Gaming Signal: Review Policies

Review Policies

Here at GamingSignal the crew will be reviewing games of all types - from board games to computer games. In order to bring some level of consistency and integrity to the reviewing process, we've agreed to a common set of policies between all the reviewers. Each person will bring their own biases and thoughts to the process, but you can bank on a certain amount on consistency between them. Consider the following to be our editorial policies.

First, there will be times when we might choose to provide our impressions or thoughts on a game that we don't want to be a formal review. This might be because we've only played the game for a few hours, it might be based on impressions from a beta test, or it might simply be that we're not ready to release the full review yet. In these cases, rather than have a title of REVIEW, this posts will have a title of FIRST IMPRESSIONS. This will be useful for games where the interest is high and we want to let people know what we think without having to wait for the full review.

However the meat of the reviews here will be REVIEWS. You can count on them to follow certain policies. We will finish every game before we rate it - an important element of a role-playing game (RPG) or first-person shooter (FPS) is playing through the single-player scenarios and discovering the plot and how the game might change over time. It would not be fair to review these games without playing them though. If we don't finish a game, it won't get a rating, although it might still get a review. Several game types don't warrant playing through every game mode or built-in scenario (true of many board games or real-time strategy games, for example.) We'll still give these a rating. Here are the ratings and what they mean:

If a game has no rating, that means we didn't finish it.

A half-star rating means the game should be avoided by nearly everybody and has no redeeming value at all. Luckily, there aren't very many of these stinkers but should we come across them, we'll let you know.

A one star rating implies that the game is overall very poor, but might appeal to somebody who must have the game based on a particular license. An example of this would be the Spider Man 2 game for the PC.

A two star game is one that is going to appeal to fans of the game type or genre (RTS, FPS, etc.) but the game has some issues, doesn't offer anything new to the genre, or isn't able to deliver on a new feature or concept effectively. I found Fable (XBOX) and Shadows over Camelot (board game) to be games of this rating. Note that this game isn't lame or a waste of time - it just isn't going to appeal universally.

A three star rating indicates that the game is very solid and fans of the genre probably shouldn't miss it. It should offer some new ideas or gameplay or execute so well that it is the new pinnacle for games of its type. These games might also contain such high production value (graphics, sound, UI) that the game transcends the two-star category for that reason. To me, Doom 3 (PC) and Fist of Dragonstones (board game) are 3-star games.

A four star rating will be used when the game is really good, delivers unique game-play for the genre, or invents a new genre. It will offer fun gameplay for everybody, even those who aren't a fan of the particular style of game. This would be a great game for people who want to get into that type of game and try it out. To me, Civilization 4 (PC) is like this, as is Puerto Rico (board game.)

A five star rating is rare - this is the game that gets it all right and does it so well, you believe most gamers will regret not playing this one. These games will likely hold up very well over time, and can be enjoyed years after they first come out. This is the hardest rating to give - predicting that a game is a classic is always difficult. Examples of this type are Half-Life (PC), San Juan (card game), and Ticket to Ride (board game.)

There are half-star ratings which allow the reviewer to further distinguish the games as needed. Additionally, each review can ultimately rate the game however they like - but they should tell you why they have chosen to deviate from the policy if they have. This is important - I think we've all just enjoyed the heck out a game without exactly knowing what it brings to the table.

We're going to make every attempt to tell you how many hours of gameplay we believe the game has. This is easy in some cases, and hard in others. I feel strongly that this is important though - you want to know you're getting a certain value for your gaming dollar.

We will also make sure to let you know which version of a game we're playing at all times. It is important to distinguish between Doom the PC game, the XBOX game, and the board game.

Most of the time we will be reviewing and rating games targetted at adults. However, when we aren't we will be careful to indicate the target audience of the game and rate it accordingly. Yu-Gi-Oh! is a card game very firmly targetted at the 'under 10' age group and should be reviewed and rated as such. Comparing this to Magic: The Gathering (card game) would be patently unfair.

Finally, certain types of games - specifically those Massively Multiplayer Online games - don't lend themselves to reviews in the regular sense. We're still review them, but reserve the right to return to our review and update it. These games can change so radically, that it will be important to let readers know how the game is at the moment, rather than frozen in time. One need only look at the recent changes to Star Wars: Galaxies for a fantastic example of this (the game today - 12/19/05 - is very different than what launched.)

If you have any concerns or comments on our policies please post them below.