57 replies to this topic

[RustyBolts]

I agree and this has been brought up before. However, the "Let them focus on the game first" crowd usually overpower those who want them to do something with the forums.

[Alistair Winter]

StraferX, on 08 March 2015 - 04:54 AM, said:

I whole heartedly disagree as I think the website is great.

[HellJumper]

Problem is simple..

With so many things incomplete... website is a small thing alone..

UI, game it self, lack of content, communication etc...soo much stuff is incomplete..

the game actually is just giant Battletech robots fighting each other.. no purpose nothing...so thats why thhey havent bothered with website

[Vassago Rain]

HellJumper, on 08 March 2015 - 05:17 AM, said:

Problem is simple..

With so many things incomplete... website is a small thing alone..

UI, game it self, lack of content, communication etc...soo much stuff is incomplete..

the game actually is just giant Battletech robots fighting each other.. no purpose nothing...so thats why thhey havent bothered with website

The website could be fixed by copy-pasting from sarna.

It's an afternoon's work to put fluff on there. Documentation, aka a manual, would take a bit longer, but if I can make an in guild one in less than a week, a paid professional with full access to all the numbers and mechanics should be able to do so in one week, too.

[9erRed]

Greetings all,

Just to clear the air here a bit.

The developers who work on the web page(s) are not any of the same people that work on the game and code.
- when all the web info was transferred from IGP to PGI there was a time gap and personnel shortage at PGI.
- there may still be this issue with having no one to actually work on any new/old web page material.
(yes, we get notices and events posted, but it's not the same.)

Everyone is correct in that the current pages are exactly the same as 'at the time of transfer' from IGP, nothing appears to have been added/updated at all.
- There are still openings at PGI for web orientated and skilled personnel.
- They do have one of the 'original' designers of the BattleTech games and franchise working with them, should not be that difficult to address game history and Lore related materials for those that 'really don't know what the backstory is'.

Note here:
Any info about this game and it's 'storyline' needs to be 'Official and/or property' of PGI or the 'BattleTech Franchise',
- reference material from Sarna or other sites, licenced reference books, or manuals would all need to be checked, and authenticated to comply with what the MWO game offers. Probably need Lawyers involved as with most things.

It would be nice to see some progress on these pages and updating the content, the Clan Wave 2 and 3 pages are actually designed and laid out rather good. But those are not directly related to this site, and we may be just looking at 'static pages'.

So info from the Dev.'s at one of the 'TownHalls' would be a good start, even if it's just to tell use it's 'not a high priority' right now. But if you have an application or resume in that field, sent it in.

Aim True and Run Cool,
9erRed

Edited by 9erRed, 08 March 2015 - 05:32 AM.

[HellJumper]

Vassago Rain, on 08 March 2015 - 05:21 AM, said:

The website could be fixed by copy-pasting from sarna.

It's an afternoon's work to put fluff on there. Documentation, aka a manual, would take a bit longer, but if I can make an in guild one in less than a week, a paid professional with full access to all the numbers and mechanics should be able to do so in one week, too.

thats where the problem lies.. they dont want to pay a professional and they dont even want the community to do it...

Edited by HellJumper, 08 March 2015 - 05:25 AM.

[Trashhead]

Alistair Winter, on 08 March 2015 - 04:25 AM, said:

Very well put. Of course, it's an exaggeration. This game has a lot of players who never heard of Battletech before, especially the younger ones. But I think your comment still hits pretty close to the mark.

Mechwarrior 2 made you a fan of Battletech by being incredibly immersive. You weren't simply an anonymous entity shooting robots, you were a Clan Mechwarrior on the road to Terra. Similarly, MW2:Mercenaries really made you feel like an Inner Sphere mercenary commander, and introduced you to the different factions in a great way. I think those games actually made lots of people look up Battletech novels and table top, where MWO probably doesn't have the same effect.

