Most overrated and underrated applications

[different]

Originally Posted by donkei

Yes, but not the loudest hype. Compare it to Trism, Mazefinger, iFishing, or Venger. For me, Dizzy Bee is way better and more polished than those games, yet no one (not only in this forum) talked about it, yet it always excelled on reviews - both on iTMS and website reviews.

It's so good I still haven't beat it yet.

(I've still got about a dozen perfect badges to get)

[bhearn]

Originally Posted by nanokiwi

Dizzy Bee is not underated - with an average 4.74 stars it is the highest rated paid game on the iphone!

No, Dizzy Bee is not the highest-rated paid game, not by a long shot. Here is a list (generated with a perl script this afternoon) of all puzzle games with at least 20 reviews and an average >= 4.75:

26 reviews; average rating = 4.808 Theseus 292035008
72 reviews; average rating = 4.778 Subway Shuffle 284997561
1160 reviews; average rating = 4.823 Trace 289446636
26 reviews; average rating = 4.885 ParkingLot 293312989
44 reviews; average rating = 4.773 Blocked 289903775
24 reviews; average rating = 4.750 Colorblind 289218198
26 reviews; average rating = 4.808 Marple 288689440


All of those but Trace are paid games. And note that this is only puzzle games. There are non-puzzle games with higher ratings, e.g.

PapiJump Plus
210 reviews; average rating = 4.86190476190476


Apple's changes to the App Store make it a pain to get statistics for all games. But among puzzle games, it looks like ParkingLot currently has the highest rating. Which is a bit of a shame, because it's a copy of Rush Hour.

Subway Shuffle was the highest-rated game for quite a while, but all it takes is one or two unhappy users to knock you off.

Also, "overrated" and "underrated" in this thread topic don't refer to app-store user ratings, I think, but popularity. That's more dependent on what Apple decides to feature. So though Trism has a lower rating than these games, at 4.7 (which you may still consider overrated!), what makes it overrated is its insane popularity. And note that Dizzy Bee was featured in the App Store for quite a while as well -- but then, it deserved to be.

[PoV]

Smiles has a 4.67 worldwide rating, but only a mere 9 reviews. I know I keep playing the "look at me" game, but I'd say that's pretty underrated.

It's tough to be seen.

[bhearn]

Originally Posted by PoV

Smiles has a 4.67 worldwide rating, but only a mere 9 reviews. I know I keep playing the "look at me" game, but I'd say that's pretty underrated.

It's tough to be seen.

Three points:

1. The first rule of getting any visibility is: have a free lite version!

2. Sorry to say it, but a high rating with only 9 reviews is not very statistically meaningful. It only takes one unhappy user to ruin your rating. And if you get enough reviews, you will inevitably get a certain number of unhappy users. You can't please everybody.

3. Isn't $4.99 a little high?

If you want to be seen, make a lite version, and drop the price.

[different]

Personally, I'd rather PoV stuck with the price he's got. Too many developers are releasing games, then 3 days later dropping the price to 59p.

It doesn't seem unreasonable, either... for the amount of play modes. I'm waiting for a couple more reviews before I buy... Just bought TBD2.