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Castle Paradox
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Shadowiii
It's been real.
Joined: 14 Feb 2003
Posts: 2460
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 Posted: Thu Nov 20, 2003 3:40 pm Post subject: |
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In regards to what Fenrir has said (yes, I did read it all) I'd like to point out a few things.
1. Reviews in this community are largely written by people who have a basic idea of game design. Agreed? I'm not saying we all have made games (me, for example) but most of us who write GOOD reviews tend to have studied about game design, played a few (or a lot) and so have a general idea of what makes a game good without being swooned by games that WERE good and now their name is what sells, not the game. (Think: FFX-2)
Although SOME reviews could be written by people who just want to write reviews because they "can" and thus write crappy reviews, or some are written by people who DO have the general concept of game design, but still write crappy ones (read my Arfenhouse review and you'll see what I mean), it is safe to say that these reviews can give you a good idea of what "real life" game critics are going to say about your game. Sure, it isn't perfect (nothing is), but reviews tend to be written by the upper crust.
2. Hits don't really mean anything. Ok, so I posted a 100 Downloads thing about Pitch Black, and now I'm saying they mean nothing? Well, there is a difference between that and Final Fantasy H.
Take for example the 2 bazillion rabid fan-boys and girls who are obsessed with the final fantasy series. They buy each game and declare it a masterpiece, even if the game is HORRIBLE. They own all the action figures, have posters, and buy pornographic/hentai magazines to see Tifa nude. You know who they are. So they are playing around, get into Google, and search for Final Fantasy. Blam. Final Fantasy H. "Ooooh! Another Final Fantasy game! ROBOT GET." Blamo, hit. We aren't saying they are going to play it, but they did "get it." Heck, probably 9/10's of them didn't even bother to get the GAME.EXE to figure out how to work it. Too hard. So...yeah.
Then take an extremely good to the point of insanity OHR game. Hmm...how about Walthros, Time Flies, or Loldis...whatever that game is called. Who is going to search for that? Who types "Walthros" in a search engine? "Time Flies" maybe. "Loldis..." heck, I can't even spell it. Nobody. Thats why they dont' ahve many hits.
Arfenhouse's hits popularity is obvious...it has two movies posted up at various locations all over, its own message boards, etc. Though not as well known as Final Fantasy, it is well known.
QUOTE TIME.
| Quote: | Now, It stands to reason that if a person made a particularily good game, then people would download it and form their own opinion of it. The excuse that people don't know what it is they're getting into also seems a little short, because (a) there's reviews already there that cover various aspects of the game, so people who download it can make a more informed decision than if there weren't reviews, (b) they can see conflicting scores and then say that different people have different opinions on it, might as well see what the fuss is about, and lastly, (c) bringing in people from outside the community to play our games IS sort of the point of even making games to begin with.
::Fenrir |
Yes. People IN THE COMMUNITY will probably see the score and think once or twice about downloading it (its a big file at 56k). But that doesn't stop all those FFFreaks from downloading it just because it has the name "Final Fantasy" slapped on it (same with Arfenhouse, for that matter)
| Quote: | Passing around a few RPGs every few months amoungst a small community of people who share similar ideas on game design will not effectively teach you what makes a good game, or at least not as much as releasing it on the public at large and then exposing yourself to a wider audience with VARIED opinions on what makes a good game.
::Fenrir |
Very true, though I don't think all our opinions on game design are similar, on the contrary, they are very...varied. I will say that a few basic underlying things tend to keep on kicking (ripping, poor stories, etc...), but overall opinions tend to vary. When reviewing Walthros, I'm probably not going to give it an A+ (true confessions) because its battles start out pretty bad. I'm sure I'll have some people get pissed, but the point is...people here DO have free will, and we also do have many varied opinions. FFH's review list is a good example of this.
| Quote: | If we're just here to show our games to one another, they'll start looking almost identical after three or four more years.
