Second Chance AKA Regaining Trust

from Elemental Forums

I think, as a customer, I've been through all the possible phases with Elemental's release: excitement, anticipation, then mild disappointment, partial denial, criticism, then total rejection, anger, bitterness, and everything else. Not second-guessing any of that, of course, since Elemental *was* a massive disappointment for me, and after some particularly ill-phrased comments posted by the developers on these forums, I thought it would be best to just forget all about this game and be gone for good.

But of course, time passes, things happen and perspectives change. In particular, the Dragon Age 2 debacle really opened my eyes on the reality of the gaming industry. Oh, it's not like we didn't know how it worked... in theory. But seeing scams of such proportions happening blatantly right before our eyes, well... it's another thing.

So I came back to these forums to check things out. Saw that while Bioware isn't making any amends whatsoever and is actually keeping the full_denial_facade, Brad and the team here are apparently trying to deliver on the promises to redeem the game. Also watched the brief interview with Derek and saw a regular, pleasant guy passionate about games (instead of your average Laidlaw_® character).

So here I am, and at the risk of "falling for it again"... I'll say that I'm sensing honesty and integrity around here, and this, I like. And it can work. I believe that a great game can be created, this time. But please, hear my words about a crucial point. Give us a meaningful, interconnected tech tree. Yes, I know, there were a lot of bland, uninspired mechanics in Elemental. Magic, combat, the world itself... I'm happy to see those are being addressed. But one thing is to be "bland", another is to be plain wrong. Don't give us a tech tree with something like Archery -> Improved Archery -> Improved Archery II -> Superior Improved Archery... and so on.  Gives us a tree with requirements, interconnections, blocked paths, meaning, and LIFE. And please don't design Raze Cities and Discover Monsters & Lairs technologies again! I'd rather get a game with no tech tree at all. ;)

Best wishes for your work, I'll be patiently waiting.

elemental
10,787 views 10 replies
Reply #1 from Elemental Forums Top

That's fair.

 

Although I don't agree about the Bioware stuff entirely.  After being purchased by EA, I just don't consider Bioware, Bioware any more.  I know that's nerd-rage fanboi hyperbole and overly dramatic, but I AM a nerd, so that is how I feel :(

Reply #2 from Elemental Forums Top

Quoting Lord, reply 1
That's fair.

 

Although I don't agree about the Bioware stuff entirely.  After being purchased by EA, I just don't consider Bioware, Bioware any more.  I know that's nerd-rage fanboi hyperbole and overly dramatic, but I AM a nerd, so that is how I feel
End of Lord's quote

I think it went wrong when Mythic was merged into Bioware by EA. Then we got the fail of Warhammer Online infecting everything else.

Elemental: Reforged
Reply #3 from Elemental Forums Top

My view is this: Actions speak louder than words.

Watch our deeds over our words.  

For me, I think Fallen Enchantress is a "sure thing" but that's because I'm privy to seeing it.  War of Magic I am more hesitant about because its design is inherently very broad -- it tries to be all things to all people.  So in my opinion v1.3 of War of Magic will be a good place to decide what its future is.

Reply #4 from Elemental Forums Top

@Tridus

They didn't merge Mythic into Bioware. They have 2 separate offices in completely different parts of the country.

 

They simply renamed Mythic to "Bioware Mythic" for two reasons. One because they were sharing resources, (Mythic is doing the PvP element for The Old Republic) and two, because they think they can convince people to play Mythic games if it has the word Bioware on it.

So i don't really see how the name change will have any effect on Bioware games, and i think it is safe to say that NO video game company is consistent across time.

Part of the reason is that people come and go. Also, the developers are human beings, they change, get new perspectives, get new ambitions. And finally, nobody wants to make the same game they made last time. Most developers want freedom to change, to grow, to try new things. Obviously Activision would prefer to keep releasing a new Call of Duty game every year. But the people at Infinity Ward were done, the people who made Halo got tired of that franchise, and broke off and went their own direction. This happens all the time.

Similarly, while Stardock could have made Gal Civ 3 or something like that, they decide to make War of Magic. I think its great that they have the freedom to pursue their dreams, and even if they make mistakes, the alternative is much worse.

So I think that you should support Stardock so that one day they can make another game that is both awesome and completely original at the same time. 

Reply #5 from Elemental Forums Top

Quoting Frogboy, reply 3
For me, I think Fallen Enchantress is a "sure thing" but that's because I'm privy to seeing it. War of Magic I am more hesitant about because its design is inherently very broad -- it tries to be all things to all people. So in my opinion v1.3 of War of Magic will be a good place to decide what its future is.
End of Frogboy's quote

Frogboy, You are probably right about FE as it will be more interesting experience out of the gate. As for WoM, I don't really agree that the design is so broad, but feel more like the design does not take significant risks. Consider for a moment a single city in WoM. A player can place a city anywhere in the world, and barring a monster attack or enemy invasion, that city will never cause the player a moment of serious consideration. The people will always be happy and health and live infinitely long lives. In a way, this makes cities easily manageable for players as their attention is not constantly diverted to manage their individual cities. Yet, this manageability comes at the price of making cities feel a bit bland and unexciting.

