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GameFAQs Nuking Negative Reader Reviews?
jvm writes "Are negative reader reviews of the Sony PlayStation Portable (like
this one) being yanked from GameFAQs? Some have certainly been removed, and Kyle Orland of the Video Game Ombudsman investigates: one of the reviews which was taken down, an interview with the author of the review, and a subsequent anonymous email purportedly by the person who took the review down. The review's author then responds that the justifications are questionable. Accompanying this is a discussion of the
handling of reader-submitted reviews." Update: 04/16 04:53 GMT by Z : Many thanks to CJayC for setting the record straight in the comments below.
Any comment that is negative of the film is dropped. The same appears to go for books and games on Amazon.
It's pretty obvious too, I mean the number of positive reviews for Jean-Claude Van Damme can be counted on zero hands and yet imdb always appears to have at least 10 people saying his latest flop was the greatest movie ever.
How we know is more important than what we know.
Seems like it's starting to happen.
Don't waste your time writing a negative product review for Newegg. It will never become visible on their site.
Personally, I think that the review was excellent. It was very professional and stayed on subject. I've seen quite a few reviews get accepted that were mostly praising system A and bashing on system B. What's happening here just looks like someone getting overprotective of a system they really like and feels that anyone who disagrees shouldn't be allowed to post a review.
... in a way.
It's better to have this reported than not at all. I'm grateful that someone commented on it because one-sided reviews are the reason I mainly avoid sites like Gamespot and IGN. They can easily be bought out, and I've been getting the real dirt on all the games I'm interested in from Gamefaqs for years, specifically because of it's consumer base feedback.
Hopefully this doesn't go on much longer or I can find some other way to get honest opinions instead of bullshit. This is just another sign that they're floating the industry as far as it will go on fluff, before bailing out as it sinks like Atari in 1983.
Just take a look at the "anonymous email" link. I may be a Nintendo fan, but this is just silly. The person writing the email purports that there are "high standards" for a GameFAQs review (go look at the reviews for any new game... 95% 10/10 with no real comment, 1 hater who gives it a 4/10 with even less comment, and the rest somewhere in between), and seems to miss the point that this is reviewing a game _system_, and thus all the components of the system are in play: games both current and near-future, other abilities, form factor, battery life...
1. In the review, he states that because of the lack of memory available for MP3s, that it doesn't stack up to the iPod as an MP3 player. This seems perfectly obvious to any rational person, and the review doesn't seem to make it a major point of contention, just a point that it's jack of all trades, master of none.
The response: We removed your review because it compared the PSP to an iPod. Quote: "For starters, this is the first and foremost reason why the review was removed."
2. Here's some damaging "false information" for you... The PSP costs $250, not $300. 2GB and 4GB Memory Sticks don't exist yet. And you shouldn't add the cost of additional hardware like Memory Sticks to the cost of the system.
One of those three is a minor point. The second is in the PSP's favor to even mention. The third doesn't even apply to the review.
3. "As a small side note, the mention of slim pickings for movies available is laughable at best. Did people blame the Ps2 when DVDs were a new breed of entertainment? No, they blame the movie studios and DVD release corporations."
Okay, so the lack of games argument is now moot on every system ever made, because it's the publishers' fault for not putting the game out for the new medium. Wanna bet that they aren't enforcing this on other systems?
I'm not even going to bother with the rest. There's a repeated implication that there is a bar of quality that must be met to get a review posted on GameFAQs. I can say unequivocally that this implication is false. Here's an example. Now I want you to look at those reviews and tell me that every single one of them justified the score they gave.
This is my sig. There are many others like it, but this one is mine.
In any case, is his site, and he can decide what to screen and what not. Don't like it? There's a whole bunch of pages with user reviews out there aswell. No biggie.
In this case: http://www.google.com/search?q=sony+psp+user+revi
CNET had some negative reviews up here
First page is filled with score 1 out of 10.
Sample this!
I left the following comment for the author.
Now, I've seen some less-than-stellar reviews on GameFAQs, but this is definitely bottom-of-the-barrel. And GameFAQs doesn't arbitrarily post anything they get. But if this were a glitzy gushing review with the same level of content (i.e., none), I would hope GameFAQs would take it down too!
Don't think of it as a flame---it's more like an argument that does 3d6 fire damage
I bought a Dreamcast once, even though I did what you suggested, because everyone was calling it "poor", "unappealing", "dreadful", "doomed", "woeful" or "horrible".
