Methodology
How PlayVerdicts works
A verdict is a purchase recommendation
It answers one question: should you buy this, at this price, right now? It is not a review score and it does not say how good a game is. A superb game can still be a “wait for a sale” today.
- Buy now — Strong evidence it is worth the price today.
- Worth considering — Good fit for many players, with caveats worth reading.
- Free to play — Costs nothing to start, and reception is good enough to try.
- Buy on sale — Good game, but better value at a discount.
- Wait for fixes — Known problems make waiting a safer choice.
- Not for you — Reception is mostly negative; most buyers are unlikely to be satisfied.
- Insufficient evidence — Not enough verified data to recommend either way.
Rule-based or verified
Every verdict carries a label. Rule-based verdicts are calculated by the fixed rules below from measured data and have not been reviewed by a person. Verified verdicts were written and approved by a named editor, shown with their name and date; an approval is flagged for review when a new patch lands, when it gets old, or when the rule-based check disagrees. Demo text is placeholder content and is marked.
The rules
These are the rules the site runs, taken directly from the code that calculates the verdicts.
- Fewer than 500 Steam reviews → Insufficient evidence.
- Latest-review sample (≥50) below 65% positive and 10+ points under the all-time score → Wait for fixes.
- All-time score below 40% positive → Not for you.
- Score 80%+ and a good price (free, deep discount, near a recorded low) → Buy now; a good score at a price that has been much lower → Buy on sale; otherwise Worth considering. An exceptional score (92%+) at a fair price (little to gain by waiting) also → Buy now.
- Free-to-play games: unless one of the rules above (Insufficient evidence, Wait for fixes, Not for you) applies, the verdict is Free to play — the question is whether to try it, not whether to buy it.
- Score 40–79% (mixed to positive) → Worth considering at a good price, otherwise Buy on sale.
- Patch freshness: a Buy now is downgraded to Worth considering when the last recognised patch is over 180 days old AND the game is online-only (no single-player mode, so updates matter) or recent reviews are 10+ points under the all-time score. For Wait for fixes, a patch within 30 days means recent reviews may not reflect it yet; none for 180+ days means a fix may not be coming. An old patch alone never lowers a verdict, and an unrecognised patch history is never treated as stale.
- Confidence counts available evidence (review volume, recent sample, price history, patch feed) and never exceeds Medium without editor review.
The Steam price is compared with the lowest price ever seen on Steam (or, if unknown, the lowest at any tracked store). Price signal: within 5% of the all-time low, within 10% of the 12-month low, or 50%+ off → good. If waiting could save under 25% or under $5 → fair (little to gain). Otherwise: on sale but cheaper before, or never discounted beyond 30% → fair; no sale and much cheaper before → wait.
Where the data comes from
| What | Source | How |
|---|---|---|
| Game facts, features, artwork, trailer link | Steam store | Synced by script; shown with sync date |
| Review totals and the latest-review sample | Steam user reviews | Fetched by the server, cached for a few hours |
| Patch and update history | Steam community announcements | Recognised from post titles; links only |
| Current price (US store, USD) | Steam store | Fetched by the server, cached for a few hours |
| Players in the game right now (online games) | Steam player counts | One count per refresh, a moment not a trend |
| Steam Deck rating | Valve | Valve’s own rating, refreshed weekly |
| Similar games, reasons and things to know | Steam user tags, reviews, patch feed, price history, store listing | Computed by fixed rules, no hand-written text |
| Price history and lowest prices | IsThereAnyDeal | Fetched by the server, cached for a few hours |
Prices come from the US Steam store on the English site (dollars) and from the Hungarian Steam store on the Hungarian site (euros, with approximate forint amounts); other regions and stores can differ. Genres, platforms and release dates are entered by hand and checked against Steam where possible; the “similar games” picks, the reasons and the things to know are computed.
What is not measured yet
- Performance and stability on specific hardware (no benchmark data is collected).
- Which bugs and crashes are currently reported, and whether a patch fixed them.
- What players praise or criticise by topic (only totals and a recent sample are used).
- Playtime, so there is no value-for-money figure.
- Console prices and console-specific problems.
Where something isn't measured, the page says so instead of guessing.
Independence
Verdicts are not for sale and are not influenced by publishers. Store links are plain links today; if affiliate links are ever added they will be disclosed and will not affect a verdict.
Credits
Store data and artwork: Steam and the respective game developers and publishers, shown to identify their games. Price history by IsThereAnyDeal ↗. PlayVerdicts is not affiliated with any of them.
Spotted a mistake?
Last updated: October 2026