The vast majority of buyers don't even leave reviews. I highly doubt there's a significant contingent of people who would buy a game specifically on Steam (rather than a key bundle or whatever) just to make sure their rating is counted.
Valve Changes Steam User Reviews Again, Removing Reviews on Unpaid Game Copies
- Thread starter ffronw
- Start date
Hmm, good point. I do think there has to be a better way to represent middle-ground feedback aside from just the written portion though. I'd also like to see better details on what constitutes a "recent" review.Fulbert said:
Valve frankly just needs to do some actual work on the Steam client and store/site design in general. The Steam workshop alone is quite cancerous in its current state.
That's stupid, 2-4 pack co-op game bundles can only be gifted, why shouldn't my mates or me review it, they are mostly awesome anyways.
Although heavy handed, I can see some sense in this move. An important part of any user review is whether or not a user finds the game "worth" the full price.
That opinion might change dramatically between someone who got the game for free or someone who had to pay for it.
That opinion might change dramatically between someone who got the game for free or someone who had to pay for it.
Technical issues can usually be patched and fixed, and who knows how many of those negative reviews will remain negatives with outdated information. Hell, even AC: Unity is perfectly playable these days yet it carries the stigma with it (Though the "women are hard to animate" comment did not help them).Saelune said:
I tend to get lucky with tech issues though, as my computer is only a year old and can probably handle games for the next 3-5. Also the fps cap controversy I don't really care about. It all looks the same to me.
There seems to be a lot of confusion around here (not just from the quoted post). Nothing is deleted from anywhere, and anyone who owns a game, no matter how they got it, can still write all the reviews they like. The only thing that is changing is which reviews are used to calculate the average score for the game. This won't make any difference at all to any sane person - anyone who buys a game based only on a percentage score without bothering to actually read the reviews is an idiot. That said, there is one clear benefit:Zydrate said:
All too many reviews have nothing to do with the actual game, but are instead people venting their anger at something else. Kickstarted games are a big problem for this, when people spend their whole review complaining about the handling of funding and communication, complaining that it's not the game they dreamed of back when it was first announced, and so on. Things that may be worth complaining about somewhere, but not on store reviews where the point is supposed to be to let prospective buyers know if the game is actually any good or not. The fact that a promised stretch goal was cut, for example, might be annoying to someone who paid with the expectation it would be there, but is completely irrelevant to someone looking to buy the game now. Things like gifted games can have similar issues - I see plenty of reviews essentially complaining that a game just isn't a genre they like, which is irrelevant to anyone who knows what genre it actually is and can make that decision for themselves. Obviously someone who doesn't like a particular genre is far less likely to have bought such a game themselves, but may well have been gifted it and then decided to complain about it in a review.Gennadios said:
So overall, it seems like a decent change in theory, but one that shouldn't actually mean anything in practice. Reviews that are more likely to be judging a game for things that shouldn't be relevant to a review will be filtered out from the score, but no sensible person should care about the score in the first place.
It's a lot easier to overlook flaws when playing a game for free for a couple of days over paying $60 for it and hoping to get a month or more of enjoyment out of it.Zydrate said:
It's flawed in a lot of ways - I dislike the "Yes / No" voting system and would rather see a score that reflects various aspects of the game. Some people dislike scores or reviews altogether; but I'm on a limited budget and would like to know how much enjoyment I'll get out of my purchase.
I'd also do away with the reviews that have a playtime of less than an hour. So many 0.1 hours of playtime and "This game is the best EVAR!" that counts towards the score, and then person never plays it again or doesn't come back to change their review about it.
Conversely you have those people that play some games for thousands of hours and then leave a negative review. They must've had some fun with it right? I am guilty of this with Space Engineers, a game I love but is so bugged and the developer would at times release weekly patches that might horribly break the game that they wouldn't fix for a month or more. We hoped by changing our review scores the developer would take note - but people often don't review or change their score, and I don't think anyone places much weight in a review from a user that has thousands of hours in a game. Unfortunately, it's possible for a game you love to play daily to receive a patch and become absolutely broken and unplayable. So many factors to consider.
I generally look for a review with a good write up and list of pros/cons. You can get a good idea about the game by looking at the negative reviews and seeing what the complaints are, for instance a game like Avorion - "The game is hard", "I flew my spaceship into an asteroid and destroyed it!" - well yes, the game can be hard and it punishes you for making mistakes, but it's also an early access alpha so, it is what it is.
That isn't a problem.
That just motivates us to post our reviews here, on The Escapist, the best site for game reviews in the entire world.
(now where is my paycheck)
Valve I do not believe is the best game development company/corporation; they once deserved the title but all they have now is the hype of previous years.
Censoring who can post reviews based on if they spent the money on Steam? I can just tack that onto the list right below lack of customer support and not making any good new games since Portal 2. And before people mention it, yes I am excluding the complicated memory-eating Dota 2 game available exclusively on PC and the VR-only The Lab game which requires investing in a headset gimmick which arguably is not as good as the PS4's VR.
Free online gameplay and fancy mods for the elite gamers are only going to sway people for so long if the other problems keep piling up.
They need to rethink how they approach community communications and what people are allowed to say and post because this is definitely a step in the wrong direction.
I would say Sega is behaving better than Valve right now, and Sega has a ton of bad games in their recent history.
How you treat the community, via social media and direct responses via PR and customer support, will make or break you in the long-term. In that regard Sega has been doing some quality investing in recent years compared to Valve. Can't say there isn't a part of me that cringes these days when the Stema community acts like Gabe Newell is a god-emperor considering how the mighty Valve hath fallen to the level of forcing users to pay to not get their reviews censored.
That just motivates us to post our reviews here, on The Escapist, the best site for game reviews in the entire world.
(now where is my paycheck)
Valve I do not believe is the best game development company/corporation; they once deserved the title but all they have now is the hype of previous years.
Censoring who can post reviews based on if they spent the money on Steam? I can just tack that onto the list right below lack of customer support and not making any good new games since Portal 2. And before people mention it, yes I am excluding the complicated memory-eating Dota 2 game available exclusively on PC and the VR-only The Lab game which requires investing in a headset gimmick which arguably is not as good as the PS4's VR.
Free online gameplay and fancy mods for the elite gamers are only going to sway people for so long if the other problems keep piling up.
They need to rethink how they approach community communications and what people are allowed to say and post because this is definitely a step in the wrong direction.
I would say Sega is behaving better than Valve right now, and Sega has a ton of bad games in their recent history.
How you treat the community, via social media and direct responses via PR and customer support, will make or break you in the long-term. In that regard Sega has been doing some quality investing in recent years compared to Valve. Can't say there isn't a part of me that cringes these days when the Stema community acts like Gabe Newell is a god-emperor considering how the mighty Valve hath fallen to the level of forcing users to pay to not get their reviews censored.