Posting a positvie reviews to your own game?

[Morbatail]

Is it unethical to have your developers post positive reviews to your game?

I know of one game that has their devs and staff posting positive reviews to their own game, most on alternate accounts or under a different name. But you can see who it is with their name history. Is this ethical or even allowed?

I have also seen several negative reviews being deleted. I know they have mod powers on their own boards, but this applies to the Reviews as well?

This makes me worried as I know many good games with good ethics do not do this and it can have a negative effect on indie games to come.

I kind of like the game a bit, but it makes me cautious now that I have seen this the last few days from the developers.

[The End]

Originally posted by Morbatail:

devs and staff posting positive reviews to their own game, most on alternate accounts or under a different name.

Fake reviews made by developer is not ok, you should use the report button to let Valve know about it.

[Morbatail]

I tried to do this, but I found a few of them go to "This profile is private" even if I click on the Comments. Any idea how to do this?
Thank you

[J4MESOX4D]

Originally posted by Morbatail:

I have also seen several negative reviews being deleted. I know they have mod powers on their own boards, but this applies to the Reviews as well?

Reviews cannot be deleted or hidden by the developers. Valve are hot on removing suspicious/fraudulent reviews so just flag any that you deem possibly fabricated and it will be assessed.

[Bob]

Originally posted by Morbatail:

Is it unethical to have your developers post positive reviews to your game?

Yes.

[The End]

Originally posted by Morbatail:

I tried to do this, but I found a few of them go to "This profile is private" even if I click on the Comments. Any idea how to do this?
Thank you

When you read the review, just move the mouse to the word "Recommended" and press left mouse, now you see the page with the review and comments, on that page there is a little flag, that is used for reporting.

[Spawn of Totoro]

I don't see anything wrong with it. As long as it is one per each employee and they actualy played the game they made. The unethical part, imho, starts then they make other accounts in order to boost the ratings.

If it is only the one per, then it will get drowned out very fast by regular user reviews and thist is why I don't see an issue with it.

Even an presidential candidate can vote for him/her self, provided it is only the one vote.

Originally posted by Morbatail:

I tried to do this, but I found a few of them go to "This profile is private" even if I click on the Comments. Any idea how to do this?
Thank you

As Rockon said, you can report the review it's self, there is no need to report the account. For future reference though, even a private account has the "More" button on it. Clicking on that will show the report option.

[Psiotic™]

Yes, it's both unethical and unprofessional UNLESS they state very clearly in the 'review' that they are a developer/mod for that game.

[Midnight Sky ✨🌙✨]

I think joke reviews are fine.

[Morbatail]

This game I saw several known aliases from the developers. What caught my eye was two with the same name, when it was asked/pointed out the posts/reviews disappeared then came back under a different name (but the profile history and profile url were the same).

Joke ones or stating that they are a developer is fine.

My thoughts, I do not think that the developers or staff from the game company or team should post up reviews (though could answer questions). After all, unless they are a disgruntled employee, who would post a bad review about their game they are trying to sell, especially one that just came out in early access.

Especially when they say things like "Great game! I cannot wait to see what the devs do next!" or similar.

[Joki the Disco Bandit]

Imagine a book where the blurbs on the back cover consisted of glowing praise for the book written by... his publisher, the copy editor, all his/her research assistants, etc., none of whom explicitly identify themselves and their relationship to the product in question.

In other words yes, it's clearly unethical.

[Muppet among Puppets]

Originally posted by Spawn of Totoro:

I don't see anything wrong with it. As long as it is one per each employee and they actualy played the game they made.

Depends on the form. Its ok if they say, i made this game and like this and that.
Its not ok if they word it like someone who bought it.

[The End]

Originally posted by Morbatail:

This game I saw several known aliases from the developers. What caught my eye was two with the same name, when it was asked/pointed out the posts/reviews disappeared then came back under a different name (but the profile history and profile url were the same).

Joke ones or stating that they are a developer is fine.

My thoughts, I do not think that the developers or staff from the game company or team should post up reviews (though could answer questions). After all, unless they are a disgruntled employee, who would post a bad review about their game they are trying to sell, especially one that just came out in early access.

Especially when they say things like "Great game! I cannot wait to see what the devs do next!" or similar.

Only thing you can do is report them, but as Spawn of Totoro said, they will drown really fast.

If it is the game I just had a look at, it was about 7 reviews, some of them has been moved to friends only/private and those reviews can't be reported, unless you are on their friendslist.

Short story, it's wrong, but they will drown very fast in the sea of real reviews.

[Morbatail]

No they definitely do not say "I made this game" or even "I work on the team". I followed their other game for over a year and got used to the devs different handles on their forums and other sites. It is, sad. Two of the reviews the devs forgot to change their display names. One it was pointed out by someone else that he was a dev and they removed it, then posted again. That one seems to be gone. But the others are still there.

I just think that this sets a bad prescience for other indies out there. If it got bad enough, gamers and devs alike would not know what games and reviews to trust. I know its impossible to get all of the Self Reviews on other accounts.

Ah well what can we do eh?

[Morbatail]

Originally posted by Rockon:

Only thing you can do is report them, but as Spawn of Totoro said, they will drown, if it is the game I just had a look at, it was about 7 reviews, some of them has been moved to friends only/private and those reviews can't be reported, unless you are on their friendslist.

Short story, it's wrong, but they will drown very fast in the sea of real reviews.

It may be. I see this happening in spurts as more negative reviews happen. I am not sure if it is the same game or not, but one failed game then another with fake reviews is making me very leery of any up coming releases by them.

Yes, I agree with the last statement. Seems we both posted at the same time.

[The End]

Originally posted by Morbatail:

Originally posted by Rockon:

Only thing you can do is report them, but as Spawn of Totoro said, they will drown, if it is the game I just had a look at, it was about 7 reviews, some of them has been moved to friends only/private and those reviews can't be reported, unless you are on their friendslist.

Short story, it's wrong, but they will drown very fast in the sea of real reviews.

It may be. I see this happening in spurts as more negative reviews happen. I am not sure if it is the same game or not, but one failed game then another with fake reviews is making me very leery of any up coming releases by them.

Yes, I agree with the last statement. Seems we both posted at the same time.

"but one failed game then another with fake reviews" It's the same game ;)

It was 7 reviews, and I do not think they dare make more, now they know people are aware of this "shady" behaviour.