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Back when the ADVDT review system was overhauled, we had several lengthy discussions on how to reflect overall ratings. The individual rankings for each of the subcategories were expanded to give greater insight into what the reviewer was basing his/her overall rating on.

A purely mathematical rating system was considered (such as at Adult DVD Empire), where the subscores are simply averaged to come up with the overall. But that seemed unfair, especially since there didn't seem to be a way to fairly weight each of the subjective categories (i.e. should sex 'count' more than A/V quality?)

In the end, it seemed to be the consensus that the half point scale, combined with the expanded subcategories and the "What It's Worth" category would be a good compromise between making the rating system complicated and making it easy to understand.

As far as grade inflation, you only need to go to IMDb to see this in action. They have a 1-10 scale, with most of the ratings being higher than 5. That would seem to indicate that "average" doesn't exist. If you further drill down into an individual movie's rating, you'll see that there are some 1's and some 10's. Does a '1' mean that the person really hated this particular movie, or that it ranks as one of the worst movies of all time? Even if there was a definitive standard, I guarantee that some fall into the "poor" standard and some who fall into the "poorest" standard.

For the record, I tend to rate adult DVDs against what I perceive the "average" video within that genre is. In other words, if I were to rate a gonzo video, I will assign a 2.5 (average) to the sex component if I think the sex is about what one would expect from the gonzo genre. Notice that I'm not comparing it to couples porn, nor to classic porn. If that were the case, most porn would be toward the lower end of the "all time ratings (porn 1973-present)".

And as far as the composite or overall score, it's based on a very subjective overall feeling about the quality and value of the DVD as a whole. That means that the DVD extras (or lack thereof), the A/V quality, the sexual heat, and so forth factor in. And the "What It's Worth" field is important too and goes hand-in-hand with the overall score.

For example, I just looked at a review I did of The Dinner Party , which I rated a 3.0 out of 5. The sex was a 4.5, but the extras and A/V quality were both 1s. As I said in my review, I thought the sex could stand on its own, but it was painful to watch. I gave it a 3 (above average) at a street price of $10. To me that means that it would be a better than average purchase if you could get it for 10 bucks or less.

Clearly, it can be confusing to say the least, especially when everyone has their own idea of what the ratings mean. I guess the only thing I can say to that is to echo what Evil_Rip said and stick with reviewers you like (that's what people do in the "real world"). Also, it would help if reviewers make a point to explain why they liked or disliked something so that people have enough information to judge for themselves.

Saki

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I've also offered to further explain or discuss why something was rated a particular way if anyone wants to discuss it via email, chat, or whatever other means of communication they want. So far, only a few people have taken me up on that offer but the conversations were usually good (if somewhat spirited at times) and offered me enough insight that I would, if able, increase a rating just a touch if we had that ability.

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