Forums → News and Feedback → Is new rating system accurate?
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So I was thinking, is the new rating system really accurate? We used to actually rate games, now we either like or dislike the games. What if someone doesn't really like a game but he doesn't feel like liking the like button by clicking like. What if he feels like actually rating. What if he feels the game deserves a 6 because it isn't that great. Does he go against his own feelings or does he do it justice by rating it in the upper fiftieth percentile. Look I'm rambling so let me make my point. I always say Armorgames as a little more sophistacated as other game sights, one of my favorite qualities was the fair rating system. Now it has devolved into twi simple categories instead of a fair rating given by averaging the ratings that people give. Is there any chance the Devs could change it back.
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The rating system was changed because the admins considered the old rating system unfair. They found that under the old rating system, users would rate like this:
The vast majority of dislikes were expressed as 1 ratings.
The likes were expressed as 6-10 ratings, much more evenly spread out.
Under the new rating system, dislikes are always expressed as 1's, and likes are always expressed as 10's. The admins consider this more fair because under the old system, dislikes were stronger than likes, but now, they have equal weight.
@Patrick2011 is correct, and this was based on statistical data - not our gut feeling. Very few users gave games ratings between 2-5, when a user on Armor Games dislikes something they go for their 1/10 button. We've seen much fairer results with this new system, though we do respect some users wish they had more freedom of choice.
In the end, ratings are about accuracy first.
I have considered a flaw in the current rating system. If a game has a current rating of 9/10, and somebody goes to rate it who does not think it deserves 9/10, but still likes it. In order to move the rating closer to what he thinks it should be, he must say he dislikes it. I would suggest changing the like/dislike buttons to higher/lower score buttons.
I like the new rating system better. If you like the game then thumbs it up and if you dislike it then thumbs it down. If you're on the fence then dont press anything very simple. Especially since most people would probably rate either the highest possible or the lowest possible score it makes sense to change it.
I like it better as well. If I like a game, that's really what matters to me. I don't want to have to sit there deciding if it deserves a 7/10, 8/10, 9/10 or something in between.
@09philj That's really not the way to do that. I mean, if you had a game that was a 99, and you really liked it - you'd downvote it just to see it go lower then 99? Rustles my jimmies.
Liked tells me nothing, just that a person liked the game at one point or another. The likes are meaningless, same with the 'this game has be played this many times' especially when it comes to MMOs.
Don't trust "Yes or No" rankings.
So I was thinking, is the new rating system really accurate?
Yes, it is accurate. It's just different from the old system, which people who have been around longer than 2014 are used to.
If you ask me, it's more accurate than the old system was, even in theory. If you ever rated a game between a 4 and a 7, you probably didn't really like the game, but you didn't really dislike it either. Those ratings indicate that you thought the game was okay, but they only work if they're relative to the preexisting rating. Ergo, you would be basing your vote off everyone else's opinions instead of your own.
If you're playing a game rated 9/10, for example, and you like it enough to give it 8/10, you've lowered the average rating even though you still like the game. If you then go and play a different game rated 5/10, and you find that you like it equally as much as the previous one, you give it 8/10, and now you've hurt one game's ratings and helped another game's just by giving them the same high rating.
Going back to the 4 and 7 example, if you think that same 9/10 game is "Pretty good" and you give it a 7, the ratings will go down slightly. If you play a 2/10 game and give it a "Meh, not that good" 4/10 rating, the ratings will go up slightly. Now you've given one game a higher rating with "Meh, not that good" and another game a lower rating with "Pretty good". Basically, by thinking a game is better than average, you lowered its rating, and by thinking a game is worse than average, you raised its rating. Even theoretically, this system has some obvious flaws.
With the current system, the only possible ratings you can give are the absolute high and the absolute low, and every average rating on every game is somewhere between those two numbers. With this system, when someone likes a game, the rating goes up. When someone dislikes it, the rating goes down. It works flawlessly in that regard, and it's in no way relative to anyone's opinion except for the person hitting the button. It may not be the system that we're all used to, but it is the most fair way of determining a game's average rating.
If a game has a current rating of 9/10, and somebody goes to rate it who does not think it deserves 9/10, but still likes it. In order to move the rating closer to what he thinks it should be, he must say he dislikes it. I would suggest changing the like/dislike buttons to higher/lower score buttons.
A rating system is put in place to reflect the individual opinions of the people playing the game, not for one person to determine whether or not everyone else's opinions are correct.
Additionally, in order for this system to work, the game would have to start out with a number rating. Someone would have to put that rating in place, and every one of those number ratings would be subjective to whomever placed them there. Essentially, everyone would be basing their opinion off the first person's opinion rather than if they actually liked the game or not.
Liked tells me nothing, just that a person liked the game at one point or another.
All a rating tells you is how many people liked a game relative to the people who disliked it. I don't see how it's in any way a reason not to "trust 'yes' or 'no' rankings".
the game would have to start out with a number rating. Someone would have to put that rating in place
That would be 5 though.
All a rating tells you is how many people liked a game relative to the people who disliked it. I don't see how it's in any way a reason not to "trust 'yes' or 'no' rankings".
"Yes I liked it BUT..."
"Oh I LIKED it then but..."
"It's not good but ...."
And then with MMOs I really don't trust those ratings, no matter the system as there's no context at all with the info. That's not how many people played it, that's not how many people are playing it, heck are those players voting or is that just 2 guys in a back room of the company voting up for it?
Yes yes that last part sounded conspiracy theory a bit but given what we've seen the Triple A pull over the last few years, I wouldn't put it past them.
That would be 5 though.
Players' ratings would still depend on what other people thought of the game and not entirely on what they thought of it. There's no reason for people's ratings to be swayed by other people's ratings.
"Yes I liked it BUT..."
"Oh I LIKED it then but..."
"It's not good but ...."
Those would be comments, not ratings.
I see the current rating system as a score of how many players enjoyed the game.
A score of 87 means that 87% of people who rated the game enjoyed it. A score of 12 means that 12% of the people who rated the game enjoyed it.
With the previous number scale system, different user's votes had more 'weight' than others. People who voted 1 or 10 regularly swayed the score more than people who cast votes closer to what the game's score already was.
Truly, as a player, all I need to know in the ranking system is how many people enjoyed playing the game, and that's what the new system does perfectly. With the previous system a score of 87 was rather arbitrary, because it didn't tell me how many people enjoyed the game, or really even how much each person liked it. With the new system everyone has equal weight in their vote, producing results that are more accurate.
I honestly feel there should be a middle rating which would more mirror a win, loss, draw system. Thumbs Down, In-between, and Thumbs Up. That way if you liked a game but thought it needed improving you could vote for In-between. But adding another rating would have to change the way ratings are valued and calculated. I think YouTube would be better off with a middle rating as well.
Those would be comments, not ratings.
And no one actually looks at those because of how buried down those are. But most my complaints are about the system when it comes to MMOs not the flash games.
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