Are there any real life examples of merits that anyone wants to share? I've scoured the comments section of the games in search of merit examples for a ridiculously long amount of time, and only found page after page of spam.
One of the purposes of Merits is to set examples for other posters. This is a somewhat improbable idea, as personally, I've never even seen an actual Merit, and I'd rather not spend another half hour searching through comments filled with spam.
If you find a noteworthy Merit, or have previously earned a Merit, please feel free to post it.
Like this is the one I got.. For an example or such x]
And it's short.. a Merit Worthy Comment does not have to be long.. xD
Here:
Good Job on the game, as always your games are epic. The keyboard shortcuts are perfect. The different type of weapons and defense as well helps your strategy.
A few things are: -Some weapons should cause more damage and maybe more expensive -The surface is so unstable when shot several times, so then you lose time. -In a lot of levels your outnumbered greatly, and your other turrets do not shoot automatically. Which brings me to the point that its a lot more difficult, and at some points seems impossibly outrageous.
So far, the game is great ;] Good job on this one John.
Takes a good 5 minutes to write something like that.. and it's not very difficult.. the more you write the higher the chance you'll have of 1 being found. That's basically all there is to it, if your lucky especially and a mod sees it. :P
Not me.. I just got a merit for a comment I wrote in November of 09 Lol.
It's like a giant waiting game...except waiting is boring, so people complain when they don't get a merit within a week XD
This is the average joe. The only thing bad about reviews is, you don't really know for sure if the mod found one or didn't, which is why its awkward to ask one if they were looking around.
Takes a good 5 minutes to write something like that.. and it's not very difficult.. the more you write the higher the chance you'll have of 1 being found. That's basically all there is to it, if your lucky especially and a mod sees it. :P
Longer reviews tend to have more in-depth criticism involved, but reviews do not need to turn out to be a novel. You just need to clarify a few key points, such as gameplay, music, art, etc. and explain a couple points within each category. If mods can say "why" to parts of a review, then it's not merit worthy.
if we give you and exsaple then you most likey copy and paste it to a game cheater.
Good point, I never thought about that...
The problem is, I'd probably get busted by the same mod who Merited the original comment. Also, plagiarizing one Merit/comment and using it for a completely unrelated game would be sort of obvious.
Maybe the mods could introduce a comment search engine that sifted through the comments and picked out any that were longer than a few words. I believe this would speed up their job and would get some well deserved merits out to the players who deserve it.
You could also have a new kind of comments log Called Write a review the rules on this comment box would be that you have to write at least 8 lines of text and it must have less than three spelling mistakes (if it was no spelling mistakes people would not be able to include things like developers names which do not come under a computers dictionary). This would also help the mods pick out some good reviews.
I rarely write more than a few words in comments however 99% of the comments I read are exactly the same so there is not really anything wrong with writing shorter comments.
Have copied this in from the Flagging a topic Forum - this is because I have something that could possibly solve both problems
I think the system they have on the you-tube comments is a good idea - There is a Like/Thumbs up icon and a Dislike/Tumbs down icon. There is also a filter at the top which allows you to see only comments which are well rated or comments which are badly rated.
This would help Moderators/Admin to see the well rated, good comments if they are looking to give out merits. It would also help them see the badly rated, horrid comments and try to delete them if necessary.
If it helps, just remember that your reviews will be in the comments forever. I would definitely wait at least a month before "knowing" if a mod merited your review. If not, then perhaps you just needed to up the ante on how you write your reviews. Since there are merit guides around the newcomer's forum, mods DO have a high standard of what is and what isn't merit worthy.
I rarely write more than a few words in comments however 99% of the comments I read are exactly the same so there is not really anything wrong with writing shorter comments.
Aside from the fact that these will inevitably be deleted.
I think the system they have on the you-tube comments is a good idea - There is a Like/Thumbs up icon and a Dislike/Tumbs down icon. There is also a filter at the top which allows you to see only comments which are well rated or comments which are badly rated.
