Steam: Updates to User Review Scores Based on Language

Comments

• Stern@lemmy.world ⁨3⁩ ⁨weeks⁩ ago

  Good for stuff like Chinese review bombing.

  source

  • Electricd@lemmybefree.net ⁨3⁩ ⁨weeks⁩ ago

    I feel like it’s also a way to limit review bombing, like what happened for recent games regarding privacy policy changes

    source

    • Stern@lemmy.world ⁨2⁩ ⁨weeks⁩ ago

      thegamer.com/wuchang-fallen-feathers-review-bomb-…

      Could be from stuff akin to this. This is the second bombing of Luchang, first was post-launch due to UE5 spec demands

      source
    • Malix@sopuli.xyz ⁨3⁩ ⁨weeks⁩ ago

      …were those reviews from some specific languages?

      source

      • -> View More Comments
  • DoucheBagMcSwag@lemmy.dbzer0.com ⁨2⁩ ⁨weeks⁩ ago

    It’s definitely because of that.

    source
• Poopfeast420@discuss.tchncs.de ⁨2⁩ ⁨weeks⁩ ago

  I like it, but currently I see two possible improvements, that I hope get added down the line.

  First, being able to give a list of languages you want to factor into the score, so it’s not just your current Steam language.

  Second, I’d like the toggle to disable the language filter and off-topic review filter to be separate.

  Both are pretty minor for me, since I think the default settings are fine, but giving people more options is better.

  source

  • Electricd@lemmybefree.net ⁨2⁩ ⁨weeks⁩ ago

    Second, I’d like the toggle to disable the language filter and off-topic review filter to be separate.

    Isn’t this already the case?

    source

    • Poopfeast420@discuss.tchncs.de ⁨2⁩ ⁨weeks⁩ ago

      Unless there’s a setting I missed, right now you can only change both settings at the same time.

      Image

      source

      • -> View More Comments
  • Electricd@lemmybefree.net ⁨2⁩ ⁨weeks⁩ ago

    First, being able to give a list of languages you want to factor into the score, so it’s not just your current Steam language.

    I think it currently chooses the languages you’ve allowed to see for reviews if I remember correctly, or the game languages you allowed to see

    source

    • Poopfeast420@discuss.tchncs.de ⁨2⁩ ⁨weeks⁩ ago

      As far as I can tell, it just uses whatever language you use Steam in. If that language doesn’t have enough reviews, it defaults to all languages.

      I also just tried and set German as a secondary language, but it still just shows the score for English reviews. It doesn’t even mention German at the bottom of the page, where you get the summary, only all languages and English (and recent). If I change the language for the store, it also changes the source for the review score.

      source

      • -> View More Comments
• Katana314@lemmy.world ⁨2⁩ ⁨weeks⁩ ago

  Perfect for reviews like “Game is great, visuals are great, no bugs, it’s very fun, but the developer was not polite enough to the glorious Chinese Communist Party, and was a week late on providing a Chinese translation. Never support these xenophobes.”

  God I wish I was exaggerating. Chinese gamers seem to have a huge victim complex.

  source

  • brucethemoose@lemmy.world ⁨2⁩ ⁨weeks⁩ ago

    Yeah.

    That’s the vibe I get from Lemmygrad too, like they assume the rest of the world is constantly pondering how much they hate China, as a dominating thought.

    source

    • Electricd@lemmybefree.net ⁨2⁩ ⁨weeks⁩ ago

      lemmy.ml, blahaj.zone, lemmygrad, hexbear…

      source

      • -> View More Comments
    • echodot@feddit.uk ⁨2⁩ ⁨weeks⁩ ago

      They really don’t seem to understand that for most of the world we don’t care about China one way or the other. Much in the same way as I don’t really think about Argentina. It’s out there somewhere, but other than acknowledging its existence I don’t really care.

      source
• Kenny2999@lemmy.world ⁨3⁩ ⁨weeks⁩ ago

  Steam reviews are a great source of info and entertainment. The score is absolutely useless.

  When actually picking my next game I’ve trusted the same gaming magazine for over 30 years.

  source

  • overload@sopuli.xyz ⁨3⁩ ⁨weeks⁩ ago

    Steam review scores are more robust than what 20 games critics thought about a game and is more resistant to review bombing than metacritic. The score is not meaningless IMO.

    source
  • Electricd@lemmybefree.net ⁨3⁩ ⁨weeks⁩ ago

    The score is useful. It could be better if Steam had a proper review system instead of just “good” or “bad”

    source

    • Malix@sopuli.xyz ⁨2⁩ ⁨weeks⁩ ago

      I dunno how useful that would be. Way back in the day eg. youtube had a star rating system for videos, and users gave 0-5 stars… except they found out that overwhelmingly vast majority of users only used 0 and 5, nothing in between.

      While a more granular review system would be nice, it’s just the users that don’t and won’t use it properly. Even if some users would use scores other than [min] and [max], they would be such a droplet in an ocean.

