2002 replies to this topic

[DaisuSaikoro Nagasawa]

DCM Zeus, on 21 March 2013 - 04:13 PM, said:

I am relaying this as it speaks truth.

CW will be a major problem with 3rd person only Units wanting to attack 1st person and viceversa.

It is recommend by the community you guys just drop 3rd person all together.

Wait, wait, when was the community vote on this? Did we vote to select you as the community representative? When did this happen?

Or does Luna Wolves = The Community

Oh the Luna Wolves.

[Zeus X]

Bryan Ekman, on 21 March 2013 - 05:03 PM, said:

We did an analysis of our data and found that players in general were having a hard time learning how to control their BattleMechs. We spent time studying their behaviours, observing, and then formulated a series of improvements. You have already seen some of them (new user controls). We did some market research, looked at the target demographic that we engaged initially but did not retain (played a few matches and left), and found that many players were not able to easily grasp the concepts of their `Mech, especially movement. 3rd person will help solve some of these issues, along with a new UI, training and testing grounds, and other features coming down the pipeline.

Hope that answers your question.

Could we get an explanation on how 3rd person helps, other than you can see your legs.

Cause in the UI I have two ways to see how my legs and torso are orentied.

One is the map with a HUGE dotted line and arrow, and the other is up top with 2 triangles in the bearing readout.

Like I said before, 3rd person does nothing but make a lazy player, lazier.

[Roadbeer]

Bryan Ekman, on 21 March 2013 - 05:03 PM, said:

We did an analysis of our data and found that players in general were having a hard time learning how to control their BattleMechs. We spent time studying their behaviours, observing, and then formulated a series of improvements. You have already seen some of them (new user controls). We did some market research, looked at the target demographic that we engaged initially but did not retain (played a few matches and left), and found that many players were not able to easily grasp the concepts of their `Mech, especially movement. 3rd person will help solve some of these issues, along with a new UI, training and testing grounds, and other features coming down the pipeline.

Hope that answers your question.

It does. Thank you again.

One final question.

What exactly is your target demographic?

Edited by Roadbeer, 21 March 2013 - 05:10 PM.

[Little Nemo]

Well, there goes finding 1st person matches anymore. It's going to be pop-snipers and all 3rd person if it is implemented.

This should NOT be allowed in community warfare, or any structured play IMO.

[Jetfire]

Bryan Ekman, on 21 March 2013 - 05:03 PM, said:

We did an analysis of our data and found that players in general were having a hard time learning how to control their BattleMechs. We spent time studying their behaviours, observing, and then formulated a series of improvements. You have already seen some of them (new user controls). We did some market research, looked at the target demographic that we engaged initially but did not retain (played a few matches and left), and found that many players were not able to easily grasp the concepts of their `Mech, especially movement. 3rd person will help solve some of these issues, along with a new UI, training and testing grounds, and other features coming down the pipeline.

Hope that answers your question.

Please review the concept of a general "Arcade" mode like War Thunder for your 3rd person mode. The general idea I think is that the player base will likely massively bloom upon "Launch/Release" in the not incredibly distant future, but a while off. If you don't make an approachable game mode, you will miss out on a lot of income. It is a perfect solution.

[Shumabot]

DCM Zeus, on 21 March 2013 - 05:07 PM, said:

Could we get an explanation on how 3rd person helps, other than you can see your legs.

Cause in the UI I have two ways to see how my legs and torso are orentied.

One is the map with a HUGE dotted line and arrow, and the other is up top with 2 triangles in the bearing readout.

Like I said before, 3rd person does nothing but make a lazy player, lazier.

Please support how a camera angle does that when you just admitted that all of the information he would glean from the camera is already displayed on his screen twice?

[syngyne]

Bryan Ekman, on 21 March 2013 - 05:03 PM, said:

We did an analysis of our data and found that players in general were having a hard time learning how to control their BattleMechs. We spent time studying their behaviours, observing, and then formulated a series of improvements. You have already seen some of them (new user controls). We did some market research, looked at the target demographic that we engaged initially but did not retain (played a few matches and left), and found that many players were not able to easily grasp the concepts of their `Mech, especially movement. 3rd person will help solve some of these issues, along with a new UI, training and testing grounds, and other features coming down the pipeline.

Hope that answers your question.

