543 replies to this topic

[Bishop Steiner]

Rebas Kradd, on 08 September 2014 - 03:30 PM, said:

I do think that the rules need to be a bit different when you're talking about crowdfunding. Government already uses our money to fund all kinds of ******** things we never approved of. We don't need that here as well, however "normal" it may be.

Crowdfunding was the Founders pack. At no other time was any package or product sold or promoted as Crowdfunded. And the only part of the Founders money not spent on MWO, was repaying the start up loan from IGP...to build the alpha of MWO.

Paul Inouye, on 08 September 2014 - 03:37 PM, said:

Well written, well expressed and worth reading every single sentence in the whole post. We are on track in improving things around here and the items of concern you bring up are valid and we are working on meeting those expectations. That's me weighing in on this. Thanks for the write-up.

And for what it's worth... I read the forums daily.. I know your post history .. kidding! It's posts like this that show people willing to dust off a layer of vitriol to try some actual discourse that I hope will be the future direction of more open communications between development and the community.

Thanks Paul, I might give you a hard time at times, but that is because I hold MechWarrior to a high standard. And while we all want things like CW in, for the most part, with a few areas we may disagree, the core of the game mechanics are the most solid MW title ever.

Now if I could just find out why you hate my Summoner and pulse lasers so much.........................

[Runs With Scissors]

headclot, on 08 September 2014 - 08:05 PM, said:

All three of these things are the result of IGP and the PGI partnership.

I would encourage you to watch the recent no guts no galaxy podcast.

so in the podcast PGI blamed those problems on IGP? does not sound good when people push the blame on someone else, but assuming its true I look forward to a much improved MWO experience. (but seeing as PGI has a new game I bet many problems will continue)

Edited by Runs With Scissors, 08 September 2014 - 09:08 PM.

[headclot]

Runs With Scissors, on 08 September 2014 - 09:07 PM, said:

so in the podcast PGI blamed those problems on IGP? does not sound good when people push the blame on someone else, but assuming its true I look forward to a much improved MWO experience. (but seeing as PGI has a new game I bet many problems will continue)

I am taking a hopeful but cautious standing on this.

PGI has been allot more talkative as of late and I can understand why IGP is out of the picture

[Kiiyor]

Runs With Scissors, on 08 September 2014 - 09:07 PM, said:

so in the podcast PGI blamed those problems on IGP? does not sound good when people push the blame on someone else, but assuming its true I look forward to a much improved MWO experience. (but seeing as PGI has a new game I bet many problems will continue)

It's not just the podcast. There have been numerous posts on reddit and in a few other areas of ill repute hinting strongly towards that, and many of those posts were from current or ex devs.

There will always be people saying that all the talk around PGI and IGP being at odds on things was just rumor-mongering to try and give mitigating context to bad decisions, and that PGI are solely responsible for the 'mess' they have created. I think that no matter what happens, these people will continue to stick to that.

You know what? I don't care if that's true.

I may be naive, but i'm prepared to give someone more than once chance, and I won't begrudge PGI for taking a fresh start. It's in the past!

[Bishop Steiner]

Runs With Scissors, on 08 September 2014 - 09:07 PM, said:

so in the podcast PGI blamed those problems on IGP? does not sound good when people push the blame on someone else, but assuming its true I look forward to a much improved MWO experience. (but seeing as PGI has a new game I bet many problems will continue)

nice way to always look for the way to twist things to the negative. Toxicity at it's finest.

[Rufus Landale]

Its still sad that Mechwarrior 4 vanilla has more gameplay content than MWO does in spite of MWO having 500 dollar virtual gold robots people actually BUY. Hell, you can get a Robo Sapien X for like 80 bucks US and it does dances and moves and stuff and is almost 2 feet tall and you can even control it with your iPhone.

Where is the meaningful content? How can anyone want to be happy about this game when its basically just been lies, more lies, delays, more delays, and some terrible ideas like Ghost Heat and a new UI that at best is better than Cyanide's Blood Bowl game?

People are ticked because this game is a poster child for never doing Founder's, Kickstarters, Indiegogos, Patreons, or anything besides waiting till a game is live.

(Also avoiding all F2P games ever honestly.)

