1555 replies to this topic

[New Day]

Ngamok, on 19 August 2013 - 10:57 AM, said:

Because Steam does the same thing, right?

Steam can afford to do that, PGI can't. The public opinion of PGI is bad enough as is. Not to mention that PGI's rewards are **** (statues, really?). Steam usually gives you half a dozen games from the publisher/franchise.

Edited by NamesAreStupid, 19 August 2013 - 12:24 PM.

[stjobe]

Druidika, on 19 August 2013 - 12:04 PM, said:

If the progress bar keeps advancing at the current rate, phase 3 will be unlocked mid-november:

While they haven't announced an end date to Project Phoenix, the 'mechs will be delivered October 15th. Whether the campaign continues after that is anyone's guess, so to be on the safe side we need to entice more people to purchase

I wants mah flames, dagnabbit!

Edited by stjobe, 19 August 2013 - 01:11 PM.

[Grimlox]

Free colours are always nice and while they MAY be somewhat similar to the PC Gamer colours it is obviously not exactly the same. Not sure what drives people to complain about something they are not entitled to. You agreed to pay X dollars for your Phoenix Package and if they want to give away extra free stuff above and beyond that then why complain?

Also I'm guessing they aren't posting the actual numbers so that they can ensure the phase 3 is unlocked. This way everyone is happy that paid into the package and PGI gets to say they met their sales goals (whatever those might be). We aren't entitled to know how many packages they have sold or need to sell.

Thanks PGI for the additional bonus rewards on top of what I already paid for. Keep them coming

[Druidika]

stjobe, on 19 August 2013 - 01:10 PM, said:

While they haven't announced an end date to Project Phoenix, the 'mechs will be delivered October 15th. Whether the campaign continues after that is anyone's guess, so to be on the safe side we need to entice more people to purchase

I wants mah flames, dagnabbit!

You aren't really believing that the progress bar reflects actual sales, are you? It will jump to a phase unlock whenever their marketing team thinks it's a good idea to do so.

The images are all already on the server, ready to be changed whenever. Here's how the fully unlocked bar will look:

Edited by Druidika, 19 August 2013 - 01:16 PM.

[Appogee]

This scheme seems overall kind of an odd idea to me. I and my two sons all bought Phoenix packages. We're done. There's nothing we can do to advance the overall tally to any additional tier. So now we just look at a horizontal bar maybe going up and if other people do something we get some free stuff. Odd.

Druidika, on 19 August 2013 - 12:04 PM, said:

The progress bar is now at 50%, after roughly 68 hours.

It can't stay at the same rate though. Every person who signs up is one less left to sign up. Sure there may be new players signing up. But it seems to me there's a long way to go to get to that third tier.

[Appogee]

Druidika, on 19 August 2013 - 01:12 PM, said:

The images are all already on the server, ready to be changed whenever. Here's how the fully unlocked bar will look:

This is why we can't have nice things.

[stjobe]

Druidika, on 19 August 2013 - 01:12 PM, said:

The images are all already on the server, ready to be changed whenever. Here's how the fully unlocked bar will look:

So? If you were a web designer asked to do an image-based progress bar, would you wait until the values were actually passed before making the next image?

Occam want's a word with you, it seems you misplaced his razor.

[Wintersdark]

Here's thing. You don't want that bar to accurately reflect sales, and neither does pgi

Not because sales are bad but because if its just an arbitrary bar they can simply advance it whenver they want to pull in some more sales with increased value, while keeping the whole event exciting for everyone. This means they don't need to paint themselves into a corner where they cannot give out the rewards.

This isnt PGI being incompetent ********, its PGI making a promotion where we all win regardless.

[Hexenhammer]

Wintersdark, on 19 August 2013 - 01:38 PM, said:

This isnt PGI being incompetent ********, its PGI making a promotion where we all win regardless.

And PGI always win. Even if "we" don't '"unlock" all three tiers of the Phoenix Project. They can sell the Flame Pattern in the lab and make money off it that way. They aren't going to ditch it just because Phoenix mechs didn't sell well enough.

