User reviews for entire database

[retromangia]

Hey Gang,

Just had a great idea for the site. I thought it would be awesome if we were all able to submit reviews for any item in the database. Obviously you could review games, however this would be extremely beneficial for lesser known swag type items, like statues, strategy guides, carrying cases, etc.  This would allow for users to go really in-depth about a particular item, giving first hand information that may not be available anywhere else on the net.

If we placed another tab at the top of each entry, right in between "Info" & "History", I think this would look excellent.

Anyhow, just an idea I wanted pass on to the team.  Keep up the great work!

- Retromangia

[vivigamer]

I think it's a great idea! It would give more incentive and curiosity for people to look up games pages. Also, maybe on the main page, there is a part which shows Latest Threads and Latest Items - Maybe below that we could have Latest Reviews?

[bikingjahuty]

I LOVE this idea! We need to implement this yesterday!

[megasilverx1]

Sounds like a neat idea.

[leonefamily]

That's a good idea, it would be a good way to add relevant information that would not be allowed in the Description tab. Sometimes I've sneakily put things in description tab such as "should not be confused with (x item that is very similar)" or something that explains why this item exists in the database although I'm apparently not supposed to. I really try not to do this but sometimes it's just way too important to add so I find a way to get it sneaked into Description tab. Now this would allow us to still explain those things while at the same time reducing style guide outlaws.

Similarly, a "reason for edit" field when editing items would be VERY nice to have, because it happened on a few instances where my edits were rejected and I had to pm DB admins to explain why I made those edits and why it should be like that, only then the edit were accepted. So adding a "reason for edit" field would add a message to my edit request to justify why that info must me added / changed. That field would be only for DB admins internal use and would not show up on the item page for regular users.

[dhaabi]

Sometimes I've sneakily put things in description tab such as "should not be confused with (x item that is very similar)" or something that explains why this item exists in the database although I'm apparently not supposed to. I really try not to do this but sometimes it's just way too important to add so I find a way to get it sneaked into Description tab.

If both entries have sufficient clarifying information in their Description fields, you can even sneak past this tactic.

[leonefamily]

Sometimes I've sneakily put things in description tab such as "should not be confused with (x item that is very similar)" or something that explains why this item exists in the database although I'm apparently not supposed to. I really try not to do this but sometimes it's just way too important to add so I find a way to get it sneaked into Description tab.

If both entries have sufficient clarifying information in their Description fields, you can even sneak past this tactic.

Yes haha, most of the time there's no need to add this because the title explains the difference but on a very few instances I thought it was necessary to explain the difference in the description tab because it's not very apparent even in the title itself. As I said, this rarely happens.

A good thing to do would be to alert users owning x item in their collection if such item is edited or deleted. This would allow our collections to not get screwed if we happen to own an item which the new description does not match ours or if the item is straight up deleted. For instance:

https://www.vgcollect.com/item/40124
There actually exists 3 variants of this item. (FZ-JP1) (FZ-JP1X early box design) (FZ-JP1X late box design). For now, this item covers all 3 variants, but I'm changing it so it follows the latter variant because that's what the item image is and also the infomation so far matches this item. But many people may have the FZ-JP1 or FZ-JP1X(Early) in their actual collection but listed it under this item, so when I will add the two other variants to the database their VGC collection will become inaccurate. Even worse is the blatant following example:

https://www.vgcollect.com/item/111213
Jesus Christ. RIP to the 6 poor souls who have this item in their collection. This entry is so incomplete that even if I try to change it into the FZ-JP1X(Early) variant the admins might just decline the edit, and understandably because these 6 people could actually have a wide variety of controllers models that are represented in thier VGC collection by this very ambiguious entry. The next option would be to straight up delete that entry, but then these 6 people would be missing one item in their collection unless they notice the change. So if these people are not informed of this upcoming change in the DB that could screw up their VGC collection.

[retromangia]

I think it's a great idea! It would give more incentive and curiosity for people to look up games pages. Also, maybe on the main page, there is a part which shows Latest Threads and Latest Items - Maybe below that we could have Latest Reviews?

Now that's a great idea as well! If we added a "Latest Reviews" section on the front page, I really believe this would bring a lot more traffic to the site.

Would love to hear the mods thoughts on this new idea. I think we have a hit on our hands here folks 

Let's make VGC the best damn collector site for 2021!

[jason]

Let's make VGC the best damn collector site for 2021!

Alright! Looking into the feasibility of adding reviews.

