Why Devs Don't Talk To Gamers Anymore: A Twitter Thread

[Stan]

Some of you may have seen this already, but I think a lot of points here are valid, and certainly apply to this, and many, many other communites in gaming. Interesting read, if nothing else.

Can and should we do more to support rather than chastise game developers? Discuss, after reading of course.

https://twitter.com/charlesrandall/status/911987526541430784?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw&ref_url=http%3A%2F%2Fcomicbook.com%2Fgaming%2F2017%2F09%2F25%2Fdevelopers-dont-open-up-about-games-theyre-working

[Yaka]

Proper communication goes two ways.
People talk, devs or official representatives/spokesmen should reply back if thats an important discussion and keep the discussion alive.
Ofc. they should't reply to every "i hate the nerf" thread, who does?

[Humpenstilzchen]

Messaggio originale di Raiden_Sola:

It isn't that WC's not communicating with us because there's so much hate, it's that their lack of communication has bred the hate, and it will continue until things start to change.

That´s it

[retsam1]

Messaggio originale di Raiden_Sola:

I used to be a supporter of the dev team here, and in most cases I still am for just about every other game in existance, even for Dragon: The Game, king of the absentee comunication right now, who are even worse at talking to use their funders than Wild Card. I've had my own hand at building a couple of quick games with game engines and I know even at the most basic and easy tools that it is very difficult, time consuming, and you can easily break ol stuff adding new and it's a constant work fiddling with things. There is one major difference between all those other development teams and WIld Card that has changed the tide though, the betrayals.

Most of us are familiar with "The Great Migration" as they've posted about it on their site, more appropriate would be to call it "The Great Expulsion" or the "Trail of Tears" (look it up in your history books kiddies). Having to wipe and recode servers again is nothing new, but how WC handled it is the issue. There's a big difference between saying "This is something we hope to avoid" and saying "We will not do this", one's cautionary, once's a promise. Wild Card promised they wouldn't wipe then changed gears at the last second; it's not the first time, and with their standard opporating they won't be the last.

Lateness: In, well, everything. Again, nothing out of the ordinary for game development, but WC in particular seems to have a gross misunderstanding of how to calculate time, and how to adress the comunity about their timeframes. Most companies learn to give a very generous overestimation of time and then pleasantly suprize their community with the treat of things coming early. WC instead piece-meals us pushbacks in small amounts of time that eventually totall up to all day (or in some caes multiples). Once it's been posted to the in-game announcement it becomes another form of promise, and an update's coming in half an hour, server activity dramaticly changes, suddenly that big trip or building project, or complicated tame, is now on hold cause you don't want to lose everything right in the middle of it. Eventually the time totals to the point where you could have done what you originally intended, but isntead have had to lurk around your base all day for fear of being caught with update at a bad time.

And finally, the illicit. Some of us have gotten suspicious enough of WC to keep an eye on it from sources other than the fluffed up steam news, and those members of the community are aware of the coming lawsuits, as well as the current action with the attempted bankruptcy. A company that sells nearly all its stock then tries to declare bankrupsy is something highly suspicious, and I am glad to see the judge handling the case thought the same and didn't grant it. Firslty, this totally tanks out the price of the stock, as businesses in bankruptsy aren't highly valuable, so the person who bought the stock just lost a ton of money. Second, it looks like insider trading, because you just liquidated your stock in a company before it went downhill to get yourself some cash back. Thirdly, that same cash, if WC just sold all that stock, how is it that they're bankrupt? There's even more stuff to be found but like that twitter thread it's best you look at things for yourself and build your own picture, but the one I've drawn is not a bright one.

WC's antics shows no respect for the gaming community that made them popular, or the investors that made the game possible. It isn't that WC's not communicating with us because there's so much hate, it's that their lack of communication has bred the hate, and it will continue until things start to change.

The false information/disinformation in this is facepalm worthy.

The official servers: If you actually knew or at least bothered to pay attention to the last 2+ years of things: First just before June of 2016 Jeremy said they were going to wipe. That was the -First- intention. However after it was met with protests, they said they would instead change it(again this is weeks later not this year mind you) that they would not wipe servers -except- ones that had become too low population wise etc.

Now we come to this summer where the issue was revisted again. What do they decide: Virtually the same thing BUT repurposing some of the deleted into new servers and changing the old ones to legacy.

