Lord of the Rings Online: Re-Categorized Review

Stradden

Dear Members,

Due to a series of miscommunications as a result of my recent business trip to Europe (from which I have just returned), The MMORPG.com editorial staff feels that the launch-day review of Lord of the Rings Online was categorized incorrectly. As a result, while we will not be removing the article, we will be removing the associated scores and will be changing the name to "European First Look", which more accurately reflects the article in question.

MMORPG.com will be posting a new review for Lord of the Rings Online within the next month, after the reviewer has had more ample opportunities to explore Middle Earth in its launched form. For those who may be wondering, this was an internal editorial decision and was not requested or suggested by any sources outside of MMORPG.com and its members.

I sincerely apologize for any inconvenience this may have caused.

Cheers,

Jon "Stradden" Wood

Managing Editor, MMORPG.com

Tuche

haha . . .

finally.

grimmbot

And thus faith in the system had been restored.

solynar

Cool. Glad to have you back 

P.S. Did you meet any hot Euro chicks?

Ackbar

Wow I knew mmorpg.com had an editor!

Kyleran

Good decision, glad to see it....thanks for posting this info....

Unknown

Very good to see. Here's hoping that the next review is written by an editor with a bit more sense in how a rating system works.

napalmsweb

Good decision. It is nice to see an organization admit a mistake and correct it.

dj_decay

Excellent decision, my hat's off to you all. 

MMoMoney

What a sellout, dont you have any respect for your own writers? How can you submit to a bunch of fanboys crying that it deserves a better rating? This is the last time I'll ever believe any review here was done objectively.



7.8 is a good score a 1-10 scale is bad because everyone's caught up with an american grade-school system where below 60% is failure. In the rest of the world there is only pass or fail and 51% is a passing grade. There aren't enough MMORPGs out there to be calling most of them so high above the average. You need to make a clear designation of what the "average MMO" worthy of a 5 rating is.



Better yet, this site should change to a 1-5 rating scale so the morons aren't crying "omg lotro only got a C+"

Admin

Originally posted by MMoMoney

What a sellout, dont you have any respect for your own writers? How can you submit to a bunch of fanboys crying that it deserves a better rating? This is the last time I'll ever believe any review here was done objectively.



7.8 is a good score a 1-10 scale is bad because everyone's caught up with an american grade-school system where 60% is failure. In the rest of the world there is only pass or fail and 51% is a passing grade.



This site should change to a 1-5 rating scale so the morons aren't crying "omg lotro only got a C+"

Just to clarify, this decision was based entirely on the fact that the article was not written well as a review.  It failed to convey *why* the scores were as they were and even seemed to contradict itself in places.  We had an internal failure that led to an article being posted live without our editor even seeing it (he was in EU visiting a game developer).  As a result, we will be changing the way things happen here in the process of articles going live on our site.

Again, we are very sorry for all of this and felt that this was the best course of action.  This game may very well get another 7.8 or better or worse score even, but the next time we will aim to have the reviewer really show you how they reached that score.  One thing we will be adding is required "pros/cons" tables to the end of reviews to better summarize what the writer liked and disliked about the title.

Stradden

Originally posted by MMoMoney

What a sellout, dont you have any respect for your own writers? How can you submit to a bunch of fanboys crying that it deserves a better rating? This is the last time I'll ever believe any review here was done objectively.



7.8 is a good score a 1-10 scale is bad because everyone's caught up with an american grade-school system where below 60% is failure. In the rest of the world there is only pass or fail and 51% is a passing grade. There aren't enough MMORPGs out there to be calling most of them so high above the average. You need to make a clear designation of what the "average MMO" worthy of a 5 rating is.



Better yet, this site should change to a 1-5 rating scale so the morons aren't crying "omg lotro only got a C+"

The score was indeed a good one. We did not make this decision based on the fact that we thought the scores were too low. This  was an editorial decision based upon the fact that it was not appropriate as a review. It is, however, a solid first-look.



Thank you for your concern.

tapeworm00

Very good decision. Applaud, or something

vingvega

Hey, I didn't like the review for The Matrix Online....It should of gotten a 10.0 in everything.  Can we change that too...it will make me happpppppy.

LOL, J/K.

Why are you people bowing down to the fanbois?  The game was lucky to get that score.  If I wrote the review I wouldn't even given it a 5 overall.  But to actually go back and pull a review for appeasing a few fanbois who think this game is worth all the gold in the world....well, i'm pretty dissapointed.  It's going to be hard to trust the reviews and rankings on here.

Deathstrike2

Originally posted by vingvega


Why are you people bowing down to the fanbois?  The game was lucky to get that score.  If I wrote the review I wouldn't even given it a 5 overall.  But to actually go back and pull a review for appeasing a few fanbois who think this game is worth all the gold in the world....well, i'm pretty dissapointed.  It's going to be hard to trust the reviews and rankings on here.

Well, now we know why you aren't the guy writing the reviews, don't we? 

 

Koddo

Originally posted by MMoMoney

What a sellout, dont you have any respect for your own writers? How can you submit to a bunch of fanboys crying that it deserves a better rating? This is the last time I'll ever believe any review here was done objectively.



7.8 is a good score a 1-10 scale is bad because everyone's caught up with an american grade-school system where below 60% is failure. In the rest of the world there is only pass or fail and 51% is a passing grade. There aren't enough MMORPGs out there to be calling most of them so high above the average. You need to make a clear designation of what the "average MMO" worthy of a 5 rating is.