[tripredacus]

https://www.vgcollect.com/item/111213
Jesus Christ. RIP to the 6 poor souls who have this item in their collection. This entry is so incomplete that even if I try to change it into the FZ-JP1X(Early) variant the admins might just decline the edit, and understandably because these 6 people could actually have a wide variety of controllers models that are represented in thier VGC collection by this very ambiguious entry. The next option would be to straight up delete that entry, but then these 6 people would be missing one item in their collection unless they notice the change. So if these people are not informed of this upcoming change in the DB that could screw up their VGC collection.

I can't say how all Admins who go through the queue would handle it, but I can tell you how I would. If an edit came through to give this item a different name, and I can confirm that the item in the picture is officially called that name, then the edit would be approved. In this case, I would look to see if the controller was sold in a box or if it only came with a console. As we've talked before, the instance where it came with a console only would mean it would have to use the name on the console manual or on the console box.

But, if the information is not easily confirmed then the edit may be rejected. Based on the idea that sometimes it is better to post in the Listing Errors thread about an entry having a problem, posting what you think the data should be changed to and why. We can't always quickly confirm an edit (with reasonable certainty) when in the queue, so I may reject it just so it can be researched and then changed later. Because if we leave an edit in the queue (we can't mark something as being under review) another admin might approve it erroneously.

[leonefamily]

I can't say how all Admins who go through the queue would handle it, but I can tell you how I would. If an edit came through to give this item a different name, and I can confirm that the item in the picture is officially called that name, then the edit would be approved. In this case, I would look to see if the controller was sold in a box or if it only came with a console. As we've talked before, the instance where it came with a console only would mean it would have to use the name on the console manual or on the console box.

But, if the information is not easily confirmed then the edit may be rejected. Based on the idea that sometimes it is better to post in the Listing Errors thread about an entry having a problem, posting what you think the data should be changed to and why. We can't always quickly confirm an edit (with reasonable certainty) when in the queue, so I may reject it just so it can be researched and then changed later. Because if we leave an edit in the queue (we can't mark something as being under review) another admin might approve it erroneously.

FZ-JP1 was only bundeled with early Panasonic FZ-1 units in the US in 1993. FZ-JP1X replaced it for bundeled consoles and was the first controller to also be sold separately (from which the "early" box design comes from). Later they changed the box design around early 1994 to the one you can see on the first item link. All this info, along with many others, will be added to the database soon.

[dhaabi]

Since it was asked for staff feedback—personally, I think that there are plenty of other outlets for people to get reviews from, whether it be from gaming journalists, online videos, and even other forums. At its core, VGC is a database. There are countless other features, system overhauls, and general quality-of-life improvements within the database system (both on the user side and mod side) that I would much rather see come to fruition some day before anything not directly related to this idea in mind. I think these aspects are the kinds of future updates that VGC needs to focus on to generate an even larger number of new users and more user involvement within the database.

As far as the idea itself, I can't imagine a surplus of users wanting to read x number of reviews from our site for the same reasons mentioned above. I can, however, imagine a rating system by way of a point scale being implemented, but that is still a feature I find secondary or even tertiary when compared to other aspects that the site could benefit from.

[masamune]

There are countless other features, system overhauls, and general quality-of-life improvements within the database system (both on the user side and mod side) that I would much rather see come to fruition some day before anything not directly related to this idea in mind.

What other features, system overhauls and QOL improvements do you think should be implemented?

[tripredacus]

There are various things that still need to be done on the site, some public, some not. Some I can think of off the top of my head:
- resolve the issue with the image upload system
- resolve the lag issue that causes the "blank" entries to be created
- enable searching within collection and/or allow to view collection by alphabet
- ability to use advanced search and not specify an item name
- ability to mark whether a game has been started/completed in collection and/or backlog
- change dev/pub UX to another method besides a giant dropdown (causes lag on some user's computers)
- implement item tagging to allow multiple data points to be connected to an item, such as ratings, developers
- implement connecting items to each other
- implement item types that have different fields per type
- add new item image slots such as spine
- add option to allow users to choose which image slot is shown when viewing collection (ie: if you collect loose controllers, you can set to show the cart image by default when viewing collection
- add additional name fields
- allow the ability to clear/reset dev/pub options on an item.
- fix signature so that tall images are resized to fit

And for any other ideas, you can just look at the other threads in the feedback section.

[deanos]

I'm not sure if i'm suggesting this in the right thread. I just think that the PC section of the database is too general. Maybe a DOS/Windows separation?