Writing a Good Review

[JPSChampagne]

In reading through the Recruitment thread, reading through everyone listing their skill and time spent on Rock Band,and I wondered just what kind of skills the Beta really needed - what kind of things they were wanting people to look out for. That made me realize that I wasn't quite sure what kind of review was necessary or even appropriate.

So, forum, I pose this question - what makes a review a good, useful review? Is it all just checking to see if everything is accurate and technically correct, or is there some element of preference involved? I've seen a few charts so far that seemed accurate enough, but knew a change here or there would make it more fun. Is it okay to bring those kinds of things up?

Also, how should issues be presented? In some reviews I've seen, authors seem to have had their feelings hurt by issues that a reviewer thought was accuracy and the author thought was preference. What's a good way to tell these things apart, and what's a good tone for delivery?

I'm sure there's more questions than this, but these were my first thoughts on the subject. I also hope this isn't a repeat thread, but I've glanced around and didn't immediately find something similar.

[trg007]

There is documentation that outlines what types of things to look for when playtesting. I don't think that's accessible outside of the beta site, but to answer your question in general, there are some things that are against the rules (such as having notes combined with the kick drum on Easy) but most feedback is on subjective authoring choices - particularly with how an author chose to reduce charts for Hard/Medium/Easy.

If an author is going to get hurt feelings from players' feedback, then quite frankly they should not be authoring. Thankfully there hasn't really been any of this occurring on the Creators site, but I have seen some of that here, and those people are going to be in for a surprise if they try and pull that on Creators. The Peer Review system works very well at preventing crappy authoring from getting through.

It's also important to differentiate between playtest and review. Your questions mainly apply to playtest feedback. The Peer Review is literally a checklist form you fill out stating that there's no inappropriate content in the song (i.e., language) and also gives you a chance to agree or disagree with the difficulty tiers. In theory, all the authoring should be completely polished before a song is sent from playtest to review, though that isn't always the case and there is still the opportunity to comment on issues even after a song is in Peer Review.

[JPSChampagne]

Very interesting! I'm obviously not part of the beta, so this is all news to me. Most of my experience in offering any kind of review so far has been on YouTube videos people have uploaded of their charts. I wish that would have been elaborated on a bit when the recruitment thread was posted. I think there's some general confusion about the difference between playtesting and peer review.

[trg007]

Very interesting! I'm obviously not part of the beta, so this is all news to me. Most of my experience in offering any kind of review so far has been on YouTube videos people have uploaded of their charts. I wish that would have been elaborated on a bit when the recruitment thread was posted. I think there's some general confusion about the difference between playtesting and peer review.

Commenting on the YT videos is very much like posting feedback on the site. Each song in Playtest or Peer Review gets its own thread on the forums for people to comment on it and discuss potential changes with the author. The authors currently in the beta have been very open to opinions/feedback. It's very common that an author will make changes to a song after it's already in Peer Review (which means they lose any votes they had already received for that song) even if it's not something that's against the rules but more of an opinion that someone feels will make the song better. I think you will do just fine if you're accepted into the beta. We could definitely use more vocals-oriented people.

[Xenigma]

It's also important to differentiate between playtest and review. Your questions mainly apply to playtest feedback. The Peer Review is literally a checklist form you fill out stating that there's no inappropriate content in the song (i.e., language) and also gives you a chance to agree or disagree with the difficulty tiers. In theory, all the authoring should be completely polished before a song is sent from playtest to review, though that isn't always the case and there is still the opportunity to comment on issues even after a song is in Peer Review.

Very interesting to know, thanks trg007! I'd been under the impression that playtesting was the primary part of Peer Review, but it sounds as though most of the dirty work happens before any votes are cast. I guess I still have quite a bit to learn about the whole review process! Would certainly appreciate any other clarification on how the system works as a curious fan.

Oh, and thanks of course to JPS for asking! This is something I've been wondering about but hadn't thought to simply ask.

[JPSChampagne]

Thanks for the kind words trg. I don't know that I'd be a lot of use in the Beta, though, since I don't know the in's and out's of reaper or magma. I'd just like to have a bit better idea of what to say to people posting charts on YouTube.

[trg007]

I don't know that I'd be a lot of use in the Beta, though, since I don't know the in's and out's of reaper or magma.

Ah, but you don't have to! Everything is done through RB2's Audition Mode. You have to have Magma installed simply to be able to transfer songs to your Xbox after downloading them from the site, but that's the extent of it. You don't even need Reaper at all.

[JPSChampagne]

Well, thank you again. I'd love to participate, but I'm all but certain HMX has made their selections for the recruitment drive. I'm not getting my hopes up about getting in for free. I may sign up when it's available to everyone, though. If I ever had the money for the membership fee on me, it'd be worth it to me to help out and make sure that the vocals and venue tracks in RBN are up to par.

Don't want to make the thread about me, though. Is there some more detail that you could share with the general populace about the playtesting guide from the Creators site?

[Knucklesdude]

trg is definitely the man. If only my 360 didn't get the E74 error... by January I shall be able to review dammit.

For every instrument you have checklists to look through for common and uncommon charting and programming errors, they detail difficulty-specific issues from expert down to easy, and even non-difficulty specific things to look for, such as big rock endings and timing of the guitar solo. There's also a checklist for non-instrument review, as well as a guide to reviewing song setup, animation, ability to achieve gold stars, and difficulty tiering. The advanced playtesting guide walks you through the process and what to fill out in forms and whatnot (being specific!).

Hope this assists you in your quest for knowledge. Obviously any of these pages can change before they hit public.

[JPSChampagne]

That's really cool! I imagine that makes the whole process a lot easier. I thought you just had to kind of know how to look for that stuff already - though I guess you'd have to have a trained eye and ear regardless. Thanks for your info, guys. Really making me wish I could spend time testing instead of being curious.