Gamers have never been able to reveal too many details in their PlayStation Store reviews, but that could soon change.
In a Reddit post (first reported by Eurogamer), user cusman78 noted that he was able to add a written review of Helldivers II.
Since when does PlayStation allow written reviews? Currently, this only seems to be allowed for a few games on the store pages.
byu/cusman78 inplaystation
Users in the comments came together to note that cusman78 was not alone. It seems PlayStation has offered select fans the opportunity to leave written user reviews on the PlayStation Store.
Previously, users could only give a game a rating of 1 to 5 stars. However, the ability to add details to a review has been missing for years, even though platforms like Steam and the Xbox Store have offered this option for years.
At the time of this writing, it’s an incredibly specific number of people who can care about reviews. Based on the comments on the Reddit post, it sounds like gamers are being chosen based on how many hours they’ve spent playing a game rather than whether they own it.
The other restriction concerns ownership, as reviews are apparently only allowed for users with digital copies. As one player explained, he received an invitation to review Final Fantasy VII Rebirth, but was unable to leave a review because he owned a physical copy of the game.
This is a good first step towards a little more transparency in game reviews, which seems crucial given the recent tensions on the PlayStation Store. Helldivers II made headlines when it was bombarded with reviews following controversy surrounding PSN accounts. Allowing (or even requiring) additional context can make those reviews easier to understand or explain to unsuspecting gamers why a game was bombarded with reviews in the months and years that followed.
The ratings aren’t perfect, though. They don’t show how much time a user has spent in a game, which can be a major drawback. After all, you wouldn’t give the opinion of someone who spent 10 hours in Final Fantasy VII Rebirth the same weight as someone who spent over 100 hours, right?
Reviews are currently published on an invitation-only basis, with invitations sent to the email address linked to the PlayStation Store account. PlayStation itself has not mentioned or announced the reviews program at the time of writing, so there is no indication when the feature will be generally available.