      Even with the current thumbs up/down people get it wrong. Give it a thumbs up but write a scathing review.

      source

      • -> View More Comments
  • Agent_Karyo@lemmy.world ⁨3⁩ ⁨weeks⁩ ago

    Why do you think the scores are useless? They are good starting point and/or a way to evaluate smaller indie titles that often don’t get professional reviews.

    source

    • Kenny2999@lemmy.world ⁨2⁩ ⁨weeks⁩ ago

      I just haven’t seen any correlation with game quality. A short subjective rant from a random gamer is much more useful, especially with those hidden indie gems.

      source
  • thatKamGuy@sh.itjust.works ⁨3⁩ ⁨weeks⁩ ago

    Which magazine? I’m legitimately surprised that (m)any have survived, to be honest!

    source

    • Kenny2999@lemmy.world ⁨2⁩ ⁨weeks⁩ ago

      Pelit. I don’t know how old it is but the above one was the first issue I bought. One of the original dudes still there making up terrible wordplays.

      Image

      source

      • -> View More Comments
• lowleveldata@programming.dev ⁨3⁩ ⁨weeks⁩ ago

  you’re late to the party

  source

  • Electricd@lemmybefree.net ⁨3⁩ ⁨weeks⁩ ago

    Image

    source
• CosmoNova@lemmy.world ⁨2⁩ ⁨weeks⁩ ago

  What is „my language“? Because depending on where the game is from this changes. Have they thought of that? Because I know from experience that US companies cannot comprehend speaking more than one language.

  source

  • Sarmyth@lemmy.world ⁨2⁩ ⁨weeks⁩ ago

    Its the language set for your client UI I wager.

    source

    • CosmoNova@lemmy.world ⁨2⁩ ⁨weeks⁩ ago

      I mean yeah and that‘s very unfortunate. Users need more control about these things. This is as rushed as Youtube‘s automatic translation slop. Most people speak more than one language. When will Americans learn that?

      source
• Adalast@lemmy.world ⁨2⁩ ⁨weeks⁩ ago

  I kinda hope they also weight reviews based in hours in the game. If ten people with 1000 hours I’m a fame recommend and 1000 people with <10 hours don’t recommend, I really hope the score is better than 50%.

  source

  • Electricd@lemmybefree.net ⁨2⁩ ⁨weeks⁩ ago

    Well maybe they stopped playing the game because they didn’t like it? I don’t continue to play games I dislike

    source
• Tetsuo@jlai.lu ⁨2⁩ ⁨weeks⁩ ago

  I personally don’t look forward to this new feature. I dont want my local language to be used. And that will be one more program that will constantly nag me about if I want to translate some review or only shows the one in my language by default.

  I just want to use my currency and being able to just speak English.

  I dont want steam to become like Firefox and decide for you that you do need some translations for stuff…

  Since I dont think the language you speak should have any relevancy to the quality of the game I have no interest for reviews that are not in English.

  So I just hope this “let’s localize for you everything” trend will stop.

  I dont want french reviews of French games made in france. I just want English reviews of games and the score for all reviews.

  Currently the localization of the reviews is the thing that I dislike the most with steam which goes to show how good I think the product is.

  source

  • Red_October@lemmy.world ⁨2⁩ ⁨weeks⁩ ago

    It really sounds like you’ve misunderstood what this change is actually doing. This isn’t steam forcing you to use a particular language, those settings aren’t going anywhere. It’s also not going to force you to see reviews in the game’s native language either, so your worry about “french reviews of French games made in france” is just… wrong. What it’s doing is sorting reviews by language, under the idea that reviews written in the language you use are probably more relevant to you. And if even that is unacceptable, you can disable the whole system to keep it just the way it is.

    This actually means you’re MORE likely to get reviews that are more accurate. First, because it limits the impact of regional review bombing. Now if a game upsets one particular population, their review bombing doesn’t render the whole score meaningless. It’s worth pointing out, games have been heavily review bombed for the sin of competing with, or beating, other regionally popular games for awards. It also means that if the content of a game hits better, or worse, for a demographic based on language, that will be reflected here. If the game is getting rave reviews where it was made, but the translations and voice work for YOUR localization are terrible, you will see reviews that reflect that. You probably don’t care how great the voice acting was in the native Chinese version if you only speak English, and what may seem culturally brilliant to a Japanese audience may lose a lot of the impact for you.

    I just want to use my currency and being able to just speak English.

    This change was made with you in mind.

    source

    • Electricd@lemmybefree.net ⁨2⁩ ⁨weeks⁩ ago

      What it’s doing is sorting reviews by language, under the idea that reviews written in the language you use are probably more relevant to you.

      It already did that, but only when viewing reviews. The update just makes it so that the score ex: “overwhelmingly positive” is now only based on reviews of your language

      source
  • spankmonkey@lemmy.world ⁨2⁩ ⁨weeks⁩ ago

    Yeah, it should be off by default with the option to turn it on.

    source
  • echodot@feddit.uk ⁨2⁩ ⁨weeks⁩ ago

    What.

    This updated doing exactly what you want it to do, what do you complaining about?

    source