Game Bashing On Steam

[Old Duck]

It's on sale. A lot of people probably just picked it up and didn't like it.

Odyssey is going to have to be on more of a sale than that for me to pick it up. And even if these people don't research things like this forum to fully understand what they are getting with Odyssey, the overall rating of the game is staring them in the face on Steam. So it kinda makes the reviewer look like a dummy if they buy it against the odds and then act all surprised that Odyssey isn't the game they wanted it to be.. I guess Elite's fans shouldn't be overly concerned about the negative reviews, because apparently people are ignoring those reviews and buying the game anyway, despite being warned about the very things they end up complaining about themselves.

When I leave a review, I usually pick my "recommend / not recommend" binary checkbox based on the game's MSRP rather than the sales price, but then in the actual text of the review I'll say something like, "I bought this on sale and I got my money's worth for the $10 I paid". But usually if I buy a game on Steam, it's because I truly believe I will like it, at least enough to justify the price I paid for it. Odyssey might be an exception, because it's such a roll of the dice when it comes to performance on specific hardware, and some things in Odyssey will need to be experienced directly in order for me to form an opinion strong enough to base an actual review on.

And while I try to only buy games that I feel I will be able to recommend, if later a game-breaking bug or other "after I bought it" change makes the current state of the game truly not recommended for me, then I'll "swing my vote" to not recommended (only after giving the developer ample time to fix said bug / change). I would say the majority of my not recommended reviews are exactly this - I buy a game, it works great, I love it, and then later some forced update ruins it for me. This will earn a much more scathing review than a game I don't like "out of the box".

 

[Old Duck]

But it never occurred to me to give a negative review, if only for the fact that my voice would be drowned in the sea of positivity.

My last really negative (as in, scathing) review definitely was swimming upstream against the river of positivity. That review was of Microsoft Flight Simulator, a game that I absolutely loved when it first came out, but one of the many frequent (and entirely too large) updates broke it for me, and many other people too. Asobo ruined something I loved, and paid $69 for! That really pizzed me off, and I let the world know about it, despite not really making a dent in the overall rating.

I missed the days if, "If it isn't broke, don't fix it." These days it's, "If it isn't broke, keep updating it every week with 50 GB files until it is." Grrr, I feel my blood pressure raising! This is very, very different than me getting a game like EGS and realizing it's just not for me. I only review games I'm passionate about.

 

[gorankar]

But what nonsense conspiracy theory is that now? Anyone can post a steam review. I am an LTP owner and can do this, so...

You have to own the game to leave a review. Some LEP owners apparently don't register as owners of some of the DLCs on Steam's review system, despite having it and being able to play it. They can still review the main game but not always the DLC. At least that is what appears to be the case for some of them.

People need to take Steam reviews for what they are, an indicator of the general feelings of Steam users that own the game. You can argue against the opinions of others but that's just your own opinion in the end. Same as theirs. The idea that it's been review bombed, rather than just bombed in the reviews is something of a conspiracy theory with not a lot of weight.
You do have to own the game to leave a review. If you click on the review, it will give you information that helps you decide on the veracity of the review. I tells you how long they played, if they got the game for free, and if they refunded the game or not. A bad review from someone with 300 hours in the game, carries a bit more weight with me than a review by someone that received it for free and has 0.7 hours in game.

 

[The Lawful]

To be fair, that second review has a lot of points that are accurate.

God bless America, they sing at the end chorus.

EDIT: Ok, this may be too complex. See, the ending song of Miami Vice is the same as the one from Electra Glide in Blue. Where the protagonist is shot off his Harley after realizing he forgot to give back the van driver's license and tries to bring it back. Fast cuts, you only see the double barreled gun for a split second above two stickers with the slogan and that's it. Scene speaks for itself. The tune was written & performed by Terry Kath of Chicago who also played in the movie, but that's another story.

@see https://forums.frontier.co.uk/threa...ing-to-right-now.424115/page-384#post-9814131

O7,

 

[The Lawful]

My last really negative (as in, scathing) review definitely was swimming upstream against the river of positivity. That review was of Microsoft Flight Simulator, a game that I absolutely loved when it first came out, but one of the many frequent (and entirely too large) updates broke it for me, and many other people too. Asobo ruined something I loved, and paid $69 for! That really pizzed me off, and I let the world know about it, despite not really making a dent in the overall rating.