[ApolloKaras]

Bishop Steiner, on 08 September 2014 - 09:24 PM, said:

nice way to always look for the way to twist things to the negative. Toxicity at it's finest.

There is a lot of that. You'll see that in some of my posts too Im sure. Frankly its frustrating.

I like your OP, well written and well thought out. I'm with you on everything but the feedback. I think there are many many players who put in quite a bit of time and effort making suggestions. However I think a lot of this almost seems to fall on deaf ears. You don't have a lot of feed back/acknowledgement from the Dev's, the communication is/has been lacking. I'm talking about popular posts, you know the ones where you have 100+ people liking it and 5 pages saying I would love to see something like this!!

[ClumsyKlutz]

Folks, i really admire your loyalty and your unshakable trust in PGI, but in all honesty if this news can't convince you, that you are being robbed for over 3 years now, what will?

After 3 Years and millions of dollars payed for useless chassis in a deatmatch game where everything is still missing what was promised, the devs talk about a new game. Hey we don't like to work on MWO anymore, lets do something else.

In my opinion this whole project is a case for the courts.

But hey, freedom of choice right?
You can sink as much money into this game as you like..but don't you think, afters this record, PGI has earned a little more scepticism?

[Kiiyor]

Saxie, on 08 September 2014 - 09:58 PM, said:

There is a lot of that. You'll see that in some of my posts too Im sure. Frankly its frustrating.

I like your OP, well written and well thought out. I'm with you on everything but the feedback. I think there are many many players who put in quite a bit of time and effort making suggestions. However I think a lot of this almost seems to fall on deaf ears. You don't have a lot of feed back/acknowledgement from the Dev's, the communication is/has been lacking. I'm talking about popular posts, you know the ones where you have 100+ people liking it and 5 pages saying I would love to see something like this!!

Yep, I hope that in the future, something along the lines of an "I appreciate this guys, but this sort of implementation isn't on our radar at the moment, and isn't likely to happen soon" makes it into these sorts of threads. Even if the result is then along the lines of STRING 'IM UP, BOYS, IT'S-A-TIME FOR A-LYNCHIN' it will be appreciated, I think, nonetheless.

[SixstringSamurai]

I think after the town hall on NGNG I'm a bit more at ease. I still have some concerns and questions, namely how my Merc Corp is going to function and did I buy $275 worth of mechs only to not have them playable in CW? But overall I think them splitting ways with IGP was a good move and Russ was at least honest and apologized for much of what the IGP/PGI administration had done. Apparently Paul owes us a post on some more details and later this month we'll see another content package (Mad Dog plz...plz plz) and hopefully some significant game content early October.

[Gooner]

I hope its a fresh start, I'm still hoping that CW will arrive and be what I imagined when I bought my founders pack. But if not, well there are at least 11 other games coming out this year that I'm interested in, and even more next year. So if MWO dies now I guess I'll just play something else.

I have to admit the last couple of announcements seem "interesting". It sounds like PGI now have alot more work to do (2 games) with less resources (because IGP aren't assisting with anything). I guess we'll see how it plays out.

Edited by Gooner, 08 September 2014 - 10:50 PM.

[Joe Decker]

In general I honestly don't care if they start a new Project. Every Gaming Corporation needs multiple Games to make sure the Corporation as a whole is a safe employer.

What I would see as a Problem is if they would stop investing in MWO though. There are bad Examples of Gaming Corps out there, where exactly something like that happened.

All the personnell was stripped from the old Project and invested on the new one. The old Project did not receive much Attention anymore and slowly died.

Something like that is pretty annoying of Course, but the only Thing Customers can do about it is to avoid Corps that acted like that in the Future.

[Bishop Steiner]

SixStringSamurai, on 08 September 2014 - 10:40 PM, said:

I think after the town hall on NGNG I'm a bit more at ease. I still have some concerns and questions, namely how my Merc Corp is going to function and did I buy $275 worth of mechs only to not have them playable in CW? But overall I think them splitting ways with IGP was a good move and Russ was at least honest and apologized for much of what the IGP/PGI administration had done. Apparently Paul owes us a post on some more details and later this month we'll see another content package (Mad Dog plz...plz plz) and hopefully some significant game content early October.

