Every gaming site claims its reviews are honest. At Incoherent Game, we would rather show you exactly how the sausage is made. This article breaks down the rating system we use for every review published on this site, so you always know what a score actually means.
Why a Transparent Rating System Matters
Review scores are everywhere, but very few outlets explain how they arrive at them. A 9/10 on one site can mean something completely different on another. When you understand the criteria behind a number, that number finally becomes useful. That is the entire philosophy behind our Game Reviews section.
The Five Pillars We Score
1. Gameplay and Mechanics (30%)
The core loop is king. Does the game feel good minute to minute? Are the controls responsive? Do the systems interact in interesting ways? A gorgeous game with hollow mechanics will never score well here.
2. Content and Longevity (20%)
We look at how much meaningful content a game offers relative to its price. A tight 8-hour story can absolutely beat a bloated 60-hour checklist. Quality of content always outweighs raw quantity.
3. Performance and Stability (20%)
Frame drops, crashes, broken quests, and long loading times all get documented. We test on the hardware most players actually own, not just high-end machines, and we note the difference when it matters.
4. Audio-Visual Design (15%)
Art direction matters more than raw graphical horsepower. A stylized indie game can outscore a photorealistic AAA title if its visual identity is stronger and more coherent.
5. Value for Money (15%)
Finally, we weigh everything against the asking price, including the state of microtransactions and DLC. A brilliant game with aggressive monetization will lose points here, every single time.
What Our Scores Mean
- 9-10: Exceptional. A defining title in its genre.
- 7-8: Great. Well worth your money, with minor flaws.
- 5-6: Decent. Enjoyable for genre fans, wait for a sale.
- 3-4: Weak. Serious problems outweigh the good ideas.
- 1-2: Broken or cynical. Avoid.
Our Promise to You
We buy games with our own money whenever possible, we disclose review codes when we receive them, and we never let publishers preview scores. If we update a review after major patches, the original text stays visible. That is the standard every review on Incoherent Game is held to.
The Scoring Scale in Practice
A number only means something when you know how it is used. On Incoherent Game a score is never a mood; it is the mathematical result of the five pillars, sanity-checked against a simple question: would we tell a friend to spend their money on this today? A 9 is rare and reserved for games that redefine expectations in their genre. A 7 is a genuine recommendation with honest caveats. A 5 is the true middle — playable, flawed, and worth it only on sale or for dedicated fans. We refuse to let scores drift upward the way much of the industry has, because a scale where everything lands between 7 and 10 tells you nothing at all.
Living Reviews and Re-Reviews
Games are no longer static objects. A title that launches rough can be transformed by a year of patches, and a beloved release can be quietly degraded by aggressive monetization added later. That is why our most important reviews are living documents. When a game changes in a way that would move its score, we revisit it, publish an updated verdict, and keep the original assessment visible underneath. You get the full history: what we thought at launch, what changed, and where the game stands now. Nothing is memory-holed.
What We Deliberately Ignore
Just as important as what we score is what we refuse to let sway us. We ignore pre-release hype, publisher review-embargo pressure, and the temptation to match whatever score the rest of the internet has settled on. We ignore graphical fidelity as a virtue in itself — a game that runs beautifully but plays hollowly will always lose to a modest-looking game with brilliant mechanics. And we ignore fan pressure in both directions, whether that is a devoted community demanding a higher number or a pile-on demanding a lower one.
Early Access and Live-Service Titles
Unfinished games present a genuine reviewing challenge, and we handle them honestly rather than pretending the problem away. For early-access titles we publish an impressions piece clearly labelled as provisional, focused on the current state and the developer’s track record for delivering on promises — never on a roadmap alone. We only assign a full, permanent score once a game reaches its 1.0 release. Live-service games get the same treatment: we review the experience as it actually exists today, not the version a marketing deck promises for next season.
How We Treat Review Bombing
User scores can be a useful signal, but they are frequently weaponized. When a game is review-bombed over a controversy that has nothing to do with the actual quality of play — a launcher change, an unrelated corporate decision, a culture-war flashpoint — we say so plainly and score the game on its merits. Our job is to evaluate the thing you will actually play, not to referee the internet’s mood on any given week.
The Bottom Line on Our Reviews
Everything above exists to protect one thing: your trust. A review is only worth reading if you believe the person writing it has no reason to lie to you. We have built our entire process — transparent pillars, living updates, disclosed codes, and a scale that actually uses its full range — around removing every reason for doubt. When you read a score on Incoherent Game, you are reading our honest answer to a simple question, and you can always see exactly how we got there.
Why We Publish Our Method at All
Most outlets keep their scoring logic vague on purpose, because vagueness is flexible — it lets a number be nudged to fit a headline or a relationship. We took the opposite path and wrote our method down precisely because it removes that flexibility from ourselves. Once the pillars and their weights are public, we are accountable to them. If a score ever looks out of step with the text, you are entitled to call it out, and we are obliged to explain. Publishing the method is not a marketing flourish; it is a set of handcuffs we willingly wear so that you never have to wonder whether a verdict was bought.
Consistency Across Genres
A fair system has to work across wildly different kinds of games, and that is harder than it sounds. A cozy farming sim and a punishing competitive shooter cannot be judged by identical checklists, yet they must sit on the same scale so that scores mean the same thing across the site. We solve this by keeping the five pillars constant while letting the evidence that fills them shift by genre: “performance” means netcode stability in a shooter and load times in an RPG; “content” means run variety in a roguelike and campaign length in a story game. The categories stay fixed; the questions inside them flex.
The Human Behind the Number
For all the structure, a review is still a person telling you what an experience was like, and we never want the system to sand that away. The best reviews on Incoherent Game combine the discipline of the pillars with the honesty of lived reaction — the moment a boss finally fell, the hour the grind turned into a chore, the feature that quietly made everything better. Structure keeps us fair; voice keeps us worth reading. A verdict you can trust needs both, and holding the two together is the craft we care about most.
Frequently Asked Questions About Our Reviews
Do you accept payment for reviews? Never. No publisher, developer, or advertiser can pay for a review, influence a score, or preview a verdict before publication. When we receive a free review code, we disclose it in the article. That wall between coverage and commerce is non-negotiable and it is the foundation everything else rests on.
Why is your score different from other sites? Because we actually use the full scale and we tell you exactly why. A five on Incoherent Game is a real middle score, not a disaster, and a nine is genuinely exceptional. If our number differs from the consensus, the text will always explain the reasoning so you can decide whether our priorities match yours.
Will you change a score after launch? Yes, when a game changes enough to warrant it. Major patches, restored content, or newly aggressive monetization can all move a verdict. We update the review, note what changed, and keep the original assessment visible so nothing is hidden.
How long do you play before reviewing? Long enough to reach and understand the endgame, not just the tutorial. For long games that means dozens of hours; for focused experiences it means finishing them. We do not publish a full score on a game we have not properly seen through.
That, in the end, is the whole promise: honest scores, transparent reasoning, and a process built entirely around earning — and keeping — your trust.