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Feature checklists make every tool look equivalent. This table leads with the three things that actually differ — what it costs you before it works, whether your files leave your device, and where the free version stops.
| itch.ioitch.io | HowLongToBeathowlongtobeat.com | Metacriticmetacritic.com | Five Booksfivebooks.com | |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| What it does | Independent and experimental games, thousands of them playable in the browser | How many hours a game takes to finish, from players who logged it | Aggregates professional reviews of films, TV, games and albums into one score | Experts pick the five best books on a subject and explain each choice |
| What it costs you | No sign-upWorks the moment the page loads. No account, no email, no trial. | No sign-upWorks the moment the page loads. No account, no email, no trial. | No sign-upWorks the moment the page loads. No account, no email, no trial. | No sign-upWorks the moment the page loads. No account, no email, no trial. |
| Your files | Runs on their server | Runs on their server | Runs on their server | Runs on their server |
| Where it stops | There is essentially no curation — good work sits beside thousands of abandoned prototypes, and browse-by-quality is not a feature. | Figures are crowd-submitted averages, so new or obscure titles have thin samples and wide spreads. | A score built from six reviews looks identical to one built from sixty, and user scores are routinely brigaded. | It is an interview archive rather than a recommendation engine, heavily weighted to non-fiction, and it cannot tell you what you have already read. |
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| Category | Film, TV & Media Discovery | Film, TV & Media Discovery | Film, TV & Media Discovery | Film, TV & Media Discovery |
| Last checked | 2026-07-29 | 2026-07-29 | 2026-07-29 | 2026-07-29 |
| Open the site | Open | Open | Open | Open |
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