My friend, do I have the gif banner of a blog post for you! the-avocado.org/2018/02/15/the-arlo-day-thread/ If I were less lazy I'd cut the gif up into separate Arlos to serve as some thoroughly worthwhile emotes... But I am as lazy as I am, so there you are, job for a more industrious individual I guess.
Another important point: people often compare games based on just their review scores. Like, even games from different genres or games that got their scores for completely different reasons. It's impossible to say whether one game is 'objectively better' than the other just because it got a higher score.
Because DUH, obviously if MY Yu-Gi-Oh TCG game from 18 years ago and from a GBA console has an 8, it's WAAAAY better than the 2021 Switch Super Mario 3D World + Bowser's Fury, that just barely got a 7. Yeah. (?)
Yes, but I would (nicely) argue that blurs the lines even more? The main point of a score is simply convenience; many people for what loss for the cause or not simply do not have the time to fine combe and mull through a persons 1 to 2 hours of stand up speech and assessments. That's why you have Like/dislike buttons; many just leave the Courtesy Like, zap to the end to see the Score and they're done. If the score then peaks their interest, they will return to indulge and dig for the meat n potatoes.
@@netweed09 Not a fan of that. Either you watch a review or not. A number tells you nothing, people's interpretation of the same number also varies wildly. Reviews aren't 1-2 hours, analysis videos are, but those are aimed at people who are already interested in the subject.
It was the only product that could successfully compete with Tiny Desk Engineer unless you consider the indie product Tiny Desk Gray Wolf. But now with Tiny Dancing Arlo out of the picture the market is losing it's variety and consumers are left unhappy.
Its actually such a good point about the 5/10 score. I've always thought its crazy that something with a 5/10 is basically considered unacceptable instead of representing something average or medium. I feel like a 7/10 holds the place a 5 is supposed to.
I think it just follows the system we have in schools where a 7/10 is a C which means passing, 8/10 means average (B), and 9/10 means quite enjoyable (A), and 10/10 is amazing (A+).
I like how ProJared used to rate games: instead of a number, he used an object or an experience to rate/describe his feelings towards a game. For example, Kid Klown in Crazy Chase got a Bee Sting/10, because the game was short, painful, and seemed to last longer than it actually did, like a bee sting.
Or what about the Sseth review system? "I give this game a completely random, but quantifiably high score, which can only be expressed on a graphical calculator."
I would like that. GameXplain does something similar where they don't score the game but say whether or not they like it and to which degree. No "7/10" but "I liked it." No "9/10" but "I liked it a lot."
Oh yeah! That's actually a pretty good idea if he was down for it. It takes away from the whole precise numbers thing and takes advantage of Arlo's charm.
Agree, they were small enough or not separated enough that I did not distinguished they represented the different attitudes towards the game in question. Still I love Arlo's reviews becuase he explains why he likes or dislikes something and I am better able to consider if that is something I would like.
Arlo always emphasises how there are other people much smarter than him, but I think everything he said in this video shows that he's pretty darn smart.
I'd say admitting that you're not very smart, is the mark of a very smart person. Ignorant and closed-minded people fail to look for other people's perspectives and understand how much they actually don't know. ...As a result they are happier. Smart people realize that compared to the world, they are stupid in SOME way.
Arlo is so wholesome! He saved his last ever score for us! So nice of him to do that for us! I can't wait for the next review or whatever he posts next!
After all these years, i just now noticed that the little Arlos beneath the review's score actually represent each one of the ratings, and are not just doing funny little dances...
Same here, although one time I tried to briefly decipher it and gave up due to the short time they are on screen. I think it would've made more sense to make 7 different static Arlo drawings expressing an emotions, and possibly even color-coded them too. Doesn't matter now though, the Arlo congo line of emotions is gone. Honestly, I'm fine with that too.
Schools I would say are definitely to blame for that rule of 7. Getting 70 on a test means you did "average" or "Good enough" Makes sense why People associate scoring that way
There are some countries where 7 is the maximum score for school gradings; but I grew up in a country where school grades are in a scale from 1 to 100, with 60 being the minimum to approve; and yes, it really affects the perception of the review scores.
Yeah 5/10 at school is just like a 1/10. It's really out of 5 since they only use 5 letters, but even then a D is a failure too, so it's really a scale of 4. 1/4 sucks, 2/4 is average, 3/4 is ok, and 4/4 is perfect.
Yep. 100-90 - A x90-80 - B x80-70 - C x70-60 - D x60-00 - F A completely worthless system design to punish and keep people in line since it was NEVER about education in the first place, so people grow up with a screwed up sense of value to begin with.
Yes... Numbers are attachable to feelings/emotions. I live in the U.S, and ever since I started getting grades of C- and under on exams or major assignments back in high school, almost every
I always liked your 7 point scale. It was basically asking the question, "Is this a good game?" And the answer would be as follows : 1 - Strongly disagree 2 - Disagree 3 - Somewhat disagree 4 - Neutral 5 - Somewhat agree 6 - Agree 7 - Strongly agree
Yeah, it was a great scale. The reason I like scores is that I get a broad idea of the quality a game has, whereas the reviews that don't have it a lot of the times don't get the point across. I can understand the virtues and faults of a game, but if you don't tell me how they relate to each other, I may leave the review without knowing if I want the product. The point of the scores is to tie all up, that's why they are important, even if it's not possible to give an objective answer.
I completely agree except I would change the question from, “is this a good game?” to, “did Arlo like this game?” If I were to review Dark Souls I’d have to admit that it’s very well-made, but I do not like playing it myself. We should all try to find reviewers whose opinions we generally agree with and listen to their recommendations to get an idea of whether or not we’ll like that thing, rather than look at some industry-wise aggregate of a thing’s supposed objective “quality.”
@@Mati303s That's true, but good review have a sum up at the end telling exactly that : did the reviewer consider the game good ? So hopefully you will get an alternative to scores here.
I actually find scoring systems flawed to begin with. I prefer a brief summary of the pros and cons, and why they feel this way. A lot of people only play a game halfway, and slap a score on it. This isn’t as reliable as a brief explanation of why.
That's not a problem with scoring systems, that's a problem with reviewers. If you use a ruler incorrectly, the measuring system isn't broken, it's that you didn't properly measure.
Same here. A score is fine at a glance, but knowing *why* a game received that score is far more important to making a decision on whether or not to purchase.
@@NintenDub I'm inclined to disagree. The general playerbase that comes in a week later is far worse in the way of reviews. With toxic concepts such as review bombing and hating a game based on the most minute things, players are far too emotional and reactionary to be trusted as reliable review sources. I'd take a professional reviewer any day. Since they also have to disclose whether or not they've been paid for the review, that can help gauge things too (although most are giving their genuine opinions despite constant accusations that reviewers are bought out for good reviews).
Agreed. With films too. I couldn't care less about the score someone sticks on something, especially since a lot of the things I dislike and like about things may differ from what other people dislike and like about things... And that is the case in many places, things that one reviewer hates I might not mind or even love, something one reviewer loves I might not like very much or outright hate/disagree with. I'd rather someone just tell me what they like and dislike about a game and pinpoint a few other things they may deem as notable and that's all we need.
I’m sorry but I strongly oppose this decision. I agree with everything you say in the video but I am worried about the mini arlos. I know Covid is tough but I don’t want you lay off any workers. I am deeply concerned for the health and safety of these arlos so I am sorry to say I do NOT support your decision.
Yeah, I completely agree Arlo. People get so caught up in the number and use it as some piece of evidence to fuel arguments about a game. I will miss the dancing Arlos though.
You're illustrating one of the big issues of today's society, the fact that people are now apparently incapable of showing any shred of respect to someone who disagrees with them the reasoning is something like this : I know I am a smart person and this is my opinion, therefore anyone with a different opinion HAS to be an idiot this attitude needs to disappear to allow conversation and debate to become respectful again
Cedrick Rozon Exactly. Such a mindset pervades the far left democrats. It’s why Resetera literally banned Angry Joe for giving Last of Us 2 under the guise of “bigotry toward LGBT”. They’ve even banned people for merely daring to say they believe not all cops are evil. Nope. You have to drink the kool aid and no deviation from their fanatical views will be tolerated. Any who dissent are “evil racists”.
@@ActionJaxonH There's a lack of respect on both sides of the political spectrum right now, which is the base of the issue, Politics is supposed to be about meeting in the middle, not about threatening anyone you disagree with
He's wanting to diminish the chance of heated arguments and hate from his comment section, not discourage civil debates. Too many seek out fights on the internet and Arlo is just trying to do what he can to avoid fueling such.
