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Similar Games v2.0

Postby DJ Speedstar » Wed Sep 28, 2016 7:10 pm

Not so important intro... :
After longer pause, hello again to old good friends and other retro gaming freaks.
For long time I was looking for a system that would show a list of similar games and other things like movies or music.
I tested many websites which offered similar games informations, but most suggestions had weak similarity precision or were absurd.
Like you know, for example, saying that Diablo is 100 percent similar to Baldurs Gate, where first game is just hack n slash with roguelike elements, and second game is strong RPG with party based tactical combat.
You may also check out similar games on popular big game database like giantbomb and make big eyes when looking at these lists.
Good solution was to use google and search for forum topics about similar games to your favorite, but this takes a time and response is not always what we expected.
Some time ago we run SimilarType service that was 100 percent community based, where users were creating similarity connections between games.
Thanks to scary_fun and few other users from here who helped us to create this similarity database.
The problem was that not much users were adding content, so we ended up with just few hundreds similar games.

To the point... :
So, I started to work on automated analyser which should bring as precise similar games as possibile, by taking focus on accuracy as main goal.
In my opinion, result is quite good, and will be improved as possible.
New SimilarType system is currently processing 2600+ PC Games (DOS and Windows, 1981-2016), and a few thousands for whole PlayStation and Xbox families.
I also coded analyser for movies and music too, but it currently supports a few main genres (it will be extended).
Here you can check example list of similar games for Baldurs Gate: http://www.similartype.com/?m=-1&id=153 ... r%27s+Gate

How to make it better?
Automated analyser is not a human, so results are not perfect, but still quite good and useful for some people.
You can find anomalies on similarity ranking like games that are too high, too low or do not exist at all while they should be there.
Some of such cases are caused by too little information about such game right now.
Good example of low score is Temple Of Elemental Evil in Baldurs Gate similar games.
You may wonder what is doing Eye Of Beholder in Baldurs Gate similar games.
It is there because of fantasy setting, party based, real time combat, dungeons and dragons rules, and some other things in RPG gameplay.
So, if you find some anomalies, let me know and their reason will be investigated.
Any comments will be appreciated.
SimilarType is available for you here: http://www.similartype.com/
You can check out similar games to your favorite titles.
Thanks for your attention!
Hard To Find... Old Games? Try Us: http://www.oldgamesfinder.com/
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Re: Similar Games v2.0

Postby mr.editor » Wed Sep 28, 2016 9:14 pm

I like the concept and I hope you have energy to improve the automated analyser! :)

Because imho it needs quite a bit of improvement. I checked about 10 games and I'm sorry to say I wasn't impressed, yet. I mean:
XIII (Windows, 2003) and Velvet Assassin (Windows, 2009)?
SWAT 4 (Windows, 2005) and Space Trader (Windows, 2007)?
Second Sight (Windows, 2005) and Star Wars: Battlefront II (Windows, 2005)?
007: Nightfire (Windows, 2002) and Thunderbolt II (Windows, 2004)?

In my eyes more often than not suggested games are far cry from being similar.

Now I feel ashamed as I don't know much about programming to give you any good advice. Maybe somehow keep human suggestions/voting/pairing in? Adding games a LOT more parameters like subgenres, keywords, themes, perspectives, metacritic scores etc.

Let us know when new version is rolled out and I'd be happy to test it.
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Re: Similar Games v2.0

Postby DJ Speedstar » Wed Sep 28, 2016 11:52 pm

Thanks for your tests.
Subgenres, keywords, themes, perspectives, metacritic scores and many other criterias are already used when analyser is making similarity score.
Green scores 81-99 are most similar games that could be found.
Blue scores 71-80 are still good similar games to check.
Red scores below 71 are optional with less similarities, and appear when not much higher scores are available.
Red scores below 61 are completely optional and may cause a laugh.

XIII (Windows, 2003) and Velvet Assassin (Windows, 2009)?
Score below 71 is optional for games with few similarities.
This similarity has score 65 due first person shooter (you can switch perspective in second game) driven by spy or espionage story.

SWAT 4 (Windows, 2005) and Space Trader (Windows, 2007)?
This is score 53 which is one of the lowest (51+ is allowed to display).
Score below 61 is completely optional and is showing only if the list does not contain much results of higher scores.
It sometimes may contain something interesting, so this is "at least to check if there is not much more".
Swat 4 is one of my favorite games, and as you know, there is not much games like this one.
There is Arma and Ghost Recon on the list with green score 80+, which are one of most similar games that I played.
These games offer squad and tactical parts.

