So after getting a mod warning for being too "negative" in my first thread it got me thinking. First, would I get a warning for being too positive? Second, how are we rating mmo's now?

After 300+ hours of SWTOR beta, doing an off the top of my head rating, it got somewhere around a 6 - 7 out of 10 (I'm an illogicaly harsh critic I guess). Lets just call it a 7 for now, which for me is a pretty godd rating since 8+ (for me) are GOTY or better. And seriously, go on the swtor forums, the most vocal and positive voices are people with the least logged hours or guild spam.

ANYWHOS, after breaking it down to a few categories I ended up scoring it much lower and I was extremely suprised.

I was positive the game wasn't that bad. So what I'd like to know is, what are the most comprehensive categories used to analyze mmo's. I'm guessing something like this:

RPG - Roleplayability, Replayability, General playability etc...

Storyline -  Story writing, World lore etc...

Audio presentation - UI sounds, Music scores, Voice acting, Sound effects, General audio quality etc...

Visual presentation - Graphics, Physics, Artstyle, Animations etc...

Community - Social interaction, Co-operative Gameplay vs environment or vs other players.

Gameplay - Ease of use, Mechanics, AI, Available content etc...

General Fun - good times lol...?

Possibly some categories may overlap or be completely redundant or even baseless but you get the general idea. What I want to know is, what IS the general idea of how an MMORPG should be broken down.

I'm sure you could find your answer with a simple search of video game review sites, magazines, etc.

Good Luck.

I think your warning had more to do with putting labels on people 'simple minded' for example when you yourself spent close to 300 hours in game.

I'll do grades on MMO's too, it's fun to break them down and talk about what you liked and disliked.  Isn't that what these forums are actually for??

But in reality, i only have ONE criteria for any MMO.  Am I having fun?  that's it.  Becuase if the answer is yes, then all that other stuff is obviously just fine.  If the answer is No, then no matter the polish, no matter the innovation, or gameplay, I'll be canceling my subscription.

We're just consumers, that's all.  And this is just entertainment, nothing more.  So I don't spend alot of time bashing MMO's I didn't like, what's the point of that?

I just ask myself, am I having fun?  And during the beta, I most certainly am.

If you want to do a "professional" review and be taken seriously, here's how you do it...

1. Get deal with game developer / publisher to get interviews / early access / ad dollars for your site.

2. Review the game based solely on a few hours of shallow "fun factor" and a subjective positive assessment of the visual presentation, and compare it only to games in the last year which were worse.

3. Give the game a 10 out of 10. Or, to increase credibility, give it a 9 out of 10 and cite some ludicrous reason like "I felt the graphics were a little too yellow, but everything else was perfect."

4. If the game turns out to lose half to three-quarters of its players in three months, don't worry...that's the new norm. Obviously super awesome perfect games often lose most of their players very quickly despite using a business model that banks on long-term play.

5. Re-review the game and talk about how they are adding lots of things and turning some corner or other, and that everyone should give it another shot.

6. Next game.

I'm surprised at some of the ratings that people are giving various games.

Much like so many other things, those ratings mean different things to different people.  I have seen some people explaining it as a pass/fail.  The one guy said that 6 or below was failing for him because of his school background (D's were failing).  That means for each "item" that he believed the game passed on, it started with a 7 rating.

So basically "positive" numbers would be 7, 8, 9, 10 while "negative" numbers would be 6, 5, 4, 3, 2, 1.

Some go on a scale of 0-10 instead of 1-10.

This is further muddled when you take into account other ranking systems.

F, F+, D-, D, D+, C-, C, C+, B-, B, B+, A-, A, A+...14 possible ratings.  Which if you go with 7 or higher being passing (C-), you have 9 grades for 4 points.

0 stars, .5 stars, 1 star, 1.5 stars, 2 stars, 2.5 stars, 3 stars, 3.5 stars, 4 stars, 4.5 stars, 5 stars... 11 ratings (or 9 if you only go to 4).

More often than not, the points - grades - stars do not really say as much as the meat of the discussion leading up to person giving that rating.  I often agree with the review but disagree with the rating.

My criteria is simple...

Is it fun? Yes / No

Don't care what other people say. It is my money, so only I can make a decision on whether it is worth the money or not :)

Here's how i do it for myself:

1. Do i enjoy this game? - Yes / No

Based on that deep analysis i proceed to do whatever i feel like doing at the moment.

Problem is ; game like ModernWarfare 3 despite its bad review , still managed to have round 6,5 million sales . Hence the enjoyment frm the players have nothing to do with the quality of the game.

Then why is review important?

Yes sure, it will not affect the sales ( u can argue this) , but it will be required for improving the game in longer term .  Especially for STWTOR , which is a subscription based game.

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Originally posted by bobfish
My criteria is simple...
 
Is it fun? Yes / No
 
Don't care what other people say. It is my money, so only I can make a decision on whether it is worth the money or not :)

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