Man, there was one really obvious one I came across a while ago, but I can't remember it off hand (the first five 5-star reviews were all written by a "first name last name" in all lower case letters, and the text was clearly typed using the iPhone's soft keyboard, which I could tell from the spaces before periods following uncommon words). I'll keep this thread in mind, though, because shilling is the one thing in the App Store that I 100% cannot abide. I don't want to hear any excuses from developers, either. If you want to RATE your app 5-stars, fine. But be honest about who you are. I have more respect for a developer that thinks he's put out a 5-star app and is willing to say so under his own name than some coward who needs to pretend to be a consumer as a form of "marketing." A couple things. I think we should be sure to have evidence when presenting shills in this thread. State why you think a developer is shilling. For instance: Try to include quotes and/or list the other apps the suspected shill has reviewed. Another thing. Some may not agree, as I admit this is a personal opinion, but I consider shilling to be fake reviews written by the developer or fake reviews written for hire. I don't consider reviews by friends of the developer to be shill reviews. This might make it far more difficult to make a clear distinction, but I just thought it was worth noting. Carry on, please!
I don't really go by the app store reviews when deciding to buy a game. I normally check here, macrumors, and youtube to get an idea of what a game is like and if its any good.
This site is an excellent venue to learn about games and read thoughtful opinions, but it can also be an echo chamber. I like to read the iTunes reviews because it provides a broader point of view. There's no reason why iTunes reviews should be destined to follow in the footsteps of the mentally challenged comments section over at YouTube instead of the invaluable and mostly intelligent and helpful reviews at Amazon.
The quality of the Amazon reviews might be because the people there read books When dealing with YouTube commenters, it sometimes feels like people aren't trying to say anything so much as throwing their cats at the keyboard and seeing what it comes up with.
This one pissed me off (I have my reasons): http://itunes.apple.com/WebObjects/MZStore.woa/wa/viewSoftware?id=320810035&mt=8 Skyworks new bowling game. Every 5-star reviewer has reviewed all or most of Skyworks' products...all 5 stars. Skyworks claims "Realistic physics"...like hell! I played their demo version on their site. It's terrible. Obvious shills. If the game really WAS good the shills wouldn't be so obvious to spot. Glad I got that off my chest, now I can continue to live my life.
yep, good one. I myself am disappointed with Skyworks for shilling. When I first got my iphone 2 of my favorite games were Arcade Bowling and Arcade Hoops. Since then Skyworks been on somewhat of a decline and have been resorting to shilling their new games.
I honestly could care less. If it's a good game, gets good reviews, and the app description's accurate, they could write a bible on how to worship their game for all I care. I have no problem with it if I get my money's worth. Just read the reviews and impressions, people. Why do you think we have TA? And has anybody considered that the so-called "phony reviews" could be friends that felt strongly about their friend and wanted to support them anyway possible? Doesn't make the reviews any more legitimate, but it takes that blame and sheer wickedness off the dev's name.
So you don't think there's nothing shady if I make an app. and call up a bunch of my friends and say "hey guys come drop a bunch of 1-sentence 5-star reviews for me and my new game just because your my friends or you work for me." "Oh and don't mention in your reviews that you're my firends or that you know me!" "I know you don't normally buy games but just DL a couple free ones so you look like a normal customer" You dont think there's anything shady about that? Dude, just about every real customer in here is gonna disagree with you.
That's true - it's bad when done that way. But there is no way of knowing for sure. The devs don't have to ask for it. Sometimes people do it just because they want to not because they were asked to. A few months ago, my dentist told me she downloaded our game and reviewed it. At an earlier appt months ago, she had seen me play with our game - got curious, we went into chatting, she thought it was cool to meet someone who made an iphone game. I didn't even ask her to buy it. She isn't a gamer, so I didn't check but I'm sure that was the first time she reviewed an app - she wasn't sure how to do it, and thought she messed it up. How could i tell her "oh no! please remove your review because now you know me!" or "did you mention that you are my dentist in your review?" ..it's not always practical to be anal about it. Once in a while I'd meet with a friend who tells me how he still loves playing and tells all of his friends to buy it to support us. I don't know if they do, or if he is just saying it. Regardless, we can't control what they do with the reviews. I'm sure same kinda stuff happens to every application and dev.
Ok Mun, your game is Tightwire - iBright Studios and this was your post in the Tightwire thread... Ok so you kind of fessed up and apologized and halfway tried to CYOA. Fine. Now you want us to believe that the shill reviews for the game Tightwire are all just a big misunderstanding. That they were from friends buying the game being friendly. Tell me something, what happened to that one shill reviewer who reviewed your game Tightrope with a 5 star and then left a 1 star rating for the only other tightrope type game in the store(your only other competition)-the game "Sky Wire"by C3 Software. Mysteriously, that 1 star review has been removed. Did you or iBright Studio instruct the shill reviewer to remove it after it was mentioned in the Tightwire thread? Because its mysteriously gone now. Here's a comment about the 1 star review that existed ... At first I thought you were just gonna fess up about it and apologize, but now it appears your taking the bs route.