I can't help but feel that this is only treating the symptom, not the disease. If players are having a hard time controlling their 'Mechs, that points to an inadequacy with the new user experience, not a camera issue. I think if you really wanted to solve this problem, what's needed is a scripted tutorial mission more than anything else. I realize that requires a lot more time and resources to create, but you'll end up with better players as a result, instead of players relying on a crutch.

[Vhetra]

I don't mind third person as an option for players doing private matches, but any kind of competitive/tournament/Community Warfare play should require first person.

[Targetloc]

Bryan Ekman, on 21 March 2013 - 05:03 PM, said:

We did an analysis of our data and found that players in general were having a hard time learning how to control their BattleMechs. We spent time studying their behaviours, observing, and then formulated a series of improvements. You have already seen some of them (new user controls). We did some market research, looked at the target demographic that we engaged initially but did not retain (played a few matches and left), and found that many players were not able to easily grasp the concepts of their `Mech, especially movement. 3rd person will help solve some of these issues, along with a new UI, training and testing grounds, and other features coming down the pipeline.

Hope that answers your question.

Panel 2 guy?

[Firelizard]

Here's a thunk, take it or leave it...

What if the 3rd person view came in the form of a UAV following your mech? You turn on the view, the thing deploys. Turn it off, it's retrieved. Even better is it can be shot at or jammed with ECM, and having it hovering over/around your mech would certainly give you away either by being visable above terrain, or making noise.

Again, take it or leave it.

[Duncan Longwood]

Shumabot, on 21 March 2013 - 04:57 PM, said:

This is where I became certain you were just making things up, that stalker didnt turn around because he's going to die of old age before you strip his rear with a spider. No one uses supressive fire in MWO because its nonsense, you can't kill people with a stray bullet and checking for safety with a poptart implies a distant third person camera and ignores the fact that it would be harder to shoot them in the first place.

I have used suppressive fire... uh today in fact. I was on Tourmaline and a winged splatcat was stuck behind cover at 300 meters due to my AC2's from my Jager. I kept the cat pinned down while an Atlas teammate strolled up and finished him. So I kept him in the fatal-funnel until the big guns arrived by denying him the chance to act. Sounds like suppressive fire to me.

And if you have never killed a stalker with a spider one-on-one... well that makes me sad. The first kill I ever got with my spider was a stalker. You can't shoot what you can't twist fast enough to see.

[Shumabot]

Quote

I have used suppressive fire... uh today in fact. I was on Tourmaline and a winged splatcat was stuck behind cover at 300 meters due to my AC2's from my Jager.

Ok, now I am absolutely sure you're making things up.

Edited by Shumabot, 21 March 2013 - 05:15 PM.

[Tekadept]

Surely at this stage you have done some preliminary testing on possible angles, do you have any screen mockups to show to avoid a lot of assumptions on what kind of angle you are planning on showing?

Also yes, I would also be interested to know your target demographic, Obviously its not the luddites on the forum.

I hope all those times I've played drunk, didnt come up in your analysis and determine i needed 3rd person

[Oy of MidWorld]

Bryan Ekman, on 21 March 2013 - 05:03 PM, said:

We did an analysis of our data and found that players in general were having a hard time learning how to control their BattleMechs. We spent time studying their behaviours, observing, and then formulated a series of improvements. You have already seen some of them (new user controls). We did some market research, looked at the target demographic that we engaged initially but did not retain (played a few matches and left), and found that many players were not able to easily grasp the concepts of their `Mech, especially movement. 3rd person will help solve some of these issues, along with a new UI, training and testing grounds, and other features coming down the pipeline.

Hope that answers your question.

I find this kind of alarming, does that mean that the whole "building a simulator style/inside the cockpit experience" thing is taking a backseat now? Because that's why i pledged gold for your game. I am part of that initial target demographic. My whole peer group is and we never left. There are still several thousand others around who believed in this. And pledged.

And learning how to control your BattleMech takes about half an hour. Build a tutorial mission. Tuning the game toward a demographic that can't grasp that, is going to turn away people who want to think.

Edited by Oy of MidWorld, 21 March 2013 - 05:21 PM.

[Bryan Ekman]

Roadbeer, on 21 March 2013 - 05:08 PM, said:

It does. Final question. What exactly is your target demographic?

