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5e and the Cheesecake Factory: Explaining Good Enough
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<blockquote data-quote="TheSword" data-source="post: 8202156" data-attributes="member: 6879661"><p>I decided to look beyond the forums to get some feedback on D&D 5e to see whether people buying it thought the system was good or not.</p><p></p><p>I figured Amazon reviews would be a good place to start. After all you might play the game because there’s no other games in town, or because it’s the only game you’ve heard of but you wouldn’t rate it highly because of that.</p><p></p><p>If D&D was peoples second favourite rpg, you would expect it’s core book, the PHB to have a low rating. Or at least a lower rating than other games core books.</p><p></p><p>I also figured it might give us an idea of comparative scale of play assuming that a person is as likely to review D&D as any other core game product.</p><p></p><p>I was genuinely surprised when this was the result...</p><p></p><p>[ATTACH=full]132974[/ATTACH]</p><p></p><p>4.8 across 27,409 reviews. The written reviews are interesting. They don’t correlate with the views people shared about it being a mediocre game, in that they are glowing. It’s worth flicking through.</p><p></p><p>I thought I had better check some other systems that have been mentioned.</p><p></p><p>Pathfinder 2: 4.7 out of 1786</p><p>Call of Cthulhu: also 4.8 out of 857 reviews</p><p>WFRP 4e: 4.7 out of 305 reviews</p><p>Fate. 4.7 out of 313</p><p>Dungeon World 4.7 out of 325</p><p>Blades in the Dark 4.8 from 399</p><p></p><p>Now it’s possible of course that people get products elsewhere than Amazon. Or there are multiple editions (please do correct me if I’ve picked up an earlier edition by mistake). However is there any reason to think that scoring would be different... indeed could it be much higher?</p><p></p><p>I then started thinking well the PHB is only part of the results... what does the DMG get? After all it’s frequently slated by the naysayers.</p><p></p><p>...4.9 out of 15,296 reviews!</p><p></p><p>[ATTACH=full]132975[/ATTACH]</p><p></p><p>Now what surprises me - other than the stark reminder of the volumes - is how everybody likes the core game books they buy about the same irrespective of system. (And not a single person out of 15,000+ logged onto Amazon and gave the DMG 1 star)</p><p></p><p>I find it very difficult to believe that these reviews can be reconciled with the idea that 5e is simply a ‘good enough’ system and that people are playing their second favourite because it’s the only one they can agree on. In fact the opposite appears to be the case.</p><p></p><p>If 27,000+ people are rating a product on Amazon 4.8 stars, that is a massive recommendation that goes well beyond simply hearing about something in Stranger Things or having watched the Critical Role team play on stream. Perhaps we should add positive player advocacy and recommendation on a massive scale to the list of reasons why it’s successful.</p><p></p><p>[Edit: these figures were taken from Amazon.co.uk which does use global figures. Amazon.com has marginally higher volumes - less than 5% more - but identical ratings]</p><p></p><p>[Edit #2: I a look through the first 20 Cheese-cake factory trip advisor scores. Ratings ran from 3 - 4.5 stars. So pretty mixed bag all told.] <img class="smilie smilie--emoji" loading="lazy" alt="😂" title="Face with tears of joy :joy:" src="https://cdn.jsdelivr.net/joypixels/assets/8.0/png/unicode/64/1f602.png" data-shortname=":joy:" /></p></blockquote><p></p>
[QUOTE="TheSword, post: 8202156, member: 6879661"] I decided to look beyond the forums to get some feedback on D&D 5e to see whether people buying it thought the system was good or not. I figured Amazon reviews would be a good place to start. After all you might play the game because there’s no other games in town, or because it’s the only game you’ve heard of but you wouldn’t rate it highly because of that. If D&D was peoples second favourite rpg, you would expect it’s core book, the PHB to have a low rating. Or at least a lower rating than other games core books. I also figured it might give us an idea of comparative scale of play assuming that a person is as likely to review D&D as any other core game product. I was genuinely surprised when this was the result... [ATTACH type="full" alt="48526E8A-EF06-4804-801B-0A8B73EF9519.jpeg"]132974[/ATTACH] 4.8 across 27,409 reviews. The written reviews are interesting. They don’t correlate with the views people shared about it being a mediocre game, in that they are glowing. It’s worth flicking through. I thought I had better check some other systems that have been mentioned. Pathfinder 2: 4.7 out of 1786 Call of Cthulhu: also 4.8 out of 857 reviews WFRP 4e: 4.7 out of 305 reviews Fate. 4.7 out of 313 Dungeon World 4.7 out of 325 Blades in the Dark 4.8 from 399 Now it’s possible of course that people get products elsewhere than Amazon. Or there are multiple editions (please do correct me if I’ve picked up an earlier edition by mistake). However is there any reason to think that scoring would be different... indeed could it be much higher? I then started thinking well the PHB is only part of the results... what does the DMG get? After all it’s frequently slated by the naysayers. ...4.9 out of 15,296 reviews! [ATTACH type="full" alt="D6488EDE-8A2D-45F3-81C1-8A4A7E4AF183.jpeg"]132975[/ATTACH] Now what surprises me - other than the stark reminder of the volumes - is how everybody likes the core game books they buy about the same irrespective of system. (And not a single person out of 15,000+ logged onto Amazon and gave the DMG 1 star) I find it very difficult to believe that these reviews can be reconciled with the idea that 5e is simply a ‘good enough’ system and that people are playing their second favourite because it’s the only one they can agree on. In fact the opposite appears to be the case. If 27,000+ people are rating a product on Amazon 4.8 stars, that is a massive recommendation that goes well beyond simply hearing about something in Stranger Things or having watched the Critical Role team play on stream. Perhaps we should add positive player advocacy and recommendation on a massive scale to the list of reasons why it’s successful. [Edit: these figures were taken from Amazon.co.uk which does use global figures. Amazon.com has marginally higher volumes - less than 5% more - but identical ratings] [Edit #2: I a look through the first 20 Cheese-cake factory trip advisor scores. Ratings ran from 3 - 4.5 stars. So pretty mixed bag all told.] 😂 [/QUOTE]
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