Edited by Hexenhammer, 19 August 2013 - 01:44 PM.

[Chronojam]

Druidika, on 19 August 2013 - 12:04 PM, said:

The progress bar is now at 50%, after roughly 68 hours

If the progress bar keeps advancing at the current rate, phase 3 will be unlocked mid-november:

This is pretty interesting. Hopefully PGI can maintain announcement-weekend numbers for the next several months.

[Chronojam]

stjobe, on 19 August 2013 - 01:32 PM, said:

So? If you were a web designer asked to do an image-based progress bar, would you wait until the values were actually passed before making the next image?

Occam want's a word with you, it seems you misplaced his razor.

imagejpeg is always ready and waiting to be called and there are plenty of javascript graphing libraries available to do the trick. You've doubtlessly seen any number of forum signatures for popular videogames that display a player's statistics, progress to their next unlock, character levels, most recent match results, etc. You can't honestly believe those are handcrafted and updated by a dedicated support team tirelessly uploading fresh jpg images to a server, it's all automated.

[Mike Getsome]

The same colours as with PC Gamer - pointless gimmick.

[Nekki Basara]

stjobe, on 19 August 2013 - 01:32 PM, said:

So? If you were a web designer asked to do an image-based progress bar, would you wait until the values were actually passed before making the next image?

Occam want's a word with you, it seems you misplaced his razor.

I'd use the pre-existing generation tools that were made to save effort in the long-term. That's pretty much the entire purpose of having computers.

[Hexenhammer]

Chronojam, on 19 August 2013 - 01:50 PM, said:

imagejpeg is always ready and waiting to be called and there are plenty of javascript graphing libraries available to do the trick. You've doubtlessly seen any number of forum signatures for popular videogames that display a player's statistics, progress to their next unlock, character levels, most recent match results, etc. You can't honestly believe those are handcrafted and updated by a dedicated support team tirelessly uploading fresh jpg images to a server, it's all automated.

Shhhhh don't use logic with the natives. Its black magic and we don't like it.

[Wintersdark]

Mike Getsome, on 19 August 2013 - 01:53 PM, said:

The same colours as with PC Gamer - pointless gimmick.

Absolutely. Except, of course, that they are not the same colours. Or a pointless gimmick, for that matter - it increases the value of the package. This renews some interest in the ProPho packs, pushing some sales, and makes everyone who already bought it a bit happier cuz they GOTS NEW STUFFS.

Hell, even if they were the PCGamer colours, the vast majority of players never had the opportunity to get the PCGamer rewards (well, there ARE ways to get it still, but it's a PITA) so it'd be great for them.

I'm nothing but happy for free stuff.

The amount of grouching and bitching over free bonus stuff given out in this thread is crazy.

[Belorion]

Chronojam, on 19 August 2013 - 01:50 PM, said:

imagejpeg is always ready and waiting to be called and there are plenty of javascript graphing libraries available to do the trick. You've doubtlessly seen any number of forum signatures for popular videogames that display a player's statistics, progress to their next unlock, character levels, most recent match results, etc. You can't honestly believe those are handcrafted and updated by a dedicated support team tirelessly uploading fresh jpg images to a server, it's all automated.

Wouldn't you rather they do something more constructive with their time... perhaps update ckeditor since the one they are using has a IE10 specific bug where you can't hit enter. (other browsers work fine)

[Chronojam]

Wintersdark, on 19 August 2013 - 01:58 PM, said:

The amount of grouching and bitching over free bonus stuff given out in this thread is crazy.

It's mostly about how poorly run the promotion is, coupled with the underwhelmingly hollow new colors that add very little actual variety. That's the problem with a lot of mech variants, actually; we shouldn't celebrate the Stalker 4N and we shouldn't celebrate the rehash of the PC Gamer palette. It seems a little dishonest to distill it down to "people are just mad about free stuff."

Belorion, on 19 August 2013 - 02:03 PM, said:

Wouldn't you rather they do something more constructive with their time... perhaps update ckeditor since the one they are using has a IE10 specific bug where you can't hit enter. (other browsers work fine)

I have assurances that your "enter" key will work once UI 2.0 is finished.

