Now this isn’t fair. It’s hard enough for Indie games on the Xbox 360 to be noticed as it is, let alone when crazy gamers are knocking out their only real way of getting in the spotlight: a game’s ratings.
Microsoft is currently “investigating a possible misuse of ratings” affecting a number of titles on the Xbox Live’s Indie Games Section, apparently stemming from an innocent PR event held by the developers of College Lacrosse: The Video Game.
Last week, the game’s Facebook page asked fans to officially give College Lacrosse a 5-star rating. Nothing wrong with that, it happens all the time. The problem seems to have arisen, though, when those fans went a little further than asked, as immediately after the message was posted people began noticing that other XBLIG titles were being given 1-star ratings.
That sounds harmless, but since XBLIG titles live and die on the popularity rankings, it’s serious business. Zeboyd Games’ Robert Boyd says his company’s game Chtulhu Saves the World dropped 13-14 positions on the service’s charts following the ratings attack, which hits his studio right in the hip pocket.
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