While seeing a numbered review score is kind of addicting, pin pointing a review to a specific number doesn't do anything useful for anyone and even games with high scores won't satisfy everyone. There are plenty of 9 or 10 out of 10 games that I just plain don't like at all due to my own tastes. Everyone's take away is going to differ so why try to define a game with such a specific number that no one will really agree on. It's all just splitting hairs. I find the only useful kind of score system is a broad 5 point system. No half points or anything. Just stick with general tiers of quality. 5. Revolutionary or near perfect execution 4. Great. Maybe it doesn't do anything new but it's solid across the board or has a few minor flaws that will hold it back for many 3. Decent or flawed experience that's worth trying if you're open to it 2. Mediocre or heavily flawed 1. Just plain bad
Was just thinking while watching this about Glass Reflection the anime youtuber. He used to do numbered scores, but after a while switched to more general recommendations to “skip it”, “stream it” or “buy it”, and gave the best shows a “certified frosty”. Kind of conveys better that it’s a personal recommendation and not a mark of objective quality.
Hey Design Doc love your stuff and I'm happy to see you here! Personally I don't really like review scores for "objective" reviews because usually they won't matter to me necessairly what the reviwer thinks about the game, I have my own tastes and usually I like more to know what are the crucial points of a game that I should be paying attention to. Still I don't mind recommendation from youtube personalities like you and Arlo and I feel the simple 5 point system is good enough to explain one's feelings for a game
I agree, a 10 point system is just too broad. Recomended games usually get a 7-10 which makes 0-6 kinda useless since they can be summarised as bad anyway. A 5 point system makes it also more easier and accurate to review games
The problem is that reviewers don't understand the concept of a scoring system. It's the EXACT same thing as a grading system. You don't reward it points for doing good things. You treat it like you do grading a math test. It starts at 100% (a perfect 10), then the score lowers for every fault the game presents that the reviewer is personally against. Those point deductions, just like getting a question wrong on a math test, can't be earned back be doing good things in other areas, just like getting questions right on said test doesn't take away the lower grade that the wrong answer caused. Basically, all scoring and grading systems are SUPPOSED to be STRICTLY a point deduction system. Anyone who is doing it differently is doing it wrong. And currently, thats almost the entire industry right now, same with movies and tv. (ps, when I say "lowers for every fault" that doesn't nessisarily mean a full number. It's up to the reviewer to define how big of a deduction that fault is worth. Could be as small as a -0.001 point deduction because a texture rendered in slowly)
@@just9019 It's only broad if its a recommendation system rather than a proper scoring/point deduction system). Basically, it's meant to be treated like you grading a test. . . but most reviewers are morons and don't seem to get that with all their numbers being baseless at worst, abstract at best. Scores are something you tally, like how many strokes you do on a golf course. . . or how many bad game elements are in a game. Each instance holds a numerical value that you add up at the end with those numbers when added together give you your result. When there is a perfect score (like in golf it's considered "par") or a "perfect 10", you get the result by taking the perfect score then subtracting the sum you got from adding from it or something similar of a negative effect.
nothing is perfect, because everyone has their own opinion of what makes a game good. For example some people might think cuphead is bad because the gameplay is too challenging for them, that just means its not their type of game or some other thing. but for me cuphead is so good, i decided to s rank all the bosses with default weapon only and i think its the best game ever.
Arlo, all we humbly request is for you to make publicly available a gif of the 7 emoting Arlos. Perhaps each of them separately as well if you could be so kind.
Hey Arlo, it’s less of people have been taught to think anything less than a 10 is bad, it’s more of ever since we were kids, we were told 100 were A+, a perfect score, and then 90 is a B, etc. I think that’s why the numbers 5 or below mean awful. Doesn’t matter how low you get after that, 50 or below has always been an F. Just my two since
I'd never thought about it before, but honestly that's a really smart way to think about it. When so many of us grew up on a system where 90's are great, 80's are alright, 70's are meh, and almost anything below that is regarded as bad to the point where a 20 and a 55 are almost indistinguishable, it probably affects our subconscious views of those numbers in regards to scores and such
What people don't understand about that is that in school the scoring is based on a more concrete measurement. You only got 50% of the questions on the test right? Well that means you must not have actually studied. Whether you agree with that is up to you, but you can see how someone can come up with that. Rating movies, games, books, etc like that doesn't work because it's not very concrete. Again it goes back to what Arlo and many others have said, that the scoring system on video games, and really most mediums, doesn't make much sense. It's better to explain how you feel about a piece of media
You're totally right. So many educational systems use a percentile grading scale, and teachers frequently give individual assignments a score out of 10 that aligns with the percentile. If I did reviews, I'd give a score from 1 to 5, because it gets away from the base 10 systems yet still has meaning to people, since 5 it's a commonly used number. It's also easier for them to accept 3 as average rather than unsatisfactory. Also, it's not super specific and nitpicky, provided you don't use decimals. That said, there are many acceptable ways of doing it, and reviewers shouldn't be obligated to cave to pressure on something like this. If you don't like a reviewer's scores, go find a reviewer whose tastes more closely with with your own. No review is universal.
@Bryce Sherman I wasn't trying to say his point is wrong, but explaining why the grading system and video game reviews aren't compatible. The grading system is already flawed, so when you take that and apply it to something that isn't compatible it just becomes a worse system
The whole "people think a 5/10 is unacceptable" thing is most likely based on the school grading system, where a 7/10 is a C, so average, and a 5/10 is an F, so a fail
It makes sense in terms of a binary “how many were right” but if you do ratings based on placement on a bell curve 4 of 7 is what the most of them would be and therefor it’s solid. I agree this difference doesn’t land mentally with people and it causes problems. Like yeah if I give you 10 questions on a topic and you know the answer to 4 of them, you probably have a very poor understanding and aren’t ready to build on that. But if it’s a game, 4 of 10 is right below average. I play 4 of 10 on a bell curve games all the time and enjoy them
Really well-made points, I largely agree. One thing I hate more than critic scores, are user scores. Apart from review-bombing, so many scores come with the description "My actual score is a 6, but I gave it a 10 to balance out all the wrong reviews"; WHICH MISSES THE ENTIRE POINT OF AGGREGATE SCORES.
The 7/10 mindset comes from the school system, where anything under that is usually a failing grade. People have essentially been brainwashed into thinking numerical ratings are more weighted than they should be.
and THAT weighting comes from over-reliance on true/false and multiple choice metrics. a literal random guess on a TF test can get you a 50%, thus getting 60% means you missed a lot more than it appears, doing only slightly better than pure guessing. It just barely gets better with ABCD. The best tests are the hardest to grade however (being free answer/essay/show your work), requiring the most work to actually grade+understand how well student understands the work. you cant just send those through the grading machine
@@deefdragon Bro I took a test yesterday for a subject I had no clue about. I had no idea what half the questions were asking about but with basic process of elimination and inferences I GOT ALL OF THE MULTIPLE CHOICE QUESTIONS CORRECT
Agreed, atleast in the US the Grading scale heavily influences everyone. I grew up in a state where there was a 7 Point Letter grade system. Meaning Anything less than a 70 is failing.
I never got the idea of 5/10 being bad either: I always thought of it as meaning a game either has little to no truly good or bad qualities, or it has too many problems to be considered good but too many positives to be considered bad; if its quality amounts to being middle of the road, it only makes sense to rate it at the middle of the scale. My interpretation of the 0 to 10 scale is this: 0 is bottom of the barrel, 1 is abysmal, 2 is awful, 3 is pretty bad, 4 is below average, 5 is average or mediocre, 6 is okay to decent, 7 is solid, 8 is great, 9 is amazing, and 10 is a masterpiece; this way, the scale is actually balanced and logical, but apparently most people are viewing this the same way as grading in school, where anything below 70% is an F, and that never made sense to me. I remember once getting into a debate about if Breath of the Wild is good or not with someone who considered themselves a Zelda purist, and one of the points they made against the idea of Zelda games doing anything differently (I think, I can't see how else it would be relevant) was that the DS Zelda games were both a 5/10, and they would then call them trash; to them, I’m sure that's what 5/10 meant, but to me, that was downright contradictory to say. Come to think of it, that might be why The Geek Critique said that Sonic Adventure 2: Battle, Sonic Adventure DX, and Sonic Heroes were critically panned; if you don't know, he makes reviews, or Critiques as he calls it, which I enjoy, but there are some occasional things that can best be described as questionable, such as how he claimed the Adventure GameCube rereleases and Heroes were all critically panned when upon release in his Shadow the Hedgehog Critique, when in reality, the reception seems to have been mixed; in fact, SA2B and Heroes got over 70 points on Metacritic, which is almost enough to have generally positive reviews by their standards, so it's possible that either those ratings don't reflect the critically reception they actually got or he considers 5-7/10 bad.