To be honest, it was ment to be an exaggeration.
But i was trying to make a point.

Anyway, it is kind of sad that PGi originally wanted to make a Solo player game,
but couldn't because of a lack of money.
Hence the idea of a crowd-founded Multiplayer shooter was born.

I think if the game could move to some extent into the direction of a Role Play game, only a little bit... it ~could~ make a difference.
Like having two pilots - 1 IS, 1 Clan - with two hangers.
(You would have to choose with which you want to play CW then, of cause.)

Speaking of CW - I think the game has it all wrong in one aspect:
We have 3 game modes with symmetrical goals (Skirmish, Assault, Conquest)
and 1 with asymmetrical goals (CW).
The first are more like Call of Duty game modes without respawn (whereas in CoD it had infinitive respawn)
the later one is more like CounterStrike with (limited) respawn (whereas CS had none).

I personally think it should be the other way around, or better, just no respawn at all.
(Plus this would get rid of the not very epic spawn camping in CW, while i know we will then have rofl-stomps; but at least there are not so agonizing for the loosing team.)
But i am pretty alone with this opinion, i guess. It just feels more intense and challenging to me, then having 3 more "lives"... . Besides, I suck as a pilot anyway, so 3 more "lives" do not change anything for me.

Then again i wonder why we discuss this entire matter.
While the community (the part that knows and cares about the forum) is pretty vocal, PGI is not. Yes, we have a new community manager, but she's not going to change PGI's information politics.

I even made a suggestion on how to improve the communication between PGI and the players.
(-> Suggestion For Improved Communication Between Pgi And The Community)
Three responses by other players, then it disappeared into the void of "Page 2 and beyond".
Which tells me that either my suggestion is garbage (which is totally possible) and no one had a heart to tell me (which is not very likely) - or that it was not read by PGI. Actually we never know what PGI is reading, or even IF. *Waves at Tina Benoit*

For me this - the lack of feedback to our concerns from PGI - is one reason why we see the same topics appear and re-appear over and over again.
Yes, certain topics are simply... not worth reading.
Would i be the Community manager, reading the 52th "Flamer needs to be fix"-Thread would not exactly excite me that much... .
But it is a good example of miscommunication and the total lack of communication.
Simply answer to the "Flamer is worthless, please fix"-Issue is (imho):
"It is worthless because it was meant to fight infantry and as a tactical weapon; we don't have these 2 options in game yet, but we are working on it.
Meanwhile we left them in the game because we feel they are part of BattleTech and therefor belong here - sorry Lil' Adder, but again, we are working on it.
best Regards,
PGI"
^ Such an answer would most likely stop the constant re-appearance of the Flamer-Threads AND show us that PGI is actually reading the forum and does care.
(Hint: create a "Flamer-the ultimate discussion thread" and stick it somewhere; better yet: create more sub-forums for different topics such as weapons, mechs, game modes, etc. so we have a better overview, THEN stick the Flamer thread in the Weapons-Sub forum.)

Communication means a lot.
To quote the new community manager from -> THIS thread:

Tina Benoit, on 05 March 2015 - 01:03 PM, said:

No no we're reading~

(..)

While i appreciate this, the problem is, we - the community forum-warriors - have absolutely no way to tell if you do or not.
For the most time, posting in this forum and addressing YOU, PGI, is like talking into a void - you don't get any response, not even a negative one - which is still better then none.
This has the potential to create frustration - on both sides.
(Again, i know a lot of the topics here are hard to read, and some are even insulting, so i really hope the people from PGi that have to read through all this get payed really well.)

Well, i don't know what to say anymore, i'm done
I hope i did not derail this thread to much, but i had to get this of my chest.
I hope no one feels insulted, as this was not my intention.

Thrashead, out. o7

[Tarogato]

Trashhead, on 08 March 2015 - 05:47 AM, said:

For me this - the lack of feedback to our concerns from PGI - is one reason why we see the same topics appear and re-appear over and over again.

