作者：Sam Prescott

现在行业的情况是，游戏评论分数几乎都是高分，比如8分或9分。随着开发者制作的电子娱乐产品质量不断提升，真正能评上此等高分的游戏也频频出现。

获得较好分数的游戏很可能成为市场巨作，这算是个事实。幸好，有些游戏记者对于那些优秀的作品会毫不犹豫地给出高分。他们在采取这种做法的时候，也知道正有许多带着批判眼光的评论家已经做好了讨伐的准备。

我为仍有游戏记者拥有如此胆识感到庆幸。这里我可以先说下自己的观点：我相信在所有满分为10分的媒体评分中，肯定有能够获得满分的作品。我的观点是，不管其他的粉丝（游戏邦注：或其他游戏记者）持有何种想法，为游戏评满分是种完全可以接受的举动。有时开发者需要展示自己的尊重和欢悦时，满分便是最有力的武器。

但无论是什么游戏，总是有评论员质疑其得分过高。当一些游戏记者聚集在一起时，他们之间的对话也不可避免地会转移到评分和给出满分的事宜上。而且，这类似于发表政治见解，大家永远都不会存在完全相同的观点。

100(from priyamahida.wordpress.com)

对于行业新手而言，讨论分为3个层次：

1、是否应该给某款游戏评满分？

2、如果应该的话，是否意味着这款游戏就是完美的？是否意味着它毫无瑕疵？

3、评论分数是否如同通货膨胀般增加，从而使其变得毫无意义？

你肯定听说过开发者或者玩家对获得6.5分的游戏感到很失望的事情，从某种程度上来说，这种游戏似乎根本没有尝试的必要。

但是，同样的数值可能产生相反的情况。比如，如果在《戏剧革命：从现实主义到后现代主义的戏剧》课程考试上获得65%的分数，那么相信多数人会欢呼雀跃。

大家都认为1-10的评分系统可以直接换算成百分比，因而获得10分就等同于100%。所有人都知道，100%就代表着完美。但是没有任何东西是完美的。这只是单纯从数学的角度来看待问题。

这种认知方法还产生某个问题，尤其是当你认为游戏应当获得5分的时候。如果我们从数学的角度来看待这个问题，5分就等同于50%。这意味着游戏好坏各半，其中半数内容值得体验，另外半数内容的价值并不高。

我们都知道，根本就无法将游戏明显区分为两个部分，那么自然也就不存在所谓的临界点。如果游戏可以获得9.9分，那么难道不算是完美的吗？评论员给出此分数，难道不算是在开发者打算为游戏的成功开怀畅饮时泼冷水吗？评论员肯定会指出游戏中的弊病，比如“当我的马匹踏过灌木时，它应当会动，因此瑕疵游戏被扣掉0.1分！你的游戏并不完美。”

我并不是说所有获得9.9分的游戏都应当获得10分满分，只是想知道出现这种“几乎完美”的情况是否缘于人们对满分的理解。

所有将10分视为数学意义上的完美分数（游戏邦注：也就是100%）的人也必须回答以下问题：这个百分比针对的是什么？是意味着评论员只能从他们玩的游戏中的X%内容找到乐趣？还是意味着开发者的意图只有X%准确地通过评论员的眼球传达到脑中，为他们所理解？我们要如何精确知道这种比例？是否意味着X%就等同于完美，而Y%等同于游戏存在瑕疵？界线是什么？

对于10分是等同于完美还是有其他的含义，这个话题还应当继续讨论下去。其他的含义包括，游戏是否让玩家感知到所有其意图传达的内容。确实有某些游戏满足了上述条件，不是吗？它们让玩家产生了丰富的情感。

也可能存在某些瑕疵少到可以被忽略的游戏，当然这只是我个人持有的观点。或者说，如果某款游戏与同时代获得满分的游戏质量相当的话，那么是否也应当评上满分。以上这些情况都有可能出现。

随着技术的发展，游戏或许会获得更多用户。或许这意味着我们得改变评分标准。但是现在，我们也许只能选择听从自己信任的评论员的意见，让他们用简单的话告诉我们：这款游戏值得一试。

游戏邦注：本文发稿于2011年12月4日，所涉时间、事件和数据均以此为准。（本文为游戏邦/gamerboom.com编译，拒绝任何不保留版权的转载，如需转载请联系：游戏邦）

Opinion: The Time for 10s

Sam Prescott

This is how it is now. Review scores for games are clustering in the high eights and nines. The titles worthy of those scores are appearing more and more frequently as developers produce an ever higher calibre of electronic entertainment.

It’s true also that titles worthy of even higher scores are hitting the market more often. Thankfully, there are journos out there who are not afraid to give credit where credit’s due. If necessary, they will dole out delicious dollops of double digits. They’ll dig deep, take a sobering breath, and drop a 10 out of 10, if the situation calls for it. They do so knowing that a slew of criticism critics will prepare to feast.