I think it's because there is no reason to play a mediocre game over an excellent one. One could also consider many NSMB games as mediocre, and another could consider Shrek 2 (GameCube) as mediocre. Someone else might think that Mario Party 9 is less than average, and another could think the same of the Bee Movie Game, and think that Mario Party 9 is just average. To me, 4 and below signifies a bad game, and one you should avoid. 5 signifies a game that you should only play if you are very interested, otherwise it might be a waste of money. 6-7 seem like general fun (think Wii Sports) or games that satisfy a niche, but not much more (think Picross). 8-10 are games that everyone should play, and are guaranteed to be enjoyable. To me, I wouldn't consider SA2B or Heroes to be critically panned. Your friend says to me that only friends of 2D Zelda would enjoy the DS Zelda games enough to be worth the money. The main issue of scores seems to be no-one agreeing on how good a score is, and games only being considered worthy of purchase if they score 7 or above - obviously, if something is scored less than that, it won't be purchased by the general public, and the franchise won't get too many more fans.
Old comment but it's probably because of conventional school grading systems. Getting a C or 70% is seen as average and anything below that is getting note home from your teachers and a scolding from your parents lol. It's infiltrated every rating system we have and I don't see it going anywhere until school rating systems are changed entirely.
Me before starting the video: OK, just don't get rid of the 7 point scale Me at 8:18: NOOOOOOOO! Me at 8:26: Nevermind I’m good with it. I will always miss the tiny Arlos, but this video still gets a 7/7 from me.
I'll miss the mini Arlos more than the actual scoring itself. Your reviews have always been great! And you can tell in your voice when youre reallly excited about a certain aspect in a game, its adorable.
You know, at first I was like "nooooo you can't get rid of scores, its always so fun trying to guess what your gonna give it" but you made some good arguments. I think it does open up more meaningful discussion to not give a score.
I think your decision is right! For example: Game Two is a German Gaming Show where they never show scores. They just say if they recommend a game or don’t recommend it and for wich People that Game could be a Good Choice.
@@Allister23 There are people who disliked Super’s gameplay but _loved_ its story. I can’t think of anybody from the N64 Era that likes anything about Paper Mario post-Wii.
Arlo honestly, you gotta start like a podcast channel or something. You have so many good things to say about gaming, the gaming community as a whole and just how people should act in general. I'm very impressed with this vid, I give it 7 out of 7💙💙💙
THANK YOU! I'm a day late here, but it always makes me happy to see a reviewer ditch review scores. I was happy when SomecallmyJohnny did so back and 2010, and in 2020 I'm happy when Arlo does. One point I want to hit up on is why people get so defensive: people think opinions can be objective. A lot of people will be convinced they have the formula of objective, universal criticism and will then try to explain why someone who came to the "wrong" conclusion is so wrong. You can see this with fans of certain reviews (not naming any names, but you can probably guess who I'm talking about) in that they'll actually very polite s but will become quite aggressive should the "opposition" try to stand their ground. Because to them, opinions can double as facts (e.i. become objective opinions) once they make enough logical sense™️. Combine that with how this mentality lends itself to confirmation bias, and you have people who REALLY don't like reviews guilty of wrong think.
I've been playing video games for decades and I really regret letting review scores dictate so much of what I played or didn't play for so many years. They can have such a profound psychological impact on my own personal enjoyment of a game that I've mostly stopped paying attention to them. Enjoying games is always more nuanced and more personal than a single number can convey. I wish more reviewers thought like you, Arlo.
Idea: At the end of each video you could give games 2 or 3 specific awards regarding how much you liked certain aspects of them ("One of my favourite battle systems in x type of games", for example), ala the bonus stars in Mario Party!
When you watch a review without a conclusive score and just hear the persons thoughts and opinions on the game it leads you to draw your own conclusion based on your own opinions so I think this system is better
Arlo is clearly incapable of doing it properly anyway if he actually thinks I OF ALL PEOPLE deserve A PERFECT 7/7. What a tasteless hack. That was a joke. I love Arlo.
Although it was difficult on your side, I always enjoyed the scoring. Especially the cool little Arlos expressing what the score means. I thought the 1-7 scale was genius. Will miss them. I think the scoring added a valuable element to your reviews. I can appreciate that complaints makes it difficult and the process unenjoyable, but as for me I have no complaints. If I may, I give Arlo's reviews 7 cups of coffee out of 7. :)
For the record, I really appreciated your 7 point scoring system and the animated Arlos that went with it. For me it accomplished exactly what you set out to accomplish. At the same time, I totally get why you're dropping the scores.
Personally, sometimes it's hard to see how the bad/good points balance out, so I love having a score to help illustrate that, like if there's a bunch of negative points brought up but it has a high score, it helps flesh out the opinion more in my opinion. Sometimes I'm left confused as to the overall opinion of the game is at the end without it.
I've always liked the GameXplain 'Liked It, Loved It' scoring system. It's so far removed from traditional number scores that the audience comes in with no preconceptions, but it's still provides a decently accurate concise view of the reviewer's feelings about a game.
It honestly makes sense. I can tell that watching your reviews will be much more enjoyable without the looming shadow of an ending that completely reduces the whole experience to a single number. It brings much more emphasis to subjectivity and appreciation for the actual work the developers put into the game. In other words it would make even reviewing the game a delightful experience. Much love. Keep it up Arlo.
This video makes me appreciate Game Explains’ review score of, “liked it, liked it a lot, mind blown, etc.” more. Keeps it positive while hitting on what you may not like.
You’re 100% correct about scores. I never thought much about it before, but looking back it’s obvious that they have to go because of how sensitive we humans can be. And while I won’t miss the scores, I will miss the little Arlos. Thank you for giving them one final hurrah in a humorous and heartwarming way! The Arlo Way! 😉
I get why you're dropping the scores, and I think it makes sense. I'm not gonna lie though, I'm gonna miss seeing the 7th Score Arlo do his boogie lol 😂
"A seven? How are we supposed to know what that means?" Remember, stay in school kids so you can do trivial math like input fractions into calculators.
I may miss the scores al little, largely due to missing the little emoting Arlos at the end, but you bring up some good points and if you're ultimately happier and less stressed without the scores? Then that's a good thing.
The other day I realised that Arlo was the only real gaming review and discussion channel that I still watch, and I wondered why I kept watching him but slipped out on all the other guys. Now I realize why, and it’s because of this - Arlo isn’t just controlled by trends and the common gaming mindset, he takes a nuanced and individual stance to these kinds of topics while so many other gaming channels melt into the same formulaic video structure and reviewing mindset. Thanks, Arlo.
I'm glad to see you making a mature decision. Ultimately, whether people want the scores or not does not matter. What matters is a creator being able to create the way they want to. No one has to answer for why they want to make something, do something, say something, in a certain way. Getting insight into the system and your opinion on it though was a fun watch, thankyou for another good video
I agree with not giving review scores, they have stressed me out in the past as well in just daily conversations and people's minds are just so fixed on them. That said, I give you a 7/7. :D
Well, I can think of reasons I personally would want to have a score of some sort, but I can definitely agree with his 1-7 scoring, so I may use that now that I know the reasoning behind it.
Scores or not, I’m just glad to see you appearing directly in your videos again. The quality has definitely improved and it’s more enjoyable to watch from start to finish!
While I agree with all your points, I’m still gonna miss scores, it makes it a lot more intuitive and easy to digest the general consensus of what the reviewer thought about the game
"I give YOU, a 7/7" Oh come on Arlo, I think I clearly deserve a 6.2 at most! In all seriousness, I'm actually glad for the change. Scoring systems for games have always been very inconsistent and divisive, so hopefully this change will be a net positive.
I 100% agree with the stuff about score increments being silly, our perspective of how weighted they are at certain ends and all that other good stuff that people are talking more and more about these days. It's definitely an uphill struggle, but a worthwhile one, to push back against that culture. One thing I disagree with though, is the idea that these scores don't have a tangible impact on the games themselves. These scores have a direct impact on a games sales, which in turn means that to the studios being scored by these games, that one number actually decides much more than it should. The arbitrary score has a lot of power. There's a reason that video of the God of War developer being in tears over his 90+ scores exists, and it's because that score means all of the people under him got to continue to have jobs, doing the thing they love (amongst other things). That's actually the most important reason this culture needs to stop. The impact these scores have on people's livelihood isn't just a footnote, it's the primary issue at hand.
