I remember the exact same thing happened a year ago in the GMTK jam 2019. We all scrambled to get some more feedback, to hear the same thing we have already heard multiple times one more time. To get one more rate. Trust me, it's not gonna lead us anywhere good. These rate for rates imply that we don't want to play each other's game and if fact, we don't. I have made a post ("Rating your games") and people reply to it all the time, asking for feedback and rates. So far I have rated about 30 games. I also asked, in that post, that people also give my game a look. 9 people rated my game. Now, I am ok with that, but if people, given the choice (it wasn't fully clear from my post if I demand a rate in return for my rating, and I in fact don't), don't want to play each other's game, then we have a really big problem as a community. It seems like we lost the ability to enjoy a game without knowing that the other person will also look at our creation.

So please think about it and stop making these endless rate for rates. In a week when the rating period ends it will all feel so stupid, so stop doing it now!

I totally agree, I feel bad even posting mine to the 100s of topic threads haha. Even then I only go 3 ratings for the 10+ posts I submitted on.. If you're going to spam it, at least put the time in to enjoy the actual point of the jam!

I do like the themed rate for rates though, then it can be a mini curation of certain genres

Yeah, I think it is a broken system but it is the only way to more people play your game. They should make the karma system better, for example as more "random" games you play clicking on that "take me to a random game" button, more chances of your game showing up to someone at the random section. Right now the karma system only shows up if you select at the filter(and that is bad, because when you open the page the default section is random). I am doing like crazy the rate for rate thing but I don't like it. I would love it if my game had the chance like any other. Because it's easy to be famous on youtube and then have a lot of rating on your game just because of this, there is a lot of hidden gems right at the bottom of the page with 10 or 5 rates and It's really hard to find them.

i don't want anyone to rate without playing and i too don't wanna rate without playing

but we all need people to play our game. i cannot see how that happens.

it just benefiting when u are active and keep commenting and when u are not ur game gets pushed.

like at night i almost get 0 ratings...:/

but i have so much trust in my game that everyone who plays it will like it and i fell happy when a comment appears

This is my teams first game jam, and we are genuinely interested in how the jam works. Does anyone know how the number of ratings affect your games final rank? I know that a game needs more than 20 ratings to be eligible for winning, but other than that, is it better for your score if more people play your game or not? 

I cant tell if Ahmed Elshazly is trolling or providing a perfect example of why the system in place is not very good.