Please, come in. Yes, have a seat. Would you like anything? Coffee, tea, motor oil? No, well okay let's start then. You're not in trouble no. It's just... You see me and your mother want to understand something about you. You don't seem to be taking full advantage of some of the resources here on the site. No no, you view enough maps, that isn't the issue. We just want to know... WHY DON'T YOU WRITE MAP REVIEWS??!! Map reviews are intended to be a tool for which the community directly reflects the quality of a map back to not only the author but to other members as well. A review is both critical and honest but well thought out and fair. It's pretty much the same as shopping. Seeing the rating of a product helps buyers make that final decision. And writing a review allows you to share your own personal, real life experiences with the product. It's no secret though that here on the site, map reviews can seem very far and few. On top of that you may notice that the maps that do actually get ratings typically get higher ones as well. If you choose to not write reviews, we would like to know why not. You're not in trouble for not doing so but we would like to encourage all members to participate in this system. If there is a barrier or stigma that needs to be worked through, I'd like to help break that down so that we can start sharing openly and honestly for the betterment of our community.
Honestly? I'm not very good at them. I can tell you if I liked playing on a map or not, but that's not a review. If something truly blows me away, then I can probably articulate that in a positive constructive way. But that's about it!
Because it's not the place for me to publicly criticize a map. If I genuinely have issues with something and you write about it publicly the map author can feel embarrassed. Often time to the point of getting defensive. It's always better to just do these things over Xbox parties. I only leave positive reviews.
I've always felt like feedback without a rating attached to it is a far better way to help people improve their maps. Also, I generally assume that if a map is posted that the author considers it complete (unless they explicitly state that it isn't). My personal goal has always been to help forgers improve and learn. I see reviews as a very poor way to accomplish that. Rating a completed map is useful for people that are just looking for good maps to play (assuming a sufficient number of reviews are submitted). That's not something that's ever been particularly important to me. I can't think of anything that would convince me that a review with a number rating attached to it is superior to feedback without a number attached to it. Anytime there's a rating attached to it, the author is bound to pay more attention to the rating than to the actual content of the review. TLDR: Reviews are a benefit to the random person that's looking for new maps to play, but a detriment to the forgers who submit their maps.
Multi has a good point. There is a huge stigma with writing negative reviews. It's probably one of the most understandable too considering nobody would wanna be "that guy" or "that asshole". I too try to avoid mostly negative reviews. I would say having a decent level of negative can be balanced with some positives though. The main issue there is that you don't wanna seem like your sugar coating. Plus, if a map has issues, the author really does need to know.
Haven't played many maps lately. Spend all my time in forge. It's only on occasion that I make it into a lobby. Maps I have rated are ones that I've spent a good deal of time playing on so I can give my honest opinion. I see a lot of ratings based off the first playthrough or a single glance of the level. I don't think this helps anybody. There also seems to be an issue with giving a negative review on a map. Seems many refer to the "if you don't have anything nice to say.." style of review. Any negative critique is taken as a personal attack and often that's exactly what it is. It would be a great tool if it was used rationally but i prefer word of mouth when it comes to my map recommendations.
If I truly think the map has potential I've gone out of my way to pm the owner and offer to talk to him over live. It's not my place to go bomb a bunch of mediocre maps with low scoring reviews, because why would I. Once I enter the 3 star and lower range I don't bother. And this might sound weird but I honestly really only leave a review on a map if it's 5 stars. Which makes the review system bunk, but it is what it is. I'd much rather have a "highly recommend" button
I've answered this in the past. You shouldn't care how many stars Spoiler or shines I think a map should get at a given time (especially immediately after its posting). I will sometimes leave constructive feedback though, because I think that's more important, as maps will frequently be updated and improve over time.
When I first came here I had never forged before and was a total design noob with only eye for sick themes ans such. I just shared what I had built on this site and I knew I didn't had enough knowledge about maps to just throw out 5 stars at pretty stuff. Now, 1250 forging hours later I'm still a design noob and I'm still a sucker for themes etc. I can't even tell what makes a map good or bad so it's not my place to do this. I had high hopes with all these great lobbies and huge amount of knowledge displayed here because all my real friends quit Halo or quit gaming altogether, but with this time difference I never got my design juices flowing. Plus H5 irritates me when I play it. I still love to check out what you guys build but not that concerned if it plays well.
I just feel its not exactly "Right" I play most of the maps posted here at least once, and Im not going to write a review on any of the not as good of quality maps, because I wouldn't want to hurt peoples feelings or them to get discouraged. I wish we could all be more honest with each other, but its highly subjective sometimes. On the side of not posting reviews for better maps, usually I just dont see the point since the review is just gonna sound stupid. It would either be like "Played a bunch of matches on it great fun" 5/5 or something like that. Im just not gonna take the time to really break down the map and state why its actually good, because what I think is good, others may not. Its also not my place to give feedback I feel. Im not able to convey whats wrong with someones map through text very well, and I would much rather tell the person what I think of the map in forge with them, with how to potentially make the map more interesting and play better, this also helps the builder visualize things better since I can throw down forge pieces and such. Talking to people in lobbies about whats wrong with their maps is just so much easier and gets the point across much better than text that could seem super negative, when you really just want the map to be better.