And in the _absence_ of those scores, higher-ups at game companies will simply rely on their own biases to decide who to keep and get rid of, or use sales as the one and only metric of achievement. The problem is that companies are hypersensitive to bad press, not that reviewers evaluate games using numbers. What you're proposing wouldn't benefit all game developers. It would hurt the exceptional ones at least as much as it helps others, and it could cause the industry to hemorrhage even more jobs than it already does. Game scores aren't "arbitrary", by the way. Thought goes into them, and they reflect someone's considered opinion.
I never realized how much thought you put into your review scoring system, though I do agree. Review scores take away from some of the nuance that can make a game good or bad and changes it into something as vague as a number.
I really liked the 7 point scale! I always thought it was a great way to score a game, and I've always thought to myself that if I ever wanted to review a game for some reason or another, I'd probably use the scale myself because the numbers on a 7 point scale feel appropriately significant. Maybe it was just me, but a 7 point scale just felt really intuitive to me and was very easy for me to understand. I understand why you're making the decision you are, but I do feel somewhat saddened about it all because it gave your reviews some extra personality that was also just really helpful in pinpointing your exact feelings on a game. I think the two review scoring methods I've always liked most have been yours and GameXplain's, as they make it most clear to me how the reviewer FELT about the game, rather than just giving a score because the game "deserves" a specific number. I'll miss the 7 point system, but if this is what you feel is best, then I guess it must be done.
GameXplain’s system is the best and imma tell you why cause I have nothing better to do with my life. How you feel about a game is purely emotional. Yes it may be based off of facts, but at the end of the day, it’s how you FEEL. Putting something on a scale is trying to grade something inherently emotional logically. The problem is we can’t really quantify our emotions. So Gamexplain uses an emotional scale rather than a logical one. It’s intuitive because we don’t have to think about how it makes them feel or guess what that really means. They just straight up tell us.
Sooo happy to hear you're no longer doing number scores. Just talk about the good and the bad. Trust us to watch the whole review and decide for our selves if it's for us ❤💙
It really boils down to what Arlo said after all those record players stopped at once: "That was annoying" The scores are a hassle. The numbers are a pain, and he explains his point of view perfectly well with words.
This video really changed my perspective on reviews. I had always viewed them as more of an objective analysis than a subjective measurement on how much someone enjoyed a game and I think I agree with him. The number is pretty arbitrary
I enjoyed the water sections of the game, honestly. I think it’s more of a joke about the line itself then the score. Too many HMs isn’t cited because everyone agrees with it.
@@emerson_5 Yeah, I feel like the issue was the poor wording of that line. Had the reviewer found a better way to express that there were too many water routes, people wouldn't have made as big a deal out of it.
@@psap29 I think the issue is that for the overall review summary, there are only 2 negative points; and 'too much water' seems quite silly to be half of the negative points.
I'm actually really glad you're getting rid of the scoring system. I've never really like scoring systems, since what people want out of a game can vary so wildly. Games are just so subjective that putting a number at the end of a review does more harm than good.
I finally subscribed because of this video. Someone going forward with how they feel something needs to be done--not just complaining about the ideal they want--is what I want to support.
I won't really miss the scores, but I'll miss the tiny dancing Arlo.
Litterally my exact same thoughts it was always plesant
same
That's the real casualty in this situation right here.
Yeah
He should put them at the end of review videos for the heck of it
I won't miss the scores, I'll miss the Arlos beneath the scores
Same
Exactly
SAME
same
My friend, do I have the gif banner of a blog post for you!
the-avocado.org/2018/02/15/the-arlo-day-thread/
If I were less lazy I'd cut the gif up into separate Arlos to serve as some thoroughly worthwhile emotes...
But I am as lazy as I am, so there you are, job for a more industrious individual I guess.
Another important point: people often compare games based on just their review scores. Like, even games from different genres or games that got their scores for completely different reasons. It's impossible to say whether one game is 'objectively better' than the other just because it got a higher score.
Because DUH, obviously if MY Yu-Gi-Oh TCG game from 18 years ago and from a GBA console has an 8, it's WAAAAY better than the 2021 Switch Super Mario 3D World + Bowser's Fury, that just barely got a 7.
Yeah.
(?)
@@erik19borgnia nostalgia factor exist
Remember how people compared IGN's review scores of God Hand and Imagine Party Babyz?
Yes, but I would (nicely) argue that blurs the lines even more? The main point of a score is simply convenience; many people for what loss for the cause or not simply do not have the time to fine combe and mull through a persons 1 to 2 hours of stand up speech and assessments. That's why you have Like/dislike buttons; many just leave the Courtesy Like, zap to the end to see the Score and they're done. If the score then peaks their interest, they will return to indulge and dig for the meat n potatoes.
@@netweed09 Not a fan of that. Either you watch a review or not. A number tells you nothing, people's interpretation of the same number also varies wildly. Reviews aren't 1-2 hours, analysis videos are, but those are aimed at people who are already interested in the subject.
I love how everyone, including myself, is more concerned about the removal of the Tiny Dancing Arlos rather than the actual system.
rip dancing Arlo's
@@tjmalanga4986 They were fun. May they live on as Gifs.
It was the only product that could successfully compete with Tiny Desk Engineer unless you consider the indie product Tiny Desk Gray Wolf. But now with Tiny Dancing Arlo out of the picture the market is losing it's variety and consumers are left unhappy.
The only reason I was disappointed of this video
Could always look at old videos with them
Its actually such a good point about the 5/10 score. I've always thought its crazy that something with a 5/10 is basically considered unacceptable instead of representing something average or medium. I feel like a 7/10 holds the place a 5 is supposed to.
5/10 literally means average
I mean YMS use 5 to mean mediocre, though according to American grading system, that's an F
@@GreatestLeaf woah crazy the MAL rating system is exactly what I thought of here too!
@@Tacom4ster exactly I think that’s why people think 5 is bad
I think it just follows the system we have in schools where a 7/10 is a C which means passing, 8/10 means average (B), and 9/10 means quite enjoyable (A), and 10/10 is amazing (A+).
I like how ProJared used to rate games: instead of a number, he used an object or an experience to rate/describe his feelings towards a game. For example, Kid Klown in Crazy Chase got a Bee Sting/10, because the game was short, painful, and seemed to last longer than it actually did, like a bee sting.
Or what about the Sseth review system?
"I give this game a completely random, but quantifiably high score, which can only be expressed on a graphical calculator."
@@Tubuxis That works too, lol.
GOOD WORK KANE
Too bad ProJared is....y'know.
@@arigat-s0244 cringe
You could keep the arlos by going "Here's how I feel this game:"
[Insert animated Arlo with no score here]
I would like that. GameXplain does something similar where they don't score the game but say whether or not they like it and to which degree. No "7/10" but "I liked it." No "9/10" but "I liked it a lot."
“Really? You only danced by shaking your head? I would’ve at LEAST thrown a shimmy or two in there.”
But then he might have to figure out unique dancing for each new review so it doesn't become predictable....
If he keeps the same dances, people would just start seeing them as the numbers they previously represented.
Oh yeah! That's actually a pretty good idea if he was down for it. It takes away from the whole precise numbers thing and takes advantage of Arlo's charm.
“I give *you*, my friend, a seven out of seven” gave me a rush of childish joy
I smiled so big
Hmmmmmm I don't know, I think we deserve a 7.0000000000001 out of 7. It's like he's not even trying.
@@LordDarner pfff
YEAH
Just like those koroks huh
I'll be honest, I thought the Arlos on the 7 point review scale were just dancing.
I thought until I got curious about how they were dancing and decided to watch each other one
I think 6 and 7 he dances, especially 7 lol
Agree, they were small enough or not separated enough that I did not distinguished they represented the different attitudes towards the game in question. Still I love Arlo's reviews becuase he explains why he likes or dislikes something and I am better able to consider if that is something I would like.
Arlo always emphasises how there are other people much smarter than him, but I think everything he said in this video shows that he's pretty darn smart.
I'd say admitting that you're not very smart, is the mark of a very smart person. Ignorant and closed-minded people fail to look for other people's perspectives and understand how much they actually don't know.
...As a result they are happier. Smart people realize that compared to the world, they are stupid in SOME way.
@@gyroc1_ I love the sense of relief that brings.
It's called "being humble".
gyro c one It’s called Imposter Syndrome and it’s the opposite of the Dunning-Kruger Effect.
I can't believe Arlo complained about animating the score, and then took the time to do it... Just for us! What a great guy
But... didn't Kane edit this video...?
