Thumbs Down

I think there should be no thumbs down button. I've seen too many awesome tracks get poor ratings for no good reason. I feel like some people just get a kick out of voting down tracks that someone has obviously put a lot of thought and work into. I don't know exactly what their reasoning is, but if there is only a thumbs up button then it would prevent unfair judgement. Bad tracks would get zero, and good ones what they deserve. Any thoughts?

 

Well yeah that's true, I've seen that. I kinda agree with that.

 

The thumbs up/down are only there to rating a track. If there's only a 'up' button, then you won't be able to know what percentage of people hated it. So, a track getting 1000 ups may sound good, when 2000 probably people disliked it (but weren't able to vote as there was no down button). Considering no votes as dislikes won't work as non-members and people who forgot to vote would count as dislikes.

But a thumbs down button may also discourage new-comers(new track-creators), so there might be a good reason to remove them.

 

Not a bad point, but that still leaves you with the problem of people voting down tracks for no good reason.

 

Yeah, but the majority of people might not be that stupid.

 

It's not stupidity. They just don't understand what it takes to make some of these tracks. Hours and hours of work

 

Blaze is right, most of the people would vote it positive if it's a good track.

 

But whatever the outcome, it must be fun. That's what is the most important thing of all it. If people don't like the track, then the hours and hours of work will become a waste. I'm not saying that they don't deserve any compliment for their works (and tries), but track voting is mostly their for the quality (I don't mean shading, scenery and all that, just how good the track is). Youtube too has a thumbs down button, people didn't go against it. Though, you can also say that LittleBigPlanet (a playstation exclusive game) also had thumbs down, which was removed later, as it discouraged players to make tracks. What is most important (for the creators), is to keep doing, and learn from their mistakes, know what is good and fun, and what is dull and boring to the players.

 

I guess coming from an artists point of view it kills me to see a beautifully drawn track get voted down. I like the games drawing perspective more. When on the other hand the majority of players just like to ride a smooth track. I know those supper detailed tracks might not be as fun for the player, however, from a personal point, I like them best because I know that it takes a lot of talent to be able to draw something like that (especially on a track editor). I'm not saying your wrong. I actually agree with you. Its just I, and I think there are others out there, value art and detail a little more than smoothness. I don't mind if the track is bumpy, if it rides and looks like a real mountain bike trail.

 

Good point, most people are "soft-core" type people, so they just like the tracks in which you just have press up and watch, it's probably because many are newcomers. The track (whose name I think is) "Smooth" got many upvotes, while it was pretty bland IMO. I consider a track's aesthetic too while voting but many people don't, in fact, they may even downvote tracks which seem hard to them (See: newcomers). That's just bad. I think it's time for the devs to do the same thing Playstation did with LBP. But I didn't see a single dev here, Btw. I hope they are listening (stupid me, you can't listen to text ) reading this.

 

It should just stay as it is, look at the highests rated, they have been rated +. If you want to make a detailed track, make it easy for the (as blaze said) newcomers, harder tracks can be for contest entry, if they will do it here too.

 

You guys have obviously put a lot of thought into the matter. As pointed out in this thread, haters are going to hate no matter what. For now as long as the community is small and the ability to upload tracks hasn't been added, we will be leaving both options available. However, as the community size grows and newcomers are welcomed in, we will be closely watching the thumbs up and down patterns to see whether changes needs to be made. My personal hope is that we can create a rating system where the more a user plays and rates, the more powerful his/her vote becomes.

In the end, it may be that it is up to the players to dictate what tracks rise to the top while it will be up to the creators to meet the players demand. I'd love to hear more input on this from you guys.

 

The rationing system sounds like a great idea, as more experienced players are more likely to vote based on all qualities of a track other than just smoothness, and will generally understand what it takes to draw a good track. I do now agree that a thumbs down does carry some necessity. Thanks for your input Velksy! It's nice being able to talk with the administrators.

 

I'd love to see the thumbs up/down replaced with a 5 star rating system. Right i'm only upvoting stuff i really like and downvoting broken/stupid tracks. 5 star would mean you can vote something a little more accuratley.

I like the "more a user plays and rates, the more powerful his/her vote becomes" idea. A game I play has a reputation system where you get 1 rep everytime a person clicks it, but the amout you give goes up for every 50 you have. So if you have 10 reputation and rep someone, they get +1, if you have 200 rep, they get +4. Caps at 100 per vote. An upvote/downvote system like this that shows the total number of likes or whatever would be cool. Downvotes would subtract from it. Like a reddit comment .

But it'd slow down the haters cause they wouldnt have as much voting power.

 

I'm not sure I follow your idea. Are you saying the more votes your maps get the more voting power you get?

This is the same system that we tried to implement with the previous Free Rider 3, but unfortunately it led to a lot of arguments between players. Mostly by players who thought their tracks deserved better. Do you think you would have an issue with this?

 

Something like that. The general idea being that people who play more/make more tracks get more voting power than someone who's just made their account. The idea would be that because you've played a higher number of tracks and made some decent ones yourself your vote is more valuable and has more thought into it than "I don't like this track, downvote".

I think it's hard to have a rating system that works for everyone because different players like different stuff. The way the rating works, (thumbs up/down, 5 star, like only, etc) doesn't make much of a difference. I can make a track I think is great but people can downvote it because they think it's too hard/easy/not fun/not challenging. Ultimatley the rating should show the community and the creator what everyone else thinks of the track. I dislike the up/down system because it's too black and white and doesn't give as much feedback as it could.

if I were to leave a rating on a track of 3.5 stars anyone can look and see i think it's a decent track. If they can only see a like or dislike there's no real idea of how much i liked or disliked something.

 

I like this idea. Those with more powerful votes would understand what it takes to make a good track, and be a strong enough rider to respect difficult tracks. I think the 1 to 5 star rating system would give the voter more room to be specific. However, how would you prevent someone from making a lot of random, bad tracks just to gain more voting power?

 

I think the 5-star system will be the best. We can say how "much" we liked it, rather than 'like' or 'hate'.

...And suddenly you realize that just after an admin posts, while I wanted to tell the same thing.

 

the amount of plays/likes on the track or something is what decides their voting power not the amount of tracks.

 

Clearly if you look back I agreed with you before Velksy said anything. Also nothing in his post was geared towards proving that it is a necessity, just that it will remain.