New Review Rubric

I've always had in my head how I arrive at my review scores for manga and anime. But I wanted to find a way to make it more explicit, consistent, and transparent.

With that in mind, I'm going to be trying out the following new rubric. I've tested it against some of my past reviews and it seems to be consistent with the way I've been scoring works. This way though, I'll be able to highlight how I arrived at my score for each review.

I'll give it a try and see if it helps. I'd really love your feedback on this, so let me know in the comments what you think of this proposed scoring rubric:

BASIC SCORE:
Story interesting (0-10)
Characters interesting (0-10)
Quality prose/writing (0-10)
Emotionally plausible (0-10)

BASIC SCORE will be the sum of the above divided by 4 and rounded to nearest 1/2 point.

BONUS POINTS:
Emotional insight/depth (0-5)
True LGBTQ+ representation (0-5)
Female agency (0-5)
Character growth/change (0-5)
Quality art (0-5)
Other bonus (specify) (0-5)

BONUS POINTS will be the sum of the above divided by 8 and rounded to the nearest 1/2 point

PENALTY POINTS:
Homophobic/transphobic (0-5)
Misogynistic (0-5)
Fan service (0-5)
Child/adult relationship (0-5)
Exploitative (0-5)
Other problematic (specify) (0-5)

PENALTY POINTS will be the sum of the above divided by 2 and then negated (ie negative points)

FINAL SCORE:
(Basic Score + Bonus Points - Penalty points)/10 (ie a total score out of 10 possible points)

For example, a manga might have a basic score of 6.5, then 1.5 bonus points, and -2 penalty points. This would give it a total score of 6/10.

What happens if a manga or anime exceeds 10 points after all this? Well, it still gets a 10/10 and is clearly a genre defining masterpiece!

So the basic score makes sense, it's just an average. But what about the bonus points and penalty points? Why is one divided by 8 and the other by 2? I came up with these in order to weight the benefits and drawbacks of each in light of what makes or breaks a manga for me. The things that get penalty points are really deal breakers for me, so they are weighted greater (divided by only 2).

I'll give this a try for a little bit. Please let me know your thoughts on this new system. Thanks!

✩🚺

Please legitimately purchase or borrow manga and anime. Never read scanlations or watch fansubs. Those rob the creators of the income they need to survive and reduce the chance of manga and anime being legitimately released in English.

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