I cant believe he took the credit for something that Kane clearly does :D
They had us in the first half not gonna lie
Arlo is so wholesome! He saved his last ever score for us! So nice of him to do that for us! I can't wait for the next review or whatever he posts next!
I always like Jeremy Jahn’s rating system, which includes such gems as “good time, alcohol required” and “would buy it on blu-ray”
After all these years, i just now noticed that the little Arlos beneath the review's score actually represent each one of the ratings, and are not just doing funny little dances...
Same here, although one time I tried to briefly decipher it and gave up due to the short time they are on screen. I think it would've made more sense to make 7 different static Arlo drawings expressing an emotions, and possibly even color-coded them too. Doesn't matter now though, the Arlo congo line of emotions is gone. Honestly, I'm fine with that too.
Most of them aren't technically dancing, but when you put that many animations next to each other, they always look like dancing.
Schools I would say are definitely to blame for that rule of 7. Getting 70 on a test means you did "average" or "Good enough"
Makes sense why People associate scoring that way
Schools are to blame for many issues, and this one makes sense like the other issues.
There are some countries where 7 is the maximum score for school gradings; but I grew up in a country where school grades are in a scale from 1 to 100, with 60 being the minimum to approve; and yes, it really affects the perception of the review scores.
Yeah 5/10 at school is just like a 1/10. It's really out of 5 since they only use 5 letters, but even then a D is a failure too, so it's really a scale of 4. 1/4 sucks, 2/4 is average, 3/4 is ok, and 4/4 is perfect.
Yep.
100-90 - A
x90-80 - B
x80-70 - C
x70-60 - D
x60-00 - F
A completely worthless system design to punish and keep people in line since it was NEVER about education in the first place, so people grow up with a screwed up sense of value to begin with.
Yes... Numbers are attachable to feelings/emotions.
I live in the U.S, and ever since I started getting grades of C- and under on exams or major assignments back in high school, almost every
Man... I can't believe Arlo abandoned his scoring system specifically because he's bad a ring puzzles.
So silly 😂😂
Send my regards to Kane, he looks like a neat guy.
Ditto
th-cam.com/users/FarfetchdReviews
@@diegorr8378 Thanks for the info
❤️❤️❤️
Lynch told me otherwise.
I always liked your 7 point scale. It was basically asking the question, "Is this a good game?" And the answer would be as follows :
1 - Strongly disagree
2 - Disagree
3 - Somewhat disagree
4 - Neutral
5 - Somewhat agree
6 - Agree
7 - Strongly agree
I feel like such a basic score is good, but I prefer Arlo not having to worry about scores 😁
Yeah, it was a great scale. The reason I like scores is that I get a broad idea of the quality a game has, whereas the reviews that don't have it a lot of the times don't get the point across. I can understand the virtues and faults of a game, but if you don't tell me how they relate to each other, I may leave the review without knowing if I want the product. The point of the scores is to tie all up, that's why they are important, even if it's not possible to give an objective answer.
That's what I thought too!
I completely agree except I would change the question from, “is this a good game?” to, “did Arlo like this game?”
If I were to review Dark Souls I’d have to admit that it’s very well-made, but I do not like playing it myself. We should all try to find reviewers whose opinions we generally agree with and listen to their recommendations to get an idea of whether or not we’ll like that thing, rather than look at some industry-wise aggregate of a thing’s supposed objective “quality.”
@@Mati303s That's true, but good review have a sum up at the end telling exactly that : did the reviewer consider the game good ?
So hopefully you will get an alternative to scores here.
Someone needs to make GIFs of those tiny Arlos to use as reaction images. We can’t let the flame die out.
I actually find scoring systems flawed to begin with. I prefer a brief summary of the pros and cons, and why they feel this way. A lot of people only play a game halfway, and slap a score on it. This isn’t as reliable as a brief explanation of why.
That's not a problem with scoring systems, that's a problem with reviewers. If you use a ruler incorrectly, the measuring system isn't broken, it's that you didn't properly measure.
Same here. A score is fine at a glance, but knowing *why* a game received that score is far more important to making a decision on whether or not to purchase.
@@NintenDub I'm inclined to disagree. The general playerbase that comes in a week later is far worse in the way of reviews. With toxic concepts such as review bombing and hating a game based on the most minute things, players are far too emotional and reactionary to be trusted as reliable review sources. I'd take a professional reviewer any day. Since they also have to disclose whether or not they've been paid for the review, that can help gauge things too (although most are giving their genuine opinions despite constant accusations that reviewers are bought out for good reviews).
Agreed. With films too. I couldn't care less about the score someone sticks on something, especially since a lot of the things I dislike and like about things may differ from what other people dislike and like about things... And that is the case in many places, things that one reviewer hates I might not mind or even love, something one reviewer loves I might not like very much or outright hate/disagree with.
I'd rather someone just tell me what they like and dislike about a game and pinpoint a few other things they may deem as notable and that's all we need.
Same
I’m sorry but I strongly oppose this decision. I agree with everything you say in the video but I am worried about the mini arlos. I know Covid is tough but I don’t want you lay off any workers. I am deeply concerned for the health and safety of these arlos so I am sorry to say I do NOT support your decision.
UNDERRATED COMMENT
You had me in the first half not gonna lie
very pog
@@SuperCrazyfin same here
So you just miss the arlos?
Yeah, I completely agree Arlo. People get so caught up in the number and use it as some piece of evidence to fuel arguments about a game.
I will miss the dancing Arlos though.
That utterly defeated look while working on the Origami King review...hang in there! 🤣😭
Kane is dead inside
That's what I thought
13:46 “A game is not a person, it doesn’t deserve anything”
Perfect
I just wanted to say right now that I love Sonic and the Secret Rings.
If it doesn't deserve anything then why would I give away my money to purchase it??
@@Zeriel00 because you deserve to entertain yourself with your hard earned money, or just cause your grandma loves you.
@@Zeriel00 I mean by definition purchasing something isn't "giving away" your money
@@Pureheartt13 I thought you were going to say Sonic 06 and I almost found someone in the 0000000000.1% I think that’s less than one person.
You're illustrating one of the big issues of today's society, the fact that people are now apparently incapable of showing any shred of respect to someone who disagrees with them
the reasoning is something like this :
I know I am a smart person and this is my opinion, therefore anyone with a different opinion HAS to be an idiot
this attitude needs to disappear to allow conversation and debate to become respectful again
Cedrick Rozon Exactly. Such a mindset pervades the far left democrats. It’s why Resetera literally banned Angry Joe for giving Last of Us 2 under the guise of “bigotry toward LGBT”. They’ve even banned people for merely daring to say they believe not all cops are evil. Nope. You have to drink the kool aid and no deviation from their fanatical views will be tolerated. Any who dissent are “evil racists”.
@@ActionJaxonH
"far left democrats"
"far left"
"democrats"
pick one lmao
@@ActionJaxonH There's a lack of respect on both sides of the political spectrum right now, which is the base of the issue, Politics is supposed to be about meeting in the middle, not about threatening anyone you disagree with
He's wanting to diminish the chance of heated arguments and hate from his comment section, not discourage civil debates. Too many seek out fights on the internet and Arlo is just trying to do what he can to avoid fueling such.
@@SkyelreMinecraft And honestly, Arlo is a place of sanction or safety from such things.
Ditch the scores, but for the love of god please leave the little dancing Arlos at the end of your videos/reviews
YES
Yes!
Agreed.
They still express opinion enough.
They need to be repurposed, we cannot lose such a gem.
YES this solves the problem
It's all about that /20 X5 scale system...that's...ughhhh... simple?
Oh hai SwitchUp
hello switchup
Love this.
I love your channel too SwitchUp.
I'm a loyal viewer there.
pleasant to see you guys here glen, or mark ?
You guys make it wooooork.
TH-cam just asked me to score the recommendation of this video, in the inherent problems with scores. Ironic.
Nice
While seeing a numbered review score is kind of addicting, pin pointing a review to a specific number doesn't do anything useful for anyone and even games with high scores won't satisfy everyone. There are plenty of 9 or 10 out of 10 games that I just plain don't like at all due to my own tastes. Everyone's take away is going to differ so why try to define a game with such a specific number that no one will really agree on. It's all just splitting hairs.
I find the only useful kind of score system is a broad 5 point system. No half points or anything. Just stick with general tiers of quality.
5. Revolutionary or near perfect execution
4. Great. Maybe it doesn't do anything new but it's solid across the board or has a few minor flaws that will hold it back for many
3. Decent or flawed experience that's worth trying if you're open to it
2. Mediocre or heavily flawed
1. Just plain bad
Was just thinking while watching this about Glass Reflection the anime youtuber.
