172 replies to this topic

[WarHippy]

Paul Inouye, on 11 August 2015 - 11:30 AM, said:

....


Again... I read the forums daily. I do not have the time to respond to them because that would generally lead to a discussion. If I did this for every post/idea/feedback thread I would have zero time to get my day to day and feature planning tasks done. The forums actually ARE the best place to give feedback/suggestions. The CM (Tina) also collates and highlights all high activity threads for us which are brought up in a weekly production meeting.

I guess this is me asking you not to make the assumption that the forums are a deadzone where feedback goes to die. I use twitter probably once or twice every two weeks. If I'm looking for the heartbeat of a certain topic.. I come here. Not Twitter, not Instagram, not Facebook, not Reddit.... here.. the MWO Forums.

I appreciate that you came in here to say that. My concern has never been with you guys not reading, but rather not communicating. That underlined part is what bothers me. I fully understand that time is an issue for you and all of your coworkers, but is it really that time consuming to have at least one or two conversations every couple of weeks on one topic or another? Is the concern over having an actual conversation eating up a little time here and there really a justification to almost never respond? I really can sympathize with your position I just don't know why it always seems to be all or nothing.

[Duke Nedo]

WarHippy, on 11 August 2015 - 12:54 PM, said:

I appreciate that you came in here to say that. My concern has never been with you guys not reading, but rather not communicating. That underlined part is what bothers me. I fully understand that time is an issue for you and all of your coworkers, but is it really that time consuming to have at least one or two conversations every couple of weeks on one topic or another? Is the concern over having an actual conversation eating up a little time here and there really a justification to almost never respond? I really can sympathize with your position I just don't know why it always seems to be all or nothing.

Discussing takes lots of time, and if you commit it's hard to back out... and anything they write can be quoted forever and be held against them. So... it's smart not to engage too often in two-way discussions.

I sit with a feeling that the players here have some influence, for good and bad... so yeah, in game polls would be a good thing. Then we don't have to worry as much about the vocal minority thing.

[Xetelian]

I see responses to things by staff every so often but it is entirely true that the forums are not the best place to contact PGI.

Twitter has replaced forums,

[WarHippy]

Duke Nedo, on 11 August 2015 - 01:07 PM, said:

Discussing takes lots of time, and if you commit it's hard to back out... and anything they write can be quoted forever and be held against them. So... it's smart not to engage too often in two-way discussions.

Like I said I understand that, but that shouldn't be an excuse to almost never do it. Every couple weeks or heck even once a month would go a long way. It doesn't need to be some sort of endless time consuming endeavor.

[Narcissistic Martyr]

Another of these?

You know WHY they don't listen to forum posts?

We don't have any damn data. We speak in anecdotes and whine and whinge about every damn thing.

When they do listen us it's not because we said something persuasive, it's because the aggregated match data they've collected and analyzed backs up our anecdotes.

[Deathlike]

WarHippy, on 11 August 2015 - 01:15 PM, said:

Like I said I understand that, but that shouldn't be an excuse to almost never do it. Every couple weeks or heck even once a month would go a long way. It doesn't need to be some sort of endless time consuming endeavor.

Reading the forums can be a detriment to your health or online life.

I take a break and ignore threads for this reason alone.

Still, the easier threads don't require much effort for a response.

Narcissistic Martyr, on 11 August 2015 - 01:18 PM, said:

Another of these?

You know WHY they don't listen to forum posts?

We don't have any damn data. We speak in anecdotes and whine and whinge about every damn thing.

When they do listen us it's not because we said something persuasive, it's because the aggregated match data they've collected and analyzed backs up our anecdotes.

Well, there was this one time... and I forget who said it (probably Russ or Bryan) where they claimed they were using stock mechs (with SHS, I presume) was fine.

Edit: As a point of reference, it was during those older ATDs and there were little to no Champion mechs available at the time.

It doesn't take much to get laughed out on these here forums.

Edited by Deathlike, 11 August 2015 - 01:27 PM.

[Gas Guzzler]

Now that everyone is here, when do we get Road Map updates????

[WarHippy]

Deathlike, on 11 August 2015 - 01:21 PM, said:

Reading the forums can be a detriment to your health or online life.

I take a break and ignore threads for this reason alone.

Still, the easier threads don't require much effort for a response.

