I asked it once, I'll ask it again.
IC/SD, please care to give us some news on what you're doing about soase.It doesn't have to be a long essay. 50 words every week or so, summing up what you're currently doing is just fine.Any problems? Ideas? Maybe incoming fixes to balance?Maybe a single comment or two in the most popular thread recently?Maybe a little news in the Sins News forum once per month?
Hell, even a single line of info about what you ate this morning would be a 500% improvement to the current information flow.
I know you ARE doing something. I know you want us to shut up and let you work. But I am sure you CAN spend a few minutes to write a tiny informative post for the community.
Goddamn it let us know you're alive out there. Just a few words. Five minutes of your time. Three minutes!
Anything.
Please.
PLEASE.
PlEasE
Agreed, I will not comment on how much I loved your post, however, because I have no time. Or did I?
i agree with this entirely
ive been so starved for information that ive resorted to the Sins Modding forum (which, i might add, is not accessible from Impulse. Not that its IC's responsibility, but SD, get your house in order! How on Earth do you think it is acceptable to provide access to some forums but not others?) and have started making my own mod with things id like to see in the game. why? because im pretty darn certain that most ideas outside of balancing options are ignored by the devs.
point is, i think I and a great many others are getting sick and tired of the lack of info. yes, you have things to do, yes you are busy with programming etc. yes, i know you are only a small company with a few staff members.
but i think its time to hire some punk kid (or, hey, why not a full blown PR guy) to write a paragraph or two each week/month whatever, with some goings on. if you REALLY cant afford to hire some guy to write a paragraph every once in a while, ask SD to let you use their PR guy. but this is getting really really old. im sick and tired of kissing ass and pleaing with IC for anything and everything. I hate whining, i really do, but im sick and tired of IC lumbering on along its own bloody way. at the very least, more info could and would show the community that IC cares about its customers opinions, as well as giving people something to talk about.
look, all said and done, Sins has no real story. Suggestion, Rumour-Mongering and Rampant Speculation is all there is to be had in that department. So outside of that, the only thing to be interested in is Modifications, and Expansion Packs. Put 2 and 2 together, and figure out that you need to start releasing information if you want to keep people interested.
How can u say no to that face?
Rezonator let all hell loose, but there's some truth to it.
You do have a tangible business in keeping people interested. Aside from being completely painless for you (it's just fifteen minutes a week, for Heaven's sake), many would really appreciate it. Moreover, news touch people's imagination, make them more interested and more willing to buy a product.Do you think anyone would be awaiting StarcraftII if not for the fifty-something QA sessions and three battle reports? If Blizz didn't answer those questions, if they stood almost dead silent for half a year, the starcraftII forum would definately NOT have a new post popping up every minute, 24 hours a day, everyday. It's the NEWS that keep the crowd interested, power up the anticipation and will eventually push people into buying the game as soon as it hits the shelves.Oh and Creative Assembly personnel would all get murdered by now for what they did to Empire TW if they didn't release daily updates on their patch development progress.
News can really work wonders in this business.
We don't want a hotline or a chat channel with a resident IC/SD employee answering our questions 24/7.But just look at the Sin News forum. It's DEAD.
Every new potential Soase buyer will 1] enter the site2] see there's no news on the site.3] go to the forums4] see there's been no official news on the forums.4b] What's worse, that person will notice that since the last patch changelog one month ago there's been 10 pages of balance flamewar discussion and no official response. We know you're working on it. That person will not.5] wave his hand at it and go get something else.
Seriously, you are willingly stripping yourselves off income.Every new potential customer will drop by the forums, see the devs are dead, see the raging balance flamewar and drop the idea of playing sins.
Think about it please, even if spending fifteen minutes per week on maintaining your fans' mental stability isn't worth the hassle in your eyes.
I also would like to see at least one post a fortnight (at least) from an official from ironclad with some information for the loyal commmunity.