[Wintersdark]

Hexenhammer, on 19 August 2013 - 01:39 PM, said:

And PGI always win. Even if "we" don't '"unlock" all three tiers of the Phoenix Project. They can sell the Flame Pattern in the lab and make money off it that way. They aren't going to ditch it just because Phoenix mechs didn't sell well enough.

Don't you get it? They set it up this way so they can get more Phoenix sales.

Sure, they COULD just sell the pattern later, but they gain a lot more from Phoenix sales than just MC Patterns. They could always sell it as an MC Pattern later too the flame pattern was never said to remain Phoenix only like the unique mechs.

This is how it works:
Release pack initially, with earlybird bonus, drive lots of sales.

As sales decline (totally natural with a promotion like this), you add a "Congratulations, you've hit this level of sales!" promotion. This renews interest in the whole thing, increases value, so previous buyers are happier and talk about it. Between the increased value and word of mouth, you get another burst of sales.

Then, as the promotion draws to a close, you release the final tier. This again nets you another burst of last minute sales, by giving all those remaining "Fence Sitters" an even better value and final push to jump in.

Finally, afterwards, they still have the option of going all: "Here, we'll add the Flame Pattern as a MC pattern as well, so you other guys can get it too."

Seriously, everyone works so hard to find ways for PGI to be teh evilz, they miss the really obvious and far more reasonable marketing methodology here.

Belorion, on 19 August 2013 - 02:03 PM, said:

Wouldn't you rather they do something more constructive with their time... perhaps update ckeditor since the one they are using has a IE10 specific bug where you can't hit enter. (other browsers work fine)

Or fix the rampant forum bugs, slowness, extreme unpleasantness of trying to use it on a mobile browser, etc, etc. The WebDev's have plenty of more important stuff to do than play with a bar that doesn't and isn't intended to show actual sales anyways.

[stjobe]

Chronojam, on 19 August 2013 - 01:50 PM, said:

imagejpeg is always ready and waiting to be called and there are plenty of javascript graphing libraries available to do the trick. You've doubtlessly seen any number of forum signatures for popular videogames that display a player's statistics, progress to their next unlock, character levels, most recent match results, etc. You can't honestly believe those are handcrafted and updated by a dedicated support team tirelessly uploading fresh jpg images to a server, it's all automated.

Why would anyone "tirelessly upload fresh jpg images to a server"? Make an image of every 5- or 10% progression, upload them all and have a script put the right one on the page.

It's just two ways of achieving the same thing, only difference is what talents you have at your disposal. A graphic artist could probably have those images ready for publication at the same time the web dev had the script ready to display them - and probably in the same time another dev could have done the imagejpeg script.

Neither of them needs to imply anything about whether or not the image accurately represent sales.

And of course it's a way of getting more sales; every "unlock this" promotion is - see kickstarter's stretch goals for a great example. Why would anyone think this is either unusual or bad?

[Chronojam]

Yeah we're pretty crazy for asking for transparency. Pack it up, folks, Wintersdark has this one figured out: PGI needs to market this like a 1990s As-Seen-On-TV informercial that relies on dishonest hooks and "bargains" instead of a modern era crowdfunding project that's more about honesty and real optimism.

stjobe, on 19 August 2013 - 02:09 PM, said:

Why would anyone "tirelessly upload fresh jpg images to a server"? Make an image of every 5- or 10% progression, upload them all and have a script put the right one on the page.

Except they didn't, we already checked. Whoops! How embarrassing.

stjobe, on 19 August 2013 - 02:09 PM, said:

And of course it's a way of getting more sales; every "unlock this" promotion is - see kickstarter's stretch goals for a great example. Why would anyone think this is either unusual or bad?

This comparison -- to Kickstarter's stretch goals, or to StarCitizen's crowdfunding drive-- is exactly what is making folks uneasy. Please, do compare it to Kickstarter for us. What's the stretch goal in terms of sales for Phase 2, remind us again..?