Understandable, though in fairness, while never wrote in stone, since CB, they always described no mixtech, mixed faction for CW. It's why I made a second acct for specifically for Clan Mechs.

[SixstringSamurai]

Bishop Steiner, on 08 September 2014 - 10:58 PM, said:

Understandable, though in fairness, while never wrote in stone, since CB, they always described no mixtech, mixed faction for CW. It's why I made a second acct for specifically for Clan Mechs.

Yeah that's what a few of us have done as well and I started one but I've put so much into this one and realized that supporting both to be at least semi-competitive was outside of my cash flow for the moment sadly.

[Runs With Scissors]

I'm not against PGI getting a fresh start or giving them a second chance.

I'm worried that the announcement of a new game means that after they launch CW module 2 MWO is on the backburner while they focus on their new game. For a game studio that's normal but for whatever reasons PGI has had a lot of problems, no one can deny this. what they are and whose fault they are is irrelevant really.

Because of that for any new game PGI makes many of the people who play MWO are going to sit it out and wait to see what develops, instead of buying in. IM certainly going to. And that will deny a new game a solid chunk of (paying) players it needs to succeed. Particularly since this new game isn't an IP like MWO with a built in fanbase.

I'm NOT one of those people who want PGI to fail cause i'm full of bile and spite. I WANT them to succeed. But the record is against them, and how it seems like their trying to pass that record off on IGP....

I'm going to withhold judgement but I'll also be withholding my cash for now. Just have to wait and see

[Appogee]

I want to believe. Honestly I do. I may even spend another $120 chasing that dream.

But how many times have we been at this exact point, with wonderful visions painted and commitments made? And where exactly are we now?

[BLOOD WOLF]

Appogee, on 08 September 2014 - 11:09 PM, said:

I want to believe. Honestly I do. I may even spend another $120 chasing that dream.

But how many times have we been at this exact point, with wonderful visions painted and commitments made? And where exactly are we now?

yea how many times. There is irony in that charlie brown picture.

[Cavendish]

Great post Bishop.

As for the fresh start, well with IGP out of the picture at least we now know where to direct our anger/praise

Like many others I have been here since the founder program and yes its been a bumpy ride to say the least, but I want to say a few words about the hate and gall that these forums have held as a tradition:

Yes, promises were made. PGI wanted to do so much with this game, make it more then a FPS with "big stompy robots".
No, they did not deliver this. Just like any hyped up game (this was hyped up in the BT/MW community) it did not, and have not, delivered the second comming of MW. Due to this people, myself included, have on an off blamed PGI for being downright stupid, incompetent and lazy, dragging their feet at developing the game to "where it should be". Features like 3PV, ghost heat has been introduced and almost fanaticaly spewed bile on by some players, while others have been everything from "meh" to "great!" about it. For a long time PGI has allowed unheard of levels of hatred to run like wildfire on these forums, far longer then I expected, and when they have clamped down on things there has always been "Cencorship! They are trying to hide the truth!" and so on and so forth, when in reality the posters may have had a point, but written their posts in such a way that a gang-banger from south central would blush at the language and insults included in them, much less read them and bothered to try to understand the underlying message.

So yeah, PGI has a LOT to prove these comming months but looking back on what has happened so far in 2014 I have to say that it is at least looking better. Sure, I might not agree with Pauls views on balance (AC2....really?) or with how Nico intend to structure these forums and such, but on the other hand I am having fun in the game and wish for it to grow and include more features. In the past the community has provided tons of suggestions and ways of handling issues, most of it has not been in alignment with how PGI wish the game to be (and then been blamed for "not listening" or "not caring about their customers") but the fact is that we are playing the game PGI provides, not the game we allways wanted.

All we can do is to try and try again to make our points and hope PGI agrees, because despite what certain posters claim I am fairly sure that they actually do read the suggestions and at least briefly think about them before going "uh nuh".

In short, PGI is making a game (well, two apparently!) and those that find enjoyment in it will stay with it despite being called "white knights" or other things, while for some reason people who dont like the game, yet somehow plays it but only now and then....like every day, will continue to "tell the horrible truth" about the entire project and company handling it and how it is doomed, but hopefully not on these forums any more.

