GameSpot gives face-lift to 11-year-old review system

25 June 2007

3 Comments

Posted by:Josh

One of the industry’s biggest video game web-sites, GameSpot, has announced that they are about to majorly overhaul their review system. A system they have been using for 11-years since the site launched in 1996!

The new system will do away entirely with single decimal points (Such as the highly controversial 8.8 and 8.9 scores they gave to Zelda: Twilight Princess) as well as individual scores for Gameplay, Graphics, Sound, Value and Tilt. Previously, all the scores were linked. Which meant that a low graphics score would effect the overall number grade given.

But no more. The new system will use a whole or half number system (such as 6.0 or 8.5) without any kind of category numbers. But the biggest change is the addition of a medal system.

Anyone that uses the site and is a member with a profile is likely very fond of their Emblem system they use to reward frequent users of the site (where having lots of classic games in your collection will give you an “Old School” emblem, for example), and the new Medal system for reviews was birthed out of that same idea.

Games will be given medals for a wide range of different aspects, both good and bad, to give you a better “at-a-glance” idea of the good and bad points of a game. For example the “Slideshow” medal is given to games that have a bad framerate, while a game that overuses advertising will get the self-explanatory “Blatant-In-Game-Advertising” medal. There will even be various graphical medals (including one for a game’s technical proficiency and one for its artistic design), sound medals (from outstanding licensed music and original soundtracks to medals for effects and voice acting), etc. There are already over 50 different medals they’ve come up with and they plan to add more as new genres are birthed and new industry trends start appearing.

As the Editorial Director Jeff Gerstmann explained, the industry has changed drastically since their original review system launched back in 1996. Back then there was no rhythm games genre and nothing like the Touch! Generation series of games on Nintendo DS had been attempted before (where the games are more like “tools” than actual games). And there wasn’t such a big gap between the graphical capabilities of systems, like there is now between the PS3 and the Wii. Not to mention the recent rise of microtransactions and downloadable games & content for consoles. And the new system will take into account the fact that graphics really don’t matter in a game like Brain Age.

Personally I think the new review system is a great change. You have to keep with the times to stay viable, and I think the medal system is an excellent idea to give people a quick and easy way to tell whether or not they’d enjoy the game being reviewed.

The new review system will go into effect this week (Old reviews btw will remain the way they are and will not be effected by the new system).