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My question was: Roguelike platformers available on ubuntu?

Are there any rogue-like >side scrolling platformers< available on ubuntu?

I downvoted both answers, because they did not in my opinion, answer my question in the slightest. For example: I asked for a roguelike sidescrolling platformer. An answer suggested a roguelike game that was neither a sidescroller, nor a platformer.

They were good answers for a different or more broad question. Perhaps I should have not downvoted them and left them be. Please let me know if that would have been more appropriate.

My suspicion is that in response to me downvoting their answers, my question was downvoted. However from what I understand in the Ask Ubuntu guidelines, I believe my question is sound and appropriate, and not worth -1 votes.

I am capable of making errors, so please point out if I am in the wrong. However, if my complaint is justified, I am wondering whether I can have the negative votes reversed?

Thank you.

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  • Votes are secret. Unless you said "I downvoted your question", or they used some other more advanced methods (which I've been thinking about for a while) they won't have specifically voted you down because of that.
    – Tim
    Commented Aug 1, 2014 at 20:00
  • @Tim If you're referring to SEDE it won't work, votes are anonymized.
    – Jason C
    Commented Aug 1, 2014 at 22:39
  • 2
    I didn't even notice my answer was down-voted (never mind).... Anyway, in case you didn't read it, I also suggested running Rogue Legacy (side-scrolling platformer) - which (just) managed to work under Wine 1.7
    – Wilf
    Commented Aug 2, 2014 at 9:59
  • @Jason, no, it probably won't work, only incredibly specific places so it doesn't really count.
    – Tim
    Commented Aug 2, 2014 at 18:07
  • Wilf; Ah I didnt notice. Thank you for correcting me, and I apologize for not being more diligent.
    – Anon
    Commented Aug 2, 2014 at 18:18

1 Answer 1

Reset to default
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There is nothing "wrong" with your question, per se, it is just a normal software recommendation question, but it borders on "too-broad" and some people don't like software recommendations for that reason. (For more information about how the software recommendation tag is/should be run and tips on how to ask a good soft-rec question see these two meta posts: How to run the Software Recommendation tag and the answer to Just lets drop the software recommendation mess.)

The downvote might have been from one of those people, and that is a perfectly valid reason to downvote. So were the downvotes you cast on the answers, perfectly valid reasons to downvote. Not everyone would have, but still perfectly valid.

Now, could the downvotes have been from one of the answerers? Yes, it could have. Does that make it an invalid downvote? No, it doesn't. They are free to vote on a post for (pretty much) whatever reason they like, as long as it doesn't extend into voting for or against a specific user. That is called targeted voting and is against the rules of the site. Moderators cannot see who voted on a post1, nor can they remove votes on a post2, so no, the downvote cannot be removed, nor would its removal be in line with the way the site works.

In your participation in the Stack Exchange network you will get downvoted, and unless the downvoter leaves a comment explaining your downvote, there is nothing you can do about it. As long as you are sure that your question/answer is correct and falls within the scope of the site the best thing you can do is ignore them.

1 Moderators can sometimes see groups of targeting votes to and from users, but not individual votes.

2 I suppose (theoretically) we can mass remove votes by deleting users, but that wouldn't really serve here, even if we could see who voted.

Now, a tip for your specific question: I suggest you go into a bit more detail about what a rogue like game is and what you expect for "side scrolling". Maybe give an example?

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  • Thank you; that is a great suggestion, and I appreciate that you took the time to explain that to me. My regards.
    – Anon
    Commented Aug 1, 2014 at 21:10
  • @Seth Just a minor point re: your minor point: "Rogue-like" is almost as well-known a genre as "first person shooter", with fairly distinct and defined known qualities; the OP would probably want to give even more specific detail about what they are going for within that genre, rather than restating its definition. The answers are poor; although the question is not ideal mostly due to lack of research.
    – Jason C
    Commented Aug 2, 2014 at 18:43
  • @JasonC I did not know what the term "rogue like" meant until just now and I assume it is reasonable to assume other people don't as well. Either way, it is just common etiquette to be descriptive about what you want when asking a question, and usually best to assume not everyone knows what you are talking about too :)
    – Seth Mod
    Commented Aug 2, 2014 at 19:01
  • @Seth Well you could always insist that askers explain what they mean by "C++" when they post questions on SO, too, I suppose. Everyone doesn't need to (and shouldn't be expected to) know what you are talking about; only those with enough personal expertise to answer your question do. The rest have Google to fill in the gaps, and may not have the knowledge required to answer. :)
    – Jason C
    Commented Aug 2, 2014 at 20:19
  • Also I just realized part of my first comment was lost in an edit. The OP actually did state specific detail - sidescrolling and platformer - two equally well-defined terms. Not knowing what "roguelike", "sidescrolling", and "platformer" refer to is understandable, but it just means one doesn't have the ability to answer the question, just like one who does not know much about electronics wouldn't necessarily be justified in asking for explanations of terminology in electronics.se questions.
    – Jason C
    Commented Aug 2, 2014 at 20:25

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