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Our guide to a world of awesome game reviews

Game reviews are important. They help developers get direct feedback on their games, and as gamers they help us make an informed purchase or share our thoughts. Writing a quality review carries a certain responsibility: to do good by both the game and the community. Striking that perfect balance is a challenge, a delicate art that we want to promote.

Next time you're about to write a review, you'll see our simple suggestions for crafting a top-notch review. You can always revisit them from the review form as well.

Focus on your in-game experience: if you have general feedback or need tech support, contact us!
Avoid politics and drama: let the game stand on its own merits.
Critique responsibly: whether it's positive or negative, a great review should be helpful and informative.

We hope that these three essential guidelines will help make GOG.com reviews even more awesome than they already are, but we also don't want to stop there!



CONTEST: REVIEW OF THE MONTH

Together with our friends at ROCCAT we venture to encourage and reward the best reviews on GOG.com – and to that end, we are introducing our monthly Review of the Month contest!

Submit your review for any game (or games!) released on GOG.com between May 1 and May 31, 2016. This time around, the grand prize is the RENGA gaming headset, courtesy of ROCCAT.

Here's what you need to know:

—Once you've posted your review, submit it for consideration by also quoting it in this post's forum thread.
—Keep the review guidelines in mind. A good review can be both entertaining and informative, it can be brief or extensive. It doesn't need to be positive in its overall assessment of the game - as long as it's eloquent and fair (or hilarious), it has our attention.
—All eligible reviews must be about games that have joined the GOG.com catalog within the previous month. For this first phase of the contest eligible reviews shall concern games that came out on GOG.com between May 1 and May 31, 2016.
—Winners will be announced at the beginning of every month with the start of next month's contest. The first round of winners will be announced in early July, giving you guys a bit of extra time to fine-tune your entries. Remember that if you're not happy with the shape of a review you've already posted, you can always contact our support team to rectify that.
—The best review of each month will win a sweet piece of gaming gear, courtesy of the good people at ROCCAT. Any runners-up will receive honorable mentions and one $9.99 code each, to be redeemed at GOG.com.

Let's celebrate the reviews that hit the nail on the head — the most constructive, informative, or fun to read. Grab your keyboards and make some magic happen, GOGers!
Post edited May 31, 2016 by maladr0Id
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CarrionCrow: Hmmm. So, find the worst game released in the time period, grab it, beat it, then eviscerate it while staying under the letter limit?
That could be a slight variation on the usual process.
hilarious
high rated
What about reviews in other languages than english? Will there be a language filter eventually? I make my reviews mostly in german, so a filter could be helpfull for people who want to read reviews in their own language, because they don`t have to scroll anymore thru dozens of english reviews until they find one in their own language.
Post edited May 19, 2016 by Maxvorstadt
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drealmer7:
Works for me. At least if I put it in review form, I might get something out of it besides another pile of garbage and a headache from me screaming about it in-thread.
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Wurzelkraft: How about fixing the review system first?
We wish. For a lot of things, one of them a sensible maximum review length. :|

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Mr.Caine: heh. was this prompted by the response Baldur's Gate EE received?
My thought exactly. And it has never been Siege of Dragonspear itself that elicited this 'response' - i.e. the review bombing - it was what certain drama manufacturers said about the expansion. GOG should have added that to submit a review, it's always advisable to have played the game first.

Not sure how to interpret the "tech support" bit in those rules. If the game's riddled with bugs, a review should point a finger at it.


And posting reviews of mine in this thread sounds like a really, really bad idea. Bad enough to have downvote trolls fuck up my forum posts, I have no intent whatsoever to guide them to my reviews as well.
Post edited May 19, 2016 by Vainamoinen
Would have been nice if one of the conditions was to own the game on GOG.