He used to do numbered scores, but after a while switched to more general recommendations to “skip it”, “stream it” or “buy it”, and gave the best shows a “certified frosty”. Kind of conveys better that it’s a personal recommendation and not a mark of objective quality.
Hey Design Doc love your stuff and I'm happy to see you here!
Personally I don't really like review scores for "objective" reviews because usually they won't matter to me necessairly what the reviwer thinks about the game, I have my own tastes and usually I like more to know what are the crucial points of a game that I should be paying attention to.
Still I don't mind recommendation from youtube personalities like you and Arlo and I feel the simple 5 point system is good enough to explain one's feelings for a game
I agree, a 10 point system is just too broad. Recomended games usually get a 7-10 which makes 0-6 kinda useless since they can be summarised as bad anyway. A 5 point system makes it also more easier and accurate to review games
The problem is that reviewers don't understand the concept of a scoring system. It's the EXACT same thing as a grading system. You don't reward it points for doing good things. You treat it like you do grading a math test. It starts at 100% (a perfect 10), then the score lowers for every fault the game presents that the reviewer is personally against. Those point deductions, just like getting a question wrong on a math test, can't be earned back be doing good things in other areas, just like getting questions right on said test doesn't take away the lower grade that the wrong answer caused.
Basically, all scoring and grading systems are SUPPOSED to be STRICTLY a point deduction system. Anyone who is doing it differently is doing it wrong. And currently, thats almost the entire industry right now, same with movies and tv.
(ps, when I say "lowers for every fault" that doesn't nessisarily mean a full number. It's up to the reviewer to define how big of a deduction that fault is worth. Could be as small as a -0.001 point deduction because a texture rendered in slowly)
@@just9019 It's only broad if its a recommendation system rather than a proper scoring/point deduction system). Basically, it's meant to be treated like you grading a test. . . but most reviewers are morons and don't seem to get that with all their numbers being baseless at worst, abstract at best.
Scores are something you tally, like how many strokes you do on a golf course. . . or how many bad game elements are in a game. Each instance holds a numerical value that you add up at the end with those numbers when added together give you your result. When there is a perfect score (like in golf it's considered "par") or a "perfect 10", you get the result by taking the perfect score then subtracting the sum you got from adding from it or something similar of a negative effect.
"Looking for literal perfection is just... why?:
Couldn't of put it better Arlo
nothing is perfect, because everyone has their own opinion of what makes a game good. For example some people might think cuphead is bad because the gameplay is too challenging for them, that just means its not their type of game or some other thing. but for me cuphead is so good, i decided to s rank all the bosses with default weapon only and i think its the best game ever.
Arlo, all we humbly request is for you to make publicly available a gif of the 7 emoting Arlos. Perhaps each of them separately as well if you could be so kind.
This is the way
Hey Arlo, it’s less of people have been taught to think anything less than a 10 is bad, it’s more of ever since we were kids, we were told 100 were A+, a perfect score, and then 90 is a B, etc. I think that’s why the numbers 5 or below mean awful. Doesn’t matter how low you get after that, 50 or below has always been an F. Just my two since
I'd never thought about it before, but honestly that's a really smart way to think about it. When so many of us grew up on a system where 90's are great, 80's are alright, 70's are meh, and almost anything below that is regarded as bad to the point where a 20 and a 55 are almost indistinguishable, it probably affects our subconscious views of those numbers in regards to scores and such
its "two cents" by the way, not "two since". Not trying to be a grammar nazi, just letting you know for future
What people don't understand about that is that in school the scoring is based on a more concrete measurement. You only got 50% of the questions on the test right? Well that means you must not have actually studied. Whether you agree with that is up to you, but you can see how someone can come up with that.
Rating movies, games, books, etc like that doesn't work because it's not very concrete. Again it goes back to what Arlo and many others have said, that the scoring system on video games, and really most mediums, doesn't make much sense. It's better to explain how you feel about a piece of media
You're totally right. So many educational systems use a percentile grading scale, and teachers frequently give individual assignments a score out of 10 that aligns with the percentile.
If I did reviews, I'd give a score from 1 to 5, because it gets away from the base 10 systems yet still has meaning to people, since 5 it's a commonly used number. It's also easier for them to accept 3 as average rather than unsatisfactory. Also, it's not super specific and nitpicky, provided you don't use decimals.
That said, there are many acceptable ways of doing it, and reviewers shouldn't be obligated to cave to pressure on something like this. If you don't like a reviewer's scores, go find a reviewer whose tastes more closely with with your own. No review is universal.
@Bryce Sherman I wasn't trying to say his point is wrong, but explaining why the grading system and video game reviews aren't compatible. The grading system is already flawed, so when you take that and apply it to something that isn't compatible it just becomes a worse system
The whole "people think a 5/10 is unacceptable" thing is most likely based on the school grading system, where a 7/10 is a C, so average, and a 5/10 is an F, so a fail
maybe not, here in australia 5/10 is still a pass (c). ive never liked american grading system :[
Yes- to me, 1-5 is the bad half and 6-10 is the good half, 6 just being passable
It makes sense in terms of a binary “how many were right” but if you do ratings based on placement on a bell curve 4 of 7 is what the most of them would be and therefor it’s solid.
I agree this difference doesn’t land mentally with people and it causes problems. Like yeah if I give you 10 questions on a topic and you know the answer to 4 of them, you probably have a very poor understanding and aren’t ready to build on that. But if it’s a game, 4 of 10 is right below average. I play 4 of 10 on a bell curve games all the time and enjoy them
That's why I prefer the Gamexplain rating system (don't like, like, like a lot, etc).
That actually sounds really accurate. I think that might be why
Really well-made points, I largely agree. One thing I hate more than critic scores, are user scores. Apart from review-bombing, so many scores come with the description "My actual score is a 6, but I gave it a 10 to balance out all the wrong reviews"; WHICH MISSES THE ENTIRE POINT OF AGGREGATE SCORES.
The 7/10 mindset comes from the school system, where anything under that is usually a failing grade. People have essentially been brainwashed into thinking numerical ratings are more weighted than they should be.
and THAT weighting comes from over-reliance on true/false and multiple choice metrics. a literal random guess on a TF test can get you a 50%, thus getting 60% means you missed a lot more than it appears, doing only slightly better than pure guessing. It just barely gets better with ABCD. The best tests are the hardest to grade however (being free answer/essay/show your work), requiring the most work to actually grade+understand how well student understands the work. you cant just send those through the grading machine
@@deefdragon Bro I took a test yesterday for a subject I had no clue about. I had no idea what half the questions were asking about but with basic process of elimination and inferences I GOT ALL OF THE MULTIPLE CHOICE QUESTIONS CORRECT
@Kunoros Hound of Athreos what?
Agreed, atleast in the US the Grading scale heavily influences everyone. I grew up in a state where there was a 7 Point Letter grade system. Meaning Anything less than a 70 is failing.
What? Getting below 40% is a fail where I’m from
6:43 "How many games out there are actually, truly perfect?" Um, Arlo, you're really forgetting about Garfield Kart here.
crazy frog kart was better
Jambo safari
Pie
I never got the idea of 5/10 being bad either: I always thought of it as meaning a game either has little to no truly good or bad qualities, or it has too many problems to be considered good but too many positives to be considered bad; if its quality amounts to being middle of the road, it only makes sense to rate it at the middle of the scale. My interpretation of the 0 to 10 scale is this: 0 is bottom of the barrel, 1 is abysmal, 2 is awful, 3 is pretty bad, 4 is below average, 5 is average or mediocre, 6 is okay to decent, 7 is solid, 8 is great, 9 is amazing, and 10 is a masterpiece; this way, the scale is actually balanced and logical, but apparently most people are viewing this the same way as grading in school, where anything below 70% is an F, and that never made sense to me. I remember once getting into a debate about if Breath of the Wild is good or not with someone who considered themselves a Zelda purist, and one of the points they made against the idea of Zelda games doing anything differently (I think, I can't see how else it would be relevant) was that the DS Zelda games were both a 5/10, and they would then call them trash; to them, I’m sure that's what 5/10 meant, but to me, that was downright contradictory to say. Come to think of it, that might be why The Geek Critique said that Sonic Adventure 2: Battle, Sonic Adventure DX, and Sonic Heroes were critically panned; if you don't know, he makes reviews, or Critiques as he calls it, which I enjoy, but there are some occasional things that can best be described as questionable, such as how he claimed the Adventure GameCube rereleases and Heroes were all critically panned when upon release in his Shadow the Hedgehog Critique, when in reality, the reception seems to have been mixed; in fact, SA2B and Heroes got over 70 points on Metacritic, which is almost enough to have generally positive reviews by their standards, so it's possible that either those ratings don't reflect the critically reception they actually got or he considers 5-7/10 bad.
