Steam's Revising Reviews

So it seems like the latest update to Steam will now include a system
to filter out 'unhelpful' user reviews.*

User reviews on Steam often get a bad rap, and it's not entirely
unearned. Whether it's from review bombing, or developers paying for
reviews, or just that the reviews themselves often aren't worth
reading, a lot of people dislike them. And while I don't disagree with
the specifics, I myself still like that Steam has them. They're a
necessary pushback against the biased marketing that developers (and
Valve themselves) put on store pages trying to get you to spend your
hard-earned cash. Both the developers and Valve have a great deal of
incentive to ignore the deficiencies of the product if it gets you to
buy. User reviews are the only counter we have. It may not always be a
_good_ counter, but I'll take what I can get. And sometimes -in fact,
a lot of times- there are worthwhile user reviews that give me a much
clearer picture about whether a game is right for me than anything
else on the store page.

But sometimes... yeah. Sometimes the reviews just suck. It'll just be
some weird joke, or an inane comment, or the inevitable ASCII picture
of a cat. It's a "look at me!" post that says nothing about the game
and exists only to attract attention to the poster.

Steam's latest update is aimed squarely at those sorts of posts.
Optional (for those who enjoy the unfiltered feed) but on by default,
it will use a combination of moderation, machine learning, and user
votes to hide reviews it feels unhelpful. Whether or not they'll
target 'review bombing' posts is uncertain, but unlikely.

But just to keep things fair, the new update is also targeting
publishers as well, by setting new rules for what can be posted on the
store page. Less links to other web sites and social media (except in
designated area), no mimicking the Steam store UI, no pointers to
other games on Steam. In other words, publishers can only use their
store page to sell the game that page is for, and not use it to push
you to other products.

Worthwhile changes all around. More information, less noise; who could
argue with that?





* read Valve's statement here
https://store.steampowered.com/news/app/593110/view/4326355263805583415