PC NEGATIVITY... Yikes!

Cadamier

Cadamier

New member
Hello Everyone!

Well, some of my group have made some comments and such about the negativity here in the forums as of late. A couple of them thought that these forums had been this way until I told them what little I knew and gave them links and such. None of their comments were 'good' but then they realized some things...

As for me - I personally don't care for it especially many of the things posted recently. Some 'negativity' is okay or good to a degree but usually it gets way out of hand; as I'm seeing...

Just to let you know I'm as old as the dirt on your boots! I've been around a long time and dropped quarters to play PONG! I've been in an Alpha testing before and a few Beta testings... The Alpha testing was long time ago but it was 'closed' - you had to login and post on a structured sheet - give your input and other data and such and that was it. "We" the testers never got any feedback what-so-ever. One of the beta testings was also like that. But I do like this structure better, because at times we do get to interact with "TFP" properly. But now we got some serious 'complaints' going on and some of TFP has come out and spoken multiple times. Isn't that enough? I would say it is. Having been on both sides here - I'd have to say that having them coming out to speak does take away their time from doing their normal job.

Example:

Lets put this into a perspective we all can understand and maybe experienced at some point. You purchase something online late Friday and have it expedited cause you really need/want it! The person processing your purchase had to do something else... They get back a few minutes before 5:00PM and can't get to your order.... Your purchase doesn't get processed till sometime Monday. You've expedited the shipping so your expecting it Monday, however because of that delay you don't get it till Tuesday.

This is just an example - a stretched example to prove the point. I'm not saying this happened to TFP with A17, its just an example I could give that I think we all can relate to.

Albeit I may not be sure but this game is designed and supported to be played a couple of ways; and that's it. This is TFP's game and sure you can put your input on something but let it go. Basing a tonne of arguments on one or two videos on a releases that's not even available to the public is a bit pointless because as most of us have seen and experienced first hand things change. To put it into further perspective A17 wasn't even 'done' at the time the video(s) where made... Now - sometimes TFP makes changes on what we recommend, etc sometimes not - I definitely don't know any statistics on that! I don't think they're legally obligated to do anything - even IF one of their representatives say something. Cause they can actually come out against what ever anyone has said.

Now then what I do see is love of the game, and that's good but please keep it under control please. Wouldn't you rather be playing 7D2D than spending tonnes of time here?!?

See what you did? I'm supposed to be on my 3rd coffee and barely finished my first! Now the entire day is in total chaos! LOL

 
Bellypetting might help a developers ego, but not to get useful feedback on potential design-problems.

 
Wouldn't you rather be playing 7D2D than spending tonnes of time here?!?
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Isn't that very generalizing and also a little bit insulting in regard to the people who spend their time in the "Game Modification" forums to eventually publish mods so "dedicated" players like you can enjoy them?

 
Isn't that very generalizing and also a little bit insulting in regard to the people who spend their time in the "Game Modification" forums to eventually publish mods so "dedicated" players like you can enjoy them?
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He is obviously not talking about the people creating mods for the game. Very obviously. No clue how you could misunderstand this so badly.

 
A lot of user feedback has been taken from the forums over the years but in such a case it would be incorporated into the design, not some change applied on a whim. And it may well be taken out later when it doesn't live up to expectations.

Personally I have a very thick skin so I'm okay with reading the forum and ignoring the self-entitled demands, game over predictions, and enthusiastic (but not well thought-out =) feature suggestions.

In many cases it is obvious that the person has no idea of how A Game works.

Why don't you just make it so that... no.

But what if you just... no.

But it would be so easy to... no.

That's not how it works.

 
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A lot of user feedback has been taken from the forums over the years but in such a case it would be incorporated into the design, not some change applied on a whim. And it may well be taken out later when it doesn't live up to expectations.
Personally I have a very thick skin so I'm okay with reading the forum and ignoring the self-entitled demands, game over predictions, and enthusiastic (but not well thought-out =) feature suggestions.

In many cases it is obvious that the person has no idea of how A Game works.

Why don't you just make it so that... no.

But what if you just... no.

But it would be so easy to... no.

That's not how it works.
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"In many cases it is obvious that the person has no idea of how A Game works." Thank you, Electronic Arts.

 
But what if you re-instated bear meat, to make harvesting meat great again? More biomes with different wildlife, not less? Two new ores?

No.

That's not how it works.

