68 replies to this topic

[Brut4ce]

Hello StillRadioActive and all others in this thread. I went through your letter thoughroughly, and i do agree with most of what you write, and it truly must have taken a lot of your effort and time to compile it, which is commendable. I would only like to point out two things;

1) Such long well thought-out letters and suggestions have been posted many times in the past on these forums but none of them has even got at least "sticky'ed" for future reference not only for the project team, but for the players as well...so in short, they reside somewhere in limbo, void of attention....One can only hope though

2)You did comment on bad behaviour patterns in the gaming industry that prevent people from making games and treating that particular field with the respect it deserves. I will only say one thing that is a general prime rule in EVERY business field;
For any particular type of industry to be considered healthy, efficient, productive and generally successful, every business operating in that field should have the appropriate ethos and levels of commitment, communication, and quality as to attract and "educate" their potential recipients-customers to those standards and ultimately form a two-way, strong enough bond between the two, to ensure a healthy and long-standing participation by both sides; i.e. on the business end, being able to have sufficient absorption of their production, and on the recipients' end, to be sufficiently content as to be able to absorb and consume that amount and provide the appropriate feedback back to the industry. When such a loop is completed successfully, it could only lead to the advancement and prosperity of that industrial field.

<S>

[Bongfu]

AMA from a former employee at PGI before they got the Battletech license.

https://www.reddit.c..._to_work_there/

[Bishop Steiner]

Bongfu, on 12 September 2014 - 05:37 AM, said:

AMA from a former employee at PGI before they got the Battletech license.

https://www.reddit.c..._to_work_there/

yes. that all comes across as totally legit.

BTW, I used to be President of the USA. Prove I wasn't.

Edited by Bishop Steiner, 12 September 2014 - 05:40 AM.

[Bongfu]

Bishop Steiner, on 12 September 2014 - 05:39 AM, said:

yes. that all comes across as totally legit.

BTW, I used to be President of the USA. Prove I wasn't.

Believe it or don't, Sir Blanco Knight. However, a lot of his stuff matches up with the community's own research. He doesn't really say anything we didn't already know. If it is legit though, it adds some validity to what we already suspected.

[StillRadioactive]

"He doesn't really say anything we didn't already know."

And that's why it seems fake.

[KraftySOT]

CMetz, on 11 September 2014 - 09:52 PM, said:

How cool is it that we play a game where the PRESIDENT and FOUNDER of the company will directly reply to a customer?

Let that marinade for a second. It doesn't happen. Go ahead and ask the president of EA something. Good luck.

Actually this is totally standard these days. It wasnt even rare 15 years ago. When I started playing World War Two Online, Warbirds, Everquest, Combat Mission, War in the East...all of those titles had pretty much daily interaction with the owner of the company.

The list I could make of companies that do this is much longer than the list of the companies that dont. Pretty much every game in early access has this kind of interaction. Thats pretty much why everyone was upset that it didnt start happening until this point.

It has its drawbacks too. People like to be liked, were all guilty of it, and people are prone to say things are going to happen that arent, cant, or wont for a while...and people get disappointed.

Honestly they just need an ingame voting system on some issues. Starting with "Do you think theres an issue with this?" and if youre not getting over 60% of the people even saying theres a problem in the first place. Dont bloody well mess with it.

And polls buy you time. Run em for a month. Make sure you get as many votes as possible. Then vote on possible solutions. Then a final vote on the solution. Itll take you 3 months just to figure out what to do about ECM. Then you have a legitimate 3-6 months to do something about it. Were happy. Devs are happy. Everyones happy. Cept Poland.

Edited by KraftySOT, 14 September 2014 - 11:32 AM.

[Kraven Kor]

Russ Bullock, on 11 September 2014 - 03:40 PM, said:

What about XP, stats? there would be a limit but want to make sure I understand what exactly would be required.

I think you just need some type of reward for PTS participation; be it C-Bills, XP, MC, camo / cockpit unlocks, etc.

The more you reward PTS participation, the more you'll get participating in PTS.

And the longer you leave PTS up for testing, the better results you get. And it is test so you can do things like adjust values on the fly or try the full IS vs. full Clan matches, with less complaints of it affecting a player's experience.

[Bishop Steiner]

Kraven Kor, on 15 September 2014 - 07:36 AM, said:

I think you just need some type of reward for PTS participation; be it C-Bills, XP, MC, camo / cockpit unlocks, etc.

The more you reward PTS participation, the more you'll get participating in PTS.

And the longer you leave PTS up for testing, the better results you get. And it is test so you can do things like adjust values on the fly or try the full IS vs. full Clan matches, with less complaints of it affecting a player's experience.

agreed.

I also suggested to Russ to make it weekend long tests, and to host Challenges on it like the Lance challenge we just had. Of course...with the rewards actually counting and not getting wiped, after, lol.

[Thermal Scorpion]

Russ, as you're watching this thread I'd like to toss this out. If you're looking for a good example of a game's community and the devs working together take a gander at Marvel Heroes. I don't think I've ever seen the same level of engagement from a developer on any other game I've played. They are in their forums daily asking for feedback, showing progress, showing concept art, showing early stage models.

This wasn't always the case. They made some of the same mistakes PGI has but they learned from them quickly and altered their processes and policies to increase customer satisfaction.

As with any game not everyone is thrilled with the direction Marvel's development takes at times but the devs do an incredibly good job at explaining why they do what they do as well as engaging with their customers. I would bet that they also have far more stringent guidelines they have to follow as Marvel/Disney run a very tight ship and nearly everything they make is approved by Marvel before it can be shown and/or released.

They also run test servers regularly and collect feedback all the time. The test periods are typically a weekend, or week long affair and correspond to new builds that add/change features, characters etc. They get players in to test the new stuff as soon as they can and have delayed their releases when player feedback shows that they are headed down the wrong path, something isn't tuned well etc. This has given them superior agility in managing community satisfaction.

Aside from the Transverse timing/Reddit fiasco I think you guys have generally gotten better with communication as well as meeting your promises. That makes me happy as a customer, it gives me hope that the will is there to improve. Dealing with an angry community and admitting fault isn't enjoyable but it is a necessary investment in your product.

As a Legendary Founder, An Overlord, Saber Pack and a Masakari pack purchaser I hope that this split from IGP really does change the way you and your folks work with the community for the better.