I missed the days if, "If it isn't broke, don't fix it." These days it's, "If it isn't broke, keep updating it every week with 50 GB files until it is." Grrr, I feel my blood pressure raising! This is very, very different than me getting a game like EGS and realizing it's just not for me. I only review games I'm passionate about.

I've forgiven them everything they ever did since they added Tobii Support in SU8 and lo! after I finally had found the sensitivity submenu in their freaking controls setup. Sometimes, it's easy as that. And my first flight sim was done by SubLogic btw, 40 years ago. Champaign to Paxton and back, forever! At least it came with printed charts.

Still, the flight model of the F-18 is comic style when compared to DCS, but well.

O7,

 

[Erei]

Interesting observation. Seems just as it looks like recent reviews of Odyssey on Steam could be headed towards putting Odyssey into the Positive rating, and what a surprise, a spike of 25 negative reviews in four days. Compare that to 31 negative reviews from just under the previous month.

And what do a proportion of those reviews contain? Just go get Star Citizen, you need the best GPU to run this game, Arx prices have doubled (?), FDev will shut the game down this year, FDev bad, cash grab... etc..

I wonder what the next few days will bring, seeing as it's on sale..

View attachment 302547

View attachment 302546
View attachment 302549
View attachment 302550

On your review, I also notice a BIG spike in positive review. Surprising you left that out of your argument, it was not fitting the conspiracy narrative ?

Also, right now, Odyssey is on sale. This is helped by a GIANT CAN'T MISS IT "frontier sale" on steam frontpage with Elite logos amongst others games. There is a theory about people buying more when it's cheaper, and thus increasing the number of review. I know kinda far fetched. I mean, obviously it's a conspiracy from Star Citizen fans who spend money to make a poor review.

Have you ever heard of statistical bias ? Because that's what you are doing. You only pick what's fitting your narrative, and ignore the rest. There is a big positive AND negative review spike ? Let's ONLY speak of the negative one. Some dude speak of SC in the comment ? Let's pick that one.

You've been doing that ever since you started posting in this thread. You cherry pick whatever fits the narrative and ignore the rest. You are not wondering about the truth of it, which is obvious, you are trying to seek for a silly drama.

 

[Sluggy71]

God bless America, they sing at the end chorus.

EDIT: Ok, this may be too complex. See, the ending song of Miami Vice is the same as the one from Electra Glide in Blue. Where the protagonist is shot off his Harley after realizing he forgot to give back the van driver's license and tries to bring it back. Fast cuts, you only see the double barreled gun for a split second above two stickers with the slogan and that's it. Scene speaks for itself. The tune was written & performed by Terry Kath of Chicago who also played in the movie, but that's another story.

@see https://forums.frontier.co.uk/threa...ing-to-right-now.424115/page-384#post-9814131

O7,

What the hell are you going on about?

edit - and Terry Kath died in 1978, so I'm not so sure he ever appeared in Miami Vice.

 

[gorankar]

Nevermind OT

 

[Fizzatron]

On your review, I also notice a BIG spike in positive review. Surprising you left that out of your argument, it was not fitting the conspiracy narrative ?

It literally can be seen in the image of the chart I posted, how can you honestly say that I "left it out"? As pointed out by someone else, and also I mentioned in my post, Odyssey being on sale is likely to drive more reviews overall. You're trying to make something out of nothing.

Also, right now, Odyssey is on sale. This is helped by a GIANT CAN'T MISS IT "frontier sale" on steam frontpage with Elite logos amongst others games. There is a theory about people buying more when it's cheaper, and thus increasing the number of review. I know kinda far fetched. I mean, obviously it's a conspiracy from Star Citizen fans who spend money to make a poor review.

I like how your tone is becoming more patronizing, but anyway, good job for reiterating the obvious point that it's on sale. As to why someone would purchase Odyssey and leave a review using misleading tropes and/or recommending playing Star Citizen instead, is entirely an open question that they could only answer.

I'm pointing out the fact that a good portion of these reviews are based on misinformation. Of which, can I presume that you're good with that then? Seeing as your defending people writing falsehoods about the game in their negative review?

Have you ever heard of statistical bias ? Because that's what you are doing. You only pick what's fitting your narrative, and ignore the rest. There is a big positive AND negative review spike ? Let's ONLY speak of the negative one. Some dude speak of SC in the comment ? Let's pick that one.