Meine Schwester ist sehr, sehr reizvoll - Nietzsche
Forum drama on GameFAQs! Next on slashdot: water is wet!
This review of the affor mentioned review has has been reviewed by Slashdot and found to be in contravention of our policy, which you all signed in blood, in regards to star rating, namely, section 24b subsection 2 of SD codex 3, "..any comment that does not give the highest praise or agree with what we are saying at this time.." etc,etc "..shall be given a lower viewable rating eg: 0, and so therefor shall not be seen by normal happy healthy slashdoters.." etc etc. *to be read in the manor of Gene Wilder from Willy Wonka and the chocolate factory* - (good movie)[the original movie not the upcoming crap movie with Johnie Depp]
"Persistance is Fertile" - Me. I can quote myself if I want to.
It should have at least been edited.
Look a little closer. I believe he says that the price to play Lumines is $300: PSP + game is roughly $300 (esp. if you add tax).
Okay, it is a poorly written review. And the author does appear fairly full of himself: he dismisses out-of-hand game genres as stuff he doesn't like, then, to top it all off, he manages to get his story on slashdot.
/., all you need is to slip in some criticism of Apple, Inc., or the Open Source movement, and you'll find that someone will moderate you a Troll. That's why trolls work: because some people have trouble distinguishing between criticism and provocation. Some of those are the forum idiots who get provoked by criticism; and some are the moderator idiots who see criticism as provocation.
I mean, heck, I dislike just about all portable games, but if I'm going to write a review (And no, I haven't and won't), at the very least I'll give some witty description of the suffering involved (like "the nauseating experience of scrolling under gobs of gaily-textured molasses" or something equally dumb, but at least evocative), rather than just "I don't like it".
And it's not surprising that stuff gets canned, especially stuff suspected -- rightly or wrongly -- of being a troll. Heck, here on
The lesson? If you're gonna slap out some criticism, even in a review that has some balance (as his does), do it with an eye to making the moderator snicker.
And if you are gonna moderate something, never comment on your actions. An absolute monarch's actions are law, and above scrutiny. Besides, if you smite a review as a troll, it may not be; but the complaint "my review was smitten" that follows necessarily is a troll. Don't bite -- retreat into the mist of mystery and let the white noise of the intardnet do the rest, as the pointed debate on a thousand forums inexorably deteriorates towards yet another case of Godwin's Law.
If you actually read further down in the comments, the reviewer had said "You'll basically be paying 300 dollars to play a puzzle game."
When I went to the store to buy my PSP, the total charged to my card for the value pack and Lumines was $311. He was not wrong, the editor just can't read.
Which I will now also post to /., even though my karma will drop even lower.
I will agree that the above review is of extremely poor quality, even for a blog. But that is no reason to pull it down. As someone else stated, there have been and still are, much more poorly written reviews that remain on GameFAQs, so this seems to be a case of them taking down reviews they disagree with.
I personally think this reviewer sounds like he doesn't even own a PSP, just read some other reviews, maybe played Lumines on a friend's and that was it. RR is a stand up game, MP3 playback is fantastic on the headphones (speaker is lacking in quality, but it came with free headphones), and as the reviewer said, the screen is incredible. He clearly bought the hype as he plunked down his hard-earned cash for the unit and a game. IMHO RR is THE launch title, Wipeout is popular due to the browser hack, Lumines is a kick ass puzzler that will keep you occupied on long trips. THUG2 is an excellent port of the original with all the same music, similar graphics and 4 NEW levels. I could go on and on, but the point is this: Regardless of the fact that this review is very shortsighted and appears to be written by a 12 year old who is pissed that his friends have PSPs and he doesn't, it doesn't deserve to be removed from the site as this is the Intarweb and people can decide this is total crap on their own.
Thank you,
THC
I hate reviews that give low scores (and especially ones without any real reason) too, I wish they would all go away.
As a regular user of gamefaqs, I can say that the site is going to shit. The moderators are out of control, you can't post a god damn thing there anymore without getting marked up for trolling, then you look at what actually made it and its a bunch of worthless, retarded threads like "who would win - sam fisher or solid snake?".
</rant>
Top 10 Reasons To Procrastinate
10.
Something is missing in your life. You owe it to yourself to step away from the computer and try to find it.
Oh you mean a page exactly like this one? http://reviews.cnet.com/Nintendo_DS/4852-6464_7-30 895578.html?tag=uolst
Go ahead MOD my day!
