Someone once said that the larger the scale you use to grade a product (videogames or otherwise), the less professional you are.

I agree.

There are several forms of scoring out there but the most common five are "100", "20", "10" "5" and "School Grades". I'll give a quick look on all of them, which should be enough to cover any uncommon variations.

- 100 System

Sometimes called Percentage System - and popularized by sites like Game Rankings, Metacritic and Rotten Tomatoes - the 100 System is broad, to say the least, but falls into a glaring pitfall... how do you define why a product is scored 95 while another gets 96? The idea that you can divide something, fairly, in a hundred different kinds of quality (more when you include decimal points) is simply unrealistic.

The above mentioned websites can get away with this because all they are doing is provide an average of other sites' scores so, while hardly accurate, it's an interesting estimate of the overall professional (and sometimes not-so-professional) opinion.

However, sites like RPGFan are an absolute joke. Well, they are a joke as soon as they start to review non-RPG games as if they were RPGs, but that's not the point here. Not only they use the 100 System for an overall score, but they also use it to define Control, Gameplay, Graphics, Sound and Story individually. Adding insult to injury, they then divide what they call the "Grading System" into five, saying that anything rated 59 or below is a bad game. If that's the case... why bother with the 100 scale in the first place? It makes no sense, and screams lack of professionalism.

You could argue that RPGFan is not trying to be professional, and that it's just a database for generic "user reviews" that no one really cares. That may be true, but their scores are included on Game Rankings just as much as any professional site, which skews the results - and is one of the reasons why you can't trust them for accuracy.

Ironically, this is the system GameSpot used for years, before changing to the current system. Yes, games were still scored from 1 to 10, but each whole number could have decimals which, in practice, turned into a 100 System. Sadly, it's still being used by IGN and GameTrailers, which is part of the reason why none of them has managed to outclass GameSpot in terms of quality videogame rating (reviewing itself is another issue), despite being close rivals.

- 20 System

At first glance, this system may appear rare, until you realize that this is what GameSpot is using these days. It's still going from 1 to 10, but each whole number can be split in half, effectively turning it into a 20 System.

Anyone who's been on this site for a while is probably aware of how much heat the reviewing staff gets when a game gets an 8.5 instead of a 9, for example. It's like discussing if a game should be a 17 or 18. Fanboyism aside, the fact is the system is still far from ideal. It's easier to divide a product into 20 different kinds of quality, but "easier" doesn't mean "easy", and while a single reviewer could probably pull it off, a team of reviewers is bound to fall into some inconsistencies sooner or later - and yes, it has happened many times already.

On the bright side, GameSpot does try to be clear about the meaning of the their scoring system. For instance, a 7.0 and 7.5 are both considered Good, the only difference is that a 7.5 is close to being Great, while the 7.0 isn't. Sounds simple enough, and should work for the most part but, unfortunately, when you're writing for the masses about a subjective theme like entertainment (music, movies, games, etc) you're bound to step on some toes. It doesn't help that videogames, in particular, are heavily sought after by a young crowd that's too ignorant to know how to interpret a score - like when I see people commenting on a game that got an 8.5 saying it was a low score.

Playing devil's advocate, however, I must admit that GameSpot is somewhat responsible for that ignorance in the first place, because they clearly state that the average game out there is a 7. Now, doesn't that strike as odd? If you want to use a relevant scoring system, the halfway point is supposed to be the average. Having 7 defined as average, simply comes off as a way to naturally inflate scores on games which really aren't anything more than average, which leads to legitimate concerns about GameSpot commercial agenda. Yes, they do claim they don't take bribes or are in any way influenced by their sponsors... but actions speak louder than words, and Gerstmann-gate was not forgotten.

- 10 System

There's not much to say about the 10 System, other than it works like the GameSpot current system, only without the half-numbers. Sometimes, this can be associated with the Star System, when reviewers are allowed to give half-stars to a product.

It's clean, simple, yet it still provides ample description on a product. Dividing a product into ten different kinds of quality is much easier, and while inconsistencies are not rare in a team environment, they are uncommon enough to let slide, most of the times.

I believe this is the system that meets the best of both worlds. It's small enough to be accurate, but large enough to provide proper differentiation between competing products.

- 5 System

Commonly used as a Star System (or any other icon shape), this system is probably most popular among gamers for being the one used at Giant Bomb, but most of us - gamers or not - will remember it from many popular sites like YouTube (before they shrunk it down even further to a simple 2 System) or Amazon.

In terms of accuracy, it's hard to go wrong with it. A 5 is a good product while a 1 is a bad product, with 3 meaning it's neither good or bad, just meh. Of course, some products are good, but lack something noticeable, and others are bad but not hopeless, at which point the 4 and 2, respectively, get the job done.

At this point, some people may start wondering why even bother with a Scoring System at all. Afterall, isn't the content review the meat of it? True, but the whole point of a Scoring System is not to replace the review or act as an alternative for lazy people. Scoring Systems are meant as tone setters. This only really works if you acquired confidence in a reviewer, though.

Imagine, for example... I don't know... how about Guy Cocker? Imagine you've been following his reviews for some time and learned to trust his judgement on a game. Sure, you may still benefit from reading the review to get the details of what's right or wrong with the game, but a quick glance at the score will set the tone immediately. You know right there and then what the game is worth to you.

On the other hand, if you don't trust the reviewer, no amount of text is going to change that. You'll continue to be none the wiser until you actually play the game yourself.

- School Grades

In a way, the School Grades System is not too different from the numerical systems described above, only with letters instead of numbers. However, there are some important differences which can confuse people who are unfamiliar with it, and the underlining reason why some sites opt for this method is concerning.

You see, in some countries, like the USA, schools grade a student's work with a letter, with A being the best grade and F being the worst. However, only people who live in those countries are graded that way, which means people from any other part of the world will be confused until they learn about the system.

If you're writing on the internet, I don't care that you're catering primarily to a north-american audience... you're on the friggin internet! You will be accessed by people all over the planet, so show some friggin courtesy! There's no good reason why someone would choose this method, unless they are either ignorant or pretentious - probably both - which, as you may guess, is hardly a sign of professional journalism.

There are many other ways to score a product, but the message here is: if you want to be respected as a professional, and informative to the masses, keep it simple and accurate.