\ok

I hope there will one day be a bear meat DLC for $1.99.

 
If you fund your game's development with a paid, public alpha, you better be prepared to handle negativity. You're dealing with lots of players with different expectations of the game, and few of them will have the social and/or verbal skills to offer their suggestions and complaints in a constructive, positive manner. That's just people, especially on the internet.

What helps is having clear channels of communication and regular updates about the game's development. Unfortunately the Fun Pimps have opted for a rather lackluster public relations approach that has only recently seen a little improvement.

If you think the negativity is bad now, just wait until A17 and its associated PR campaign (promotion by streamers) bring in a wave of new players. If you ask me, it's a bit of a weird choice by TFP to promote an alpha that hasn't even been released to their existing player/testing base yet. I'm glad I've lowered my expectations considerably over the past few years, now I'm just lurking with a bucket of popcorn at the ready.

 
What helps is having clear channels of communication and regular updates about the game's development. Unfortunately the Fun Pimps have opted for a rather lackluster public relations approach that has only recently seen a little improvement.
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So, what would you change (in more concrete terms)? Or can you point to someone doing it right? EA and ubisoft surely pour serious money into their PR, but they have the same problems, ♥♥♥♥ storms and customers prone to explode verbally. They have clear channels of communication and you see the equivalent of high gloss brochures as videos or press releases once or twice a year.

If TFP wanted a clear channel of communication they would have to stop especially Gazz and Fataal from posting here, cutting information by half at least. Is that the improvement you are thinking of?

 
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Updates on what's being worked on at set intervals (as opposed to "whenever MadMole feels like it"), preferably with a few screens or videos. Collected information on the current state of development should be easily available at a centralized location. The overview on the first page of the A17 thread is a big step in this direction, but ideally you shouldn't have to go to the forums for that kind of stuff. Speaking of the forums, some of the bigger threads could do with better moderation, there's way too much off topic banter by a handful of forum regulars, which is off putting for people who are just looking for discussion on the actual game.

All this doesn't have to come at the expense of individual devs posting at their own discretion.

As for examples: I think the dev teams for Subnautica and Project Zomboid do a really good job of early access communication. Sure, they probably get their share of inflammatory or entitled commentary, but at least their setup doesn't frustrate customers that do know how to behave. I never had to dig through forum threads to know the state of the game and as far as I know their Steam reviews don't mention communication complaints, lack of updates or forum staff abuse quite as much as those for 7DTD.

It's never going to be perfect, but that doesn't mean the Fun Pimps don't deserve the criticism they get on community management.

 
Updates on what's being worked on at set intervals (as opposed to "whenever MadMole feels like it"), preferably with a few screens or videos. Collected information on the current state of development should be easily available at a centralized location. The overview on the first page of the A17 thread is a big step in this direction, but ideally you shouldn't have to go to the forums for that kind of stuff. Speaking of the forums, some of the bigger threads could do with better moderation, there's way too much off topic banter by a handful of forum regulars, which is off putting for people who are just looking for discussion on the actual game.
All this doesn't have to come at the expense of individual devs posting at their own discretion.

As for examples: I think the dev teams for Subnautica and Project Zomboid do a really good job of early access communication. Sure, they probably get their share of inflammatory or entitled commentary, but at least their setup doesn't frustrate customers that do know how to behave. I never had to dig through forum threads to know the state of the game and as far as I know their Steam reviews don't mention communication complaints, lack of updates or forum staff abuse quite as much as those for 7DTD.

It's never going to be perfect, but that doesn't mean the Fun Pimps don't deserve the criticism they get on community management.
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Ok, this sounds reasonable.

I'm not totally sold that the centralized location isn't the forum, but it could be in a separate pinned and locked thread to make it more visible. The regular updates clash with TFP's rule to only announce stuff that is definitely in the game, but that rule is very unpopular anyway and should not be continued.

 
The pimp staff do a spectacular job of keeping us informed . MM makes all those videos for us which is great and the forum staff updates things as they become aware and communicate with us regularly. The communication and information given to us is impeccable and i've never seen any other game company do as good a job as TFP does.

 
The regular updates clash with TFP's rule to only announce stuff that is definitely in the game, but that rule is very unpopular anyway and should not be continued.
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It beats the alternative, you know?

Every time that has happened and a potential feature (aka iron-clad promise) didn't make it the hurt feelings were ginormous.

 
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