But here's the real and embarrassing kicker in this for you: The majority of players of Ark dont play official servers. Its been this way for almost the entire 2+ years and why there now are 26000+ unofficial servers to the less than 700(was 950ish pre 29th Aug). Only a minority still dont get that Ark isnt -at- -all- about the official servers. Its about custom and modded content.

Jeremy even speaks to this in his gamasutra interview last week:

https://www.twitch.tv/videos/176248583

Official servers are little more than basic game showcase servers.

Lateness: Man has this dead horse been beaten beyond a pulp and into a puree. Jeremy speaks to some of how their development progression goes in the above interview but he says it even more so during his GDC talk:

https://www.gdcvault.com/play/1024229/-ARK-Survival-Evolved-Lessons

Alleged "Illicit" claims:

WC is owned by Snail Games and has been since dec 2015. WC does not have nor issues stock nor listed on any stock exchange. Your whole "illicit" part is complete and utter bunk.

Bankruptcy? This game has been a complete cashcow for both WC and Snail games. It has remained consistently in the top sales on steam for almost these 2 years and continues to be in the top played rankings as well. Its sold well on xbox and ps4 to the point that xbox even has made it one of the small list of featured titles to be on the xbox1x1. A game and studio doing this well and with a small base team and with production costs also lowered further due to outsourcing of work to studios in Egypt and Colombia, but yet you -think- is going bankrupt.

Yeah making these sorts of libelous claims against them isnt going to end well for you.

Thus please, cite your sources otherwise with the "insider trading", supposed bankruptcy, and lawsuits you speak of.

All in all, you're claims are false at best or just giving compelling evidence of intentional disinformation inflicting at worse. Reminds me of some of the troglodytes that made trouble for WC via Trendy actually: https://www.oneangrygamer.net/2016/06/investigation-a-video-game-studio-from-florida/5139/

[Morgan]

Messaggio originale di Nast:

Some of you may have seen this already, but I think a lot of points here are valid, and certainly apply to this, and many, many other communites in gaming. Interesting read, if nothing else.

Can and should we do more to support rather than chastise game developers? Discuss, after reading of course.

https://twitter.com/charlesrandall/status/911987526541430784?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw&ref_url=http%3A%2F%2Fcomicbook.com%2Fgaming%2F2017%2F09%2F25%2Fdevelopers-dont-open-up-about-games-theyre-working

It’s an interesting point but while the gamer community may be toxic, many developers, and to a greater degree publishers do not help their own case. Ark (which I love in spite of its flaws) is a perfect example of a game that was released before sufficient QA had taken place. Batman Arkham Knight, and Rome 2 are two worse examples. You then get Sega\Creative Assembly with ludicrous DLC policies. This makes gamers feel disrespected and taken for granted. The situation is exacerbated by fanboys “white knighting” in the forums, as all they do is add to people’s frustration.


Take Rome 2, the game was aggressively marketed for pre-ordering and on day of release it was apparent that the game was really still in early beta. The AI simply didn’t work in some case, the performance was abysmal, bugs were rife, and the game was fundamentally broken on a design level. The lead developer had out and out lied in interviews and in the games marketing material. It took almost a year of patching to get it to the state that it was initially meant to be and even the Sega had the nerve put release I as a new edition and charge full price for it again.


Of course we have good developers like CD Project Red, but the attitude of many developers and frankly the author of the tweets does not give the impression that they consider us to be valued customers, more a whiny rabble that will buy what they release regardless.


Furthermore there are plenty of “safe” ways the developers can talk to the community, blogs, YouTube clips, heavily moderated forums.


As for whether or not we can do more to support, myself I can be very critical, I do like to think that I am also fair though.

[Toasty]

That first Twitter reply is so true.

The ark devs used to be very publicly active but as the game grew it attracted a more immature player base.

Eventually they cut most public communication and that is when patches also started to get delayed (they used to be bang on-Time).

Sadly it’s the modern self-entitlement and ignorance that often causes these issues.

[Morgan]

Messaggio originale di N Corbin (UK):

That first Twitter reply is so true.

The ark devs used to be very publicly active but as the game grew it attracted a more immature player base.

Eventually they cut most public communication and that is when patches also started to get delayed (they used to be bang on-Time).

Sadly it’s the modern self-entitlement and ignorance that often causes these issues.