Reply #6 from Elemental Forums Top

Quoting Frogboy, reply 3
My view is this: Actions speak louder than words.

Watch our deeds over our words.  

For me, I think Fallen Enchantress is a "sure thing" but that's because I'm privy to seeing it.  War of Magic I am more hesitant about because its design is inherently very broad -- it tries to be all things to all people.  So in my opinion v1.3 of War of Magic will be a good place to decide what its future is.
End of Frogboy's quote

If it's a sure thing then let the consumers of your game test it now, so we can have something to enjoy, not be frustrated with like WoM. 

Reply #7 from Elemental Forums Top

Quoting kenata, reply 5
If it's a sure thing then let the consumers of your game test it now, so we can have something to enjoy, not be frustrated with like WoM. 
End of kenata's quote

One of the things I am truly trying to recover from is the relationship between stardock and the open beta testers for EWOM. I heralded the move and thought with strdocks experience in non-game software development we would see testing between a developer and the community in an absolutly new way. I trumpted this on many other boards.

Then they failed me in pretty much every single expectation I had.

I thought they would have a release that actually followed SDLC. Instead they renamed development builds as betas by even the broadest definition of the semantics and released the first actual beta version they gave the pre-release community. I had'nt even started to test or post much I thought there was going to be 6 months to a year more of testing easy the state the game was in (I was playing the "dev" versions).

I thought they were going to have a rigorous bug tracking system where every single bug was tracked and went through a QA process, just like it would be done with internal testers. Instead they used the forum and left many posted bugs unacknowledged. Redundant posts were everywhere on the forum, bugs and feature requests were intermixed, and the release schedule got away from them. They basically violated every QA best practice there is with the community.

They had an opportunity to use an army of passionate, dedicated, FREE testers, and basically treated them as annoying forum trolls. Not directly in words but by their actions. And i am still wondering why some company hasn;t yet figured out that if they take the offer of free testing seriously from their community and then actually follow that up and treat them as real internal testers there going to have dug right into an unbelievable way to sell pre-releases and save money on testing. The real trick I have yet to see any game company do (except blizzard to a lesser extent with WoW) is the part where they actually treat them like real internal testers and track every single bug submission to resolution within their internal system.

I just had to post this in response to you saying they need to let us test and I just wanted to say no, don't, not unless your going to treat us as actual internal testers, give us a serious form that tracks directly with whatever your internal bug tracking tool is, and get some help on conforming to well known and understood industry best practices specifically in regards to how you name your builds and release them on a strict timetable.

Reply #8 from Stardock Forums Top

I like the tech tree idea. :beer:

As for BioWare... I blame EA.

Reply #9 from Elemental Forums Top

Quoting Jam3, reply 7

Quoting kenata, reply 5If it's a sure thing then let the consumers of your game test it now, so we can have something to enjoy, not be frustrated with like WoM. 

One of the things I am truly trying to recover from is the relationship between stardock and the open beta testers for EWOM. I heralded the move and thought with strdocks experience in non-game software development we would see testing between a developer and the community in an absolutly new way. I trumpted this on many other boards.

Then they failed me in pretty much every single expectation I had.

I thought they would have a release that actually followed SDLC. Instead they renamed development builds as betas by even the broadest definition of the semantics and released the first actual beta version they gave the pre-release community. I had'nt even started to test or post much I thought there was going to be 6 months to a year more of testing easy the state the game was in (I was playing the "dev" versions).

I thought they were going to have a rigorous bug tracking system where every single bug was tracked and went through a QA process, just like it would be done with internal testers. Instead they used the forum and left many posted bugs unacknowledged. Redundant posts were everywhere on the forum, bugs and feature requests were intermixed, and the release schedule got away from them. They basically violated every QA best practice there is with the community.

They had an opportunity to use an army of passionate, dedicated, FREE testers, and basically treated them as annoying forum trolls. Not directly in words but by their actions. And i am still wondering why some company hasn;t yet figured out that if they take the offer of free testing seriously from their community and then actually follow that up and treat them as real internal testers there going to have dug right into an unbelievable way to sell pre-releases and save money on testing. The real trick I have yet to see any game company do (except blizzard to a lesser extent with WoW) is the part where they actually treat them like real internal testers and track every single bug submission to resolution within their internal system.

I just had to post this in response to you saying they need to let us test and I just wanted to say no, don't, not unless your going to treat us as actual internal testers, give us a serious form that tracks directly with whatever your internal bug tracking tool is, and get some help on conforming to well known and understood industry best practices specifically in regards to how you name your builds and release them on a strict timetable.
End of Jam3's quote

 

this makes a lot of sense

Reply #10 from Elemental Forums Top

*nods*

I purchased Elemental on the day it came out. I started playing it, and sadly discovered it was not as fun for me as I expected or hoped.

Am I playing it right now? No. Do I regret buying it in the first place? No. Stardock has the courage to try out new things, bring out new stuff, not "Action Slayer 3 - The Sequeling" or "FightSim VI - The Return of the Curse of the Son of FightSim". And for supporting a game studio that has that courage, and also the courage to fail AND to admit that too, it is money well spent.

If 1.2/1.3 and Fallen Enchantress turn the game into the pack of fun I hoped it would be I'll be more than happy. If not, I still do not consider the money misspent.