I think I've only done one review. It was a well-done map that wasn't getting any attention. As others have said, negative reviews will only garner negativity towards you, regardless of intent.
I'm in the camp of I don't have enough time or don't use the time I have to do lots of random games and play many of the maps that are posted. Outside of weekly lobbies I hardly even play H5 outside of forge unless someone invites me to test something specifically. And for the feedback of maps that go into the weekly lobbies looking for it, they can get it live or in video/text form from said lobbies. Also I don't personally take a whole lot of value from a star rating on a map I make so don't take time to give them out. A reply with any (positive/negative) feedback is more important than worrying about what star rating your map is.
I like the "highly recommend" option @MultiLockOn mentioned. Could solve the community favorites selection process also.
Building off of what Multi said, maybe having an anonymous system of 3 Different buttons you could choose would be kinda ok. The buttons would be something along the lines of like "Needs Work" "Would Recommend" "Would Highly Recommend" And if you so wish to review the map then whatever button you pushed would appear for the author along with all the reasons for why you chose what you did. Edit- Now that I think about it A single button would probably be better, since anyone could just spam needs work on a bunch of maps that they think are not very good. With the single button, the better maps would rise to the top and the not as good maps would fall below them with less Highly Recommended clicks, since not as many people would recommend them. The highly recommend system also seems less serious so I would be more open to just leaving comments with the highly recommend click such as "Fun to play" or something like that, since it isn't a review, its just a "hey this is a good map check it out if you can" Edit again- It would be nice to tie this kinda system into the trending maps and community favorites as well. Like the top trending gets reset every 2 weeks and the number it shows is the number of highly recommended clicks it got. Then the community favorites can just be easily chosen by who got the most highly recommended clicks.
I disagree with @MultiLockOn about public reviews. If you get defensive or embarrassed over feedback, then you shouldn't be posting your map. ForgeHub is not a platform to dump your **** and expect people to just like it and download. By sharing your content, you should anticipate and be receptive towards feedback, especially if you expect people to play it more than once. Of course, it goes without saying that the site needs to foster constructive feedback and not drive by **** posting outside of friend circles, because then the environment is too hostile and exclusive. As for why I don't give reviews, I feel the same as @a Chunk. With the way the rating system is now, it implies that a map is finished once it is posted, and therefore a review is final. I don't believe a Forge map is ever truly done unless it is explicitly stated that no additional tweaks will be made; therefore, I think it'd be a disservice to write off a map in its current state if the author is willing to improve the design. Reviews are also heavily based on the individual's preferences and interpretations of the design while not knowing much of the author's intentions. To that end, I see how having a one-on-one conversation with them would be more beneficial. But for the volume of content created and the time required to have those meetings, it simply isn't efficient on a large scale. I've long been an advocate for an amendment to the review system, whether it is based on a universal scale or template, or simply a revised version of what we already have. In its current state, I find the review system discouraging and unreliable.
Kinda building off of some of the statements and suggestions here. How does this idea sound: In place of the rating that is displayed with a map, what if there was a public "Popularity Bar" for each map. This bar would reflect how "Hot" a map is. The bar would be filled by a combination of page views, comments, likes and downloads. If a Recommendation feature was also included, that too could play into building the popularity bar. Pros: - Maintain a public way of displaying the community's interest in a map - Much of the bar building is an automated process - Contribution to the bar is mostly anonymous - Authors have real-time feedback on the activity on their map Cons: - A system would have to be put in place that values unique actions higher than repeated actions. Meaning a single member visiting a page 10 times would not be equal to 10 different members visiting the page and so on - The real-time feedback on engagement on a map can discourage people with less popular maps - Besides the recommendation option, the popularity bar does not offer detailed information on the real quality of a map as much as it does the raw activity on the posting. - Groups of friends, if left unmonitored could abuse the system
In my opinion it should just be one thing not a combination of a bunch of things. Page views/Comments/Downloads can all be manipulated. Just keep it simple. The thing people currently dislike about the whole trending maps section is that nobody understands it. If it was directly tied to likes or recommendations or whatever, this would be better. This goes for community favorites as well. It should be obvious what maps should be in the vote for community favorites. Also super against comments affecting the "hotness" of a map or whatever. Just because a map has a ton of comments does not mean its a good quality map that should be above the rest. All it shows is peoples friends are commenting on it, and the author is responding. It does nothing to show the quality of the map whatsoever.
Yeah. Trinity was like the most commented on map in forgehub history and pretty much everyone agrees that it's just okay