I often find use of the phrase entitlement odd in game forums. If you pay full price for a game then you are entitled. You’re entitled to a quality title that has undergone rigorous QA. Suggesting that the player base it to blame for lack of communication and delayed patches is a little silly. If WC are a professional company then they should behave in a professional manner. We’re paying customers, they’re not doing us a favour

[Pebbles-chan]

I wish studio wc talked and listened way less to the fanbase, i don't like that many creatures came up only as a commercial maneuver to make happy the complaining fans (that still complain anyway), a nursery-mechanic maiasaur would have been way more useful than a tapejaracopter, a treasure finding liopleurodon or a healing hell pig (that isn't being useful in bossfights anymore)

That's just unfair for many creatures that didn't get the place just because not popular enough...

[Toooni]

They just need to check the constructive bugreports and suggestions in the forums. Its nice if they stop all the communications. They need the time to read bugreports.

[Dooks]

communication has always been wc's biggest flaw ! ....at least one of them has now noticed aparrently ....... i read the article but here's the thing ....if it was said and 2 years on is not done .....that is not the customer...... if you don't warn at all over major game changes balancing whatever ......again that is not the customer ....... if your patches are late...... get the picture ? .... so personally to a small degree maybe decide what you will do as a company and stick to it?
but hey ....as far as some on here see it we GAVE our money to wc as it is aparrently a charity now lol ....... no ..... it is a business ......and a badly run one at that
I understand the toxicity here ...... put out a complaint and watch it roll in!

[Monty]

Messaggio originale di Morgan:

Messaggio originale di N Corbin (UK):

That first Twitter reply is so true.

The ark devs used to be very publicly active but as the game grew it attracted a more immature player base.

Eventually they cut most public communication and that is when patches also started to get delayed (they used to be bang on-Time).

Sadly it’s the modern self-entitlement and ignorance that often causes these issues.

I often find use of the phrase entitlement odd in game forums. If you pay full price for a game then you are entitled. You’re entitled to a quality title that has undergone rigorous QA. Suggesting that the player base it to blame for lack of communication and delayed patches is a little silly. If WC are a professional company then they should behave in a professional manner. We’re paying customers, they’re not doing us a favour

They've provided you with a game that IS complete, full story, mechanics, and continue to work on the game post release which they have no obligation to do. They passed the QA, maybe you should have a problem with the QA process rather than the devs of the game?

[Morgan]

Messaggio originale di Monty:

Messaggio originale di Morgan:

I often find use of the phrase entitlement odd in game forums. If you pay full price for a game then you are entitled. You’re entitled to a quality title that has undergone rigorous QA. Suggesting that the player base it to blame for lack of communication and delayed patches is a little silly. If WC are a professional company then they should behave in a professional manner. We’re paying customers, they’re not doing us a favour

They've provided you with a game that IS complete, full story, mechanics, and continue to work on the game post release which they have no obligation to do. They passed the QA, maybe you should have a problem with the QA process rather than the devs of the game?

Are you suggesting that the you think the development the QA process are totally isolated form each other?

[BeardO]

Messaggio originale di NGCaliber:

uhmm... actually WildCard probably has one of the best community outreach of any game developer that I have ever seen. They have even created a website dedicated to tie together the communication lines between players and the developers.
https://arkdevtracker.com/
The problem isn't with the devs. The problem is that not everyone wants to hear what they have to say. They would much better prefer to be ignored than to be heard. Customers want to be toxic and angry not happy. If they were happy they would be playing the game and not talk.

Arkdevtracker.com wasn't created by the devs. It was created by the same guy that did the one for H1Z1

https://www.reddit.com/r/playark/comments/3blzar/ark_dev_tracker/

Customers want to be toxic and angry? Where do you even come up with something as asinine as that to say? I think the majority of us would love to be happy with the game so we could just play it. The people that are angry are the ones that can't get the game to work properly most of the time, get tired of the same bugs over and over again, and generally can't stand the way the Devs go about putting band aides on broken legs within the game.

[Leslie]

Maybe the issue is Early Access.

While it is obvious, I'll state it for the kiddies....If a game is worked on and completed "offline", then the developers are free to work on, modify, tweak and finish their game to their own vision - without the interference of outside critics.
And likewise, gamers are first exposed to a final product without all the intervening changes, nerfs, bad decisions and all the hairy warts that crop up during development.

Then a game can be finished in the manner the deveoper wanted, and can be evaluated by gamers without the baggage of "what it used to be" or the bad blood of whatever atrocity the customer feels the studio did during development.

