User Review Overhaul

[DGCae]

I'm going to be completely honest, the User Review section is shit at the moment when it comes to organization. Right now it's a conglomerate of a bunch of reviews for a bunch of games both video and otherwise with absolutely no order or easy way to find what you're looking for without searching for every topic/post that may include the game you're after on the forums. Since the forum is still in the process of getting developed and what not I thought it'd be a good idea to throw in a suggestion on how to organize it a bit better.

• Subsections for the subsections for the subsections. I'm not talking every game, do it like we have on the rest of the forum, Video Games > RPG or Table Top > Card Games... etc.
• Perhaps an alphabetical sort option and a way to jump straight to a specific letter.
• A format requirement for at the very least the title of the topic. The actual review format itself can very from user to user but have a requirement for the title of the review ie. Game Name - Console/PC - Score so it makes it easier on the eyes and easier to find what you're looking for while also working in tandem with that alphabetical sort from before.

I think incorporating any one of these would benefit the forum greatly but personally I wouldn't mind seeing all three for the most optimal experience, but that's just me. I'll even offer to edit titles and sort the stuff myself too for free. Sometimes it sucks being a neat freak. :P

[Tom]

There needs to be atleast 2 sections to begin with: Trending reviews( new etc ) and the review archive.

[Ronnin426850]

One of the major reasons the User Review section is a mess is that 98% of the people who post there think it's a "General opinions about whatever I wanna talk about" section. Like, reviewing a single item from a game, and the "review" consisting of 4 sentences giving personal opinion about the item - that's a joke. A review should be on a full game or a DLC with 20+ hours of gameplay, and should be informative, objective and well written.
So I believe a section called "I can't write reviews to save my life, but I have a strong opinion about this one thing" should be made to separate those passionate shitposts from the actual reviews.

[Tom]

One of the major reasons the User Review section is a mess is that 98% of the people who post there think it's a "General opinions about whatever I wanna talk about" section. Like, reviewing a single item from a game, and the "review" consisting of 4 sentences giving personal opinion about the item - that's a joke. A review should be on a full game or a DLC with 20+ hours of gameplay, and should be informative, objective and well written.
So I believe a section called "I can't write reviews to save my life, but I have a strong opinion about this one thing" should be made to separate those passionate shitposts from the actual reviews.

I have to disagree with the rhetoric here,
i think that everyone should write their review as they please,
"actual" reviews are going to be listed officially for the main site, forum is for everyone to share their takes.
Your personal dissatisfaction with someone's take on this is not a good reason for a change..

Let me make it more objective:
We should add minimum character requirement for the review section posts.
We should also create a new subforum under 'User reviews' called "User Opinions" for short posts.

There you go,
no reason to have a mean attitude.

[Tom]

-"I have never done that. I never ever classified anyone's attitude."
Strawman
"That" is not "classifying anyones attitude", "that" is telling me what shouldn't be mean instead of being respectful and cutting on the passive-agression.

-"are you sure EG is the right platform for you? You'll feel right at home in some other forums, where calling out people's tone, morals and ethics is perfectly ok."
Ad hominem + hostility

"A dictionary definition says nothing about established standards of quality. "
There is no standart to write exclusively objective reviews. Get over this, or provide proof besides your opinion, period.

"No, the line is useless and subjective vs useful and objective. If you disagree, you are just wrong. "
Strawman + further contradicting the objective definition, no backing for words provided.

"I did not make the thread, nor am I the only one complaining of the state of the User Reviews section..."
Strawman, your personal needs are expressed in your own first post here, OP doesn't share your thoughts.

"Oh, and the lack of standardization"
Strawman, i didn't mention lack of order, the thesis is about your rhetoric.

"1) your logic is retarded"
Ad hominem

" the usability of the forum is reduced by all the unsorted clutter and low quality shitpost."
Strawman + Ad hominem,

"Once again you're not thinking before you post something."
insult (def: speak to or treat with disrespect )

"I do not seek conversation. I would much rather you stop talking to me. Or at all. My post serves to, as I already said, bring awareness to an issue. I don't want your comments, replies or opinions, "
You are commenting under my post.

