RPG Evolution: So You Got a Bad Review

Don't panic! You can turn this around.

Picture courtesy of Pixabay.​

It happens to everyone eventually. No matter how much you poured your heart and soul into a product, someone isn't going to like it. And that someone will let you and everyone else know it by posting a negative review. What to do about it? That depends on what brand you're presenting to the public.

Who Reads That Review?​

The first thing to consider is that reviews are moments in time, and are not an effective means of communicating between reviewer and creator. Some platforms, like DriveThruRPG, allow you to answer the review. Others, like Amazon, no longer allow comments in response at all. Amazon allows other readers to upvote reviews, while DriveThruRPG does not. This should influence your response: on DriveThruRPG, directly responding to the reviewer will be clear, while on Amazon you can only send a private note to the reviewer (I get many private notes from the companies I review, more on that later). And of course, on forums and other comment sections, you're joining a dialogue, not just responding to a review, so you'll want to keep that in mind.

Your response is best guided by the platform, which determines who sees the response, and the content of the review itself. The mechanism in responding to the review is important to keep in mind; more often than not, you're not responding to the reviewer but to future customers who will read the review. Those potential customers are far more important in convincing the reviewer is wrong (if they are indeed wrong!).

The Review is Harsh But Fair​

These reviews are gifts, as they are essentially editing your work by telling you what's wrong. If you can't make the edits, acknowledging the flaws and promising to do better is helpful. Even better, fix the flaws and explain in your response that the review improved your product. This is easier with digital products you produce personally. Your response makes the reviewer feel good, makes you look proactive, and turns a review into an opportunity to potentially retain future customers.

One point of note here: Amazon companies now contact me every time I give them less than a stellar (five star) review in an attempt to "make things right." Three star reviews don't warrant this kind of response and the emails I receive via Amazon are clearly form letters managed by a call center. This process pivots on the idea that somehow, if I got a new version of the product, I would give it a better review. If the reviewer believes the product is fundamentally flawed, this doesn't fix the issue and it certainly doesn't endear you to reviewer. Focus on addressing the flaws, not placating the reviewer.

The Reviewer is Uninformed​

If the review is misguided or ill-informed, your response is an opportunity to correct an oversight. Almost no one ever goes back and edits their review unless it's a professional platform (like EN World), so sending a note to correct an error in the review has dubious value unless you want to be able to state later that you told the reviewer what they got wrong and they didn't change it. In short, it puts the onus on the reviewer to fix their error.

The bigger issue is that the review may mislead other consumers to think your product is flawed in some way that's not accurate. If that's the case, your response is an opportunity to inform everyone else what the reviewer got wrong. Remember, for platforms that can see your response, you're talking to that audience, not the reviewer who already made up their mind.

The Review is Ridiculous​

The reviewer may make outrageous claims that are simply not true. The problem is that all reviews seem equally valid, so it's your job to show how it's biased. You can be factual, you can be sarcastic, but pointing out that the review is ridiculous is important. Not responding means that the review stands as is, and that wildly inaccurate one-star criticism will stick around to haunt you for the life of the platform.

One way you can politely deal with these issues, which larger companies do all the time, is to simply take it off line. Show that you respect the person's concerns by giving them an email or other means of communicating with you to provide a refund or otherwise set the record straight. You probably don't want these types of reviewers as customers anyway. This shows you care and are the reasonable person in contrast to the reviewer.

The Review is Rude​

If the review's just plain rude, you can of course just flame them to the ground in your response. This might not quite work out in your favor when others stumble upon your response years later. Generally speaking, a reviewer is considered "one of the people" and you, as a producer, are considered to have more power. So the onus is on you to appear calmer in your response. But if the audience is on your side (say, in a forum where you're well known), you have a little more latitude to fight back. Some reviews simply can't be salvaged though, and you may need to just let it go and move on. Or, if you own the platform, just yeet them.

What Not to Do​

If your mental state isn't a place to deal with negative reviews, consider not publishing content to the public. The implied contract with these platforms is that if you publish something, you're opening it up to public criticism. That's the tradeoff for receiving payment in return.

You may want to turn off notifications and not read the reviews at all. One of the challenging aspects of crowdfunding and Patreons is that consumers let you know in real time if they like or dislike your product by their financial support, and you experience it in real time. If you're having a bad day, this can be personally devastating. If you feel very protective of your work or can't deal with criticism, those platforms are not for you.

But all that aside, taking things personally and going after the reviewer and not the review (publicly or privately) is a mistake. It makes you look bad. It ensures the reviewer will give you more negative reviews in the future. And because of the aforementioned power imbalance, it often looks like bullying even though you are the one being attacked.

Still Up to the Challenge?​

Take some deep breaths, go for a walk, get some sunshine, or even wait a day, and then respond to the review. Like reviews, your response is a moment in time. Your response will be at its best when you're calm and receptive to feedback.

Your Turn: How do you deal with negative reviews?

 

[ced1106]

I used to be a DriveThruRPG reviewer, until I stopped because I accumulated so much RPG material. IMO, While a bad review is a concern, it's more important to get your RPG product noticed. Reviews only work when someone is already familiar with your content, or if it's suggested by a newsletter or recommendations. If you're concerned about a bad review, that means you assume someone's reading it, which may not even be the case.

So reviews are part of selling your content, but only part. Pre-CoVid, I would have said that you should attend game conventions and run your RPG, and now there are online GM'ing and other options. Yes, your product is supposed to sell itself, but, no, that's the ideal world. Try running online GM sessions with your RPG for free, and ask your players to give your RPG product ratings and reviews.