::Fenrir |
This is irrelevent to the topic at hand, but I'd like to point out that I strongly disagree with this. Game have and always been inspired by the author's imagionation. Sure we have influences from other sources, but you could say that all OHR games are Final Fantasy ripoffs and be right about almost half of them. I fail to see where this is a bad thing...because the community builds us up, it doen't break us down.
| Quote: | How many people here do NOT have Super Mario Bros. 3 in their houses?
::You know who  |
Me, actually. I fail to see why this game is so popular. Probably because it says "Super Mario Brothers" on it. This is actually one of my least favorite platformers of all time, believe it or not.
| Quote: | Granted, if you were going to say that 'Game X' is very popular in the OHR community, but 'Game Y' is not as popular in the community but has 10 times as many hits as Game X because of outside influences, then I'd say that it appeals to a wider market, and that should speak something of it's quality.
::Fenrir |
No. I follow you until you said "quality." How many copies of Final Fantasy X did they sell? How many copies of Legend of Dragoon? The "quality" thing could be stated for a few games (think Myst) but it isn't a universal truth. Remember above with the FFFanatics...people who download something becaue its got that in its title. I bought Legend of Dragoon (to my everlasting shame) because I saw the "Three Years Production Time" crap and played it. I bought Empire Earth because of of all the hype. I bought Final Fantasy 8 for the same reason. I'm sure there are people out there who love LOD or EE or FF8, but I don't. I think they are lower quality and I dislike them. Many reviewers would agree with me (and disagree) that these games suck.
Eh. I guess the real point is that you can't determine whether a game is good or not by how many people buy it or how many people download it, you'll have to take what they actually SAY. And...I had a really witty thing to say but I just forgot it. I need ginko bad or SOMETHING. 
Eh....but I think you can see my point. Download count does count for SOMETHING, but certainly not more then people who have actually played and studied the game THEN written a review. Assuming they studied it (I do)...but that is a different story.
So yeah, there is my position on the matter.
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Fenrir-Lunaris
WUT
Joined: 03 Feb 2003
Posts: 1747
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| Posted: Thu Nov 20, 2003 5:02 pm Post subject: |
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| Fenrir-Lunaris wrote: | | I had to use an example of a popular game that a lot of people like, and yet has a low rating. It stands to reason that because of it's position, and for various other reasons (advertisment mostly) and also because of it's grade, that it made the best choice to illustate my point: The grade doesn't matter. |
I mention it for one paragraph, and people actomatically assume that my second post as a response was meant to defend FFH. No, no, no, for the last time no, I used it as an example to illustrate my point that it's popular (for whatever reasons, rabid fanboys included) and yet has a low score. In fact, my prediction way back when was that Arfenhouse 3 would eventually surpass it as far as the download count goes. I keep trying to reiterate that a grade doesn't matter, regardless of what it's slapped on. PHC has said that Walthros isn't worth the A+ it has, Gihern and Mercenaries are much better, and I'll agree with him on this. Misteroo probably, no... definately thinks Arfenhouse is WAY too hyped up from what it deserves. If a game's author thinks that their game is less deserving than the grade it's got, then they're probably more justified in saying that then most people. After all, they know its flaws better than anyone else.
And yes, I'm aware that FFH's target audience is more or less the majority of old-school Final Fantasy fanatics, that was sort of the point behind releasing it. I don't expect someone who hates FF to automatically hate FFH, but then again, I don't expect them to like it. It's modeled after the rest of the series, it shares their flaws of unoriginality, cliche storyline, and repeditive gameplay.
There's one major flaw in my illustration of using FFH to point out the grade doesn't matter... it's the only game on the list that fits that pattern. No one game with a high enough number of downloads (200+) also has a relatively low score aside from FFH. EXCEPT for maybe Magnus. Magnus is a game that just about everyone will say is outright TERRIBLE. And yet it has quite a few downloads. If this is what people are picking up on, I'm sorry for the misunderstanding in my reasoning, but frankly I believed it was an accurate account of why a game's grade simply has no bearing on what's inside that game, and I attempted to use that as an allegory that grading people has no bearing on who or what they actually are. Instead I'll quote Hunter Green.
