10-22-2013, 10:28 PM
Judgement systems are not objective. It's just not possible.
Objective cannot pass judgement, it can only state that which exists.
All judgement systems are created by reasoning beings to serve their own purposes. If something better suits their purposes than other things, it's "good"; otherwise, if it detracts from their purposes instead, it's "bad."
For example, if someone decides that their judgement standard for food is "it contains lots of sugar," then sweet foods will be "good" and not sweet foods would be "bad."
If someone decides that their judgement for games is "it offers relatively novel and difficult decisions at a steady pace" then certain strategy games would be "good" and exp-grinders would probably be "bad."
Note that judgement criteria can contain objective measurements like "contains at least 1 gram of sugar per 5 grams of total mass," but the fact that that particular criterion was chosen over others is itself subjective.
I suppose one could also say "well the reason such a criterion would be chosen is objective because consuming too much sugar can lead to obesity and health defects" or "the human body/mind is conditioned through biological and evolutionary development to prioritize the consumption of sugar." However, these are actually still subjective, because actual people still determined that these values are important (biologically motivated or otherwise).
As a developer, I believe that it's best for you to simply choose your own judgement metrics to measure your own games (and those you play) by. Of course, how you choose your metrics can itself be based on certain objective facts like "thing x sells well, so I should prioritize it," but realize that the decision to consider that data important was made by you and is therefore subjective.
Objective cannot pass judgement, it can only state that which exists.
All judgement systems are created by reasoning beings to serve their own purposes. If something better suits their purposes than other things, it's "good"; otherwise, if it detracts from their purposes instead, it's "bad."
For example, if someone decides that their judgement standard for food is "it contains lots of sugar," then sweet foods will be "good" and not sweet foods would be "bad."
If someone decides that their judgement for games is "it offers relatively novel and difficult decisions at a steady pace" then certain strategy games would be "good" and exp-grinders would probably be "bad."
Note that judgement criteria can contain objective measurements like "contains at least 1 gram of sugar per 5 grams of total mass," but the fact that that particular criterion was chosen over others is itself subjective.
I suppose one could also say "well the reason such a criterion would be chosen is objective because consuming too much sugar can lead to obesity and health defects" or "the human body/mind is conditioned through biological and evolutionary development to prioritize the consumption of sugar." However, these are actually still subjective, because actual people still determined that these values are important (biologically motivated or otherwise).
As a developer, I believe that it's best for you to simply choose your own judgement metrics to measure your own games (and those you play) by. Of course, how you choose your metrics can itself be based on certain objective facts like "thing x sells well, so I should prioritize it," but realize that the decision to consider that data important was made by you and is therefore subjective.