As a suggestion, to be counted in the list of ideas, I'd rate and do rate games on the way I play them. I pretty much play every P2P game that comes along and give it its free month, not many make it past that month but some do and then they get a full 3 months further view, sometimes up to 5+yrs if it really gets me. Anyway, I'd like to post these  thoughts on my own internal review and usually what I put out to others if I were to rate it.

1=i would take it out back for target practice, while 10=Glory to thy name you are the 2nd coming

1. Gameplay- Is it fun, what was my fun factor, how long did It take to get bored, did grinding start right away, was in difficult or hard to level, was there a new twist on mechanics that made it interesting. Twists to guild tools, UI differences good/bad. Is there more then one race to play, a few classes, many skills, FPS? Is there interesting things to do other then combat pve/pvp? is there a crafting system, how deep is the crafting system, how weak? (Rate 1-10)

2. Sound-Does the sound jive with the world, is it just a compilation of crap standard music, do sounds happen when they should (i.e. animations sequences)., Does it sound choreographed, does the sound help me immerse myself into the world and really get into it and lose tract of hours.  (Rate 1-10)

3. Video-Does it have stuttering, does it chunk my card and make it crawl in FPS, does it have to high requirements to be good for casual gamers or too low. Do I have to go spend money on upgrades to really play this properly, and is it worth it to do so. (Rate 1 - 10)

4. Quest System-Is it kill 10 rats and fetch quests repeated exponentially, is it realistic, does it make sense, does it change the world, does it do anything different to expand the genre. Is the quest system linear, open, no quests, few quests, significant quest story lines/arc that feed into an epic real quest line that shakes the foundations of the world on discovery?  (Rate 1-10)

5. Visually Appealing-Does the textures and background make sense for the world, is it appealing, does it flow properly or look patched and hacked together, are there seams ready to burst open. Does the overall art design follow the vision of the game and flow together right, to cartoony, too reaslistic, to over shaded.. (Rate 1 - 10)

6. Combat (PVE) -general feeling of combat is fun and immersive, does it give everyone soemthing to do to feel a part of a group, a party or effective as a solo player. Does it feel like i have to grind incessantly to reach end-game to compete or have fun. Is it a race or casual game where it occurs naturally.      (Rate 1 - 10)

7. Combat (PVP)-Balanced? Fair, Zerg Fest, ganksquads, FFA, does it fit the world, does it make sense, is it all instanced or world pvp, does it support other areas of the gameworld, does it only happen at end-game highest level, is it a race to the end game to compete?    (Rate 1 - 10)

8. Roleplay-Does the game support role play, is it immersive enough to encourage roleplay, does the community support roleplay, are there us and thems? Pickup roleplay groups? are there tools that assist roleplayers in doing what they like, is it an open enough world to facilitate events.   (Rate 1 - 10)

9. World/Environment-Overall world design makes sense, does the world look different then other games, is it a clone? Are there glitches? To much instancing, zoning, phasing, or to little?       (Rate  1 - 10)

10. Support-Community, forums, customer service ticket response, helpful forums or chat areas, trade and tech areas in chat, ingame voice support, in-game gm support, quickness of response time? Helpful community leaders, designated helpers? Asshats? Barrens Chats?      (Rate  1 - 10)

I take these 10, rate them and then add together and divide by 10 and there ya go you got your score and a pretty overall fair rating touching most elements of the game.  Granted many of these kinda of slide over each other but try to stay unbiased as possible while still getting the idea across of how you feel about a game to say guildies or what not and I have used that method before in the past.

I would recommend dividing up your scores into two categories.  Subjective and Technical.  Then have the reviewer write it up along these lines.

Graphics:
-Graphical Quality (frame rate, polygons, lighting, textures, etc.) - Technical score
-Art Style - Subjective score

Sound:  
-Sound Quality (Clarity, volume levels, 3d effects, etc)
-Acoustic Style - Subjective Score

etc.

Each category should have two scores.

At the end, provide 3 scores:  Technical Score, Subjective Score, and  the average of the two.  The overall technical score should be an average of the tech scores, but the overall subjective should not have to be.  Though if the review is written properly, the overall subjective score SHOULD be around the same area as the individual subjective scores.

A review needs an actual opinion in it.  Otherwise a box-stacking game might make a perfect 9 on the technical side, but actually be about as fun as well, stacking boxes. 

Other than that I would like to see some other subjective scores on the potential of a game.  There are many games out there that start off not-so good, but have great potential and should be "watched".  There are others who are great, but didn't leave themselves alot of room to "grow" (Champions Online, i'm thinking of you.)  Lastly I would like to see some sort of meter for determining how well a game is meeting its potential.  Some games squander it, others start to develop it.

Remove the rating system completely. Make the review as informative as possible. Describe the game mechanics without giving any kind of opinion. Make a suggestion what kind of players might enjoy the game and what don't.

The use of stickies to group discussions into one thread and subsequent locking of posts on that topic outside of the thread.

Wouldnt it be just as easy to merge the locked threads into the main thread as a whole, thus not losing potentially valuable insights made in threads outside of those stickies?

Personally i dont like the use the use of the sticky threads for grouping topics like this anyway.

I think reviews should declare up front what the reviewer has received from the company.  Beta Key, Beta key plus perk, free game account, free game account + 1 month sub, free game account + 3 month sub, temporary account that is deactivated after the review is written.

It would provide two benefts:

1, it should give the reviewer and the those reading some perspective on value of a game.  It's easy to say something is awesome, the most fun ever, especially when you did not have to pay for it.  It also provides some perspective, would the reviewer keep paying to continue playing, even if s/he got the original product for free.  It also can short circuit skepticism when a reviewer states "I'm still playing the game 1 month later" -- well, gee, is that because you're still using the free time the company gave you?

2, it begins to pull the back the curtain (a bit) on anys concerns of payola (although not entirely, given ad buys.  That could be short-circuited by declared number of buys though -- doesn't have to be how much they paid)

On this site there are almost 100 games with a User Rating score of between 7.00 and 7.79.

That's 100 games with a score within 8/10th's of each other.

Which essentially makes those scores useless for determining the quality of a game.

So, with the rating system as it is, the reviews by the staff take on a greater importance and meaning.

I agree with many of the suggestions mentioned so far for improving the mechanics of the reviews.

But for me, the most important attribute of the review should be it's integrity.

Is the reviewer able to give an honest opinion without any outside pressure from advertisers or other monied interest?

littlemonkey

Id like to suggest that when you review F2P games, that you scrutinize their cash shop. The cash shop is essential in those games, and I'd like to know how it holds up in comparizon to other games. Are there items for sale making the game P2W? How is the pricing system - is this more expensive compared to other, similar games? How far can you actually play without paying, and how will the game really be if you do? What is the estimated average the gamer should spend to have a fun time in the game without too much grind/hinderances?

Not reviewing how the cash shop actually works is the same as closing your eyes on a very essential part of the game. This is not good. Please fix.