[NextGame]

So my answer to the thread is this:

Whenever PGI feel that they need acceptance of something, usually something they want to sell, they tend to go into PR mode, like we are seeing now. At the moment the reason is around their new game announcement and that it has been received negatively, and their response is to shore it up with assurances that MWO is still important to them.

Personally, I think that as a game development company, it is correct that they explore and work on new projects, particularly as they only have 1 game to support their company at the moment. First person shooters by their own nature are very boom or bust in terms of lifecycle in that you have the counterstrikes and team fortresses which can keep a community for several years, but in reality most shooters are gone within a couple of years. MWO is on the middle of a see-saw right now, with some determination, creativity and development effort, it can have longevity, because the community for this IP and game format is there for it, but if it continues being 10 maps and 3 game modes, and $30 mechs, then no, it's going to die.

It is not entirely unreasonable to draw parallels with Hi-Rez Tribes: Ascend. Being a Tribes 1 & Tribes 2 player that was a game I really wanted to succeed. What happened however was that Hi-Rez built some very dumbed down game mechanics, a handful of maps and then went "lol, time for a new project, bye bye" as soon as the revenue stream started to dip, because they had built a game for the casuals, nothing new was being added to hold them, and they had begun floating away to newer things.

Now granted, PGI and Hi-Rez are different entities, and therefore it's not fair to tar with the same brush, but the point being is that the business model could very very easily be the same, especially given how MWO has been monetised to date, and that non-revenue content comes at a pace that can only be described as glacial.

I think that ultimately we *are* seeing a change in how PGI operate, and they have certainly been showing their more human side lately. Although I personally do not like the message, particularly some items around forum moderation, a change in approach to community engagement and MWO in general will probably be a good thing for the wider community and the game we play.

That said, there is still a reluctance to address elephant-in-the-room matters. For example, in the questions about their new game thread, the overriding question throughout v2 of the thread was essentially "why should we even consider looking at this new title, given how MWO has progressed". Granted, not a straightforward question to answer, and probably quite an embarrassing one to even have to address, but there's no point steering away from it. Unless I have missed something though, this particular question was not addressed.

Regarding IGP now being out of the equation. It means that the jury is out, and only time will tell whether it actually means anything different for ourselves as players or not. But we have been in similar jury being out situations before and been let down, for example the various re-shiftings of the MWO development roadmap. The ball is once again at the feet of PGI to decide how to best play, but it has a slow puncture, and a couple of the panels are tearing off or have gone missing.

Edited by NextGame, 09 September 2014 - 12:45 AM.

[Jez]

It took me a while to figure out just what it is about this thread, and the forums in general, that have been raising red flags in my head. I'm not sure how to describe it but it feels very similar to the phenomenon that the communities of Palm, Blackberry, and a number of other long gone MMOs have faced.

It's as if all those people with new or casual interest in the product are gone and the only ones left speaking are the fanatics and die-hard haters. The middle ground has been lost and the only voices left are those from the extreme end of the spectrum. When I see a noticeable drop in new threads created and a reduction in topic diversity all of this combined are sending alarms going off in my head telling me that the company has lost its grip on its customer base and its efforts are no longer focused on bringing in new customers but rather fighting to retain its remaining customers and convince its departed customers to give it another look.

Based on what I saw with Palm, RIM (Blackberry), HP, Dell, and too many MMOs, I would hazard to guess that MWO is past the point of no return and is on the downtrend of its life cycle. I think we are past the high point and MWO's heydays are far, far, back in the rear view mirror. I'm not saying the game is on its deathbed cause it could go on for years, but we've definitely seen its best days already.

When the day comes where only the hardcore fanatics are running the forums and the haters have moved on to other things then I know that this game is on borrowed time.

**My personally take on PGIs 2nd project: It sounds to me that for a small development company with limited resources, they no longer are willing to risk all their eggs into 1 basket (MWO). This is a move that says to me they aren't confident that MWO will be successful enough in the long term for the company to survive on. Project #2 is their insurance, their back up plan, their acknowledgement that they are no longer as rosey about the game as they once were.

Edited by Jez, 09 September 2014 - 12:50 AM.