✍️ How to leave a review (and how to check that nobody touches it)

Yesterday we opened public reviews. Today let’s look at how they work up close: how to write one and, above all, how anyone can check that nobody has touched it up.

Writing a review

1. Sign in with your account (Google, GitHub, Facebook or Microsoft).
2. Play at least 3 games to the end: that’s how we make sure people reviewing LexiSmash have really tried it.
3. Open the Reviews page from the home page, or press ✍️ Leave a review in the Account panel.
4. Choose 1 to 5 stars and, if you like, tell us how it went (up to 500 characters).
5. Press Publish review.

Before publishing, read it through calmly: once it’s online it cannot be edited. If you change your mind you can delete it and, after 7 days, write a new one.

Why it can’t be edited

A review is there for people still deciding whether to try the game. If whoever runs the site could correct, polish or remove reviews, they’d be worthless. That’s why:

• the LexiSmash server has no function at all to change the text or the rating, not even for staff;
• staff can only hide a review containing insults, spam or personal data, and the reason stays in its place, visible to everyone;
• staff can reply publicly under the review, with the date of any edit to the reply.

Check it with your own eyes

Every review gets a digital fingerprint: a code calculated from the rating, the text and the language. Change a single comma and the fingerprint changes. The fingerprints are linked to one another like the links of a chain and published in a public archive on GitHub, updated automatically a few seconds after every review.

To verify:

1. open the verifier: it recalculates the whole chain in your browser and tells you whether it’s intact;
2. to check one specific review, copy the rating, the language and the text as you see them on the site and press Compute and look it up: if it’s found, the review is exactly as the author wrote it.

The archive never contains the texts or the name or account of the author: only fingerprints, ratings and dates. That way, anyone who deletes their review really removes it.

What if I’ve found a problem?

Reviews are public. If you want to report a bug without making it public, use the feedback form that appears while you play: only I read it, and it helps me fix LexiSmash.

You’ll also find everything in the game manual.