The problem is that we can't trust users not to abuse this system as similar systems have been abused in the past. Users would fish for votes, play a game of "I scratch your back, you scratch mine", vote for friends, or even create alt accounts to vote for themselves. Because there are points at stake with this system. It's one reason why upvotes are practically useless.
Its a real shame you cant trust anybody - I don't use the system on you-tube that often and I only use it when I see a really bad comment or a really good one. The simple fact is that the good comments are too few to stand out. I guess the people who try to take advantage of it shouldn't really comment at all but I guess that is just life
The system wouldn't be abused as much if there was a "vote up" button and a "vote down" button like on Youtube. The "flag" button just doesn't help in situations like that.
It would also help them see the badly rated, horrid comments and try to delete them if necessary.
Of course, in one exception, if a user is hated by a group of users that band together just to "vote down" comments, that user has no chance of keeping comments; unless, of course, a merit-worthy comment is voted down enough times for it to be seen by a mod. Then, the plan would backfire for that group of users.
You want to here a merit comment? Well here is one. I think it wshould be a merit, but maybe that's because I wrote it.
And that is probably why they won't give it to you... if people keep asking for one and keep stating that their review is worth one, mods will ultimately check your name on the black list or something similar... Just like the guidelines on merits says: 'don't ask for a merit!'...
The problem is, I'd probably get busted by the same mod who Merited the original comment. Also, plagiarizing one Merit/comment and using it for a completely unrelated game would be sort of obvious.
What's the point of plagiarizing a comment/review? Isn't it far more satisfing to write a review on a game and create it all from scratch (with you 'bare hands' if you like) and get credit for it? To me that is exactly what it is and should be!
If it helps, just remember that your reviews will be in the comments forever. I would definitely wait at least a month before "knowing" if a mod merited your review. If not, then perhaps you just needed to up the ante on how you write your reviews. Since there are merit guides around the newcomer's forum, mods DO have a high standard of what is and what isn't merit worthy.
I copied your post Freakenstein, but only to give a reply on it! I actually got a merit rewarded on a review I wrote in November or so (can't recall the exact date, but hey), so it can take a little longer for you to get one instead of one month. And the pleasantness of it was, that it was a really big surprise for me! Even better then getting one within 3 days if you ask me! =)
Of course, in one exception, if a user is hated by a group of users that band together just to "vote down" comments, that user has no chance of keeping comments; unless, of course, a merit-worthy comment is voted down enough times for it to be seen by a mod. Then, the plan would backfire for that group of users.
But seriously... wouldn't this mean even more work for the mods and admins?! They already have their hands full now...
wouldn't this mean even more work for the mods and admins?
No, because all that would change about the comment would be the number next to it indicating how many "vote downs" it has; or it could possibly make the text size much smaller...
Of course, in one exception, if a user is hated by a group of users that band together just to "vote down" comments, that user has no chance of keeping comments; unless, of course, a merit-worthy comment is voted down enough times for it to be seen by a mod. Then, the plan would backfire for that group of users.
Paraphrased forum post by Yours Truly:
Vote up or vote down, mods do not need these to know what is and what isn't a spam comment or attempted review. All vote ups and downs are to a website is just what a group of people generally think about a certain person's comment. Is there even a need to use this in a game comment? No, considering that 98% of all game comments are shorter than my pinkie. This will only have any sort of merit in forums such as the S&S, WEPR, and NC's forums, where posts with high vote-ups generally mean that that post is credible, while vote-downs should be avoided. Credible, whereas a helpful post may be the right answer and that a post has a strong point in a debating thread. Avoided, as in spam posts and offensive posts-- but we really don't need vote-downs to know what a spam/troll post is!
Spam-posts 'show themselves' quite easily, no further explaining needed... but somehow I have the feeling that the earlier mentioned 'group-down-voting' will be the biggest problem in this matter... If someone was to be 'bully-ed' (is that correct English?), this would provide a new way to try and push this certain person into a corner by a group, simply by the push of a button... and that's something to be avoided if you ask me!
