Discussion Bad Reviews

I like reviews. Yes, there are bad apples, sometimes a lot of them. No, reviews aren't useless. You should read them, because some are really thorough/well done. You're not a baby. I trust you're able to make your own judgement. You can ignore them all, but I'd rather know more than the synopsis before diving into a story.

I really dislike the generalizations in this thread. Don't throw away the baby with the bathwater.

This one probably contributes to OP's frustration but it's not the main reason, I feel. There are a lot of people not patient enough to give a story a fair chance, for example. There are people bombing their score to 1 for a story despite it being good, just because they don't like one aspect of it.

 

I like to read reviews before I decide to invest time into reading a novel, simply because I've seen too many super interesting descriptions, just to be disappointed, again and again. Sometimes if a synopse has me all hot and hyped up for the novel, it turns out it is simply misleading and only slightly relevant for the first 20-chapter-arc.

On the other side there are some authors who are completely useless for writing a good description. One good example would be Er Gen. Seriously, that guy has some of the worst descriptions for his novels, I've ever seen. Sure, it's subjective, but I clicked ISSTH away about 30 times, till I finally gave it a chance, because it was recommended literally everywhere + good reviews & memes. It was not perfect. By far not. But it was still decent and I would have regretted not reading it.

One review alone doesn't tell you alot, but looking at 5-10 reviews, you may see a trend. If everybody is complaining about racism while holding shift down (caps lock is only for the non-enraged), you will most likely know if you'd enjoy something like that and not waste your time.

Anticipation overall is pretty important, too. I kept reading some stories, simply because I was extremely interested in a spoiler. I wanted to see how that - what I read in the spoiler - happened. Reviews may bring it.

Also it's nice to know beforehand, if a translator sucks at english.

 

I like MAL reviews, so I was inspired to make my own reviews here, like my first review, which is in ISSTH(though I drop that novel)... But after learning how crappy the system was, I didn't bother making anymore except if I truly want to.

Low star reviews are always crap, only few of them are legit like from Triggerk, most of them are based on taste biased, especially those people who reads Chinese novel that are making reviews.

Some of the high star review are crap, a lot of them spoils the story, not even following the basic rule, also a lot of them were made to defend their novel instead of looking for potential readers.

And the worst thing in this place is the lack of informative and objective review, a lot of people here makes short review which are inclined to their own taste, most of them doesn't justify their reason in review.

 

Honestly I read more bad reviews than good. Most good reviews are pointless and generic. Its all the detailed bad reviews that really get into the problem with the novel. From how well the person can structure their review I can learn a lot of the novel and if its something worth getting into.

Edit: I should state by bad I mean negative review or review with low scroll not reviews that are just badly written XD

 

thank you for showing me the way to these reviews ...

 

Reviews..... I read em just for the shake of doing it sometimes n in rest meh.

 

There are useless. While searching for a novel I never bother to read the reviews or ratings.

 

I love the people that leave a one-star rating when only one chapter has been published.

 

Review numbers are pretty much useless, and numbers for amateur reviews are even more so. One big problem is that amateur reviewers often have no real discipline when assigning numbers so books are given the best and the worst rating far beyond what is warranted. People rating books before they've finished them only makes things worse. It's like reading film reviews from people who haven't watched the ending. How does that benefit anyone?

The text of a review is much better, but even there, I care more about what a reviewer says about the book than whether he/she liked it. In general, I don't read reviews very much, and usually only after I've finished the particular book in question.

 

Take reviews with a pinch of salt and assuming that there are trolls inbetween. Tastes differ so honestly, first read for yourself and after that decide.

 

You have to learn to sift through reviews.
Avoid stupid reviews like how you avoid stupid people irl.

 

they are not reliable. its better if you try reading the novel first before making a conclusion. for example Strongest Abandoned Son, it has a lot of bad review and rating, turns out I like the story.

 

I like bad reviews. Reading from it I can know if it's my cup of tea or not.

 

Checking the reviews huh. Sometimes, I do that. Whenever I see that there are many high ratings (4 to 5 stars), the first thing I do is to look for one star/two stars rating and that's what I do read. XD

 

Reading bad reviews of my translated novel makes me feel hopeless. It's not like I can change the genre or add more action scenes or anything lol.

The readers don't talk much about my translation either, so... it doesn't matter much, I suppose? It's way more useful to read the comments left in the actual series.

Though I admit, if the review of NU says the translation is bad, I don't really feel the urge to read... :<

 

Agree with this. Though sometimes I still try it. Try if it's not understandable enough for me, at least.

 

Any review with least than 100 words are to be ignored.

 

lmao do you count the words before reading?

 

It's just an estimated number, if it has least than 3 line or so, it is meaningless.

 

I use to find them helpful in learning about a novel if I'm on the fence about it. Then I realized some people have no idea what they are talking about. I have seen people complain because novel mc's didn't just sleep with women who wanted him (not because he was too shy or didn't realize their feelings, but because he did not want to cross that line with them). I have also seen stories praised as great, when I couldn't understand why characters were so dumb (I want to protect this person, so I will give them some guards, but I won't check who they are and if they can even protect this person, literally next chapter the person they wanted to protect is already dead and the character is like "I should have checked the people I assigned because then I would have realized they couldn't keep her safe.")
TLDR: Sometimes they are helpful, but can be misleading.