We'll be launching in about 3 hours and 40 minutes from this post... I'm aware the countdown isn't working as intended but there's not much we can do about that now. We won't have the site up directly at the time it goes down, but it'll be up shortly after as we change some files over, so don't freak out when the full site doesn't show up right away! There will be activity going on in the chat so be sure to show up.

Anyway, I know a lot of people didn't like how we used to decide the best of show- basically we just had the staff pick the booths we liked, it wasn't very organized and there wasn't much to it. We weren't very clear about it though, so it brought a lot of confusion as booths had ratings on the site.... so we have something new to work with this year:

Basically we'll be operating on a points system... highest points in a category wins.

Likes: The highest liked game in a category gets one point.

Reviews: Based on a five-star system, each review can give out points. 5 stars means 3 points, 4 stars means 2 points, 3 stars means 1 point, 2 stars means 0 points, 1 star means -1 points, and a review with no stars means -2 points. Reviews will be quality checked before they can be considered for this... that means no reviews like "it's a good game" or similar- reasons have to be given.

Judges: This year we'll have the staff be the judges... they pick their favorite in each category and post why, their reasoning probably won't be as detailed as a review but it should be of some substance so it's not just random picking.. 4 points per judge pick. (Next year we might pick out judges and have a separate "Staff's Pick" category to go along with Best of Show... depends on how this all turns out)

It does seem a bit biased in favor of the judges but keep in mind that enough reviews could totally outweigh whatever they have to say... I don't know how many reviews we'll be getting since this is the first year we're doing this so keep in mind this is experimental and future events will have the points better worked out if there's any issues with the current system.

Hope that explains everything that needs to be explained!

Should there be some sort of maximum/limit on the reviews? The subsection for reviews has four AM2R 5-stars while a ton of other games haven't even had reviews yet.

Not to mention, basing in on the number isn't quite right, because everyone has a different subjective standard for what grants that number score; for example, I'd never give a 5 to a demo, but I'd only give a 0 to something that is outright completely unplayable. This leaves a good amount of the games in the 3-4 range. Other people give 5-stars and 0-stars like candy bars.

There's only 1 zero star review...

I'm aware there are flaws with this- this is an attempt to shift from a behind-closed-doors staff-only pick of the best of show to giving the members more input here. We will adjust how best of show is determined based on what happens this year... there was no expectation that this was going to be a perfect system right out of the box- we just need something to work with to tell us what direction we need to go in to get the best possible system.

and honestly I don't think best of show is that big of a deal... if people are here just for the best of show then I don't think they're at the right place.

(10-28-2011, 05:31 PM)Kesha Wrote: There's only 0 zero star review...

"Cookie of Destiny" used to have a 0-star review up, but it appears to have been deleted. I do get the rest of your points, though.

i meant to say 1, whoops; it's still there

Honestly it's going to be an issue whenever member input is taken into account. But really the reviews this year are meant to prevent people from slapping out arbitrary ratings like last year (though those didn't count into the judging.) While this does lend itself to people giving out five star reviews for games they really like, they have to back up the reasons why. It's impossible to justify a zero point review that's done just to knock someone down. Granted a lot of the popular games will have more people willing to hand out reviews, but that's a problem with taking public opinion into account in general.

Last year the best of show was done completely behind doors which a lot of people disagreed with, and it's not something that we should do again. Things will have to be tweaked again next year - but honestly, I would say the example you gave with AM2R is well deserving of the reviews its gotten. If there's a really good game hidden in the booths, get the word out to other people, and post a review!