I think it's because there is no reason to play a mediocre game over an excellent one.
One could also consider many NSMB games as mediocre, and another could consider Shrek 2 (GameCube) as mediocre. Someone else might think that Mario Party 9 is less than average, and another could think the same of the Bee Movie Game, and think that Mario Party 9 is just average.
To me, 4 and below signifies a bad game, and one you should avoid. 5 signifies a game that you should only play if you are very interested, otherwise it might be a waste of money. 6-7 seem like general fun (think Wii Sports) or games that satisfy a niche, but not much more (think Picross). 8-10 are games that everyone should play, and are guaranteed to be enjoyable.
To me, I wouldn't consider SA2B or Heroes to be critically panned. Your friend says to me that only friends of 2D Zelda would enjoy the DS Zelda games enough to be worth the money.
The main issue of scores seems to be no-one agreeing on how good a score is, and games only being considered worthy of purchase if they score 7 or above - obviously, if something is scored less than that, it won't be purchased by the general public, and the franchise won't get too many more fans.
@@miimiiandco act like player himself isn't mediocre huh during school 🤭
Old comment but it's probably because of conventional school grading systems. Getting a C or 70% is seen as average and anything below that is getting note home from your teachers and a scolding from your parents lol. It's infiltrated every rating system we have and I don't see it going anywhere until school rating systems are changed entirely.
Change is inevitable, change is good. Arlo will remain one of the best
Well said Kim
Too bad you won’t change your country
@Ice Goomba Sorry my bad.
ALL HAIL KIM JONG UN!
Good to know that Kim Jong-un likes good content
Hey u watch damien lee
Alro: "it's all worth it I promise"
Kane: "Existence is Pain"
I never knew the little Arlos represented his feelings. I thought they just danced
I imagine some of the problems with review scores come from school, where anything below a 60 is failing and “good” only really starts at 80.
Me before starting the video: OK, just don't get rid of the 7 point scale
Me at 8:18: NOOOOOOOO!
Me at 8:26: Nevermind I’m good with it.
I will always miss the tiny Arlos, but this video still gets a 7/7 from me.
Arlo #7 makes me so happy
@@BryanWithAnI Agreed!
I say 692.76/1000.2
@@StyleSnivy ign in 2050
Thank god that was actually seen as the joke it was
I'll miss the mini Arlos more than the actual scoring itself. Your reviews have always been great! And you can tell in your voice when youre reallly excited about a certain aspect in a game, its adorable.
Can you please put a little dancing Arlo about how you feel about the game though,, we need the small Arlos
You know, at first I was like "nooooo you can't get rid of scores, its always so fun trying to guess what your gonna give it" but you made some good arguments. I think it does open up more meaningful discussion to not give a score.
I think your decision is right! For example: Game Two is a German Gaming Show where they never show scores. They just say if they recommend a game or don’t recommend it and for wich People that Game could be a Good Choice.
I personally love a good picture of a pros and cons list way more than I should....
When the Origami King review is gonna be so harsh that Arlo changes his entire review process for it lmao
That's the tea. But I'm ready for a harsh review.
origami king was a divisive game.. people either loved it or hated it.
@@otherlego it seems to be that way ever since Super PM, which is still kind of sad. Loved Super tho'.
@@Allister23 There are people who disliked Super’s gameplay but _loved_ its story. I can’t think of anybody from the N64 Era that likes anything about Paper Mario post-Wii.
"If you want a good review, have a good game at launch."
Well said.
Arlo honestly, you gotta start like a podcast channel or something. You have so many good things to say about gaming, the gaming community as a whole and just how people should act in general. I'm very impressed with this vid, I give it 7 out of 7💙💙💙
I’m fine as long as we get access to the score Arlos as gifs
Best idea of the 21st century
THANK YOU!
I'm a day late here, but it always makes me happy to see a reviewer ditch review scores. I was happy when SomecallmyJohnny did so back and 2010, and in 2020 I'm happy when Arlo does.
One point I want to hit up on is why people get so defensive: people think opinions can be objective. A lot of people will be convinced they have the formula of objective, universal criticism and will then try to explain why someone who came to the "wrong" conclusion is so wrong. You can see this with fans of certain reviews (not naming any names, but you can probably guess who I'm talking about) in that they'll actually very polite s but will become quite aggressive should the "opposition" try to stand their ground. Because to them, opinions can double as facts (e.i. become objective opinions) once they make enough logical sense™️. Combine that with how this mentality lends itself to confirmation bias, and you have people who REALLY don't like reviews guilty of wrong think.
“Even a 7 is considered a mediocre score”
I’m having DAMN. flashbacks...
6.8 too much water
-IGN
Justice for MBDTF, fellow melon-head.
This whole video, while not directed at Anthony, could be a callout post for him lmao
Idea: remove the numbers, keep the mini Arlos
yes ٩( 'ω' )و
Actually a good idea. Having the expression shown without a numeric value shown is easier to connect.
I've been playing video games for decades and I really regret letting review scores dictate so much of what I played or didn't play for so many years. They can have such a profound psychological impact on my own personal enjoyment of a game that I've mostly stopped paying attention to them. Enjoying games is always more nuanced and more personal than a single number can convey. I wish more reviewers thought like you, Arlo.
8:20 - 8:24 Respect for Kane editting that haha
0:25 plot twist, this is Arlo and Kane is a fictitious character who Arlo becomes when he eits videos
Gotta add that to the arlo lore book
There’s actually a picture of what real Arlo looks like taken from a convention, he has light colored hair
This channels sense of humor alone is a reason to watch
Idea: At the end of each video you could give games 2 or 3 specific awards regarding how much you liked certain aspects of them ("One of my favourite battle systems in x type of games", for example), ala the bonus stars in Mario Party!
Game dungeon also does this system, it's always fun to see what kind of awards he gives to the games.
Replying to bump this! This idea is awesome!!
When you watch a review without a conclusive score and just hear the persons thoughts and opinions on the game it leads you to draw your own conclusion based on your own opinions so I think this system is better
This is basically how I've been viewing Zero Punctuation for the last decade.
I had no idea journalists were dealing with this and it explains a lot. I look forward to your future reviews.
I respect this decision immensely especially because of how toxic much of the Internet is 90% of the time.
Arlo is clearly incapable of doing it properly anyway if he actually thinks I OF ALL PEOPLE deserve A PERFECT 7/7. What a tasteless hack.
That was a joke. I love Arlo.
90%? Don't you think that's a little high? I'd say it's probably 75%, or maybe closer to 84.32%
@@difty-dift You clearly are not the brightest are you. Obviously it's a 84.33%. Duh
I mean, I totally agree. In every way.
But can I also use this wonderful string of comments to say that the remaining 10% is still pretty neat?
"Toxic" is an overused term that means nothing.
Although it was difficult on your side, I always enjoyed the scoring. Especially the cool little Arlos expressing what the score means. I thought the 1-7 scale was genius. Will miss them. I think the scoring added a valuable element to your reviews. I can appreciate that complaints makes it difficult and the process unenjoyable, but as for me I have no complaints.
If I may, I give Arlo's reviews 7 cups of coffee out of 7. :)
For the record, I really appreciated your 7 point scoring system and the animated Arlos that went with it. For me it accomplished exactly what you set out to accomplish.
At the same time, I totally get why you're dropping the scores.
I'll miss the scores only because the dancing Arlos are cute
Personally, sometimes it's hard to see how the bad/good points balance out, so I love having a score to help illustrate that, like if there's a bunch of negative points brought up but it has a high score, it helps flesh out the opinion more in my opinion. Sometimes I'm left confused as to the overall opinion of the game is at the end without it.
Arlo: "I have never given a game a 1"
Me: Only because you never technically reviewed Sticker Star.
I still don't think it's a 1,prob a 2
I’d give it a 3 personally
I say in his own old review score system, Sonic 06 would be a 1 and Sticker Star would be either a 2 or a very HIGH 1
I think the "too much water" joke would still happened, with or without a score number. It's just a funny complaint with or without context
Exactly, it was a game about water which they said should have had less water.
That Person Was Clearly Just A Team Magma Grunt.
I've always liked the GameXplain 'Liked It, Loved It' scoring system. It's so far removed from traditional number scores that the audience comes in with no preconceptions, but it's still provides a decently accurate concise view of the reviewer's feelings about a game.
