I'm curious. What would you use in place of the current system? I think Steam's thumb system is good but could use a third, while I also favor a gradient based system with bars and a tally.

For scoring, current is fine. If I was GOG, I'd put a quick guideline like the following based on my go-to reviewers, ACG and The Completionist:

5 = Buy [@ Regular] = Complete
4 = Wait for Sale = Finish
3 = Deep Sale = Play
2 = Rent / Very Deep Sale = Demo
1 = Never Touch = Donate

Brief, direct, and concise. Differentiate for different demographics (e.g., casuals, intermediates, hardcore).

I support fewer rejections, at least.

Hatred, Devotion, Aeon of Sands - The Trail, Das Geisterschiff, The Consuming Shadow, DreadOut Keepers of the Dark, the freeware Heroine's Quest: The Herald of Ragnarok, Gods Remastered - some ideas

I wonder why Double Fine's The Cave still isn't here. Was Night Trap - 25th Anniversary Edition
rejected by GOG? Knights of the Temple: Infernal Crusade

GOG's apparent choices can certainly be confusing; maybe there's lots more complications behind-the-scenes. Maybe GOG has tried to unreject some of these but other issues came up.

Oh ... hey I hope after 6 years of Pajama Sam releasing maybe some day Spy Fox, Freddi Fish, and Putt-Putt games show up ;) (this may not lie on GOG, maybe Tommo)

edit: that review made me think maybe it's time to start bloatmaxxing joe rogan incels betabux 4chan drumpf white brusempacy cnn blackpilled nick fuentes jogging oneyplays cumtown

Hmm. I don't think that'd handle very well for games that for their time were great, but have aged.

Have you folks considered relativism? Specifically, using different criteria to evaluate games based on their traits, particularly their genre, its original date released, and novelty/significance?

tfishell - That would be the most logical reason why some games get approved and why some are rejected that doesn't agree with GOG's main demographics. To think that they'd be using one universal criteria checklist to assess a game's eligibility is inconceivable and laughable. Honestly, I chuckle to myself at people being confounded by GOG's black box curation process and its results. The answer's pretty clear to me.

Darvond - For older games, the only pragmatic way is a retrospective in how the game has aged and how playable and fun it is today. Maybe you want to split your review to address both old gamers and casuals or maybe you just want to target the general audience. Price should be a factor that favours older games.

If a 2002 game costs $4 and provides you with 25 hours of good entertainment that you enjoy that you felt you should've paid $10 for, that's a 5. If a 1993 game costs $7 and the controls are so unbearable on your overall experience, within reason, to get past the second level, that's a 1 or 2.

That's how I'd do it anyway - just reviewing games here, not submitting a PhD thesis in neurosurgery.

EDIT: added novelty/significance, improved clarity.

It must be really hard to justify your Cube-Earth hypothesis but I'd be interested to hear them anyway. I wouldn't reply to you if I wouldn't be interested in outrageous claims and civil discussion.

Why do you reply if you can't be bothered to read my actual post? What abuse are you talking about? Just because someone else has better system than you doesn't automatically mean abuse.

I always investigate deeply into the game before writing any review or even rating it.

By "here" do you mean Gog or Long Story in particular? I haven't bombed this game since I haven't looked into it. I haven't looked into it because it haven't intrigued me enough to have any interest in it what-so-ever. YET.

This you?

Chum, if you're having difficulties remembering what videos or games you've watched or looked that you need to abuse a rating system to keep track, you're either playing too many forgettable games and/or you've got other health problems you need to work on.

I wasn't even talking to you, not even before editing out that post :D

You're kidding, right? Or you're perfectly aware which exactly number of season/episode of TV series you watched recently, you remember all 2000 books you've read and 5000 movies you've watched? I guess knowing all of these could be a symptom of a mental health problem...

Oh, and one more thing. If a book/game/movie was good enough to be remembered, you'll probably remember it. But you never know before, so it's obvious that you need some tool to remember you've already played/watched/tried something, which is not worth to be remembered, isn't it? If you can 100% sure pre-select only those unforgettable titles, let me know how to do this!

???

That might be my fault. The game sounded weird enough, so.... and I actually took the plunge and played it too. You can thank me later...

Impressions:
- I actually like the art style, but it should have been drawn in higher resolutions. So it's either a window, or blurry. Also it could have used... well more of it. Like, there aren't too many locations, number of characters are fine, but more expression portraits would have been nice.
- There's only a handful of music tracks, they're ok and fitting, but could have used more variety.
- Now for the most important thing - the writing. Really on the fence here. There's a lot of lines and situation that are written spot-on. Having a kid of that age (and remembering my own childhood), I was really impressed. There's also quite a few choices to make - if they matter much is left to be seen. It seems pretty reactive to some of the choices though.
On the downside the game is trying too hard in two areas: being LGBTQ+ friendly, and being "charming and positive".
Don't get me wrong, IMO there is nothing wrong with being LGBTQ+ friendly in general. But in some dialogues they really want to make sure to get their "lesson" across. I feels rather forces and weird.
As for the "too charming" - the game deals with serious topics like bullying, friendship, first love (or rather, crush) and feeling misunderstood, awkward, alien and generally confused, things that are heavy stuff with deep emotional impact at this age. And it glosses over the downsides, like feeling like an outsider, or being heartbroken way too quickly and easily. I guess that's intentional, but that's where I thought "this is not how it works - wish it were that easy". Allowing a little more "darkness" (and ways out of it, something more than a pat on the back and ice cream) would made the story more impactful. I mean, I do have that kind of drama "live", so those parts felt a bit of a let-down.

I'm aware because I read about and actively discuss them with other people so my memory with them is stronger than those who don't. It's not an issue for me. If you guys are consuming too much entertainment media you can't recall, your product selection or lifestyle choices are likely unoptimal. Quality over quantity works best for me anyway. Yeah, it's called curation and reviews. No one is forcing you to sift through all these new, released games when there are other people, with similar tastes to yours and make this their living, already doing it and publishing their findings through text and video reviews. We're standing on the shoulders of giants here.

I can see how you might be able to use the rating system as a bookmark in a thread even if it is knowing misuse of the system, but in what way does giving a game a 1-star rating replicate an "ignore" or "hide" function?

It was published by Sega IIRC.