Retreading the trail: Review scores

UPDATE: Whatever happened with those review scores, isn't a lasting trend. I'm late to return here, but as I guessed, it wasn't a permanent change in feature. Sad, but I still stand by this article as a reminder that reviews don't really need scores. End Update

So one of my more frequently visited sites, PS lifestyle, had an interesting unofficial change today. Perhaps its just a glitch, and before I even submit it things are changed back to normal, or maybe there will even be an official word and explanation for this put out. Its the Headlander, and the import review of Dragon's Quest Heroes 2 both do not end with a number score. Although the DQH2 score can also be explained away with the bottom as "Only PS4 version evaluated in this review. Therefore, cross-platform multiplayer could not be tested and for this reason, there is no numerical score assigned". So don't read too much into that, but it still strikes me as odd and Headlander has no explanation. In fact the entire score card if off. At first I was a little disappointed. Reviews scores are fun to read, I'll give it that, but that's all it is... its just fun. Its fun to hypothetically assess where a game is on this number of 1 to 10 scale. However as a serious tool and use, its as useful as playing charades with a buddy to determine if you are burning or keeping your $60. That's why I ditched them myself, and I still stand by my system and what I crudely said here. Notably the part where I said...

They give it a 7. What's that supposed to mean? How is that supposed to really tell you the whole experience they had, and their recommendation? A 7 out of nearly infinite numbers or other ratings they could have choosen? Well it makes no difference... whether its 70%, 7%, 7 out of 10, 3 stars out of 5, or C-, you can't really get anything out of that. [...] An entire $60 seems to be in part balanced not by entertainment, length, or cleverness, but instead by a scale ranging from 1 to 100 or 1 to 5. You can't summarize a whole essay, speech, or professional judgement on anything with just a number. Neither can you summarize all the content, fun, or problems of a game with it, and I might even say developers should feel insulted that their work and effort is put on such abstract scales.

So I certainly agree with it being removed. Its not just my input though. I think PS Lifestyle's scores have been trouble for them before as well, and a few other users have also commented on it. Lets take a look at their infamous 10/10 ACU score from some time back, and I'll quote a conversation starting with person "A" and including me at one point (ironically defending the score)...

A) How can you list 2 negatives yet give it a flawless score?

B)  10/10 does not indicate a flawless game, otherwise no title would qualify. It simply means "as impressive as a game can be."

A)  Huh? They both mean the same thing and no title should qualify for top marks either imo. That's why I don't like the numbered review scores, it's flawed, colours would be better

B)  Well, my (and this site's) interpretation is that no game is perfect. A game can be incredibly impressive with a couple minor issues and still earn a 10/10.

Me)  They're pretty minor negatives for a game that's supposedly a blast to play.

C) Minor negatives that in other reviews could end up meaning the game gets a 7. See this is the problem with game reviews. There's no consistency at all. It's because the reviewers still believe they should be giving strictly their own opinion, instead of trying to be objective and realizing that reviews are used as a reference.

It wound up being a guy that responded to me who ran into his own ramblings about a broken number system, but that wasn't even the first time it was bashed in this chatter ("colours would be better"). But I'll tell you what, you can go and look at this whole mess yourself to find the full conversation. This was a review that left them with nearly around 400+ inflammatory comments angered by mostly the score. The review was badly written and got some flak itself (and to the writer's defense, he saw legit feedback from the two or so people that gave it), however the score was a big part of its problems. People were inraged by the 10/10 a broken and poorly functional game like Unity got. The funny thing to is I'd totally be on the guy's side if it weren't for the fact that his review was still poorly written and I couldn't get behind him on it at all. But I'd been in those cases where a game was "flawed, broken, trash" and I still loved it. I love games like Naughty Bear, Two Worlds 2, and then Alpha Prime remains one of my favorite casual FPSs to just jump in and enjoy its sheer B-grade rip-off pulp fiction style. On the other side of the spectrum, I know critics who literally can't play fully functional and fun 30fps games if their lives depended on it.

