We start with the game itself. Story, mechanics, feel, pacing, overall enjoyment. That always comes first because a good game is still a good game whether you play it locally or in the cloud. The cloud side is important to us, but it’s not the main event unless something goes badly wrong.
Where We Play
If we can play the game on GeForce NOW during review, we will. If we receive a game early and it isn’t available on GFN yet, we’ll say that clearly at the start. In those cases, the core review will be based on local play, and once the game arrives on GFN we’ll follow up inside the same review with how it performs in the cloud so readers don’t have to guess.
Cloud Performance
Cloud performance is only a small part of the final score. Most games behave well on GFN, so there’s no need to turn this into an engineering lecture. If something genuinely affects the experience, such as input lag, streaming artefacts or stutter, we’ll point it out. If everything feels normal, we won’t overload the reader with unnecessary detail.
Finishing Games
For standard single player games, our intention is to finish them before reviewing. If we don’t finish a game, we’ll say so directly and include the approximate playtime so readers know exactly how far we got.
For games without a traditional ending, such as multiplayer titles, roguelikes and endless systems, we’ll include a rough total of hours played and the kinds of modes, runs or matches we spent time with. This keeps expectations clear without pretending these games can be wrapped up neatly.
How We Score
We use a 1 to 5 star scale and we actually use the full range. Nothing is automatically a 3 or 4. Scores reflect both the quality of the game and how it works in the cloud, with the game taking priority. A 3 out of 5 is still a decent, worthwhile game, not a backhanded insult.