EA mobile game Dungeon Keeper has attracted criticism for discouraging negative reviews.

When the Android app asks users if they want to leave a review, it gives them two divergent options. If they choose to rate it at five stars, they are taken through the relevant page on the Google Play store. If they choose a lower rating, they are taken through a series of screens encouraging them to contact the developer instead, meaning they have to quit the app and find its listing in the store manually to leave a review.

Its not an uncommon practice, but its a particularly overt example – and, from a major publisher like EA, it has understandably attracted controversy.

An EA spokesperson responded to Gamasutra saying: “Were always looking at new ways to gather player feedback so that we can continue to improve our games. The rate this app feature in the Google Play version of Dungeon Keeper was designed to help us collect valuable feedback from players who dont feel the game is worth a top rating.

“We wanted to make it easier for more players to send us feedback directly from the game if they werent having the best experience. Players can always continue to leave any rating they want on the Google Play store.”

The app received poor reviews in the press – Eurogamer, for example, gave it 1/10, in part due to its reliance on microtransactions – but currently has a 4.3/5 rating on the Play store.
Given that the most visible ratings (based on user-voted helpfulness) are overwhelmingly one-star, this suggest that the tactic has been successful – or that the reviews have been generated inorganically.

Weve reached out to various sources to investigate this story further.