Video Game Review Grading Scale

[Ayen]

How do you determine what is serious enough of a flaw to dock marks? What aspects do you favour? The problem with giving an objective rating like a number to a subjective enterprise like a video game review means that the number is a suggestion at best.

It depends on the game. The only things I can think of off the top of my head that can apply for any game would be glitches and I tend to lump glitches together as one minus.

This is interesting to me. If a game has so many technical glitches that it is practically unplayable, are they considered to be only one flaw? Is that game still eligible for a 9/10 by your system?

I haven't encountered this situation so I can't say. The first game I reviewed where glitches were mentioned was Dark Souls, and the glitches were more of a WTF than game breaking. Arkham Origins had on three separate occasions bugged to the point where I had to restart the game, but I thought the auto-save feature was a redeemable addition to combat this and it didn't happen often. Assassin's Creed III had a couple of glitches that ruined sidequests and moved your character into position for the plot to play out ruining immersion into the story and I separated those by two. Though that's mainly because I wasn't sure if the latter counted as a glitch or not. I may have to reevaluate my system.

Or give ET a 9/10 and unlock the Ultimate Trollage achievement.