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What Is The Very Least Pgi Has To Do To Start Getting The Players Back?


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#21 Novakaine

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Posted 20 August 2018 - 06:06 PM

[Redacted]

Edited by draiocht, 22 August 2018 - 09:56 AM.
unconstructive, replies removed


#22 XX Sulla XX

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Posted 20 August 2018 - 07:05 PM

View PostAnjian, on 20 August 2018 - 04:42 PM, said:

There are games that managed massive turn around and they make great case studies with. The most obvious is Final Fantasy 14. There is a complete overhaul of the game under brand new management. Even as the MMORPG market is gradually fading away, this epic and historic effort of reviving a damaged game to one of the most played MMORPGs will go down forever in the books.

Another game that has managed to do a complete turnaround is No Man's Sky. Simply by delivering the features the game promised.

There are games that managed complete graphics and game engine overhauls, one being EVE Online and the other, World of Tanks. These are interesting studies from a technical point of view.

Good point there are games that turn around with the correct choices.

#23 Valdarion Silarius

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Posted 20 August 2018 - 08:41 PM

Listening to the player base might be a good start.

#24 Anjian

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Posted 20 August 2018 - 08:46 PM

View PostXX Sulla XX, on 20 August 2018 - 07:05 PM, said:

Good point there are games that turn around with the correct choices.


Read about Final Fantasy 14 A Realm Reborn, it will affirm the importance of things.

https://www.polygon....rn-new-approach

A turn around also requires a new management approach to the game. Sadly we may not see it until the top people running MWO is changed.

Summary of some important points:

1. The older game continues to be developed while the new game is forged out in detail in design first.
2. Staff is made to play the older game until they realize the importance of game experience.
3. It is important to earn back the trust of the players who bought the first game.
4. Updates on the old game is used to test ideas that will be solidified into the new game.
5. Yoshida and staff obsessively studied the FF14 forums, fan complaints, feedback, and suggestions.
6. Began regular livestream to connect to the fans and the development team. They still do it today.
7. According to Yoshida, as long as players complain about the game, they still care. The trick is to listen and adapt to these complaints. Game creators must also play their own games.

Edited by Anjian, 20 August 2018 - 08:48 PM.


#25 Rick T Dangerous

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Posted 20 August 2018 - 09:32 PM

QP: Get rid of tiers and leaderboards. Make QP a thing where people can have fun without their [Redacted] in the way.

FP: a simple "proto-matchmaker" to put the bigger groups in the less advantageous position. I.e. in Boreal (or basically any other siege map), the smaller groups or teams with higher pug content always defend.

Solaris: adjust the divisions every month. And give them a general overhaul, ignoring the "only one division up or down" rule. Up to this point, the solaris division list and its development is embarrassing for PGI (and revealing to the ...."cough" critics).

The game in general: stop the nerf-buff dren, stop frelling with our mechs, nothing makes players stop like the developers changing the game each month to make it worse.

Edited by draiocht, 22 August 2018 - 10:08 AM.
inappropriate reference


#26 FireStoat

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Posted 20 August 2018 - 09:47 PM

View PostAnjian, on 20 August 2018 - 08:46 PM, said:

Game creators must also play their own games.

Numerous staff members over at Riot Games can play League of Legends at a competitive level, mechanics-wise. They are expected to do so to provide meaningful insight and feedback to the evolving game and problems encountered.

The biggest thing this solves is the 'tunnel vision' approach to nerfs and buffs which is a huge issue with PGI and this game.

Edited by FireStoat, 20 August 2018 - 09:51 PM.


#27 JRcam4643

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Posted 20 August 2018 - 10:30 PM

There is a way I think they could improve the game experience a lot with out changing the MM, mechs or weapons. just change how planets in faction play are won and lost. Give points based on performance in faction play battles that players can use to assign to conflict planets, which ever side has more at the end of time out wins.

For this to be really interesting you need to let players choose any planet of the opposing faction and get rid of the current voting system. Instead the only thing decided by the vote would be the faction to attack. Allowing players to choose any planet would make units coordinating much more important and add another dimension to faction play a lot of would probably find more interesting then the battles themselves.

#28 Wil McCullough

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Posted 20 August 2018 - 10:35 PM

View PostFireStoat, on 20 August 2018 - 09:47 PM, said:

Numerous staff members over at Riot Games can play League of Legends at a competitive level, mechanics-wise. They are expected to do so to provide meaningful insight and feedback to the evolving game and problems encountered.