Yeah no kidding. I can't help but scratch my head when I was accused of trolling in my response to Paul, but that was coming from Johnny so I guess I can't be too surprised.

[Johnny Z]

All I know is that if more people worked for a living they would have alot more respect for others trying their best to do their job.

By the way its people making stuff that makes the world go around and they all deserve alot of respect. That goes for construction or making games or farming or anything.

[Duke Nedo]

WarHippy, on 11 August 2015 - 01:15 PM, said:

Like I said I understand that, but that shouldn't be an excuse to almost never do it. Every couple weeks or heck even once a month would go a long way. It doesn't need to be some sort of endless time consuming endeavor.

Sure, but I sort of think that is what the Town hall is all about. Any Dev posting will be considered speaking for PGI... so they really can't engage in heated discussions without consequences... just saying I understand their policy, if it's a policy.

Edited by Duke Nedo, 11 August 2015 - 01:41 PM.

[WarHippy]

Duke Nedo, on 11 August 2015 - 01:36 PM, said:

Sure, but I sort of think that is what the Town hall is all about. Any Dev posting will be considered speaking for PGI... so they really can't engage in heated discussions without consequences... just saying I understand their policy, it it's a policy.

Fair enough. I just see it as a missed opportunity for a lot of things. By no means do I think the devs are not passionate about what they are doing, but when they actively seem to avoid talking directly with people it can give that impression. The Town Halls are nice, but when you really get down to it they are using a third party middle man that picks and chooses what questions and wording get passed on instead of talking to their users directly. If one wants to be truly pessimistic about it It shows a lack of interest and even contempt for the users. I feel for them because I know they really do care about the game, but sometimes they are just really bad at showing it.

[MechWarrior3671771]

I've had devs respond twice to a complaint about game bugs. Out of the blue too. So they are watching.
They were very professional and civil and made me feel like a valued customer.

OTOH, Customer Service has been ignoring me since May. I guess PGI doesn't need my money.

Edited by Fenrisulvyn, 11 August 2015 - 01:55 PM.

[Revis Volek]

Johnny Z, on 11 August 2015 - 01:05 PM, said:

That one of the peeps making this game popped in to say hi basically. Your low tier trolling suggests you are upset about it and maybe having a brighter outlook may be help you be in a better mood.

Try saying thanks next time.

and you low tier trolling of a "low tier troll" is something to commend you on?

He was not trolling, he spoke his feelings and what he thought on a matter, if you dont agree it doesn't mean he is wrong, right, smart, dumb, whatever. He said his piece, right or wrong he was man enough to step up to the mic and tell everyone how he feels.


Where as the true troll (you) just take the weak mans way out and try to poke holes in someones argument. You cant have a constructive thought so you try to destroy others ideas and thoughts?

Next time you wanna play the troll blame game take a look in the mirror bud.

[Kristov Kerensky]

Juodas Varnas, on 10 August 2015 - 10:12 PM, said:

How is this good?
When PGI is left to their own devices they come up with sh*t like ghost heat, 3PV, consumables, dynamic geometry, et cetera.

Not a single one of those things were PGI's ideas, every single one was suggested by players before they were done, and oddly enough, almost every single one of them was implemented EXACTLY as someone had suggested in the forums.

So, before you blame PGI for all the things you don't like, keep in mind that those things probably came from one of the players, who constantly come up with far WORSE suggestions every single day and demand they be implemented to make the game 'good'.

Krafty, funny how you make this post after getting jumped by Russ in another thread just a week ago, remember? They do check the forums, they just don't post here often, it's not worth it usually, as you well know. Why the button pushing lately man?

[MechWarrior3671771]

"Customer Service has been ignoring me since May. I guess PGI doesn't need my money."

FWIW, within an hour of that post, 2 customer service staffers have contacted me to help. So they do read the forums.

[Gremlich Johns]

HellJumper, on 10 August 2015 - 09:33 PM, said:

CW? whats that?