So, 3/10?

So how do you decide to review games like this? How in a world where people will flock to and buy millions of a watered-down Battlefront cash-in, with critics who are blind to certain broken games, and snobs who can't be bothered to touch a game if its not hitting certain standards developers may not even consider for the normal market? One word: COMMUNICATION! Communicate the way you like your games, tell people how good the game is, where it falls (and if it does or doesn't bother you), tell them how the mechanics work and if they're any good, and tell us if the game is good or bad in regards with what you're looking for. A seven, a ten, or a big fat hen wont tell you any of those things. They distract from all those efforts to say such things. They have caused people to get cozy and lazy and rely on a number to dictate their emotions.  However emotions, like number scores, are abstract things, and so nobody really knows what they're arguing over. Maybe a 10 is a forbidden perfect to some people, but to others it just means its as good as you could hope for and not about perfection. It differs, and no matter how much you stand by a web's code on what a number means, nobody is actually looking at that... because you made them a shortcut abstract code they want to read, interpret themselves, and argue over, rather than actually read what the damn game is about. Take that away, and they're forced to edge into reading bits about the game and maybe even *gasp* get a curiosity about what it offers and does as a game.

Sadly there's already one (and one upvoted at that, so basically 2) people arguing for this to be reverted. I'm not here to single out any individual, and its definitely not the result of a mob mentality to complain about, but I'm going to address their side of the argument head-on anyways. I already discussed this with them as well, so I did do my part to hope this doesn't snowball in that direction. Basically, they're wondering how will they determine if a game is worth reading about and save their time if they don't have a number score to determine if its any good first? Basically, they would maybe consider reading about a game only if it got like an 8/10 or something (not specified, but going off the modern assumptions of a system, they wont be giving much of the score a chance). Otherwise they'd save time and skip the game completely, not reading a bit about it.

I could respond to this mentality in so many ways. I get it, and understand the desire to save time in this busy world. Right now I want to edit together a video, start a new Doom map, have 2 novels I'm trying to finish, am writing my own work, have a couple youtube videos I want to watch, and I probably wont get it all done today and I'm still distracting hours of my time with this article. I definitely didn't wast even more of my morning reading the full review of either of the games that kickstarted this discussion. Still I'm not in such a hurry that I'd throw away any knowledge of the game. Be it a 3/10 or a 9/10, they're both worth knowing something about if they caught your attention enough to go to the review page. So freakin' read something! That's what the summary is there for, or the ability to skim an article. I've done that countless times and walked out still empowered to know what that game did for the reviewer, and if its worth my time to consider. You don't need numbers for a shortcut, and if you do need things cut that short, you certainly don't have the time to be browsing video game websites for reviews. Either learn about the games, or don't bother to make it a big part of your time. You almost deserve to miss out on hidden gems if you only accept 8 out of 10s and such.

The only thing I'll add in conclusion is... I actually would like to see the summary points go back. PS lifestyle actually inspired my own review board, and I believe I found them doing it before sites like IGN followed suit. Its not a bad thing to copy either, the summary pros/cons are an awesome little bit. They bring up the most prominent faults and awesome bits of a game, and highlight them as "This is what you've got to accept walking into if you're planning on buying this product". It was perfect not only for those in a hurry, but just as a powerful end for those doing a full reading. So I borrowed that element in creating my own new format, and also applied general powerful feeling words, like if walking away from a gaming session left you to find the game was still "awesome", or if it was "okay", or something "heretical" to your time and to the nature of gaming. Those formed the basis of my score cards instead of abstract gibberish numerical nonsense. I'd certainly welcome PS Lifestyle to put those back. But you know what, even if that's the end of it alongside their entire scorecard, I'd be fine with that. Throw out the number scores, take a stand like Eurogamer, and continue to push the net that much closer to actually learn about the games that your writers are spending time on, and devs spent up to and beyond a year of their life working on. No 6, 7, 8, 9, or whatever can cover that kind thing.

Neither can a number capture the surprises, and joy that a good game brings