By the way I actually like your new game, but I know shill reviews when I see them and everyone else who saw those store-shill reviews last night for (edited for apologizing) knows they were bs too. Why dont you tell (edited for apologizing) to get their confidence up about their game next time because it actually isnt all that bad, there was no need to shill it.
Hmm, i don't think I'm taking the BS route freedog. I apologized last night for the reviews for the game TightWire because apparently some friends of the folks at iBright Studios left some reviews. As I said, i don't agree with that and it's bad when it happens. Even though we had nothing to do it, I think it was the right thing to do to apologize because our name is attached to the game, because we always want to be proud of what we are producing and we don't want any "fakeness" associated with us. However, my post on this thread had nothing to do with TightWire. I was talking about Gemmed! - TightWire didn't exist a few months ago. What my point was, even though it's bad, you can never be sure if the devs mentioned in this thread told their friends to leave a review or not. So please don't blame the devs without knowing the truth. People can't really control what their friends do. You probably know very well (as you are a senior member) almost all devs give out promo codes and most of the time anyone who gets a free code leaves a nice review for that app. Don't you think that is as bad? But do you know how many and which devs just bought out reviews that way? Heck, you could pay 100 people a dollar each to review your app very easily, and neither you nor I would know if any of the devs out there did it. There is a website just for that purpose already - devs give promo codes in turns of a good review. Every dev, good or bad, gives out codes for a good review in return. Once again, I'm not trying to defend "shilling" here. I'm just saying don't come to conclusions so fast. (again, this has nothing to do with tightwire) As for the review that was removed - if you look at my post last night, I say "I'll contact them and let them know what's happening". I did contact them today and did my part - I think that was the responsible thing to do. What they did with that information, how they will act from now on is beyond me. We only have a business relationship and they own the rights to the game. Btw, I'm not the owner, or seller of TightWire. We developed it and we are done with it so I don't gain any benefits from the sales at all. We are already paid for developing it. I just wanted to introduce the game here as I'm already familiar with this community, and I wanted everyone to know that we've been working on this project for the last 2 months and we didn't disappear. That's all.
I totally agree with you! There is no need to shill it! From the conversations we had during the development, I can tell that they are pretty good guys. I still don't know if they were the ones who left the reviews, if they told their friends to do it, or if their friends or relatives just did it without talking to them. But I'm sure they will choose to do the right thing - now and in the future.
Well it sure sounds like you are trying to stick up for your partners. Whatever. But I doubt any "innocent friend of a developer told about the game at the dentist's office" is gonna go to the extent of 1-staring the only other Tightrope type game in the store...(basically the only other competition) Anyway, I tell ya what, you get (edited for apologizing) or the shill reviewer friend to come in here and "fess up or apologize" to the community and I will remove (edited for apologizing) from "shill review list." Fair enough?
Oh I totally agree - that -1 rating thing was a very bad move/decision/choice - whoever did it. There is no excuse for that. And yeah I doubt my dentist gave bad ratings to the other match 3 games Maybe the person who left that review will come here and apologize - I can sggest that to them, but unfortunately I can't enforce it or do anything more than that based on our relationship level.
Well, it seems to me like if anyone of the workers for a developing company play a game that they made, like it, and then rate it, that counts as "Shilling reviews" too. I believe it can be accepted if like that, but when Devs like Gplex write about how awesome the game is, when they are lying, that's very unacceptable.
Shill Definitions: -noun 1. a person who poses as a customer in order to decoy others into participating, as at a gambling house, auction, confidence game, etc. 2. a person who publicizes or praises something or someone for reasons of self-interest, personal profit, or friendship or loyalty. ---Dictionary.com shill (shl) Slang n. One who poses as a satisfied customer or an enthusiastic gambler to dupe bystanders into participating in a swindle. v. 1. To act as a shill for (a deceitful enterprise). 2. To lure (a person) into a swindle. ---thefreedictionary.com A shill is an associate of a person selling goods or services or a political group, who pretends no association to the seller/group and assumes the air of an enthusiastic customer. ---Wikipedia
Apology Hello. I am the co-owner of iBright LLC. I wanted to come on here and clear up what seems to be some disagreement about some posts that were made with our new game, TightWire. We are fresh out of college and have a great deal of close friends that know and pay attention to what we're doing. They were excited about knowing some people that have made an iPhone application and went and reviewed our game when it hit the App Store. One of these friends was the one who looked at the other tightwire game and gave it a poor review. We have since corrected the problem and asked that person to remove the poor review which, I agree, was disrespectful and mean. I however cannot control people, and have no way of knowing what people do unless it's otherwise pointed out. We promise there is nothing sinister going on and now understand the art of "shilling", but we just had some people that were excited to see our app out, as we've been in the process of doing this for a few months now. That is simply it. We have asked a lot of our friends to check out our application, and obviously cannot stop them from reviewing it if they like it. We are very proud of our little application and would not want anyone to think poorly of us, our company, or our partners and to think we're intentionally asking people to do these things. Again, this is my apology for any harm done, and my promise that we'll do our absolute best to keep our company and it's appearance to be as good as possible. Thank you for pointing these things out, and I hope this apology somewhat helps correct any foul tastes left. We hope you all enjoy our current application and those that come in the future. Thank you for your time.