" I am objectively, measurably right "
Your post is completely subjective and doesn't contain any objective background or proof.

"if you so much dislike the opinions of people who state issues with the forum, get out of the "Questions & Suggestions", nobody asked you to evaluate people's opinions."
Strawman + hostility

Hope you're proud of yourself, man.
"I don't want your comments, replies or opinions"

Ronnin426850

[Ronnin426850]

I have already addressed all your comments and remarks in previous posts. I will not repeat myself anymore. I will not comment and feed the troll further, go police someone else's suggestions. And seriously think about whether this is a platform that philosophically aligns with your agenda, or is your energy better spent in an echo chamber somewhere else. Bye.

[Tom]

False accusations are not going to be unnoticed.

Ronnin426850

[Aidy]

I think one of the problems holding the review section back (though probably not for all) is that there is probably a size limit on posts so a longer, more detailed review may need to be chopped up. As Tom said though, the proper reviews aren't going to constitute the review section of this forum.

[Nodsaibot]

I don't think you should be bothered by the user reviews (forum) but a proper way to ensure clean reviews is to enforce a format and only allow members with certain rank to post there (eg. after 20 non spam posts)

[gLItcHyGeAR]

I just want to be able to sort the section for reviews for certain games, and sort either from oldest to newest or newest to oldest at my liesure. That should be the bare minimum expected of a review section. If I have to sift through ALL THE REVIEWS for a single game, it's useless to me!

[Tysakasa]

• A format requirement for at the very least the title of the topic. The actual review format itself can very from user to user but have a requirement for the title of the review ie. Game Name - Console/PC - Score so it makes it easier on the eyes and easier to find what you're looking for while also working in tandem with that alphabetical sort from before.

With regards to this, the way I'm kind of doing it (currently just testing the waters here, reason I only have one review up) is starting with just the title of the game (nothing fancy, just game name plus "review" tagged to it) but when you get inside you have title name, developer, platform, what platform it was review on (unless it's an exclusive game then I don't bother adding this), then the review, which can be a little messy, but again, mostly just testing the waters here and trying to figure out how I want to organize my own reviews if I continue forward with them. Also have a final verdict. Then at the bottom I provide links to official outlets you can buy from (so Steam, GOG, Origin, PSN, LIVE ... Nintendo if they have a web store) in the event you're sold on the review and are a digital purchaser. Won't link to retail stores since I don't know where people are from or if the store even still carries it, nor will I link to third party sellers even if they are legitimate.

As for searching through the section, I think one of the main issues is how some of the filtering ends up global instead of for a specific section. But this is just my guess as I'm not that much in the know with forum development, most I've really done is front end stuff (so organizing the look). But the forum is still in development, as more and more people being to use it more often, the team will most likely adjust things to help streamline certain things and make it easier to navigate based on user usage. They may even offer subsections to users who are frequent reviewers with a following so that they're easier to find while the more casual reviewers will be lumped together the way it current is. Only time will tell as the forum is still in its infancy. The upcoming holiday isn't helping matters either XD Though it may allow for more usage data to be collected as more are likely to start using the forum over the holiday's since there's more free time available to them to check it out.

[DGCae]

It's a fairly good system though I think the "review" tag is unnecessary in the actual title. If you are posting it in the User Review section then people are already going to expect it to be a review since that's what the section is for. It may be better to include the system you played the game on in the title instead since a game can vary drastically from system to system (i.e. Arkham Knight for instance). That way a user can search for the title of the game and the system they want to get it on and know exactly what the review will include without having to actually read the review itself. I personally wouldn't like to click on a review only to find out it's based off the PS4 version when I was looking for the PC version, so easiest way to eliminate that is to put the name and system right up there in the topic title.