Country AND Western

[Void Angel]

If the devs post complex explanations or let us in on what they're thinking in game design, they've always gotten two things out of it: massive, "burn all the things," raging flame wars, and people taking some quote or other and prating about it for years. Do the words "broken promises" ring a bell? Don't mention the fact that games very often deviate in some way from development plans; this was the plan at one time, and somebody paid money and they didn't like how it changed later, and now they get to be angry - forever. They have found their new hobby horse, and they are going to beat you with it:


All of these comments, and you guys know who you are, about how PGI needs to "acknowledge issues," or "post more so we know you're listening" come from a flawed premise - that PGI's entire staff is able and ought to engage at will with every thread and topic out there. This is not a realistic assumption, because a nontrivial and highly vocal minority don't want dialogue. They want validation and an audience.

Think about it: how many people still have their "how to fix," or "what X cost us" thread stamped into their fracking signatures, despite that ship having very obviously sailed? For better or for ill, this game has an extremely vocal and toxic minority who will simply stamp their nerd-foot and rage forever about this or that thing that should have been done, for whatever reason - the favorite justification is "the lore." Take a moment to remember how people shoehorn their favorite thing to hate into any remotely related topic. Pre-buff NARC is so underpowered that no one with experience ever uses it? Blame ECM! Locust legs too fragile? Blame ECM! Command Console doesn't do enough for the tonnage and space? The real issue is ECM!

Given these kinds of sadly typical posts in response to just about anything the devs do, it's hardly surprising that they tend to gravitate toward more controlled releases of information - Dev Outreach, Announcements, and the Command Chair. I'm sure someone will suggest that if they engaged more, the negativity would die away - this occurred to me, but I can't agree. They did engage more, a while back. There was posts all over the place, love and reconciliation were in the air, and the trolls complained about it all... if that's backed off, likely it's either because they're too busy to keep up that level of involvement, or glasnost failed to deliver on reduced player tensions.

Now, it's possible that they just let things slide because they were busy or something - but the swiftness with which dev posts on this thread have led to condescending jackassery aimed at PGI and an agument about all the Bad Things PGI "comes up with" when "left to their own devices." If you want more dev interation, hey, great! Just remember what they're dealing with out here, and think about maybe putting that feedback into a Support e-mail or a constructive thread.

[redacted]

Gremlich Johns, on 11 August 2015 - 03:10 PM, said:

Country AND Western

GASP! Both kinds of music!

Edited by Catalina Steiner, 13 August 2015 - 08:06 AM.
removed unconstructive troll content

[Rebas Kradd]

stjobe, on 11 August 2015 - 12:36 PM, said:

If we don't see you post, it's easy (if not very justified) to jump to the conclusion that you don't read, and from there it's just a short hop, skip, and (illogical) jump to "PGI doesn't care", and the forums get worse.

So basically what I'm saying is that you have to post, not just read. You don't have to do it 24/7 like ol' Joe, but without a few new posts a day from someone at PGI, the forums become a worse place.

[redacted]

Here's what you really want. You want progress. I say that because if PGI just started responding to every thread with a pretyped post along the lines of "We appreciate the problem, we agree that something needs to be done, please give us at least eight months to get to it" for every single thing you guys gripe about, you won't be nearly as happy with the "feedback" you're getting. You'll just switch to gripes about how PGI is a small developer with limited resources.

Feedback can make us feel better temporarily. But when the bulk of it isn't accompanied by any visible progress, it will get old fast.

Edited by Catalina Steiner, 13 August 2015 - 08:06 AM.
removed unconstructive troll content

[Speedy Plysitkos]

Paul Inouye, on 11 August 2015 - 11:30 AM, said:

....


Again... I read the forums daily. I do not have the time to respond to them because that would generally lead to a discussion. If I did this for every post/idea/feedback thread I would have zero time to get my day to day and feature planning tasks done. The forums actually ARE the best place to give feedback/suggestions. The CM (Tina) also collates and highlights all high activity threads for us which are brought up in a weekly production meeting.

I guess this is me asking you not to make the assumption that the forums are a deadzone where feedback goes to die. I use twitter probably once or twice every two weeks. If I'm looking for the heartbeat of a certain topic.. I come here. Not Twitter, not Instagram, not Facebook, not Reddit.... here.. the MWO Forums.

oh my god!

someone hacked Paul account. Run, Forest, Run.....

[Speedy Plysitkos]

btw, never saw so many blue posts in one topic.... its like.... your team loosing 2-11, you the last mech.... going lalalaaaa, then booom. 10 focus fire on you...... dead around 127 times in a row...