About My Review System for Upcoming Game Reviews

Starting soon, I'm finally going to start doing some game reviews. I've been kind of working on how I would score these reviews which is sort of tricky. Anyone that knows gaming knows how tricky scoring games can be, but I'm going to try my best. My system may change over time, but this is how it will start and I hope it will work well.

I'm going to use a 1-10 scale with quarterpoints in between similar to what Game Informer uses. I feel like the quarterpoints will greater allow me to differentiate between titles that have close scores while I believe using tenths of a point is too much (meaning the difference between an 8.1 and an 8.2 is too subtle). As far as what each score means here is what I'm going for (these scores will also apply to components of each game I'll be scoring too which I'll explain more about later as well as the overall score):

10-Nearly flawless or very close to perfect. No game is perfect, but it must be really close to get this. I'm the type of guy whose is a bit reluctant to give a 10 out, but will if the game is good enough.
9, 9.25, 9.5, 9.75-Excellent, great or elite.
8, 8.25, 8.5, 8.75-Good.
7, 7.25, 7.5, 7.75-Above average.
6, 6.25, 6.5, 6.75-Average. I'm using this range of "6" scores as average as to give myself room to say that several games are average, but still say which is better. Also, while it may make more sense for 5 to be average, I'm using this as average as to be more in line with what readers will think. The industry average is in the 6's somewhere and people already overreact to 7's for example, so, this is my attempt to let those who might just glance at scores a real idea of how the game is.
5, 5.25, 5.5, 5.75-Below average.
4, 4.25, 4.5, 4.75-Bad.
3.75 and under-Very bad to terrible.

That is the basic structure of the scoring. I elaborated a bit on the 10 and average scores because they are the trickier parts of the system. It's best to read my words and not just the score. This will help you best know what to think of the game, but I am trying hard to have a scoring system to make it best for those who just want to glance at the scorewho don't have time to read it. I will also be avoiding spoilers to make my reviews safe to read and not just look at the score.

I will also be scoring individual parts of each game (sort of like IGN or Gametrailers does) with the same scoring system as above. These areas will be:

Gameplay-The most important part of games, how they play. How fun they are, how they control, the quality of the level design, how good the gameplay elements like platforming, puzzles, combat, etc. are and how they come together, etc.
Story-How good the story is and how well it is presented. This will not apply to a game like say Lumines, but I will just not score certain games in this area.
Graphics-How good does the game look as well as animation, framerate, the quality of the artistic design, etc.
Sound-How good the different sound elements of the game are. The music, the voice-acting and the sound effects will be evaluated here.
Replay Value and Extras-How much playtime you can get out of the game and how the unlockable extras or stuff outside the main game are. This includes how long it will take to finish a game, how likely you are to come back to play extra modes like mutliplayer or challenge modes or just how likely you are to play the game again. Also, I'm going to include extras and stuff that you can unlock by beating the game or accomplishing things in the game and their quality in here for the time being. The price of the game will be considered here as well relative to how long you'll be playing it (a five-hour game for $20 is different than a five-hour game for $60 and that will be taken into account here).

That will be followed by the overall score which will not be an average of the components because games aren't just a sum/average of their parts. Nor do these compents encompass all that makes up each game. The individual part scores are just to give people an idea of how good I think the graphics and sound and so-on are. Also, games will generally be compared to other games on their platform. For instance, graphics in a DS game obviously won't be compared to a PS3 game. Though generally it would be okay for me to compare graphics on 360 game to a PS3 game. Same goes for gameplay. But maybe not comparing gameplay of a DS game to a PSP game. So generally, games will be compared to other games on the system due to it's capabilities, but in some cases it would be safe to assume (like with 360 and PS3) that these scores go across platforms. Even the Wii can be compared to PS3 and 360 in some situations especially overall score. The only other thing I will mention is that it is sometimes tricky to rate games in franchises on say a handheld as compared to console entries in the series. Take for example Daxter for PSP or The Legend of Zelda: Phantom Hourglass for DS. I believe these games are at or close to being the best games on their platform, but are not quite up to the level of some of their console brethren. But due to being at the top end of their system they'll be rated as high as or close to some of those other games in the series even if they may be not quite as good.

Well, that was all a bit confusing, but I believe it will all make sense in my reviews. When I review something, I'll say if it's the best on it's system, across all consoles, or how it compares to other games in it's series on other systems. At the same time, I'm aiming to make the scoring system give you a good idea of how the game is. I think if you just look at my score or summary, you'll know if I think the game is good, bad, incredible, or average. So, I hope anyone reading this will enjoy my reviews which I will start having up soon.

Also, comments are very welcome. If you think I'm way off or right on with the review tell me. Or maybe just what you liked or didn't about the game, then we can have a discussion on our thoughts on the game in the comments. Just keep the comments clean (no dirty language) and spoiler-free so we can be kind to other readers and not ruin anything for them. I will be moderating comments, but I'll try to approve them as soon as possible. Will be back with some reviews soon.