Comments on: Why The Average NG Review Score is Not -5

By: John Kershaw

John Kershaw — Thu, 25 Nov 2010 15:22:19 +0000

@Adushan Govender: This is still accurate as it talks about NG. Though I should probably write a new one when I get round to updating the review system to compute the stats based on the 5* system.

By: Adushan Govender

Adushan Govender — Thu, 25 Nov 2010 14:21:42 +0000

Hang on a sec…shouldn’t this be updated to our scores are 0 stars to 5? And the average 2.5? Why so Negative, gamer?

By: wardrox

wardrox — Thu, 03 Dec 2009 02:43:27 +0000

@ScottyGrayskull: They don’t take smaller sites for one, and for two, this publicising of the data is just an added bonus to the new review system.

The new system was made to help me track all our reviews (keeping track of who has what review due when gets complex with 30+ writers, lol). Originally all the data was going to simply sit in the database, away from public eyes. Then I added the stats for my own personal interest, and then thought it would be nice for others to see.

It also compliments something else I’m working with the site; adding more game data to pages. Still in the very early stages, but my plan is for every game to soon have it’s own auto-generated page, with reviews/haikus/info on etc. All data will be gathered via Giant Bomb (who have an API, which is actually used internally to get game data).

Then you can go to, say, Modern Warfare 2′s “page” and get general game info, as well as all the material NG has on that game, all in one place.

I’m also going to experiment with wikipedia style info boxes to go in articles. Just to give a light smattering of facts and such :)

There is much more I’m tinkering with and planning, but as so much can change and the plans are so early, I don’t want to go too much into it.

By: ScottyGrayskull

ScottyGrayskull — Thu, 03 Dec 2009 02:37:09 +0000

@paraparaking
Oh yeah… I’ve always liked gamerankings’ data too. :)

Although at the risk of sounding like a dick, why go through the trouble of making the data available on this site when you could’ve just used gamerankings? You put it on there for the potential extra exposure, and get that as a bonus.

Unless they don’t take smaller sites, in which case nevermind then. :P

By: wardrox

wardrox — Thu, 03 Dec 2009 02:26:43 +0000

@ParaParaKing: Maths corrected sir, not sure what I was thinking there.@ScottyGrayskull: To be honest the only hard part is putting the data into the system. I assume most sites keep some record somewhere of all their reviews. If not, it doesn't take too long to manually check them all. If there are hundreds of reviews to add, work as a group, or just work slowly. I certainly agree though that one reason sites don't do this is the effort.

By: ParaParaKing

ParaParaKing — Wed, 02 Dec 2009 22:55:23 +0000

@ScottyGrayskull: You can view all reviews of one site on gamerankings.com . There is no reason for any big enough site to build something like this.

By: ScottyGrayskull

ScottyGrayskull — Wed, 02 Dec 2009 22:26:13 +0000

The reason I always assumed most sites don’t make their review data and scores more easily accessible is because that requires extra work. Work that probably isn’t easy to do with the drag and drop blogging software they used, and for one reason or another they won’t make something themselves.

By: ParaParaKing

ParaParaKing — Wed, 02 Dec 2009 21:57:42 +0000

You have to check your math. -4.5 is not the average between 0 to -10.

MATH:
0-x=-10+x
2x=-10
x=-5

The average is -5.

For more shocking math:
5 isn’t the average between 1 and 10.
(Hint: It’s 5.5)

By: player66

player66 — Wed, 02 Dec 2009 21:06:35 +0000

Wardrox, please take down that graph! Graphs are scary!!!