Love Me Not (by UNCADE)

[Famousmortimer]

Uncade posts at Neogaf all the time... so him posting there wasn't some crazy plot to take down Touch Arcade. Or atleast I would assume not. If I had just received the best news of my indie gaming career (a perfect score from a celebrated site) and it got revoked I would go post at neogaf also. Not because neogaf is filled with haters, but because that's where it would get some publicity.



And to be honest I was ready to pick up my pitchfork when i read about it over there, but the 'neogaf haters' also posted Hodapp's side of the story and now the whole thing makes sense. It was an overzealous freelancer and the review didn't go through the proper checks. When you guys get back it will and the review will go back up with a proper score.


Sounds settled to me. I don't think there's any reason to be mad at uncade for getting upset - it had to have been a shock. And i don't think anyone should be mad at the site because you guys were transparent about what happened and why.

[chickdigger802]

Originally Posted by Hodapp

It's an odd move, that's for sure. For the sake of transparency, here's the email Brad sent David-Since the internet lynch mob seems to be eager to form up over this, here's a bit longer version of what happened: As mentioned, Jared and I have spent this week on and around the E3 show floor where I can barely place a phone call or send text messages, and forget about any kind of data access. WiFi is totally ruined. We basically need to drive back to our rental in Hollywood in order to get any kind of meaningful internet connectivity, which is anywhere between a 30-60 minute trip depending on traffic.

There was a lull in the day, so I called Brad and asked him to post some of the reviews in queue, unaware of how many more reviews had been submitted by our array of freelancers since the last time I was able to load the TouchArcade back-end. I made an incorrect assumption in that he was just going to post a couple of the reviews that I was able to look at, and not delve too deep into the back log of reviews that hadn't gone through a full editorial pass yet.

What does that pass entail? Well, I read over everything and make sure the tone fits in with the site, play the games and make sure everything sounds right, and then I make sure the score lines up with the review text as well as our historical ratings. If anything doesn't add up, I talk to the review author and we come to an agreement on edits, scoring, and things like that.

I didn't get a chance to do this with Love Me Not, Brad assumed I did, and I assumed he knew which reviews I was referring to when I asked him to publish them. The solution we came up with was to pull the review, email the developer to start a conversation and explain the situation, do the edit pass that got skipped, then re-publish it.

...But, instead of the whole "starting a conversation" step we've got yet another NeoGAF drama explosion.

The conspiracy theories surrounding this are a little weird though. Look at the rest of our five star games and ask yourself if Love Me Not really fits in with those. We just made a mistake, and for what it's worth I'm very sorry about this and it won't happen again.

There is one thing that is confusing. What does other 5 star reviews have to do with anything? Last time I checked all the games aren't written by one person. People tend to have differing opinions. Are review scores crowd sourced or something here?

[Eli]

Originally Posted by chickdigger802

There is one thing that is confusing. What does other 5 star reviews have to do with anything? Last time I checked all the games aren't written by one person. People tend to have differing opinions. Are review scores crowd sourced or something here?

I don't think Love Me Not is a five star game. I didn't have a chance to talk to Frank about it. So, the review was pulled until we have a chance to do the edit pass we usually do.

[putermcgee]

Originally Posted by Hodapp

Look at the rest of our five star games and ask yourself if Love Me Not really fits in with those.

well, does draw something fit in there either? even at the peak of its hype, it was a fairly unoriginal, barebones paint app. fun, yeah; but five stars?

i think it's totally understandable for something like this to sneak past the typical publishing process, given the notoriously bad network at e3. and besides, what's in a review score anyway? does changing it to 4-stars mean it's bad? people cling to those numbers to tightly.

[Jdragoon19]

Originally Posted by chickdigger802

There is one thing that is confusing. What does other 5 star reviews have to do with anything? Last time I checked all the games aren't written by one person. People tend to have differing opinions. Are review scores crowd sourced or something here?

If you knew TouchArcade reviews and actually read them daily, you'd know that the standard for a iOS game to get rated a 5 star on TA is very rare. Only the top-notch games are rewarded with a 5 star. Hodapp is saying that this game just isn't 5 star material, thus, it is needed to be taken down and the review had to be revised since it hadn't been revised yet, as that was a mistake that Brad had made.

[backtothis]

Originally Posted by Famousmortimer

Uncade posts at Neogaf all the time... so him posting there wasn't some crazy plot to take down Touch Arcade. Or atleast I would assume not. If I had just received the best news of my indie gaming career (a perfect score from a celebrated site) and it got revoked I would go post at neogaf also. Not because neogaf is filled with haters, but because that's where it would get some publicity.



And to be honest I was ready to pick up my pitchfork when i read about it over there, but the 'neogaf haters' also posted Hodapp's side of the story and now the whole thing makes sense. It was an overzealous freelancer and the review didn't go through the proper checks. When you guys get back it will and the review will go back up with a proper score.


Sounds settled to me. I don't think there's any reason to be mad at uncade for getting upset - it had to have been a shock. And i don't think anyone should be mad at the site because you guys were transparent about what happened and why.

Oh, I see. Posting a thread on NeoGaf is a better solution in comparison to trying to work it out with the TA editors. There's no way he didn't know what kind of reaction the forum members there would have, especially if he regularly posts there. Did he even bother responding to Brad's email? Does anyone ever post both sides of the story? On the bright side, at least there are a few sensible members over there. I hate console forums. They're no better than YouTube comments.

[Uncade]

Before this gets too out of hand, I'm going to repost what I just posted on neogaf:

OK, I've calmed down a bit now.
Maybe it was a mistake to make this thread, I dunno.

My complaining about the review being taken down because of the comments was probably out of line, it was just an assumption and I was incredibly upset.

I'll be the first to admit I was surprised the game got 5 stars. Not because the game isn't really good, but because it is a very simple game. I was ecstatic to get a review at all. I wasn't upset over them changing the score as much as I was about them just completely removing the review. That email basically felt like a punch in the gut.

[Kerrby]

Originally Posted by Hodapp

I don't think Love Me Not is a five star game. I didn't have a chance to talk to Frank about it. So, the review was pulled until we have a chance to do the edit pass we usually do.

Wow, you're complete 💩💩💩💩ing scum.

[Eli]

Originally Posted by Kerrby

Wow, you're complete 💩💩💩💩ing scum.

"Your opinion regarding a video game is different from mine, therefore your thoughts are objectively wrong."

[chickdigger802]

Originally Posted by Hodapp

"Your opinion regarding a video game is different from mine, therefore your thoughts are objectively wrong."

Actually that is pretty much what I thought when I read what you wrote.

I might have interpreted it wrong but, you pretty much don't agree with with the review of your reviewer, and now you want to change it to reflect your opinion and not his?

Why not just review every game yourself then?