Yes, certain topics are simply... not worth reading. ... reading the 52th "Flamer needs to be fix" thread isn't exactly exciting... but it is a good example of miscommunication / total lack of communication.
A simple answer to the "Flamer is worthless, please fix" thread could be:

"It is worthless because it was meant to fight infantry and as a tactical weapon; we don't have these two options in game yet, but we are working on it. Meanwhile we left them in the game because we feel they are part of BattleTech and therefore belong here - sorry Lil' Adder, but again, we are working on it. Best Regards, PGI."


^ Such an answer would most likely stop the constant re-appearance of the Flamer-Threads AND show us that PGI is actually reading the forum and does care.

^ Reformatted and paraphrased for easier reading, because it was a mess.

I can't reiterate the message here enough. PGI needs to have an official presence on their forums answering questions and just generally existing, because right now... PGI doesn't exist on their own forums. The amount of repetitiveness in forum QQ because PGI never address topics is maddening. It took months upon months of threads before we finally TWEETED Russ to fix the Gargoyle archetype. And when we Tweeted him about it, he seemed blissfully unaware that the forums had been griping about it for months.

[Koniving]

Mudhutwarrior, on 08 March 2015 - 03:36 AM, said:

The tower of babel.
Good reference and the application fits in a way.

Though seriously I need to welcome everyone to 2013 -- the last time the website received an update anywhere beyond the front page or additional pages obscured in various links.

[Koniving]

Trashhead, on 08 March 2015 - 04:03 AM, said:

I knew a lot about BattleTech because after my first contact with BattleTech, which was the MEchWarrior2 games, i started to buy novels and even some Technical Readout books, although i never played the TableTop game.

If you're interested, there are other Liaos at Zhizhu who play tabletop. More specifically we use Megamek because online tabletop thingy that handles all the rules, board generation, etc (yay super time saver!). With very little direction I've seen people who knew absolutely nothing about it start to enjoy it (though the fear of the Urbanmech was absolutely priceless! "I dunno, all I know is everyone seems obsessed with that thing. Stay back!") Good stuff.

Evenings during the weekdays, day time during the weekends. Drop me a message if you get curious.

(Random side note, compared to the last time I looked at the site about a month ago, they completely changed all the screenshots. Comical, considering we're in a thread about how the majority of the MWO website hasn't been updated since 2013.)

[Tarogato]

Koniving, on 28 March 2015 - 02:22 PM, said:

(Random side note, compared to the last time I looked at the site about a month ago, they completely changed all the screenshots. Comical, considering we're in a thread about how the majority of the MWO website hasn't been updated since 2013.)

What screenshots? The screenshots section of the website hasn't been updated since Wave 1.

Many of them should be removed and replaced with Lordred's work, it's much better and it would be a great way to spotlight the community and keep people coming back to the page to see what wonder work has been included.

[Mr D One]

Alistair Winter, on 08 March 2015 - 12:51 AM, said:

PGI, if you need some volunteers, I'm sure a lot of players are ready to help you out with this stuff, especially the lore stuff.

Hi AW, good forum topic. Here is some skimmed source material from my battle tech source books. Hope this helps you M8.

[Koniving]

Tarogato, on 28 March 2015 - 10:26 PM, said:

What screenshots? The screenshots section of the website hasn't been updated since Wave 1.

Many of them should be removed and replaced with Lordred's work, it's much better and it would be a great way to spotlight the community and keep people coming back to the page to see what wonder work has been included.

You didn't notice the entire post was about Megamek, short of commenting that Megamek had just replaced every single one of their screenshots to showcase the latest updates while we're in a thread about how MWO hasn't updated most of its website since 2013.

And I completely agree.

Edited by Koniving, 29 March 2015 - 08:38 AM.

[Deathz Jester]

I think a lot of slack on information and what not has been picked up by a number of the community members. But yes actual developer content for the forums/website are lacking.


