I want to remind registered members that in order to sue a recommendation image your review must be of proper length.
If the map lasted 15 minutes and you write a short paragraph and use a recommendation image, that’s fine.
However, if the mod last over two hours and you write a short paragraph and add a recommendation image, that image is removed.
I don’t expect everybody to write detailed, in-depth and insightful reviews but if the best you can say after playing something for a few hours is “great mod, loved it”, that’s not enough to warrant a recommendation image.
The image is supposed to be a visual representation of a proper review, not a replacement for it.
If all this seems a little harsh, it’s because I want to avoid situations like ModDB where people can come along and rate something a 10 or 1 with no justification. That makes my faith in their system zero.
I want people to really trust the system here. Yes, you might disagree with my “soft (I say passionate) reviews, but at least I try to justify that recommendation.
I have emailed a few people over the years, but haven’t received a reply.
If you have posted short reviews recently with recommendation images, you should check to see if I have removed it, because I probably have.
If anybody has a problem with that, it’s pistols at dawn!
Must admit I have been guilty of that, I only posted a short comment on ‘The Gate 2’, and only then because I thought it was brilliant. It’s rare I’d comment normally and doubt I’ll bother again. It was good though.
I do not disagree with this process at all. I don’t know whether any of mine have been removed mostly because I know I’m wordy 😉 There really have been a lot of times when people post a PIN or even PF and then just kind of … don’t give a clue as to why. What is it about the mod that you enjoyed or found to your liking? What moments did you remember long after?
Not everyone really has been trained to write proper reviews, mind you. That’s something of an art and does require a bit of good old high-school composition and English class attention. And not everyone who loves a mod gives a crap about serious writing styles.
…. I on the other hand am a writer, …. can you tell? 😛
You are right, not everybody has been trained or even wants to write long reviews and I respect that. However, nobody forces them to write anything, so short reviews are fine, just not with recommendation images.
I see people walking down the street with a phone glued to their ear, constantly. I hear them in supermarkets carrying a shopping list in one hand, a phone in the other presumably talking to their other half saying “do you want me to get milk”? These are often the same people who will write incessantly when there’s not much to say, and ESPECIALLY when its already been said many times. I can tell you what I think of those people. “Men of few words” aren’t always bad, just because they are different than the above types!
I was shocked at your decision to essentially eliminate people from participating in this site if they don’t have the “verbal diarrhea”. I have seen a recommendation of mine removed, and I didn’t just say “great mod, love it”, I simply chose not to repeat what others have already said.
I hope you were just bored or had a bad day and decided to make a new decision with this. To me, this proves that there are people who do great work who make the occasional mistake. Try as I might, I can’t recall the disaster envisioned HERE on THIS site in terms of the recommendation images in all the years I have been here. That’s because there is a certain overriding decorum which is in place which marks this site as much higher in status than anywhere else.
Therefore its really too bad for me to see this.
Now there, I’ve written more than I do with any mod. Simple. That’s because nobody had already said it.
Well’p, guess I’ll go fetch the pistols!
You don’t have to leave *no* review. Just that if it’s so short or so uninvolved, *don’t use the recommendation image*. It doesn’t mean that people won’t see your review. I read all of the reviews regardless of whether they’ve got images, because sometimes commentary and hints can be found among those.
I think, given how many downloads each mod or map gets, and how very, very few actual reviews there really are, that it isn’t any skin off anyone’s nose to put some effort into a more detailed statement about why they did or didn’t like something. Quality over quantity.
Seems to me we have a few points here.
Nobody is forcing anybody to write something they don’t want to write. If you want to be a man of few words, that’s fine. However, to bring value to the recommendation system, the text review has to be appropriate for the length of the mod.
If not, we get into the ModDB situation of having tens of ratings with absolutely no text. That’s no different from using “Great mod. I loved it!” I’d prefer 3 proper reviews with recommendation images and lots of short reviews with no rec. images than all reviews having rec. images irrespective of the review length.
There’s no disaster here. You can continue to write your reviews as before – just please don’t use a rec. image if the mod was long but your text is very short. Short mods with short reviews and rec. images will continue to be valid.
This policy has been in place for years, I’m just reminding people about it.
I believe that this policy and its enforcement is actually part of that higher status you mention. Recommendation images with no justification as worthless.
I’m new here so it’s good to know this. Thanks 😀