Not at all, I feel we're heading down your failed Occam's Razor argument again, but shoehorning some other psuedo-argument to fit your narrative. I can point to one positive review that says that it's a conditional positive. Tell me what basis you you would conclude a positive review to be a bomb? Plus, the title of the thread is "Game Bashing on Steam", so forgive me if I stick to the topic. Feel free to pull examples of things going the other way, I would be happy to give you my thoughts on whether they're legit or not, though of course, I've asked you to do the same but for some reason you fall back to trying to negate the observations.

You've been doing that ever since you started posting in this thread. You cherry pick whatever fits the narrative and ignore the rest. You are not wondering about the truth of it, which is obvious, you are trying to seek for a silly drama.

Funnily enough, I've also ignored many negative reviews too, I wonder why that is? hmm.

 

[Fizzatron]

One of the problems is: people who like a game tend to play the game rather than waste their time writing reviews. People whose expectations have been disappointed are probably more inclined to write their frustrations away. Another, perhaps the biggest, is that many people nowadays are no longer used to forming their own opinions and prefer to follow the mainstream. This quickly leads to a fatal downward spiral which, at a certain point, becomes self-propelling. Of course, this also happens in the other direction.

I agree, it's also one of the reasons why we get prompts in certain games to leave a review on x gamestore. Phone apps are one area that does that by default. Here's a question for all, would it be seen as wrong for Frontier to ask players to rate and share on Steam/Epic etc? Some would say that it shows lack of confidence in the product to ask for ratings, but in this online world, it's quite evident that aggregate scores/ratings are more than just a guideline for many, so asking for a player to leave a rating/review could be viewed as a legitimate part of the marketing strategy.

For example, I believe that Elden Ring is a good game, but clearly overrated as a result of this effect.

I hear a lot about Elden Ring from my son, it seems to be quite popular. Anyway, you raise an interesting situation, it's overrated by your view, which is entirely fair, but, and this is a general question, does this give one the justification or authority to try to correct that by compensating the other way?

 

[Fizzatron]

You can see a pattern in the reviews though. More often than not, there's a mention of the performance or a hint at a bad experience with the on-foot gameplay.

I think there's legitimate gripes in those areas, though no-one needs a NASA supercomputer to run the game and the onfoot gameplay has its own strategy and way to play.

I think in that second case, partly this is FDEV's fault. Their excessive grind design has finally bit them it seems.

For the most part I agree, I've mentioned this before, it smacks of the 80s limited memory technique of extending gameplay.

Though, again, to be fair, there are many very popular games out there right now that rely on just as much of a grind to get anywhere. I've personally not been bothered by the grind because I'm not in a hurry to level up just yet. I like the fact that you can get up to G3 equipment, with engineered effects from Pioneer Supplies, that's got me on a good start into it and it's only now that I'm really giving thought about unlocking some Engineers.

I think maybe we're finding people start off too weak. This makes enemies a bit spongy. This leads to repeated weapon switching which the switch animations are too slow for, which makes players irritated at the gunplay design.

I personally have no issue with the different gun for shield/kinetic mechanic as I'm a big fan of the Metroid Prime series, which had that mechanic. I do agree with the animation speed and maybe some magazine quantities for certain guns, but these are balance issues that get addressed down the line for most games. It seems that Odyssey has only now started to leave critical mode so hopefully we will see some of this?

It's crazy to me that all these people talk about SC, though. I know it's a new game, it's a breath of fresh air, but is SC actually good at this point? Last I checked, it was broken worse than Odyssey and sold people up to $10000~ ships.

And if SC is some kind of good at this point, why the f does SC just get to be good at this point after all the ridiculously rotten stuff it has actively pulled on people by now?

That's a rabbit hole and a half.

 

[gorankar]

People are sounding more and more patronizing because you are failing, intentionally or otherwise, to understand the facts you are being presented with. The game was/is not being review bombed, it earned many of the poor reviews it has received in the eyes of those reviewers. The way Steam reviews work, requiring you own the game, makes it difficult for people that don't have it, or bots, to alter the reviews scores. Once reviews swing one way, they take time to swing back.

 

[Erei]

It literally can be seen in the image of the chart I posted, how can you honestly say that I "left it out"? As pointed out by someone else, and also I mentioned in my post, Odyssey being on sale is likely to drive more reviews overall. You're trying to make something out of nothing.

