Good, the Steam reviews were in dire need of an overhaul. The amount of absolute garbage in the reviews and how it's practically only used to bomb games for whatever reason is getting out of hand and it was often very difficult to get to the good informative reviews about the actual game.

The next problem will probably be that the people that review bomb games are now likely going to target helpful reviews instead. Because nothing is more obnoxious than haters taking down games and people who actually enjoy them, even if provided with helpful and informative descriptions.

A good example right now would be Star Wars Outlaws, most people who got to try the game are mostly optimistic about the game, while still being realistic about flaws and issues. But on the other side there are a load of haters using various excuses elevating the toxicity to a new level. Some of these reviewers are scared to even post their opinions because they get targeted by toxic trolls trying to take down their content because the reviewer's opinion doesn't fit their narrative. Some reviewers even ended up having to remove their content because it was hurting their image they've been working on for so long.

I think that Steam would really need are truly neutral curators judging whether reviews on Steam are legit helpful and informative or not. But with the amount of games on Steam that might be an impossible job.

[–] [email protected] -1 points 4 months ago* (last edited 4 months ago)

A problem I've personally run into is a lot of reviews focus entirely on MTX/monetization and this can turn into a fun game getting thrown through the floor because the corporate side decided to put in a bunch of optional purchases.

I'm not saying monetization doesn't matter ... but sometimes I really don't care ... like Lego 2K Drive has a bunch of MTX bricks I'm never going to use and the option to grind them out with a lot of play time (another thing I'm not going to bother with). Those reviews almost definitely really hurt the sales of the game (which I did end up getting and it's actually quite solid in terms of PC kart racing) and probably killed any chance of it ever living up to its potential.

Artifact Classic (the card game by Valve) also got review bombed to hell about monetization (and that one I get a little bit more because you had to buy card packs) ... but if you actually play the game (and you can for free now with all cards unlocked)... I found it to be a really fun card game. I and all my friend stopped playing when Valve announced they were just going to redo the whole thing... I suspect a lot of people did the same thing which caused the chain reaction of "nobody's playing our game... this looks hopeless..." and the eventual abandonment of both the original game and the rework Artifact Foundry (which I ... didn't particularly care for). The people I know that knew about the game that didn't get the game said the negative reviews basically immediately disqualified the game from consideration for them.