Second Sight (Windows, 2005) and Star Wars: Battlefront II (Windows, 2005)?
I never played any of these games, but it seems that they are both Science Fiction First Person Shooters, with possibility to switch into 3rd person, released in the same year, using similar graphics technology, and have close average critic score (74, 77).

007: Nightfire (Windows, 2002) and Thunderbolt II (Windows, 2004)?
Again, score 53 which is one of the lowest (51+ is allowed to display) and is showing only if the list does not contain much results of higher scores.
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Re: Similar Games v2.0

Postby user43687 » Thu Sep 29, 2016 8:49 am

:cool: :cool: :cool:

I've been looking for such sites and was never able to find one. For music, soundcloud does quite a nice job suggesting what I like which is fine. But for games, finally there is something :D

I've looked up some games, and yes there is room for improvement but it does quite well what it does!

I expect myself to use this site often :up:
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Re: Similar Games v2.0

Postby Molitor » Thu Sep 29, 2016 4:00 pm

Any plan to integrate OldGameFinder's search engine in the games section of Similartype ? Thus it would allow users to search the game from several resources in a single click.
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Re: Similar Games v2.0

Postby annoyment » Fri Oct 07, 2016 7:27 am

Here's a question, will you be including DRM (copy protection scheme) as a criteria? Since I've now started to catalogue those, might as well include the entire 16 years of gaming instead of just titles not yet properly crk'd, just wanna know if there's any use for that bunch of info in the future. :thanks: in advance...
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Re: Similar Games v2.0

Postby DJ Speedstar » Fri Oct 07, 2016 8:33 am

Molitor wrote:Any plan to integrate OldGameFinder's search engine in the games section of Similartype ? Thus it would allow users to search the game from several resources in a single click.


I was thinking about it for older games, but I am not sure yet if I want to associate SimilarType with "old warez" websites (to be clear, no offense here). This is easy single line update, but must be thought first.

annoyment wrote:Here's a question, will you be including DRM (copy protection scheme) as a criteria? Since I've now started to catalogue those, might as well include the entire 16 years of gaming instead of just titles not yet properly crk'd, just wanna know if there's any use for that bunch of info in the future. :thanks: in advance...
Windows is shutting down


No, any type of copy protection will not be used as criteria. I am not sure if you offer such info or are looking for it, so maybe this lists will be useful for you somehow: http://www.mobygames.com/search/quick?q ... r=1&sGG=on
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Re: Similar Games v2.0

Postby annoyment » Fri Oct 07, 2016 10:07 am

:thanks: for the link mate, but I was talking of deprecated Windows-only wrapper-type DRMs (SafeDisc & Co.). But since the answer is negative on all cases (the info I'll offer, once done, are the names of PC games that are still without a proper crk, as mentioned above), it'd ease my work substantially. :thanks: again for the response :up:
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Re: Similar Games v2.0

Postby BR4ZIL » Wed Nov 16, 2016 1:55 pm

As a sugestion it seems theme is being regarded way too highly, i used Commandos (any of them) and i got a bunch of ww2 rts games. Meanwhile the Desperados games had only 65ish match, despite being widely known as q Commandos clone in the old west
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Re: Similar Games v2.0

Postby DJ Speedstar » Fri Feb 15, 2019 7:50 pm

If anyone is interested yet, we are back to the concept with huge update after more than 2 years.
Games similarity has been improved and large number of titles has been added, including indie releases.
More similar titles should get even higher score and less similar even lower.
Current stats:
- 32,000+ PC games
- 10,000+ PlayStation games
- 5,000+ Xbox games
We are also working on other idea related to games, but it is a secret yet and we hope to show it ready soon.
Hard To Find... Old Games? Try Us: http://www.oldgamesfinder.com/
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Re: Similar Games v2.0

Postby mr.editor » Mon Mar 04, 2019 6:15 pm

I tested with 3 games and in my opinion some improvements can be made until it can be taken seriously.

Feist result - Toby: The Secret Mine in too low on list
Sébastien Loeb Rally EVO result - WRC series is nowhere to be seen
Second Sight result - Psi-Ops: The Mindgate Conspiracy in nowhere

Sorry.

The idea is solid though.
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