 

[talien]

OK -dumb question from the old guy incoming: Is joining a Patreon and downloading all the stuff and then quitting bad form? Honest question. I am not big into subscriptions - I understand why subscriptions are the dominant model, but they do not work well for me. Anyway, I thought about joining a Patreon and downloading the stuff and leaving - I have not done it, and I certainly would not want to do something that is insulting, dishonest, or plain rude.

Are there Patreons that this expected and others that it is a no-no for?

Sorry for going off-topic.

Yes.

At least for my Patreon, it's a subscription model with the value directly determined by how much product is offered at a support tier. What this means is that you could join at five dollars/month, download all the content that is immediately available, and then cancel your subscription. What's offered at that tier is worth far more than five bucks, because otherwise I'd just sell the products exclusively on DriveThruRPG. So the Patreon is a better deal, with the assumption that if you support the Patreon over time, more products get added, and therefore you have an incentive to stick around as a supporter and keep your subscription longer. Conversely, each monthly payment directly supports the creator, paying them to keep producing more product.

When people just download everything and then quit (sometimes within minutes!), it's a lopsided deal. The consumer conveys the message to the creator that they like the product, not the creator. They treat it like a coupon rather than a social contract.

Where this gets really problematic is when physical product is involved as a reward for a tier. I've spent considerable effort signing books, packaging product, paying for shipping, taking it to the post office ... only to discover that the patron was already gone by the time I shipped the product. So at the higher support tiers there's even more personal investment on behalf of the creator.

Patreon and creators all accept this as part of doing business on the platform. It's not just Patreon either, it's an ongoing problem with ebook creators on Amazon where people read the entire book, don't like it, and then return it, forcing the creator to PAY AMAZON BACK.

Add all this up, and on bad days, these types of fast-transactional relationships can be very demotivating.

 

[TheSword]

I think you have to see the downloading of existing stuff as just another part of marketing. The hope is they like the stuff enough to want everything else you provide.

Sure people can do things cheaply by joining downloading and cancelling every few months, but most people who are really into the work will pay for it any way to ensure they keep getting the content. Better that folks download and read for a fiver, and maybe stay long term than never read at all. At least in most cases there is no cost of sale with digital rewards on Patreon.

I think you just have to see it as another form of marketing.

 

[Piratecat]

I feel incredibly lucky that I've never gotten a really bad review. I'm still keenly aware that not all games are for everyone. When playtesting TimeWatch, playtest feedback was really good -- except for one playtester group where the PCs literally suicided their characters rather than continue the adventure. (There was a bad GMing-style mismatch that I needed to address in GM Advice. But daaaamn.)

And honestly, the problem many designers have is that they don't get ENOUGH reviews (good OR bad). Reviews matter.

 

[talien]

I think you have to see the downloading of existing stuff as just another part of marketing. The hope is they like the stuff enough to want everything else you provide.

Sure people can do things cheaply by joining downloading and cancelling every few months, but most people who are really into the work will pay for it any way to ensure they keep getting the content. Better that folks download and read for a fiver, and maybe stay long term than never read at all. At least in most cases there is no cost of sale with digital rewards on Patreon.

I think you just have to see it as another form of marketing.

Totally valid. It's still hard to take though, especially when it happens in waves. But if I wasn't able to handle it I wouldn't be on Patreon -- which is why it's not for everybody.

 

[talien]

I feel incredibly lucky that I've never gotten a really bad review. I'm still keenly aware that not all games are for everyone. When playtesting TimeWatch, playtest feedback was really good -- except for one playtester group where the PCs literally suicided their characters rather than continue the adventure. (There was a bad GMing-style mismatch that I needed to address in GM Advice. But daaaamn.)

And honestly, the problem many designers have is that they don't get ENOUGH reviews (good OR bad). Reviews matter.

As I mentioned in a previous article, the biggest concern for most products isn't that anyone's mad at you, it's that nobody even cares enough to get mad. It's hard to rise above the noise of social media to get noticed, and triply so to get someone passionate enough to write a review.

 

[Greggy C]

OK -dumb question from the old guy incoming: Is joining a Patreon and downloading all the stuff and then quitting bad form? Honest question. I am not big into subscriptions - I understand why subscriptions are the dominant model, but they do not work well for me. Anyway, I thought about joining a Patreon and downloading the stuff and leaving - I have not done it, and I certainly would not want to do something that is insulting, dishonest, or plain rude.

Are there Patreons that this expected and others that it is a no-no for?

Sorry for going off-topic.

No, there are all sorts of ways Patreons can restrict content to make it fair, though I am sure some creators aren't very savvy.

 

[dragoner]

I got a three star review, and I know who gave it to me because: "Nice art, who am I going to show it to, the players? It just pads the page count ..." Of course I got another three star because there was no art in that particular pub, you can never win.

 

[pogre]

A reviewer who explains their perspective and then gives their opinion gives the review value for me - even if it is negative. So, if there was a reviewer that said "At my table we concentrate on player-to-player roleplaying, prefer theater of the mind, and do not like complicated combat," and then proceeds to ding a game for requiring miniatures and having too much combat - they probably have just made me interested in the game.

I have purchased a few rules over the years based on "bad" reviews.

 

[Teo Twawki]

Although a precursor to a review, in The Husband's professional writing career, he's kept a couple of personal notes from publishers (or in more case a top tier author's handwritten note about a story) offering helpful criticism, but his prized publisher responses are two particularly vile rejection letters that got both personal, bitter, and long-winded; one profanely questioned his intelligence & literacy and the other questioned his morality and sexual deviancy.

The connection here is that what we write to be shared is--at least partially--intended to provoke a response. That response is not always offered/given in a positive manner. But the stronger the response, positive or negative, the more powerful the effect was. It's difficult to remember that while reading a personal attack disguised as a review.