally I think a 6 is average, a 5 is serviceable and a 7 is slightly above average.
I always consider 6-7 to be about average. 8-9 being good/great and 10 being absolutely perfect. Anything below 6 probably has some sizable problems but that doesn't mean it isn't playable. Usually any game that isn't a total bugfest or constant crashing and literally not playable has to be at least a 3 or 4.
Based on short, and not-nearly-exhaustive research, I used logic to address this question. I looked up the reviews for an adventure game that was pretty horrible, and had zero replay value. So, just to be clear; assuming the game really has zero replay value, lets see how they rate replay value.
They gave replay value a 6 out of 10. Therefore an 'average' game would be an 8 out of 10.
Even then, I expect that an awesome game would really be more like 9.5, because they'd nit-pick to make it look like a critical review.
Don't take my word for it. Take games that you know were absolutely horrible, and games that were positively excellent, and try this yourselves. [You should have done this anyway - trust but verify!] I'll be very surprised if you find any game scores less than about 5.5 - that should be a game that physically assaults you right out of the box.
They gave replay value a 6 out of 10. Therefore an 'average' game would be an 8 out of 10.
Even then, I expect that an awesome game would really be more like 9.5, because they'd nit-pick to make it look like a critical review.
Don't take my word for it. Take games that you know were absolutely horrible, and games that were positively excellent, and try this yourselves. [You should have done this anyway - trust but verify!] I'll be very surprised if you find any game scores less than about 5.5 - that should be a game that physically assaults you right out of the box.
7 is average.
It´s simple, because I don´t play games that only provide 50% funtime (5) while playing.
If a game is 14 hours long you waste 7 hours of your life. That´s a whole sleep-cycle or a party.
A game that provides fun for 70% of it´s playtime is acceptable and therefor average.
It´s simple, because I don´t play games that only provide 50% funtime (5) while playing.
If a game is 14 hours long you waste 7 hours of your life. That´s a whole sleep-cycle or a party.
A game that provides fun for 70% of it´s playtime is acceptable and therefor average.
Average performance of students is a very different concept to rating how good a piece of media is. What I mean by this is that the average mark of say, a test, it defined by the results of the students who sat it. When evaluating a game you don't have that same dynamic baseline, so we set an arbitrary amount that we define as "average". It's not average in the mathematical sense, but use more to mean "it was alright". And since all reviewers have different opinions on this, their "average" value will be different to another's.
You must be very bad at maths. The average of a consecutive series of numbers is the number in the centre. But it isn't your fault, it's mostly because the OP is confused about what people mean when they say the average game score is a 7.BabyRaptor said:
You as well seem to misunderstand what average means in this context. The average mark students get in a test is defined by the total of all scores divided by the number of students. 50% is not the "average mark", 50% is the Pass/Fail point.Adventurer2626 said:
[Personal Opinion/Soapbox] Putting an average at 7 skews the scale way too much and doesn't leave enough room to place scores on a scale. I believe that both rating systems and academic grading should use a 1-10 (1-100) scale with 5 (50) as the average. It allows plenty of range for good and poor. It's also mathematically simpler. for the academic system you would have to increase the difficulty accordingly. Get kids used to competition; the population is only going to increase in their generation cycle. And probably the following one too.
And yet they put all the bad, but 'new' games in the 9&10 slot, and give, say Syberia for example a 7 >.>Arluza said:
I use 6 as the threshold or bar, personally. It means it has a bit of good going for it, but not enough to stand out, isn't broken, and might be worth a shot. That said, the content of a review is of significantly more worth than the score the reviewer gave.
10 - Awesomely awesome
9 - Amazing
8 - Great
7 - Good
6 - Meh
5 - No
4 - Nono
3 - Nonono
2 - Nononono
1 - E.T. the Extra Terrestrial
9 - Amazing
8 - Great
7 - Good
6 - Meh
5 - No
4 - Nono
3 - Nonono
2 - Nononono
1 - E.T. the Extra Terrestrial
Pretty much this problem:
http://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Main/FourPointScale
This is why I don't ever read scores any more, I'd rather go with what trusted reviewers actually say about the game, film, etc.
http://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Main/FourPointScale
This is why I don't ever read scores any more, I'd rather go with what trusted reviewers actually say about the game, film, etc.
They're the same thing really, considering that most gamers won't play anything that gets below a 5 or 6 on the 1-10 scale.
Woah..... I was totally thinking of something else when I read that...
OT: I read it thus:
>5: Crap
6: Bad
7: Decent or Average
8: Good
9: Excellent
10: AWESOME
OT: I read it thus:
>5: Crap
6: Bad
7: Decent or Average
8: Good
9: Excellent
10: AWESOME
should be 5.
is usually 7. it's a marketing trick mostly. The "weight" of the scale used to be because of how gaming is really a "go big or go home" industry... after the 16bit era, but before the indie boom, there really was no such thing as a simmering success. There were cult classics, but you couldn't bank on it. So a game that was "just a 7" was bound to just hit the bargain bin at terminal velocity. Then you tack on publisher pressure on the publications, and reviews being basically advertisements, and the number system's inanity to begin with, and you have a roiling kettle of fish.
Angry Joe uses a balanced-at-5 numbering scale though.
is usually 7. it's a marketing trick mostly. The "weight" of the scale used to be because of how gaming is really a "go big or go home" industry... after the 16bit era, but before the indie boom, there really was no such thing as a simmering success. There were cult classics, but you couldn't bank on it. So a game that was "just a 7" was bound to just hit the bargain bin at terminal velocity. Then you tack on publisher pressure on the publications, and reviews being basically advertisements, and the number system's inanity to begin with, and you have a roiling kettle of fish.
Angry Joe uses a balanced-at-5 numbering scale though.
Nowadays it seems game devs must commit seppuku if their game doesn't score over 8, but I still remember a time when in game reviews, 5 was "average" with a game scoring 6 or 7 still very likely to be fun. Most of my ps1 collection are considered 7/10s and I wouldn't trade them for anything else.
I've grown used to it, which is a damn shame. What's nice with having a 5 as an average is that it gives the really great games a bigger window to shine, nowadays the awesome and the very, very good have almost the same score, which just isn't right. Maybe we should implement a 1-12 scale to balance things out.
Just to clarify, the reason 7 has become the average is cuz of publishers and marketers pressuring reviewers for bigger scores, so they simply raised all scores. Damn metacritic and its importance >.<
Still, who cares about scores, it's what the reviewer has to say about a game that has importance.
Just to clarify, the reason 7 has become the average is cuz of publishers and marketers pressuring reviewers for bigger scores, so they simply raised all scores. Damn metacritic and its importance >.<
Still, who cares about scores, it's what the reviewer has to say about a game that has importance.