I'm beginning to think there's a correlation.
Regardless of who did what, the plain and simple fact that this game runs like garbage, and the package says "StarDock". You stand behind your product, not write a bunch of blog posts about how everyone should feel sorry for you.
Feel sorry for us? Where have we implied that people should feel sorry for us?
LIke you said, the package has Stardock on it. We're the publisher. We saw a problem and we took action by assigning our own developers to solve it. As we work on it, I post progress reports.
WTF does this have to do with common sense. FrogBoy is the CEO of stardock, right? He comes on here telling how he has 4 groups of developers working on the game.. that would lead me to believe that stardock is the developer.Regardless of who did what, the plain and simple fact that this game runs like garbage, and the package says "StarDock". You stand behind your product, not write a bunch of blog posts about how everyone should feel sorry for you.
Standing behind your product is exactly what FrogBoy is and has been doing.......
Yeah, I highly doubt you're going to find a company that's is as open to the community and is as accepting of criticism on their own forums as Stardock. If Stardock is treating player's like trash, well, then, I can't even begin to think of a negative qualifier you'd use to describe any other game developer/publisher.
I own Galactic Civ 1 and 2 and Sins of a Solar Empire, and now Demigod.
I don't understand how frogboy can claim to hate Multiplayer when Sins was good at it?
I've been a shameless Stardock fan for some years now. Originally came from their skinning stuff but fell in love with Galactic Civilizations and later Sins of a Solar Empire.
I was in the Demigod beta. I would love to know what goes on behind closed doors.
I'm a little surprised that nobody from Gas Powered Games has been on to talk to people. With Sins of a Solar Empire, Blair from Ironclad was on regularly answering questions and I still see him on and he's the President (I think) of Ironclad.
I continue to be impressed with how Stardock treats customers. But I do think it would have been nice for GPG to come on and share some of the heat. The fact you have users thinking Stardock developed Demigod tells you all you need to know really.
I have purchased a fair (alright, large) number of items from SD. I also have connection issues that I have voiced concern over. So, the implied correlation does not seem to work. I do have the utmost respect for Stardock, the rate at which they are bringing to the fore a brand new multiplayer system is astounding, but the multiplayer "as is" is...problematic. I enjoy the progress reports, and I find the tone refreshing. What makes me consfused is while Frogboy is free to call a spade a spade, when a productive member of the community does so they are banned. A strange blemish on the otherwise sterling Stardock reputation.
Well Frog at some stage if you choose to discontinue game development, i think this thread has shown you could perhaps move into Diplomacy next
well to be fair.... it isn't like stardock is unique in their dealings of problemsolving and updating their games. Other smaller gameproducers do the same. Keberos, the producers of Sword of the Stars(awesome game) are a small game producing company and they listened to the gamers and patched up the game nicely.
for a small company that wants to become big needs a good ears to geat a steady base of fanboys/girls to sell their product
SD makes Microsoft look like a god in service. I've complained about them in the past and never got banned. They have apologized and did everythign they could to make it up to me. ANd this is big bad microsoft. SD could learn a thing or two from them.
I'm pretty sure Frogboy and the SD team took personal offense to Warhawk's comment, since if I recall correctly, he was implying that the SD crew were liars that weren't standing behind their product when Frogboy and company are working 70 hour weeks to get the game running in prime condition. Frankly, I don't know any company-owned forums where you wouldn't get banned for posting personal attacks on company employees. They don't want to put up with that crap, and it's well within their discretion to ban offenders.
(slaps forehead)
Stardock isn't the DEVELOPER of Demigod. Why is this so hard for people to understand???
Sword of the Stars was published by Lighthouse Interactive. Did you see Lighthouse Interactive's CEO on the Sword of the Stars forums helping people? No.
I would have been as offended as hell if I were at SD and read those comments. Stardock's the one bailing out the game that they didn't make on the principle that they're the publisher but I can't think of any publisher, ever that has done what Stardock is doing.
The game doesn't run like garbage, and I'm not even a fanboy. Maybe you guys should stop trying to play new games on your commodore 64s.
It's obviously hyperbole and that player is frustrated by multiplayer not working (for him).
I'm happy that I've been pretty lucky and haven't had too many problems.
I bought Gal Civ 2 + all expansion packs and also Sins of a Solar Empire. As far as customer support and corporate integrity go, Stardock is easily the best major company in the game industry imo. Which is why I make it a point to support them.
That said I am somewhat disappointed that this game has so many issues. I'd like to have played it properly starting when I paid for it, not wait a few weeks for patches to make AI replacements not completely gamebreaking and add basic connectivity. I have complete faith in Stardock's ability and commitment to resolving these issues, but at the same time it's off-putting that they're there in the first place. I don't want to hear any "Stardock is just the publisher" excuses either, they could have left the game in the oven a bit longer if that's what it needed.
Hey guys, let me clear a few things up.
Stardock is the publisher which means, no, we didn't develop Demigod.
BUT...
As the publisher, all final decisions are made by us. Therefore, EVERYTHING that goes wrong with a game is ultimately the fault of the publisher IMO. The buck stops with the publisher.
A lot of people have heard about Stardock "developing" things in Demigod. This is true because once we saw there were problems, I pulled people off of Elemental and Impulse and assigned them to Demigod in order to resolve problems faster. More people with more know-how = faster results.
Like many of you, I've seen games come out where there are problems and people end up waiting months and months for solutions. I don't consider that acceptable.
Now, with the case of Demigod, we thought it was done. Or, to use your analogy, we thought it was cooked to perfection so to speak.
But as a publisher (or developer) we had never developed or released a peer to peer multiplayer centric game before. The closest thing toa MP centric game we've done is Sins of a Solar Empire which has an online population that tops out at around 300 people in a weekend (compared to 5,000+ for Demigod). So all our assumptions came out to be wrong.
There is no excuse for the situation people have been faced with. All we can do is our best to rectify things as quickly as we can for as many people as possible.
Demigod is a long-term game though. It's not something that's going to disappear. THat's one of the advantages of being MP centric like it is. People still play counterstrike years later.
And Stardock will make sure there's a good MP population to sustain it one way or the other.
This kind of attitude is the reason I love you guys.
hmm sounds like you are admitting to your mistakes and kick some peoples asses into overdrive into fixing it
i hope what ever problems there still are get fixed and that you continue too work hard
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