Textual Analysis of Virtual Reality Game Reviews

Abstract

Virtual reality systems are complex and made of various parts. Since a person is an integral component of such systems, virtual reality technologies also have a cognitive aspect. As such, these technologies engage with the perceptual, attentional, and decision-making processes of users. Consequently, they can be considered cognitive tools. Thus, it is imperative to understand what people think of such environments. To take a step towards this understanding, textual reviews of virtual reality games made for entertainment were investigated using text mining methods. Thus, 1,635,919 textual reviews were scraped from the Steam digital video game distribution platform in the spring of 2023. The reviews were grouped by whether they were positive or negative. According to the results, the following conclusions can be made regarding virtual reality games: 1) Negative reviews are significantly longer than positive ones. 2) Negative reviews are written significantly earlier than positive ones, although no correlation was found between the review type and the playtime before writing the review. 3) The most frequent words and word correlations are different between review types since negative reviews are more focused on game mechanics and bugs. Due to the results, insights can be provided to virtual reality game developers to help them refine their games. Index Terms—computer games; game review; player experi ence; Steam; textual analysis Abstract—Virtual reality systems are complex and made of various parts. Since a person is an integral component of such systems, virtual reality technologies also have a cognitive aspect. As such, these technologies engage with the perceptual, attentional, and decision-making processes of users. Consequently, they can be considered cognitive tools. Thus, it is imperative to understand what people think of such environments. To take a step towards this understanding, textual reviews of virtual reality games made for entertainment were investigated using text mining methods. Thus, 1,635,919 textual reviews were scraped from the Steam digital video game distribution platform in the spring of 2023. The reviews were grouped by whether they were positive or negative. According to the results, the following conclusions can be made regarding virtual reality games: 1) Negative reviews are significantly longer than positive ones. 2) Negative reviews are written significantly earlier than positive ones, although no correlation was found between the review type and the playtime before writing the review. 3) The most frequent words and word correlations are different between review types since negative reviews are more focused on game mechanics and bugs. Due to the results, insights can be provided to virtual reality game developers to help them refine their games.