It honestly makes sense. I can tell that watching your reviews will be much more enjoyable without the looming shadow of an ending that completely reduces the whole experience to a single number.
It brings much more emphasis to subjectivity and appreciation for the actual work the developers put into the game. In other words it would make even reviewing the game a delightful experience.
Much love. Keep it up Arlo.
Reviewer: *Reviews game in any way*
Literally like hundreds of people: And I took that personally
This video makes me appreciate Game Explains’ review score of, “liked it, liked it a lot, mind blown, etc.” more. Keeps it positive while hitting on what you may not like.
You’re 100% correct about scores. I never thought much about it before, but looking back it’s obvious that they have to go because of how sensitive we humans can be. And while I won’t miss the scores, I will miss the little Arlos. Thank you for giving them one final hurrah in a humorous and heartwarming way! The Arlo Way! 😉
I get why you're dropping the scores, and I think it makes sense. I'm not gonna lie though, I'm gonna miss seeing the 7th Score Arlo do his boogie lol 😂
Same her dude.
I mean here
"A seven? How are we supposed to know what that means?" Remember, stay in school kids so you can do trivial math like input fractions into calculators.
Thanks. I needed that chuckle today.
I may miss the scores al little, largely due to missing the little emoting Arlos at the end, but you bring up some good points and if you're ultimately happier and less stressed without the scores? Then that's a good thing.
The other day I realised that Arlo was the only real gaming review and discussion channel that I still watch, and I wondered why I kept watching him but slipped out on all the other guys. Now I realize why, and it’s because of this - Arlo isn’t just controlled by trends and the common gaming mindset, he takes a nuanced and individual stance to these kinds of topics while so many other gaming channels melt into the same formulaic video structure and reviewing mindset. Thanks, Arlo.
You should say "Well, here's the thing" more. You sound cool when you say it.
I'm glad to see you making a mature decision. Ultimately, whether people want the scores or not does not matter. What matters is a creator being able to create the way they want to. No one has to answer for why they want to make something, do something, say something, in a certain way. Getting insight into the system and your opinion on it though was a fun watch, thankyou for another good video
I agree with not giving review scores, they have stressed me out in the past as well in just daily conversations and people's minds are just so fixed on them. That said, I give you a 7/7. :D
So you want to stress him out? Why do you hate good ol Arlo? :(
>Spends half of the video explaining his scoring system for the first time
>"I'm no longer giving scores at all now"
Wow, gee, thank you, lol.
Well, I can think of reasons I personally would want to have a score of some sort, but I can definitely agree with his 1-7 scoring, so I may use that now that I know the reasoning behind it.
Scores or not, I’m just glad to see you appearing directly in your videos again. The quality has definitely improved and it’s more enjoyable to watch from start to finish!
When he started going over what each of the 7 points mean, I lost track of his voice and could only focus on the lil dancing Arlos.
While I agree with all your points, I’m still gonna miss scores, it makes it a lot more intuitive and easy to digest the general consensus of what the reviewer thought about the game
EXCUSE ME ARLO!? YOU GAVE ME A 7, I ONLY DESERVE AT THE MAXIMUM A 5, DO YOU KNOW HOW MANY PROBLEMS I HAVE
I agree, I mean even your name has Glitches in it, so I'm pretty sure 7 out of 7 is unfair.
I don’t even think I deserve a 2
"I give YOU, a 7/7"
Oh come on Arlo, I think I clearly deserve a 6.2 at most!
In all seriousness, I'm actually glad for the change. Scoring systems for games have always been very inconsistent and divisive, so hopefully this change will be a net positive.
I 100% agree with the stuff about score increments being silly, our perspective of how weighted they are at certain ends and all that other good stuff that people are talking more and more about these days. It's definitely an uphill struggle, but a worthwhile one, to push back against that culture.
One thing I disagree with though, is the idea that these scores don't have a tangible impact on the games themselves. These scores have a direct impact on a games sales, which in turn means that to the studios being scored by these games, that one number actually decides much more than it should. The arbitrary score has a lot of power.
There's a reason that video of the God of War developer being in tears over his 90+ scores exists, and it's because that score means all of the people under him got to continue to have jobs, doing the thing they love (amongst other things).
That's actually the most important reason this culture needs to stop. The impact these scores have on people's livelihood isn't just a footnote, it's the primary issue at hand.
And in the _absence_ of those scores, higher-ups at game companies will simply rely on their own biases to decide who to keep and get rid of, or use sales as the one and only metric of achievement. The problem is that companies are hypersensitive to bad press, not that reviewers evaluate games using numbers.
What you're proposing wouldn't benefit all game developers. It would hurt the exceptional ones at least as much as it helps others, and it could cause the industry to hemorrhage even more jobs than it already does.
Game scores aren't "arbitrary", by the way. Thought goes into them, and they reflect someone's considered opinion.
I never realized how much thought you put into your review scoring system, though I do agree. Review scores take away from some of the nuance that can make a game good or bad and changes it into something as vague as a number.
I really liked the 7 point scale! I always thought it was a great way to score a game, and I've always thought to myself that if I ever wanted to review a game for some reason or another, I'd probably use the scale myself because the numbers on a 7 point scale feel appropriately significant. Maybe it was just me, but a 7 point scale just felt really intuitive to me and was very easy for me to understand. I understand why you're making the decision you are, but I do feel somewhat saddened about it all because it gave your reviews some extra personality that was also just really helpful in pinpointing your exact feelings on a game. I think the two review scoring methods I've always liked most have been yours and GameXplain's, as they make it most clear to me how the reviewer FELT about the game, rather than just giving a score because the game "deserves" a specific number. I'll miss the 7 point system, but if this is what you feel is best, then I guess it must be done.
GameXplain’s system is the best and imma tell you why cause I have nothing better to do with my life. How you feel about a game is purely emotional. Yes it may be based off of facts, but at the end of the day, it’s how you FEEL. Putting something on a scale is trying to grade something inherently emotional logically. The problem is we can’t really quantify our emotions. So Gamexplain uses an emotional scale rather than a logical one. It’s intuitive because we don’t have to think about how it makes them feel or guess what that really means. They just straight up tell us.
I don’t know why but That ending part when he says “I give you my loving friend a 7/7” that made me shed a little tear, and I don’t even know why😭
Sooo happy to hear you're no longer doing number scores. Just talk about the good and the bad. Trust us to watch the whole review and decide for our selves if it's for us ❤💙
6:45 "How many games are actually, truly perfect?"
2. Pong and Tetris.
Tetris graphics are last gen
@@djiboutinationalanthem5252 Tetris effect slander in my replies? Nah bro
Pong????? aRe YoU TaLkInG aBoUt MaRiO TeNnIS?
Anon BonBon I don’t know man I think Tetris 99’s graphics are really what any game should strive for
Let us not forget Knack!
It really boils down to what Arlo said after all those record players stopped at once:
"That was annoying"
The scores are a hassle. The numbers are a pain, and he explains his point of view perfectly well with words.
I’ll still be watching! Your well-thought-out points are way more valuable in helping me decide which games to spend my money on than any number is.
6:07 Ah yes I see Arlo is true to the Jedi ways. He does not deal in absolutes
I’ll miss the scores but what a heartwarming way to send it off. We don’t deserve your happy dancing 7 Arlo.
This video really changed my perspective on reviews. I had always viewed them as more of an objective analysis than a subjective measurement on how much someone enjoyed a game and I think I agree with him. The number is pretty arbitrary
*”Too much water”*
Gotta admit that was hilarious when it came out regardless of the number
"7.8/10, too much x" is still a joke I frequently use and likely will my whole life
I enjoyed the water sections of the game, honestly. I think it’s more of a joke about the line itself then the score. Too many HMs isn’t cited because everyone agrees with it.
@@emerson_5 Yeah, I feel like the issue was the poor wording of that line. Had the reviewer found a better way to express that there were too many water routes, people wouldn't have made as big a deal out of it.
My head cannon is team magma was trying to fix their ign score
@@psap29 I think the issue is that for the overall review summary, there are only 2 negative points; and 'too much water' seems quite silly to be half of the negative points.
I'm actually really glad you're getting rid of the scoring system. I've never really like scoring systems, since what people want out of a game can vary so wildly. Games are just so subjective that putting a number at the end of a review does more harm than good.
I finally subscribed because of this video. Someone going forward with how they feel something needs to be done--not just complaining about the ideal they want--is what I want to support.
"7/7" I feel like I'm a 5.6/7. Not enough backflip.
Not enough water. Stay hydrated!
Were you not able to snap the bad guy's neck?