I said I was thankful for that, right? Well, I really am. I might as well be up front with my opinion here: I believe whole heartedly that there’s a place for 10s in those wonderful 1-10 scales so many media outlets have. My argument is that despite what many fans (and, yeah, many journalists) think, giving a game 10 out of 10 is perfectly acceptable. Sometimes, in order to show one’s respect and delight, a 10 is the last piece of weaponry in the arsenal.

In a world where many consider that review scores are inflated, having the 10 as a kind of Holy Grail becomes very important. And alongside that, the willingness to sack up and use it is essential. No matter what the title, there will always be criticism that the game in question has been rated too highly. Indeed, 10s attract so many comments from readers that you almost have to measure them by volume. A lot of the time it’d be easier to have slapped a 9.5 on the thing and be done with it; but there’s a difference between those scores that sometimes deserves to be highlighted.

Along the entire spectrum, the comments tend to reflect a gaming populace that (at one end) recognises what game critics are trying to do when they bestow the hallowed 10/10, and (at the other) finish reading with a taste in their mouth like they have been steadily eating Turkish delight out of a used ashtray. I say “tend to” because this is based on what I have experienced and observed. Hard data is called hard data because it’s hard work putting it together, and I am only just now getting through season one of Game of Thrones, so it’s not like I have nothing else to do.

But tell me; is there anything angrier than a wronged fanboy? From the level of vitriol it’s like they’re boxing with the English language. They come out of their corners intending to wound.

All of that said, the conversation about scoring does help (regardless of how nasty the debate might get) to illustrate the point that videogame criticism is opinion based. If nothing else, this means that railing against a score you believe to be too high is, on its very best day, utterly pointless.

Of course, it’s not just the readers who have strong opinions: whenever two or more game journos gather, the conversation inevitably turns to scoring and the issue of giving out a 10. Even when people agree, they never agree entirely. It’s a bit like politics, actually.

For newcomers (aren’t you bored yet?) the debate has three levels:

1. Should any game ever score a 10? Ever? I mean, should it?

2. If it does, does that mean it’s perfect? Does it mean a stark absence of flaws?

3. Are review scores, on the whole, inflated and therefore meaningless?

You hear stories about developers or the people distributing their wares phoning media outlets to express their distaste that some game has received a measly 6.5/10 – which has somehow come to mean don’t bother (an issue that has had itself plenty of op-ed time).

The counterpoint to that view goes something like: Eh? You’re moaning about 65%? When I got 65% in Theatrical Revolution: Drama from Realism to the Postmodern, I went out and celebrated so hard I puked into my own shoes outside a Burger King.

But whoops. Awkward. Now I’ve gone and suggested that the 1-10 rating system equates directly to percentages, and therefore a 10 must mean 100% and, as everyone knows, 100% is perfection. And nothing’s perfect. Pobody’s Nerfect, etc. That is mathematical.

This poses yet another problem, especially if you consider games that score 5 out of 10. If we’re taking a mathematical view of things (look, I didn’t even take real maths at school; I took the version for people who used protractors to mark their place in The Hobbit) then a 5 is 50%. It would mean that game is precisely as good as it isn’t. Half of it, you’d have to say, is worth playing. Half of it is not.

We all know that games are never this cut and dried, so isn’t it simply about a tipping point? If a game gets a 9.9, then could it not be being short changed? Isn’t that the reviewer smugly thumping the developer in the gut while he is trying to quaff his celebratory champagne? “Sorry, bub,” the reviewer must be saying, “but that bush really should have moved when my horse ran through it. You get 1% off! Your game is flawed. Suck it.”

I am not suggesting that every game that ever got a 9.9 deserved a 10, but you have to wonder whether a philosophical aversion to 10s might be responsible for some of those almost-nearly-but-not-quites. Speculation, of course. We are just keeping it friendly here. Spitballin’.

Anyone treating a 10/10 as a mathematically perfect score (one hundred percent) must also be asked the question: percentage of what? Does it mean the reviewer enjoyed [x] percent of what they played? That [x] percent of what the developers intended was accurately transmitted through the reviewer’s eyes and into their brain hole? How could we ever know that? Does it mean that [x] percent was not flawed and [x] percent was? Where is the line?

There has to continue to be a constructive debate about whether a 10 actually means perfect or whether it’s more, say, about a game that delivers on all of its promises. You know what that’s like sometimes: a veritable snowfall of lofty claims. But some games meet them, don’t they? They tick the boxes, and leave a gamer feeling… replete.

It could also be a game that has so few flaws that they are negligible – for the record, this is the view I hold personally. Or maybe a game that is as good as any game could be for that point in time. You know what? It might be all of the above.

It’s possible that there are journalists out there – pros and amateurs both – who are prepared to deliver a 10 one day, and so they’re mooning over their unused statement like it’s a dragon’s egg.

Every so often, while locked in to some new exemplar of perfected control mechanics or a gorgeous and shapely battle system they’ll cast their eyes to that magic spot on the wall above the TV where scores reveal themselves and ask that fateful question: is this the game?

More often than ever before, the answer will be yes.

Maybe that means we need new benchmarks. Maybe that means scoring needs to be looked at across the board. For now, though, perhaps just enjoy the fact that there are critics you can trust saying in as plain language as possible: play this game. (Source: IGN)