Dracomut1990: GOG seems to have an abundance of people guided by nostalgia when rating games. Given what GOG specializes in I am not surprised and it does not make me dislike the site but it's still something that that bogs you down after a while.

Which do you guys think is worse: someone giving a game 5 stars simply because they loved the game as a kid, or giving a game one star because it's the sequel to something they love and they find it insulting? I have found an alarming amount of reviews on both sides that literally start with "I haven't played the game since I was a kid" and "This is based off of my memories playing this years ago".

noncompliantgame: YEs game reviews on GOG are, well, problematic. Unfortunately a considerable percentage of people just don't seem to understand the simple concept of reviewing. THey write something that has little to do with the game such as something along the lines of what a great childhood memory the game brings back. And then there's this idea that unless a game is total rubbish it should be given 5 stars. 5 stars should IMO be reserved for the greatest of games, the game changers, as it where. Essentially 5 stars = 100%.

Its not that difficult to write a simple review about various aspects of a game. A brief one or two sentence general description of the game. Some specifics about game-play. Sharing a comment on your opinion of the aesthetic qualities of the graphics may be helpful. And some more specifics on other qualities the game might be endowed with such as immersiveness, mechanics, online community, options, re-playability, user interface, and other features. Finally some closing comments about the game and before you know it you've written a game review that people will actually want to read and may even assist them with deciding on a purchase!

mindblast: Reviews on the store pages are not reliable for review purposes and it's a logical explanation for it. First of all, buying games it's not a lottery for most people. If i love playing turn-based RPGs, i might not go ahead and buy all sport games in order for me to rate them. I'm not a reviewer i am passionate about computer games, but i am passionate about computer games that touch the genres that i enjoy playing. So, just because of that, the rating will move towards being positive from a general user perspective.
Same principle goes for the desire of writing reviews. I don't usually write reviews, and i definitely don't write for games that i find "meh". I'm might write for games that i find good, or for games that i find bad, but not for "meh". And that's the case for many users, so you won't find objectivity, as, again, we're not reviewers, we're gamers.

Now, there is something different going on with Steam, for example. Over there, you will find much more games with bad ratings than on GOG. And there are more reasons for that, but the main one is that there are more releases over there. And i mean games that are launched on Steam and they are played for the first time by people that are buying them over there. So, you will get 1.0 version of the game, and, many of them might have some problems until next patches, or simply being bad. So, you will have those negative reviews flowing for these titles. On GOG, you get mostly older games, that, in many cases, have stand the test of time. They were popular games back in the days, some of them were patched and over-patched, so there are less chances of people complaining about bugs and stuff like that.

As for nostalgia, again, we're gamers. We're allowed to be nostalgic, and we should be allowed to express our nostalgia to other fellow gamers.

I personally rarely read user reviews before purchasing a game. I always prefer reviews written by people that do that for money, as they are more objective. It's their job to be. I suggest you doing the same.

Dracomut1990: Professional reviewers are rarely any better, especially when they are bribed by the companies who give them games to review.

Leonard03: I like fedoras.

zeogold: ACTUAL fedoras are neat. The "fedoras" that have gained so much infamy are actually trilbies.

zeogold: http://cdn.goodmenproject.com/wp-content/uploads/2013/10/FedoraVsTrilby.jpg

Leonard03: Ahhh. Well I like 'em both

zeogold: Neither are a bad hat, it's just that the latter one's been associated with the whole Reddit/athiest/egotistical/fake-high-IQ/m'lady/MLG/neckbeard meme.

Leonard03: Oh my O_o. I just like hats. Bowlers are cool too.

zeogold: Here's what the fuss is about:
http://knowyourmeme.com/memes/tips-fedora