Better yet, this site should change to a 1-5 rating scale so the morons aren't crying "omg lotro only got a C+"

Originally posted by vingvega


Hey, I didn't like the review for The Matrix Online....It should of gotten a 10.0 in everything.  Can we change that too...it will make me happpppppy.
LOL, J/K.
Why are you people bowing down to the fanbois?  The game was lucky to get that score.  If I wrote the review I wouldn't even given it a 5 overall.  But to actually go back and pull a review for appeasing a few fanbois who think this game is worth all the gold in the world....well, i'm pretty dissapointed.  It's going to be hard to trust the reviews and rankings on here.

 

After reading all of those posts on the thread, it seems to me that most of everyone wanting that review taken down/altered wanted it becuase it was poorly done, not because of the score. Not to mention quite a bit of those that had a problem with it don't even like the game, so where's your arguement there? I suggest reading back over the posts before writing this troll excretion.

Also, the same can be said if they kept it up. "why are you bowing down to the haters?". Glass of hypocricy anyone?

skywisenight

MMoMoney - "You need to make a clear designation of what the "average MMO" worthy of a 5 rating is."



This has been talked about and planned out weeks ago, and will make it to implimentation in the next week or so.

Rattrap

Good work!



Now let Donna play LOTRO for month or two , and give us a detailed review this great game deserves!

GRIMACHU

Originally posted by Admin
Just to clarify, this decision was based entirely on the fact that the article was not written well as a review.  It failed to convey *why* the scores were as they were and even seemed to contradict itself in places.  We had an internal failure that led to an article being posted live without our editor even seeing it (he was in EU visiting a game developer).  As a result, we will be changing the way things happen here in the process of articles going live on our site.
Again, we are very sorry for all of this and felt that this was the best course of action.  This game may very well get another 7.8 or better or worse score even, but the next time we will aim to have the reviewer really show you how they reached that score.  One thing we will be adding is required "pros/cons" tables to the end of reviews to better summarize what the writer liked and disliked about the title.

I found the review more helpful than the usual over opinionated drivel that passes for reviews in much of the game media.



Also, it does definately feel like you've caved, and failed to support your reviewer in the face of whining.



Inflated scores don't do anyone any good, if you're not using the full 1-10 scale independently and properly, what's the point?

neothoron

Originally posted by skywisenight


MMoMoney - "You need to make a clear designation of what the "average MMO" worthy of a 5 rating is."



This has been talked about and planned out weeks ago, and will make it to implimentation in the next week or so.

Will that implementation lead to a re-review of all the ratings that were given in past reviews? or will such a change not be necessary ?

As for the ex-review itself, I was quite surprised to see a review on MMORPG.com only days after launch, I believe that more time (maybe one month) is needed to adequately review a MMORPG.

ronan32

what a sellout, i guess he ran out of tissues for lotro cry babies..something had to stop the tears.

Ipcryss

LOL, I'll reserve my opinion on this until we see that next "review."  Part of me thought this might happen; let's wait and see if it's for the right or wrong reasons.

silkakc

I thank you and applaud you for your decision:)

Perjure

Originally posted by neothoron


 
Originally posted by skywisenight


MMoMoney - "You need to make a clear designation of what the "average MMO" worthy of a 5 rating is."



This has been talked about and planned out weeks ago, and will make it to implimentation in the next week or so.

Will that implementation lead to a re-review of all the ratings that were given in past reviews? or will such a change not be necessary ?

 

As for the ex-review itself, I was quite surprised to see a review on MMORPG.com only days after launch, I believe that more time (maybe one month) is needed to adequately review a MMORPG.

Actually the so called review was posted a few hours into launch.

princeearwig

Personally I have no objections with the review and disagree with the removal, cest la vie.

But then again I am perpetually confused as to consistently high scoring being achieved in the user reviews of Eve Online...each to his own I supppose. (and no that isn't an invitation for everyone to explain to me why Eve is "Teh Gr8test", more qualified people than you have tried. Tried and failed? no, Tried and gave up...)

Kyleran

Originally posted by GRIMACHU



I found the review more helpful than the usual over opinionated drivel that passes for reviews in much of the game media.



Also, it does definately feel like you've caved, and failed to support your reviewer in the face of whining.



Inflated scores don't do anyone any good, if you're not using the full 1-10 scale independently and properly, what's the point?

Surely you jest.  The review read more like a press release for Turbine.  It contained virtually "no" negative comments of any kind.  I don't care what scores the game gets, give it a 5 if that's what the reviewer thinks it deserves, but they'd better be able to back it up with solid list of pros vs cons (and the con's better be pretty strong for a 5)



But you can't give any score, be it a one or a 10 w/o explaining the reasoning behind the rating.... and this article did nothing to explain the rating it received.



Also, and this is one of the hardest things to do when "impartially" reviewing anything is...leave your personal preferences and prejudices behind at the door.  Of course that's impossible...but if you love sandbox games, slamming the rating on this one for not being one isn't really fair, since that was never the intent/design of the game designers.  Unless of course, you have a rating category called "game openness and freedom"..then I suppose you could give it bad marks.  As part of the overall gameplay score, it would have to be a very small component of the overall evaluation.



I could care less if they leave up the original review and the scores, as long as the writer spends a decent amount of time playing the live game (I'm thinking she should at least get to level 25 or so) and can defend her scores with a well written review.