I speak as BOTH a member of the community AND a software developer AND a computer support person.
as a sofware developer I NEED communication from the users of the software, as a computer support person I DESPERATLY NEED communication with the computer users, and as a member of the sins community I also want (need) the feedback from the developers to help me move with the patching/expansions/modding areas that I am interested in
harpo
Agreed, just make post with few lines on friday, just before shutting down the lights and leving to enjoy the weekend.
Guys, please bear in mind that having devs posting regularly in and of itself as we've had in the past is an oddity in the industry. It's not at all unusual for them to be quietly working on the next update/project.
Some of the guys from IC visited the office last week to discuss some stuff, so rest assured that the gears are still turning in the background. Just because IC doesn't have anything to announce right now doesn't mean they're doing nothing--it just means it'll be that much bigger and spiffier when it's ready for public eyes
It's easy to say stay calm and wait when you are perfectly informed.
When a man's wife is on a business trip and doesn't call him for six months, the man is worried. It doesn't matter that she turned out to be lesbian and there's zero possibility of her screwing with her marriage vow.It doesn't matter that the man has reliable intelligence through his friend working in CIA that his wife is all right.
Lack of news is still driving him MAD.
Please understand that we're not PC programs. We won't be showing a " >_ " prompt for 150 years until the linux crashes or the power plant explodes.
Two more things
a] You are losing money by not showing your engagement and efforts in developing this software to new, potential customers. We know you're all working. People who don't have this game yet and had a thought of purchasing soase will see lack of any info as a discouragement.
b]
COH - Relic eployees usually post every 1-2 weeks to notify the public of some patch under construction, new map competitions etc.SCII - features regular QA sessions, in-game movies and all sorts of stuff.Empire TW - creative assembly dudes post every 3-5 days on their patching progress.America's Army 3 - dev team contacts the community at least once per week with news or requesting assistance in identifying certain bugs.
Having devs contact the community all by themselves was an oddity - 10 years ago.Times Change.
That same thing was said about Episode 3, but they've taken so long that if it isn't better than everything else combined, i'll be disappointed
But as i've hanged around in the Bethesda forums for few months, i've learned that even missing a release date by two weeks is no reason to contact the community. Besides, i'd imagine the vast majority of the next expansions sales will be from people who already have Sins, i doubt there are too much new people coming to this game at this stage.
To be honest I'm already losing interesting. The next big game will be more interesting at this point.
so like i said, hire some kid, part time, still in school/college or just out of college, and get him to write a paragraph every once in a while?
I remember Bungie during Halo 2 and 3 development, there were multiple posts a week, including a standard, weekly bulletin. there were times when something went horribly wrong, and Bungie needed all hands on deck to fix the problem, in which case, someone took 5 mins before going home for the day or while drinking their morning coffee to write, Hey Guys, its all hands on deck here atm, just trying to fix some stuff. rest assured we're still working and we'll let you know, or, he wrote Hey guys... really nothing much going on atm, we're close, really close, just playing the game to fix and any all bugs so hang in there
that entire paragraph took me all of 40 seconds to type!
given, Bungie did screw around and ended up releasing 2 games that did not live up to their full potential, but we must learn from our mistakes no?
they could say, hey, this week we are looking at MP balance, at different planet types, at the new furry space bunny achievement, and its all very cool, whatever
Really, ive sid it before and ill say it again. Sins does not have a story, so straight off the bat you've lost something the community can gossip about, and something that allows for rampant speculation etc etc. right now, its all balance wars, new ideas that we think are probably never listened to, and question about how to incease fleet supply, or beat achievements, or get more resources, or other super noob questions which are fine... but not very fulfilling to 'loyal' customers
I was working on a new dev blog and will post it asap. It got delayed by my trip to Stardock HQ.
by the way, you do realise that alot of the forums and subtopics are not available to people who read the forums via Impulse?
