About reviews...

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How are those checklist format reviews helpful at all? I keep seeing more and more of them pop up and they keep getting to the top of store pages as "most helpful" when they really don't say anything. Here is an example:

❤ Audience ❤
☑ Beginner
☑ Casual Gamer
☑ Normal Gamer
☐ Expert

☼ Graphics ☼
☐ Bad
☐ Alright
☐ Good
☑ Beautiful
☐ Fantastic

♬ Music ♬
☐ Bad
☐ Alright
☐ Good
☐ Beautiful
☑ Fantastic

☠ Difficulty ☠
☑ Easy
☐ Average
☐ Easy to learn / Hard to master
☐ Hard
☐ Unfair

§ Bugs §
☐ Bugs destroy the game
☐ Lots of bugs
☑ Few Bugs
☐ You can use them for speedrun
☐ Nothing encountered

☯ Story ☯
☐ There is none
☐ Bad
☐ Alright
☑ Good
☐ Fantastic

⚔ Gameplay ⚔
☐ Frustrating
☐ Sleepy
☐ Boring
☑ Fun
☑ Challenging

۞ Game time / Length ۞
☐ Really short (0 - 3 hours)
☐ Short (4 - 8 hours)
☑ Few hours (10 - 20 hours) [if you focus on the main story]
☑ Long (40-60 hours) [if you complete everything]
☐ Very Long (61-100 hours)
☐ Extremely Long (101+ hours)

$ Price / Quality $
☑ Full price
☐ Wait for Sale
☐ Don't buy
☐ Refund it if you can

Based on the information provided, can you guess what game this review is for? What's it about? What kind of game is it?

Point is, these reviews are completely interchangeable. I bet if you took this exact review, and copy and pasted it to every game in your library, you'd get the top review for half of the games you put it on, even if you didn't change the check marks to fit each individual game.

In my opinion, the Steam community should stop encouraging this format and instead downvote them all into oblivion. Maybe it's just me, and I guess it's not THAT big a deal, but for someone that puts at least some effort into the reviews they write, it is a little disheartening that the steam community prefers lazy checklists that ultimately don't say anything specific about the games in question. Plus I don't see how they could ever actually influence someone's decision to purchase a game or not when so little information is given.

Anyone agree or am I the only one that wants to read legitimately helpful reviews for games I might be interested in?

[flobefall]

Well, with this kind of reviews you get easily an overview about important facts, but if I want to buy a title, I need for information... E.g. you dont get any details about the plot or the gameplay. So I prefer comprehensive reviews like I'm writing (sorry if this sounds like an ad, besides judt a small part here is speaking german :D), but it feels like that they are rare or hard to find.

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@NotEvenBlurm - I suppose it does give an overview and is quick to glance over, but I just can't wrap my head around why they keep getting the top "most helpful" review when they don't give any details about their points. It's a little annoying when I want actual information about the game.

I just looked through your reviews and your format is quite good. I don't understand German so I can't say much about the content, but based on the format and amount of detail that appears to be present, I'd say you have good reviews that'd help any German speakers make an informed decision.

[Seraphita]

What are you seeing that is NOT useful about those? Reviews are objective and checklist added to possible information is rather descriptive of what the person thinks about the game. In my case, I think it's pretty clear what the reviews are about when I see those. Not seeing a problem.

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引用自 Zero：

What are you seeing that is NOT useful about those? Reviews are objective and checklist added to possible information is rather descriptive of what the person thinks about the game. In my case, I think it's pretty clear what the reviews are about when I see those. Not seeing a problem.

The problem for me is lack of any detail or perspective. A checklist of random facts does have its usefulness, I guess -- it does provide SOME information, even if it's limited... but they're far from being helpful in regard to helping me know what I'm getting into. There are no real details, and as I said in the original post, they are completely interchangeable, because there's no telling which game I got the example review from considering the complete lack of any substantial info beyond basic criteria and a checkmark or two under each.

If they are helpful to you, then great, but for me the information is too limited and I find them more annoying than helpful because they push out other more informative reviews from being shown on the store page.

Ultimately, it's not a REAL problem, just something I find annoying and thought I'd bring up.

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Also, as a side note, I don't feel reviews have to be completely objective. Containing objective information is important, but in the end a user review is based on the user's experience and whether or not they enjoyed a game, making subjectivity also important.

[Seraphita]

Um... My last comment felt wrong. I meant to say "reviews are SUBJECTIVE", not objective. I wrote that post far too fast. Oh well... I just meant to say that they seem detailed enough to me.

[Lichwarri]

I use these templates to give an overview and write an more in depth review below!:)

[ReBoot]

Checklists don't mean anything. A thorough description in text, now that's valuable information.

[FB_Destroyer_Rebecca]

I like those formats. Some are very neat and they are very good for a fast overview and well structured. thanks for posting it here so I could find it with google ;)

[Apathetic]

i mean i KINDA do my reviews like this in a way. People just have their own styles heck i like these types over 3 paragraph essays or people saying "game gud 6/10."

[ミ★ Sucrelune ★彡]

The real problem with reviews (imo) is that we have a really poor material and space to write it. I love writing reviews and i read a lot too.
But when you don't care about Steam levels, cards, gems etc like me (i just log in to buy / play / review), you are condemned to write like a simple com' ... it's a bit sad !
No blue ink, no character font etc.
(I understand the fact that mixed reviews don't exist, it makes sense. But the lack of perspective / tools / settings etc when you write is really a pity. I suppose they keep it this way to prevent abuse, and weird stuff).

[ReBoot]

引用自 Nadja：

The real problem with reviews (imo) is that we have a really poor material and space to write it. I love writing reviews and i read a lot too.
But when you don't care about Steam levels, cards, gems etc like me (i just log in to buy / play / review), you are condemned to write like a simple com' ... it's a bit sad !
No blue ink, no character font etc.
(I understand the fact that mixed reviews don't exist, it makes sense. But the lack of perspective / tools / settings etc when you write is really a pity. I suppose they keep it this way to prevent abuse, and weird stuff).

You got the BB code to create lists or put an emphasis on certain words. Yes, you can't design your review like you'd design a magazine cover, but that's actually an advantage as this way, the review gotta contain information instead of typography.

[StickyPawz]

I find the "checkpoint" reviews to be low effort and skip them.

If you need them to write up your review, then cut out that clutter when you're ready to post.

[T9]

checkpoint reviews should get deleted as worthless spam

[Start_Running]

SOme people like the style... Just luike how some people like adam sandler movies or country western music.