PAX East 2023: Crit-Rate Pioneers a Humanized Approach to Video Game Recommendations

Ever taken a Myers-Briggs test and discovered your personality type? What if a similar mechanism was applied to a video game recommendation platform? Enter Crit-Rate.

Co-founders (both named Justin) are hard at work at PAX East 2023 with Crit-Rate. It is a web-based video game recommendation platform where you answer some questions about your gaming habits and preferences, then you are sorted into a gaming ‘house’. Neat, right?

The five houses are:

Vantagist: Lover of strategies and high difficulty
Curionaut: Fans of adventure and experimentation
Ascendiary: This is for those who are hard core completionists
Galabander: Fans of multiplayer and use gaming to socialize
Bravadier: Lover of fast-paced and competitive titles

What does this all mean? It works a little differently than Steam, which is an aggregate of user experiences and tags via a PC algorithm. When you are sorted into your own house, you are looking at recommendations based off people who have similar habits and preferences as you. This leads to a more personalized curation of titles, instead of, say, looking at a Metacritic score contains much broader input. For example, Elden Ring may be Game of the Year and amass high user scores, it may not be a good recommendation for everyone.

Just like in all other aspects of life, nothing is black and white. After sorting, you arrive at a dashboard that provides your affinities–where you more likely to lean, and what are your secondary traits. There are also various recommendation categories.

Types of recommendations:

Your house’s choice: Games with the highest ratings in the last 30 days
What We’re All Playing: Most ratings in the last 30 days
What We’re Excited For: Top 15 games that are most anticipated within the house

Your ability to rate games are love it, like it, and leave it. Free text reviews can also be left.

It has been a pleasure to talk to the co-founders, and I learned a lot of their growing business. They are truly people and community first. The personality quiz is fun, and Crit-Rate provides a community of gamers just like you.

At this time, the games are uploaded to the site manually, which means the creators take care to catalogue every title they can! They even included games showcasing at PAX East and are displaying their live standings on a screen at their booth. I also wanted to credit the pleasing aesthetic of their website and design for each house.

Their live board ranks games from PAX East 2023

The creators have additional ideas in the pipeline for Crit-Rate, and we at Boss Rush will keep you up to date. Until then, check out their site and take the quiz!

Crit-Rate also hosts a podcast. Check it out here.

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