The biggest thing this solves is the 'tunnel vision' approach to nerfs and buffs which is a huge issue with PGI and this game.


[Redacted]

Edited by Tina Benoit, 22 August 2018 - 02:04 PM.
nonconstructive/staff abuse/insult


#29 Vellron2005

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Posted 20 August 2018 - 11:45 PM

View PostXX Sulla XX, on 20 August 2018 - 10:22 AM, said:

So I was thinking. What is the very least PGI has to get right to start getting players back in decent numbers?


One word - MWO2.

#30 XX Sulla XX

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Posted 21 August 2018 - 12:03 AM

View PostAnjian, on 20 August 2018 - 08:46 PM, said:


Read about Final Fantasy 14 A Realm Reborn, it will affirm the importance of things.

https://www.polygon....rn-new-approach

A turn around also requires a new management approach to the game. Sadly we may not see it until the top people running MWO is changed.

Summary of some important points:

1. The older game continues to be developed while the new game is forged out in detail in design first.
2. Staff is made to play the older game until they realize the importance of game experience.
3. It is important to earn back the trust of the players who bought the first game.
4. Updates on the old game is used to test ideas that will be solidified into the new game.
5. Yoshida and staff obsessively studied the FF14 forums, fan complaints, feedback, and suggestions.
6. Began regular livestream to connect to the fans and the development team. They still do it today.
7. According to Yoshida, as long as players complain about the game, they still care. The trick is to listen and adapt to these complaints. Game creators must also play their own games.

Cool thanks for the highlights.

#31 IIXxXII

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Posted 21 August 2018 - 12:27 AM

View PostXX Sulla XX, on 20 August 2018 - 10:22 AM, said:

So I was thinking. What is the very least PGI has to get right to start getting players back in decent numbers?


#1 Make the new user experience a better one. Give new players a few mechs, engines, equipment and weapons to start with.

#2 Advertise more. Reach out to youtubers, gun nuts, fans of the 80s/90s.

#3 The game needs some type of fictional people for gamers to connect with and relate to. Staring at hulks of metal all the time is ok for engineers, welders and autistic people who relate to machines better than humans. For everyone else they relate to people more, the game could use more of a human element.

Posted Image

Edited by IIXxXII, 21 August 2018 - 12:30 AM.


#32 Appogee

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Posted 21 August 2018 - 12:34 AM

[Redacted]

Edited by draiocht, 22 August 2018 - 12:34 PM.
unconstructive


#33 MTier Slayed Up

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Posted 21 August 2018 - 12:45 AM

View PostXX Sulla XX, on 20 August 2018 - 10:22 AM, said:

So I was thinking. What is the very least PGI has to get right to start getting players back in decent numbers?
Here are things I think they could do that are low risk and high reward.


  • Buff mobility on most mechs. With under performing mechs getting the largest buffs. This makes the game more fun over all, increases time to kill and buffs under performing mechs.



  • Buff under performing mechs that have bad hard points, tiny engine caps, terrible hit boxes etc. Stop being afraid to make things work better. There are so so many mechs never used because they are just bad.



  • Figure out a way to cut down on match search times and waiting times in general. The matches are already terrible because of the low player base and terrible tier system. So if we are going to get bad matches at least give us fast matches.
Just those three things would get me to play a lot more and have hope they would fix more complex things later. What do you guys think?


1. Overhaul. A lot of bugs. Games aged not very well. Balance issues that still haven't been addressed.

2. Advertisement. Big selling point on this one. Word of mouth only takes you so far.

3. Innovation. MWO lacks this. Pretty generic game when you boil down to it.

4. Lack of appeal. This isn't Call of Duty nor is this strategy. It's a robot game meant to blow up other robots. Only other game that I think of is Armored Core but that's more fast paced combat whereas in MWO you're piloting slow tanks. Slow=Not Fun normally.

We have a pretty loyal following just behind the BattleTech name but that's where it ends.

#34 Wil McCullough

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Posted 21 August 2018 - 01:54 AM

Advertising is a sinkhole if your product is mediocre. Ad fatigue means the company pays exponentially more per conversion as time goes on and starts running out of target audience to shout to.

Advertising can get people to TRY your game but only a good game will make people STAY. If you have a mediocre or stagnant game, eventually you're going to lose more players than you can bring in and ad fatigue means it'll eventually become unfeasible.

