PEACH
Arbiter
- Joined
- Jan 22, 2017
- Messages
- 286
Reviews themselves are dangerous, much less Steam reviews where the average user is retarded, and that's the problem. It's entirely possible for someone that has prestigious taste to review a game, like it, but take issue with one or two specific elements in the game. A developer might be inclined to list to this reviewer, as they've established themselves as someone with good taste and knowledge about the genre and so on. But then another reviewer comes along, who is also prestigious and respected, and they also like the game but once again take issue with one or two specific elements in the game, and these elements are different than the ones described by the first reviewer.
So now what does the Dev do? How does he differentiate between which critique is correct and which isn't? Perhaps both are correct? Multiply this by five, and its entirely possible that the Dev will have to change three or four or five different things about their game, changing into something completely different which is objectively worse than the initial product they first had. This is a simplified way to look at reviews, and this analogy only get more complicated once you introduce doubt on a person's credibility as a reviewer, or introduce people that you know aren't very prestigious reviewer. This dilemma is what game developers struggle with, and they're losing the fight, as the vast majority of them end up changing their game for the worse, or god forbid, starting off from scratch to design a game based on such reviews.
Everyone making something for an audience needs to learn how to evaluate criticism and be discerning in their response to it eventually. It can be tough but it's necessary if you're going to be making your work open to public scrutiny.
I don't see this as a problem with reviews, I see it as a problem with developers.