| Hunter Green wrote: | | The download system is probably a better way to judge a game's quality, but JSH makes a good point that not everyone necessarily knows what they're downloading. On the ohter hand, unless CN makes review grades affect the grade you get from said reviews, he's basicially opening the door for any goofass with a grudge to tarnish your name on CP. |
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Fenrir-Lunaris
WUT
Joined: 03 Feb 2003
Posts: 1747
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| Posted: Tue Nov 25, 2003 1:23 am Post subject: |
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| I assume this is now a dead issue? |
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msw188
Joined: 02 Jul 2003
Posts: 1041
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| Posted: Tue Nov 25, 2003 3:30 pm Post subject: well... |
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| What else is there to say? Chaos Nyte says that it is definitely happening. I think that if the purpose is to create competition, then this is a perfect idea. Me, I don't think that competition is so necessary (or even necessarily good), but I could argue that having the grades appear doesn't actually do anything. It's just information, just a statistic. It's up to community members to either judge or not judge others based on it. As long as these grades don't affect anything concrete, such as webspace allowed for games, posts allowed per unit time, or something like that. That would make me upset. But the mere showing of information should not be an issue; people here should know enough not to trust someone else's grades of a person. |
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Chaos Nyte
Reviewer
Joined: 03 Jan 2003
Posts: 511
Location: Hirakata
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| Posted: Tue Nov 25, 2003 6:32 pm Post subject: |
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| Well said, msw. |
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Rinku
Joined: 02 Feb 2003
Posts: 690
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| Posted: Wed Nov 26, 2003 12:09 am Post subject: |
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"CN, Fyre, and Rinku have stated over and over that part of the reason games are reviewed in the first place is to help the game's creator improve and develop their skills as a game maker/designer/whatever."
correction: i said that's the reason demos are reviewed, not that that is the reason games in general are reviewed.
the reason games themselves are reviewed are to save time for the audience: to tell the audience whether he'd like or dislike the game in question.
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Battleblaze
Warrior Thread Monk
Joined: 19 Dec 2003
Posts: 782
Location: IndY OHR
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| Posted: Fri Dec 26, 2003 11:30 am Post subject: Both sides have a pretty good argument |
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ok heres the lowdown( ) What rinku is trying to do is just enhance OHR by adding more of the spirit of competion. Not make people feel ashamed. And yes it has been proven to make people try harder its the spirit of all sports and competions that fuels athletes to do there best and if they fail take it with stride and keep trying.
But
One setu's side OHR isn't a competition it's a comunity where people make games and have fun. James created a comunity not a sport. And while making games is fun and can be competitive if one makes it, this is not what OHR is. Sure rank does exist here. Every one knows Setu's a better game maker than me but no one needs to make it official. But since he's better than me I do strive to make better games but he's not a rival he's a standerd. Some thing to look up to and work at, not somthing to fight with and be able to say "I'm better"
In conclusion 
I'd have to agree with setu and the rest. Let's leave the competion to the contest (which we need more of). It was a nice thought but it would do more bad then good.
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"Aeth calls PHC an anti-semite; PHC blames anti-semitism"
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Iblis
Ghost Cat
Joined: 26 May 2003
Posts: 1233
Location: Your brain
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| Posted: Fri Dec 26, 2003 12:25 pm Post subject: |
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Wow, thanks for summarizing a debate we all participated in months ago. It's good that we have people like you to do that.
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Hunter Green
About to beat this double head with a pipe
Joined: 04 Feb 2003
Posts: 350
Location: Alternate Albion
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| Posted: Fri Dec 26, 2003 12:30 pm Post subject: |
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Watch out, pointing out forum faux pas like that can get you banned from OHRRPGCE.com.
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Aethereal
SHUT UP.
Elite Designer
Joined: 04 Jan 2003
Posts: 928
Location: Gone! I pop in on occasion though.
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| Posted: Fri Dec 26, 2003 12:56 pm Post subject: |
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Why was this even revived when it was rather obvious that we were going to go through with this?
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