Your post claimed the negative reviews are to "bash the game" and put it down in review to prevent it from rising up.

Surprisingly, you didn't apply the same deduction for the positive spike in review. I didn't read anything about "white knight" pushing the game up, or "fdev apologist". Surprising it only work one way ?
Oh no, it's totally natural when it goes up, but totally wrong when it goes down. That's the most biased reasoning you can make.

Me ? I'm rational. I don't think there are any concerted push one side or the other. There are no indication of such things. Sure, some trolls here and there, as always. Not enough to have an impact, even more so they exist on both side and cancel mostly each others.




Here's a thing you learn quickly in science : the conclusion should fit the facts (datas, reasoning, experiment...), and not the opposite.

There is a small story about some priest who tried to translate the Egyptian hieroglyph by starting as the premise they were part of the Bible and other christian related stuff. And so he built his entire translation upon it and it kinda worked. He was biased so he made the fact fits its narrative, and ignored it when it was not helping. Then came Champollion, and he didn't have an agenda, he got the datas and fact, and translated the hieroglyph.
Guess who was right ? One was after the truth, the other was after a confirmation.


Sorry if I sound patronizing, but biased reasoning to fit a narrative are tiresome.

 

[myothershipisacobraiv]

I personally have no issue with the different gun for shield/kinetic mechanic as I'm a big fan of the Metroid Prime series, which had that mechanic. I do agree with the animation speed and maybe some magazine quantities for certain guns, but these are balance issues that get addressed down the line for most games. It seems that Odyssey has only now started to leave critical mode so hopefully we will see some of this?

This is basically how I feel as well. I don't mind the gunplay either but in recent times I have found myself noticing the switching animations a lot which makes me think that plays into it when you see people complain about the design. This game reminds me a lot of the way things played in RAGE and I really liked that game. In RAGE, a lot of the enemies had armour and it would really DR everything up to a point, and then got destroyed. There were guns in that game, notably the basic assault rifle, that were really, really bad. The only reason you would use it would be to use up the armour before switching out to something that did more damage but for which ammo was more precious. So I don't really have problems with the design.

I haven't found it too difficult either. I would argue it's way, way harder to take down even a Master-ranked comparable ship in the base game when you're in a non-meta unengineered ship than it is to take out several enemies on-foot at once by yourself with just the g3 suit and the starter gear.

My main gripe so far with the on-foot stuff is not being able to do download missions without being put in the position that I need to murderlize the entire settlement just to do it. Elite is a very RP game and violence is personally unappealing to my Elite RP. I haven't done the thing where you run in the security room, hit the alarms off, and then run out before the SEC guy shoots you yet. I've been meaning to, but the one time I remember making an attempt, I got burned by an e-breach halfway through. I haven't gotten back to it yet because Elite takes a lot of time and I've been doing other stuff in it.

 

[Shinji Ikari]

When did Occam's Razor become obsolete?

 

[Riverside]

When did Occam's Razor become obsolete?

When people realised they can just say what the most likely scenario is, is whatever supports their pre-conceptions.

 

[Banana's_Are_Good_For_You]

I suppose people could just ignore steam reviews.
Personally, i only listen to those whose opinions are similar to mine as we like the same games.
That's not to say i ignore all others, just that i would be aware that their prefered playstyle may be different from mine but i will still be able to gain info from what they say.

The problem with steam reviews is that much of it is incoherant nonsense so i look elsewhere and to a variety of different sources before i buy anything..

Steam is just a very bad review system, imo.

 

[myothershipisacobraiv]

When did Occam's Razor become obsolete?

Point well made. On the other hand when the subject is people and their ways, things rarely like to stay simple.

 

[DYSEQTA]

Thanks for the balanced post, glad to see that my reasoning isn't entirely moronic. Just a minor correction, LEPers actually can leave a steam review if they linked their Frontier account to Steam.

My account is linked to steam and I cannot leave an Odyssey review. Base game, yes, Odyssey, no.

 

[DYSEQTA]

What they are trying to say is that Lifetime Pass Owners aren't able to leave a Steam review but a lot would given half the chance and it wouldn't be a positive one.

Mine would be positive overall, with obvious caveats regarding performance, if I could leave one.