Nice modlist, but...

[xander]

...Hall of idiosyncratic mediocrity?

We need that. ;)

xander

[hitm4n]

Instead of giving so called "Playable" mods a stamp of approval, give a stamp of disapproval to mods with serious problems!

Like a golden or silver banana? This is exactly what TGF proposed. For what it is worth, I think it is the correct way to handle things. I don't see a need to subjectively rate each mod. That isn't that helpful. Instead, what people really want to know is: is the mod playable? will it blow up in my face? does it work? That is what the golden and silver bananas do.

xander

They are all playable. I've not found 1 that doesn't work, so none get a shitty banana and all would have a gold one. So lets just inform people of an average public opinion. Mediocrity would be a 45-55%ish rating, a good mod would be 75%+ and a poor mod (no scripts, 1 badly made level) would be a sub 40%. Plus, i am only prepared to add a single column like i said before.

Still waiting for a couple more opinions on "colour".

[xander]

They are all playable. I've not found 1 that doesn't work, so none get a shitty banana and all would have a gold one.

No, they wouldn't all get a golden banana. Did you read the description of what it takes to get a golden banana? Or a silver banana? or a Spade or Club? Many of the mods on that list would not get a golden banana. Several would get the Club. Also, assigning a banana to every mod would be very simple -- TGF's scripter can even do it automatically.

xander

[The GoldFish]

And you'll always be waiting for opinions...

As nice an idea as it might be to have several 'reviews' for each mod and take an average... I'd say it's a) never going to happen and b) ultimately pointless. If you don't agree with me, that's fine, stick with what you're doing and see what happens - like I say it would be very interesting to get this information and I'd love you to prove me wrong, but, I just don't think it's ever going to happen.

I'm not sure if you get that the main reason I put the badge thing forward is we can do that *today*. It will be *done* by *tomorrow*. Problem solved. Assigning them doesn't really even take the program's (somewhat dumb) scanning - it's pretty much a no brainer for anyone at all experienced with the mod in question. But the mod list isn't for people who've already played the mods...

OK so you can't badge things so they get different tiers and give useful information, so stop trying and heed what other people are saying perhaps? Did you look at the list of requirements I put forwards rather than hinge of the word 'playable'? Wouldn't that in itself qualify out different mods? Remember, this is just something I put forwards, it's not set in stone or gospel or anything - It doesn't matter, anyway, since it's *your* mod list - noone can make you add columns you don't want and ultimately, you have the final decision. Whatever that decision may be, I will attempt to support it.

The problem with the modlist is simple. It's a list. There's *no* information whatsoever about if a mod is a finished product, or if it's something someone did one day and released as a sandbox, and that's all it was ever intended to be. If it's a mod, it's listed on there, and that's all well and good; except, a lot of people *don't want to have to work out for themselves* which mods are remotely what they want. They have to download them and install them and start playing them to have any idea of what they're like, and that's wrong, IMO. Even if it's as simple as splitting it into 3 lists, as I joked earlier, into a hall of fame, middle of the road, and hall of shame (doesn't mean unfinished or boring, it means likely to punish the player for doing the tiniest thing wrong) - the mods SHOULD all be listed, and some general idea of what they're like be attached - you don't need a %age score - you don't need that much precision on the quality (which is totally arbritary anyway) - just some *fundamental low level basic information* about them. QA is a big important part of a campaign, and those that have that should be acknowledged at least somehow. You can't tell a person if they'll enjoy the gameplay or the story in advance or not, but you could attempt to catagorise it (Darwinian combat, Squad fu, that sort of thing, and give them the information they need to make their own decision about if they think they'll like it). Sandbox style (the original big mod parts could be considered a sandbox, for example, though I personally consider them as garbage :P) and such mods don't follow the same rules, and need different badges - I haven't even attempted to go there yet.

But, just to actually say it, the mod list is a great resource and has probably pointed many, many people in the direction of mods they might not have played otherwise. The only problem is that the only failsafe reliable mark of finding a good mod on it is, basically, picking the ones that aren't hosted by it.

[martin]

I agree with a lot of what TGF said there (good god, what's wrong with the world), I think we should go with banana awards for now and maybe rate some of the mods later numerically.
Maybe you could also group the modlist, so have a section for campaign mods, single level mods, random mods of fun, unfinished mods, and maybe some test mods. because sometimes I fancy a 99 hour long darwinia epic and I load insurrection, sometimes I feel like blasting some reds and I load up WAR.

[shadow_archmagi]

Perhaps just a short 2-3 line description of each mod?

[The GoldFish]

That works too, but what are you really going to say? Is a campaign, Darwinian combat heavy, is generally ok in QA.

Ends up being easier to say it with pictures, I think

[martin]

Maybe, but I think a brief description would be good too.

[The GoldFish]

In a list? It's not called the mod paragraph!

If you want a description, put it in the first post on your forum thread, or ask hitm4n to recode the modlist to give it TNG style sub pages for each mod when you click on them. It's impossible to convey more useful information in 2-3 lines than.

I'd thinking 4 catagories;
Revise the banans to be just quality - it's simpler - gold banana, silver banana and club of dismay
length - S M L as 1-4, 5-10, 11+ levels or modder specified
gameplay as either Campaign or Sandbox (more ideas?)
combat type as being DG heavy, even, Squad heavy

comments?

[hitm4n]

All this over a way to rate. The way i see it, showing a coloured banana, equates to 0-33% bronze banana, 34-66% silver banana and 67-100% gold banana. If the mod doesn't meet your QA requirements it would get a bronze... then i would score it at <33%. Theres no space to tell the visitor what the bananas mean, the new player won't even know if they want a non-scripted 4 level short unfinished mod or a single 3 hour (possibly excellent) battle mod and bananas won't tell them that. And a mod that works doesn't have to be good... and a mod with problems could be a really innovative design idea and be great fun and well worth persevering with.

I'm not adding texts, i'm not adding extra pages. Its simply a modlist of all known mods with hosted downloads of mods under a certain size (my choice) or where i was allowed to host (authors choice).

Its not a resource of info, and its nothing special. Nor do i want to make it so. I just want a simple hierarchy of scores to give "some" indication of which mods to aim at first. We all know the mods that would score highly. We know that those mods would get gold bananas, but non forum regulars and new people to the game won't.

I think the easiest way is for me to play them and rate them myself. It'll be my opinion up there and if people don't agree, screw em, or i could just not bother

[martin]

I think the easiest way is for me to play them and rate them myself. It'll be my opinion up there and if people don't agree, screw em, or i could just not bother

well just do that then! you play it, tell us which one you're playing and then some of us may bother too.

[The GoldFish]

If you think your %age scores will solve the issues then go for it.

I still really don't believe in an all in one universal scoring system, but at least if it's just you doing it, this type of scoring might happen. I really hope you don't go crazy, playing all those mods though.

Also, tooltips are your friend - a few tooltips would have easily explained what the icons meant.

[Tricycle21]

The way i see it, showing a coloured banana, equates to 0-33% bronze banana, 34-66% silver banana and 67-100% gold banana.

I think adding 'no banana' icon is better.

[Lowell]

Mod DB lets people who have played mods vote on graphics, sound, gameplay. Mine scored a 7.8 and it's not even halfway done yet. "?"
I think the number score seems to be the norm from other game sites I've seen.

[martin]

yeah, a number score is certainly the norm.