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| Type of site | Gaming |
|---|---|
| Successor(s) | Metacritic |
| Owner | CBS Interactive |
| Created by | Scott Bedard |
| URL | gamerankings.com |
| Commercial | Yes |
| Launched | 1999 |
| Current status | Shut down in 2019; redirected to Metacritic |
GameRankings was a video gaming review aggregator that was founded in 1999 and owned by CBS Interactive. It indexed over 315,000 articles relating to more than 14,500 video games. GameRankings was discontinued in December 2019, with its staff being merged with the similar aggregator Metacritic.
Rankings
GameRankings collected and linked to (but did not host) reviews from other websites and magazines and averages specific ones. While hundreds of reviews may get listed, only the ones that GameRankings deemed notable were used for the average. Scores were culled from numerous American and European sources. The site used a percentage grade for all reviews in order to be able to calculate an average. However, because not all sites use the same scoring system (some rate out of 5 or 10, while others use a letter grade), GameRankings changed all other types of scores into percentages using a relatively straightforward conversion process An A+ was simply 100% or 10/10 and an A was at 95%, and so forth with the same five percent increment; the average unlike Metacritic avoided opinionated weight systems for rankings, as it used a simple mean of every ranking from all the accredited websites reviewing that game.
When a game accumulated six total reviews, it was given a ranking compared to all other games in the database and a ranking compared to games on its console.
At the time of the site's closure in December 2019, seven games had an aggregate score of 97% or higher: Super Mario Galaxy, The Legend of Zelda: Ocarina of Time, Super Mario Odyssey, Super Mario Galaxy 2, The Legend of Zelda: Breath of the Wild, Grand Theft Auto IV, and Grand Theft Auto V.
Discontinuation
GameRankings was shut down and redirected to Metacritic, another review aggregator, on December 9, 2019.
References
- ^ "GameRankings Help". gamerankings.com. Archived from the original on 22 October 2017. Retrieved 28 April 2018.
- "GameRankings". PC Magazine. March 25, 2003. Archived from the original on May 12, 2008.
- "Reviews and News Articles - GameRankings". GameRankings. Archived from the original on 21 March 2018. Retrieved 28 April 2018.
- ^ Plunkett, Luke (December 5, 2019). "RIP Gamerankings.com". Kotaku. G/O Media. Archived from the original on December 6, 2019. Retrieved December 6, 2019.
- "GameRankings Shutting down". Archived from the original on 2019-12-04.
- McAloon, Alissa (December 5, 2019). "Review aggregator site GameRankings is shutting down". Gamasutra. Archived from the original on December 6, 2019. Retrieved December 5, 2019.
External links
- Official website at the Wayback Machine (archived December 9, 2019)
- "High Scores Matter To Game Makers, Too", The Wall Street Journal, September 20, 2007.
- "Video games: Aiming to please?", StarTribune, June 7, 2008.
- "Things that suck about video game reviews" Archived 2016-03-11 at the Wayback Machine, That Videogame Blog, April 2, 2008.
- "Do Review Scores Really Matter?", Dpad Magazine, June 11, 2010.
| Video game journalism | |
|---|---|
| Video game magazines |
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| Video game websites | |
| Review aggregators | |