Prime Example: Ark Survival
There would be zero DX12 outrage if not for it's mention in early access before the devs knew if they could do it, or it would work as intended. Ditto for bridges, flyer nerf, falling thru things and any number of other complaints over the past two years. It is unfortunate that because of early access and players already having and using features... nothing can be taken out of the game during development without offending someone... only added. Anytime the developers change their mind- outrage!

The initial early access game release was a primitive survival game featuring dinosaurs.
It has morphed into a Steel Box Base,Tek gear, Eve Online style smash game.
This makes it wildly out of balance because it . still . starts . as . primitive . survival.

It is bad to mix those two genres.

And lastly:
Wildcard brought most of this on themselves. Their "vision" was bigger than, or has grown bigger than, their ability to achieve it. they started doing the assets and game mechanic coding before anybody did the basic math to check what kind of load this would put on a client or server. Examples: Building sizes. Dinos counts. Basically anything that impacts server load... it has all gotten out of hand. They built a game that a server won't run at their intended 70 player count.
That's why there is no improved AI... couldn't stack that on top of 25,000 NPC, 70 players, 300,000 building pieces, and 12 million resource items in storage. and still have a server or client handle the load. Whoops.

They would have had the opportunity to backtrack and rethink and change some things if it had not been out in Early Access yet.

Too late now, that bus left over 2 years ago.

So, my take on Wildcard---
"Experienced professional game developers"?
No.

"Level designers and Asset Creators?
Yes.

A small team of competent stock clerks, but no one minding the store.

[BeardO]

Messaggio originale di preorbital:

Prime Example: Ark Survival
There would be zero DX12 outrage if not for it's mention in early access before the devs knew if they could do it, or it would work as intended. Ditto for bridges, flyer nerf, falling thru things and any number of other complaints over the past two years. It is unfortunate that because of early access and players already having and using features... nothing can be taken out of the game during development without offending someone... only added. Anytime the developers change their mind- outrage!

The DX12 outrage is the devs own fault for posting that it was amazing...only to then say nope never mind it's not ready but we will get it soon...year later...gone. You don't praise something and build a hype train to then say whoops I was wrong it's not even worth using.

And lastly:
Wildcard brought most of this on themselves. Their "vision" was bigger than, or has grown bigger than, their ability to achieve it. they started doing the assets and game mechanic coding before anybody did the basic math to check what kind of load this would put on a client or server. Examples: Building sizes. Dinos counts. Basically anything that impacts server load... it has all gotten out of hand. They built a game that a server won't run at their intended 70 player count.

Edit: Forgot to mention that yes I think the issue really is with ea games in general rather than WC just being that ♥♥♥♥♥♥ of a studio. When you make big changes that impact game play you are of course going to have people raging. That's not the devs fault per say, they have to start somewhere and tweak things along the way. I think were WC shoots themselves a lot though is that they don't always communicate some of those changes and people rage even harder because they feel like WC is trying to pull one over on them, like "hehe they won't notice"
That's why there is no improved AI... couldn't stack that on top of 25,000 NPC, 70 players, 300,000 building pieces, and 12 million resource items in storage. and still have a server or client handle the load. Whoops.

They would have had the opportunity to backtrack and rethink and change some things if it had not been out in Early Access yet.

Too late now, that bus left over 2 years ago.

So, my take on Wildcard---
"Experienced professional game developers"?
No.

"Level designers and Asset Creators?
Yes.

A small team of competent stock clerks, but no one minding the store.

This I agree with completely, platform saddles were a great example of this. They promoted them as being awesome and they were...only once you had a few on a server the server pretty much died. The collision checks were just too crazy. So then they limit the amount of structures, then they apply them to a tamed dino limit. Those two actions to try and "fix" the issues were met by player with WTF, give it then take it away. Had they actually tested in a real world server with Alpha tribes that would build like 10 of them each, they would have seen what it did to performance and would have been in their best interest to either scrap the idea or implement the limits day one.

[Monty]

Messaggio originale di Morgan:

Messaggio originale di Monty:

They've provided you with a game that IS complete, full story, mechanics, and continue to work on the game post release which they have no obligation to do. They passed the QA, maybe you should have a problem with the QA process rather than the devs of the game?

Are you suggesting that the you think the development the QA process are totally isolated form each other?

They're not totally isolated, but not all QA is conducted in house. You think Microsoft or Sony, or even Steam don't conduct their own QA of new games? There are plenty of processes that these games go through and there's a big eno7gh active player base who have put a substantial amount of time into the game. Bugs aside, this all points to a very successful game and release.