I think it would also be good to give more time for reviews. Having reviews in May for games published in May is a sure fire way to get reviews from people who didn't play the games extensively. (Some games can be played quickly, but games at the end of the month, and long ones, are less likely to get good reviews.)
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hyperagathon: Perhaps update the post to include the eligible titles. Tracking down each release post just to check the date doesn't sound like a good use of anyone's time.
Here you are:
[url=http://www.an-ovel.com/cgi-bin/magog.cgi?ver=730&scp=gdspio&dsp=ipgfsorlcmbahTP&ord=j0&flt=jne~01052016~jnl~31052016~&opt=nr]http://www.an-ovel.com/cgi-bin/magog.cgi?ver=730&scp=gdspio&dsp=ipgfsorlcmbahTP&ord=j0&flt=jne~01052016~jnl~31052016~&opt=nr[/url]

The link will update itself as games are added to GOG (until May 31).
The games are sorted by ascending addition date.
high rated
Hey guys, keep in mind that no purchase is necessary to participate in this contest!

The rules clearly state that the games in question must be released on GOG.com during May, but they don't need to be Day 1 releases ;)
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styggron: I gave up doing reviews. Although I keep them balanced and respectful not a single one ever gets posted so I gave up some time ago. I find it frustrating when mine never seem to go live and others which use profanities or are totally unhelpful seem to go up

:(
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Marioface5: Have you contacted Support about that? There's no approval process for reviews, so they should be going up regardless of the content.
I've written 6 and not a single one goes live *ever*. No I never contacted support. I'll try to write one and when it does not go up contact support.

How soon before you are supposed to see it ? A few hours or instant ?
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Maxvorstadt: What about reviews in other languages than english? Will there be a language filter eventually? I make my reviews mostly in german, so a filter could be helpfull for people who want to read reviews in their own language, because they don`t have to scroll anymore thru dozens of english reviews until they find one in their own language.
I read some reviews in german, i always look for english versions, my german is so bad even a bat can't make head or tales out of it, most are in english, i always choose english if and when available.

As for games: what games will be reviewed ? I know all the things and rules about making a honest review, but to be honest: there really are lots of games that aren't even worth wasting precious time, words or paper and ink on it (incase of a hardcopy)

Anyway a good game will always receive better reviews than a lousy game, and i assume the reviewers will have some form of 'freedom of press' when reviewing a game (ofcourse they should follow the rules to keep it nice and clean).
Anyone know which games actually released since May 1?
I struggle to remember.
Cool idea, maybe that will help people focus on actual GOG versions, not retail/CD ones or world releases and consider their words for actual game content. ;-P
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Maxvorstadt: What about reviews in other languages than english? Will there be a language filter eventually? I make my reviews mostly in german, so a filter could be helpfull for people who want to read reviews in their own language, because they don`t have to scroll anymore thru dozens of english reviews until they find one in their own language.
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gamesfreak64: I read some reviews in german, i always look for english versions, my german is so bad even a bat can't make head or tales out of it, most are in english, i always choose english if and when available.

As for games: what games will be reviewed ? I know all the things and rules about making a honest review, but to be honest: there really are lots of games that aren't even worth wasting precious time, words or paper and ink on it (incase of a hardcopy)

Anyway a good game will always receive better reviews than a lousy game, and i assume the reviewers will have some form of 'freedom of press' when reviewing a game (ofcourse they should follow the rules to keep it nice and clean).
Wouldn`t you rather like to read some reviews in ,uhm... Netherlandish?
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omega64: Anyone know which games actually released since May 1?
I struggle to remember.
magog can tell you!
Before I forget, TinyE made a good point regarding the review system.
If we're throwing out idle ideas for improvement, a filtering sub-system would be helpful.
If you can eliminate what you already consider to have no merit by default, you can get to the useful things that much faster.
Post edited May 19, 2016 by CarrionCrow
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Maxvorstadt: Wouldn`t you rather like to read some reviews in ,uhm... Netherlandish?
Dutch, don't ask me the same question as the answer would be no. :p