What mwo needs is an emotional hook. Battletech can provide that with the rich lore it has but pgi hasn't been bothered to actually use that to its advantage. They've just been focusing on frequent cashgrabs through mech packs. There should have been some effort to introduce multiple component manufacturers with components like weapons and armor that behave similarly but still different.

To retain the player, he/she should also have a stake in the game. And by that i mean meaningful contribution. Preferably a persistent contribution. Fp could have given players that stake with players fighting over resources abd production facilities etc. Unfortunately pgi didn't work on it for 18 months despite lying and saying they were. In the end we received a half baked game mode that lacked all the features it should have had.

These are the things that pgi should work on to get players back.

Unfortunately it's also economically not viable for them to do so, so mwo.is dying a slow steady death.

Edit: this is coming from an ad man who's successfully worked on brands both small and big across different industries including games.

Edited by Wil McCullough, 21 August 2018 - 01:59 AM.


#35 OmniFail

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Posted 21 August 2018 - 02:06 AM

[Redacted]

Edited by draiocht, 22 August 2018 - 10:43 AM.
staff abuse


#36 IIXxXII

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Posted 21 August 2018 - 02:13 AM

View PostWil McCullough, on 21 August 2018 - 01:54 AM, said:

Advertising is a sinkhole if your product is mediocre. Ad fatigue means the company pays exponentially more per conversion as time goes on and starts running out of target audience to shout to.

Edit: this is coming from an ad man who's successfully worked on brands both small and big across different industries including games.


Seeing as how the internet has no scarcity of business phds and industry professionals in everything from brain surgery to moral values could someone answer the following question.

The following google search quotation took me 2 seconds to find:

Quote

The IRS says your business can "usually" deduct the cost of goodwill advertising to keep your name in front of the public. For example, an ad by a company selling beer that promotes responsible driving would probably be deductible.


It claims advertising costs are often "tax deductible".

Does this make advertising a more feasible option or no?

Posted Image

#37 MW Waldorf Statler

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Posted 21 August 2018 - 02:16 AM

Marketing is horrible by PGI ...seeing the Marketing for MW5 ..only a preview in Year from PC Gamers ..Mech Con ..Yes PGI have aTwitter and FB side for MW5 and a own MW5 HP of the PGI HP the latest News..MW5early playable to the Mechcon 2017

https://mw5mercs.com/#news

and now...
https://www.polygon....ries-delay-2019

Quote

MechWarrior 5: Mercenaries is being delayed,” Bullock said, “so that we can deliver the best single-player MechWarrior experience to date. [...] We are well aware of the responsibility and great opportunity we have in re-introducing MechWarrior to the world.”
thats like the same words from the Start to MWO and what the FW in future

Edited by Old MW4 Ranger, 21 August 2018 - 02:19 AM.


#38 Sneaky Ohgoorchik

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Posted 21 August 2018 - 02:28 AM

1.Advertisment. Promotion. Marketing. I don' see any around.

2. Make FP more pug friendly.



#39 Wil McCullough

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Posted 21 August 2018 - 02:30 AM

View PostIIXxXII, on 21 August 2018 - 02:13 AM, said:


Seeing as how the internet has no scarcity of business phds and industry professionals in everything from brain surgery to moral values could someone answer the following question.

The following google search quotation took me 2 seconds to find:

[/size][/font]

It claims advertising costs are often "tax deductible".

Does this make advertising a more feasible option or no?

Posted Image


I'm from the agency side of things so whether a client can, or is successful in putting ad costs as tax deductible, i have no idea. I'm actually skeptical that macdonalds can argue "goodwill" by pushing out a clever ad that suggests people exercise though. Seems awfully abusable. Don't quote me on that though.

Advertising is a necessity because word of mouth only gets so far. What your basic ad does is an attempt to create brand awareness. It basically tells the audience your brand exists. A memorable ad serves to influence brand recall, which means people remember your brand. These two things are what get people to try your product when they see it on the shelves or on the rotating homepage banner on steam. Then, it's up to the product to retain the customer. A good product can sell well with a low marketing budget precisely because they have loyal customers. And loyal customers react to good products. That's why coke is a giant. And why nike is losing huge amounts of market share to under armor. Cos for all its marketing efforts, nike products are ****.

#40 w4ldO

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Posted 21 August 2018 - 02:44 AM

switch to unreal engine

get rid of spaghetti code

resync engines





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