Our target demographic has always been (in very simple non-marketing terms): the male action gamer looking for a little bit more than your average shooter. You can lump in someone who likes anything from Call of Duty to Flight Sims into that bucket.

[N0MAD]

Implementation should go along the lines of games like War Thunder and ARMA where you have say 2 game modes (i know these games have more modes but i mention 2 for ease) You will have say an Arcade mode where the views are on a togle and a Simulator mode where its strictly a FPV.
Having said that personally im totally against a 3rd player view for quite a few reasons, basically it will split player base wich this game cant aford, will create problems in CW, how will you determine how a planet is won if you have 2 diferent populations fighting over it, will not make it any more player friendly as in any new player will soon be playing PoptartWarriors (just look at MW4) i could go on but it would just get to a TL,DR situation.
On a personal note, I bought the Founders package on your vision of a (to keep it simple) Simulator game that you promised, this game has deviated from that by a wide margin and am now feeling used and cheated, no i dont want my $ back but i goto tell you im not happy, not happy at all.

[Demoned]

Bryan Ekman, on 21 March 2013 - 05:03 PM, said:

We did an analysis of our data and found that players in general were having a hard time learning how to control their BattleMechs. We spent time studying their behaviours, observing, and then formulated a series of improvements. You have already seen some of them (new user controls). We did some market research, looked at the target demographic that we engaged initially but did not retain (played a few matches and left), and found that many players were not able to easily grasp the concepts of their `Mech, especially movement. 3rd person will help solve some of these issues, along with a new UI, training and testing grounds, and other features coming down the pipeline.

Hope that answers your question.

forums yes are only a small part of the player base but. if that's true couldn't we say the ones that do post on the forums are the ones that need to be listened to?
lets face it if people can't be bothered to post on the forums to make their views known, is it really necessary to
listen to them in the first place?
and those that do post in the newbie section always leave feeling, more confident in what they need to do in game to work better at it.

yes 3rd person will help these coughcoughs, but so would a tutorial that walks people down the road rather than drag them into it

just my thoughts

edit

Bryan Ekman, on 21 March 2013 - 05:16 PM, said:

Our target demographic has always (in very simple non-marketing terms): the male action gamer looking for a little bit more than your average shooter. You can lump in someone who likes anything from Call of Duty to Flight Sims into that bucket.

looking for more than a average shooter,
you'll find a few that will say that's why they don't want 3rd person brought in.
it'll make MW:O more like a average shooter
what you need to say is
we want to make a game mode for the average gamer

Edited by Demoned, 21 March 2013 - 05:21 PM.

[Bryan Ekman]

syngyne, on 21 March 2013 - 05:09 PM, said:

I can't help but feel that this is only treating the symptom, not the disease. If players are having a hard time controlling their 'Mechs, that points to an inadequacy with the new user experience, not a camera issue. I think if you really wanted to solve this problem, what's needed is a scripted tutorial mission more than anything else. I realize that requires a lot more time and resources to create, but you'll end up with better players as a result, instead of players relying on a crutch.

Yes we agree, 3rd person is not the entire solution, only part of it. Resources are already working primarily on those exact features. Not one single person is working on 3rd person.

[Shumabot]

Bryan Ekman, on 21 March 2013 - 05:16 PM, said:

Our target demographic has always (in very simple non-marketing terms): the male action gamer looking for a little bit more than your average shooter. You can lump in someone who likes anything from Call of Duty to Flight Sims into that bucket.

I asked this a bit ago, but you might not have seen it. What is your plan to avoid playerbase fragmentation? Do you think that a full release population boom would be able to absorb the issue, keeping in mind that you're also planning on splitting up regional servers?

Edited by Shumabot, 21 March 2013 - 05:18 PM.

[Truckasaurus]

syngyne, on 21 March 2013 - 05:09 PM, said:

I can't help but feel that this is only treating the symptom, not the disease. If players are having a hard time controlling their 'Mechs, that points to an inadequacy with the new user experience, not a camera issue. I think if you really wanted to solve this problem, what's needed is a scripted tutorial mission more than anything else. I realize that requires a lot more time and resources to create, but you'll end up with better players as a result, instead of players relying on a crutch.

After reading Bryan's responses I came in to post essentially this. Adding a camera mode that will potentially/probably split the community to fix movement problems of new players seems a bit odd considering there is no tutorial option in the game at all.