Uh on a side note anyone tell me how to change my forum title again, it seems I've forgotten or can't find it.

The little "legendary founder", etc. Title

[anonymous161]

Yeah they really need to expand this game beyond just collecting battlemechs. Yes they are very good looking models, though I wish the maps had more variety for example the new cw map...just looks ugly and copy paste everywhere too me, there is another map just like it only it's desert, need more unique structures.

As for info on lore yes this needs to be done. I remember they used to have some short story for certain mechs like the heavy metal.

[Will9761]

I agree that PGI really does need to update this site. Especially if this game is coming to steam. A PGI member should take a look at this thread to make their site better. I know that they could not do it because of the focus of game balance, but now it is time to fill up the rest of the website's contents. Leaving it the same way is now inexcusable especially for this game. The information that needs sprucing are things like: Game Modes, Maps and Clan Omnimechs.

[Lordred]

Tarogato, on 28 March 2015 - 10:26 PM, said:

What screenshots? The screenshots section of the website hasn't been updated since Wave 1.

Many of them should be removed and replaced with Lordred's work, it's much better and it would be a great way to spotlight the community and keep people coming back to the page to see what wonder work has been included.

I am honored by your opinion.

[Nothing Whatsoever]

Iron Harlequin, on 29 March 2015 - 08:47 AM, said:

I think a lot of slack on information and what not has been picked up by a number of the community members. But yes actual developer content for the forums/website are lacking.


Uh on a side note anyone tell me how to change my forum title again, it seems I've forgotten or can't find it.

The little "legendary founder", etc. Title

Titles and Badges can be changed in-game, you can find the tab below the Testing Grounds and Tutorials from the Home tab.

[TheSilken]

Lordred, on 29 March 2015 - 08:54 PM, said:

I am honored by your opinion.

And dead by my many.....many............MANY missiles hahaha. If you guys had been there you would have felt the hatred towards me by him and Kon. Gosh I love playing MegaMek with them.

But yes Lordred's pictures deserve to be on the screenshot page since he puts sooo much time/effort into them. Seriously sit in comms with him while he takes them and especially when he's processing the literally hundreds-thousands of high depth pics to find that special one or two.

[Dino Might]

Alistair Winter, on 08 March 2015 - 12:51 AM, said:

PGI, if you need some volunteers, I'm sure a lot of players are ready to help you out with this stuff, especially the lore stuff. It's kind of silly that we have to go to Smurfy to see the maps, in addition to building mechs.

Excellent post. You raise an issue, explain why it's an issue, and offer a solution. You have reached the 1% of forum posters that is trying to make things better. Keep at it. I hope they listen. Using some of knowledge base and talent of the enthusiasts here could lead to some seriously awesome developments, and ones I think that are absolutely critical before release on Steam. I remember old games, where I would spend hours upon hours reading everything in the game, from the news blurbs between the missions to the codex files on everything and everyone in the universe. It's something that adds so much to the game. Sure, a lot of people skip all of that stuff, and they just get their stompy robot fun. But for those that get invested in the setting, it really adds to the experience. Fiction is a fantastic arena, in which we get to live out fantasy lives. It's why I love reading literature so much. I can live but only one life if I do not read.

My recommendation is to work up something on your own. Build a draft product that they could, in a day, polish and post as a main part of their website. Granted, there are legal concerns and all that, but I'm sure there are ways to do it right. If you provide the answer and then give them the completed or near completed work, they are much more likely to use it. Now, the risk is that they don't and you are out the time and effort invested. If you are willing to take that risk (i.e., if you will enjoy building the background regardless), then go for it. I'm sure you can rustle up plenty of others to help out. Worst case is that you make a reference website and post it yourself, get a sticky in the forum directing people to that as one of the key sources for MWO, kind of like Smurfy.

Edited by Dino Might, 30 March 2015 - 01:32 PM.