More opinions here
You know you COULD expent the whole afternoon discussing why gamefaqs is cutting bad reviews ( on a product which is hated by all n fanboys nonetheless) or you could actually visit the site right here and check there actually are some bad reviews not being deleted?.
your choice.
Go ahead MOD my day!
More opinions here
It's true. They're not massively killing off negative reviews - most of the reviews I have on that site are negative, and they're all still there (even though negative reviews have been removed from the same games). They're getting rid of the crappy half-assed reviews written by people who clearly didn't play the game (and often SAY SO in the review), and give no coherent reasons behind anything.
There's a difference between a good bad review and a bad bad review. Now all GameFAQs has to do is get rid of all the bad good reviews and maybe they'll have something left worth reading.
Any content posted to a web site can be removed if the owner of the web site wishes. If you don't like this, post crap to your own web site, or Usenet.
First of all, the review posted on the Video Game Ombudsman as "Chris Buzan's GameFAQs PSP Review", isn't. While it is indeed a part of the review he submitted, it's been edited down from what was actually posted (and subsequently removed) from GameFAQs.
But more to the point, while some people think GameFAQs is operated by a faceless corporation known only in whispered tones as "CNET", in reality very little has changed from the days in which I ran the site all by myself. GameFAQs receives hundreds of codes, reviews, FAQs, and game saves from contributors every week, and they are all reviewed and approved or rejected by a staff of two, including myself. While we do check every submission that comes to us, we don't always get it right. This is precisely why we have a Contributor Problem report form, so any registered user can report anything we've posted that "slipped by" us.
We review these complaints, determine if they're justified, and if we feel they are, we take appropriate action. That's how our system works, that's exactly how it worked in this case (both times the reviews were posted, they were subsequently reported by site visitors), and we probably remove eight or nine reviews a month out of the few hundred that are posted in this manner. These removals are not influenced by any advertiser or by management, but by our other users.
Of course, since our users are the ones that report problems with reviews, it should come as no surprise that when a review with a low score is posted for a very popular game or system, it will draw more than its fair share of complaints. Likewise, a review scoring "11/10 Best Game Evar!!" won't draw that level of scrutiny, even if poorly written. This is a phenomenon not unique to GameFAQs, but to any community on the Internet or off; those who go against the norm will always receive more attention, and their flaws are much more likely to be pointed out.
To sum up: Did we remove the reviews of Mr. Buzan and others bashing the PSP? Yes. Do we remove similar reviews bashing other systems and games on a regular basis? Yes. Is this whole thing blown way out of proportion? Oh, yes.
Jeff "CJayC" Veasey
Senior Editor, GameFAQs
Ah, so we should blame the rabid fanboys? That makes a lot of sense, actually... too bad the nutcases are running the asylum in a large portion of GameFAQs...
shut up ya damn fat nerd
god
I've never seen that review, and have been visiting the PSP section since it was first created not long after E3 2003, and marking reviews since the JPN launch. I did see a review much like that, but that has definitely been edited from the one I remember.
Now, first off, I marked it for removal because A) I see no evidene that he actually owns a PSP. We see reviews like that all the time over there, and they get marked all the time. The sad thing is that I don't own a PSP and could've written a much more convincing, in depth review. B) He's trolling, and just trying to work up people who like the PSP, which is against GameFAQs' TOS. C) The review is way too short, especially for one that gives a low score or scrutenizes the PSP. He doesn't take any time to jusify the score he gave overall, or in the particular categories. D) He gives a 6/10 for a launch with 17 games and 1 million PSPs launched? That is just ridiculous! It's the second best console launch ever, next to DC's!!
So tell me, what is the ratio of reviews rejected that are pro-PSP vs anti-PSP?
Learn something new.
Why would he say "to play a puzzle game"? You arent forced to buy lumines, there ARE other games
it's funny, every time he defends cnet, he declines to mention the massive backlash of bugs the new design still wreaks on the site, and the number of problems stemming from the GS merge. One wonders whether he seriously doesnt realise how bad it's becoming, or he chooses to ignore it in the hope that it will fix itself...
Exhibit A: http://www.gamefaqs.com/portable/ds/review/R85913. html
Your full of shit. Either some money or some fanboyism is exerting it's influence over at your site.
True genius is grasping a situation like a peice of fruit, and peircing it just right so that it drains dry.
This is GameFaqs we're talking about: It's very essence is defined by fanboyism.