Modding, Dev Journals, Beta Feedback... as a matter of fact anything other than the main Sins forum are unaccessible to Impulse users.
Seems a wee bit silly to me
[EDIT] in fact, seems a big bit silly to me, i knew forums.sinsofasolarempire.com did exist, but i also saw the same posts etc on Impulse. Since i preferred to use Impulse, i stayed there. it was only after i started making a mod, and realised i couldnt get to the modding forum from Impulse, did i realise that all the interesting and important stuff is only available via an internet browser.
really, what gives?
Kryo, Blair, thanks for responding. Weekly news, or weekly views, general chat; we just want to know someone's alive in 'thar! It really is true, ongoing communication from the developer olympus is key to maintaining enthusiasm in the player base.
But now I wish to discuss some things that we players can do. If only we had a New Pilot or Beginners forum section, people new to the game would feel more at ease posting their questions. And we could respond.
You can also drop in on gamefaqs every week or so and answer a question or two over there. Seems to be where a lot of new players hang out.
Replays: Hast ye looked at the Replays section lately? Kind of barren when it comes to the most recent patch (and yes I am guilty too.) Ought to be at least a few replays for the current patch level of Sins and Enlightenment for new players to look at.
YouTube Videos: Sins video posting has slacked off greatly in the last year. If you have the capability of making a video, then throw one over occasionally. Doesn't have to be anything profound or over produced.
Anyway, Blair, Kryo - we're not really trying to push you into spending days on the forums instead of coding.Don't think too bad of us.
Just a nice little 5-line teaser of what you guys are messing up with rite nao.Three minutes per week, one official slice of news in the official news forum so that everyone, new or not, can find it easily and it's all cool.
Okay, I'm a few weeks late on this topic, but the situation still stands...devs are terrible at communicating with us. Look at the "Sins Developer Journals" section. Notice the last date anything was posted? Yeah, that's right...MARCH 4TH.
March. Fraking. Fourth
That means that in five months no one has even considered talking about what they're doing. Not a screenshot, or a video, or a dev blog. Nothing. We have been kept out in the cold, forgotten, cast aside like an unwanted play-thing. I'm sure the devs aren't heartless bastards, and they're happy to have fans, but FOR GOD'S SAKE, SHOW US THAT YOU ARE. Is it really so hard to spend a few minutes writing a paragraph or two saying "Hey guys, just wanted to let you know we're working on X project, and here are a few details about what we hope to accomplish"? How long does it take? Ten minutes at the most? This is something that could be done on a lunch break!
Give us some interaction! That's all we ask. Nearly every game and game developer these days has an active, ongoing relationship with its fans on the forums. ESPECIALLY with RTS games. So what's the hold-up? It's your job as developers to keep the fans interested so we'll buy your new stuff. We want to know what you're working on. We want to know what updates you have planned. We'd like some degree of interaction with you.
Let's face it: at this point, drawing in new fans isn't likely to happen in any large number. That means focusing on keeping the fans you're already got should be the main issue.
We get more interaction with the modders than we do the devs. And the modders are usually just one guy, at his computer, in his spare time. No one is paying them. And yet, they post updates and talk to the fans of the mods daily. Why is it so hard to do the same for an actual company? I mean, even the giant, heartless, all-consuming entity known as EA at least talks to people on its game forums.
Hire someone to talk in the forums once in a while, post something on a lunch break, type out a little paragraph or two before you go home. It's all we ask. We know NOTHING about the next expansion, besides what it's called and the very basics of what it's supposed to do. Give us some details. It really can't hurt.
Amen! I completely agree! Karma to you!
wow nearly a month later the blog hasn't even been posted
The way I interpret these sorts of things is to take a lack of response or notice as being equivalent to "We haven't done anything yet," or "We haven't made much progress." People like to discuss good news and tend not to voluntarily report bad news (like "We haven't made any progress yet.") It's very possible that they just don't have anything to talk about yet.
I suspect that the developers never had any real concrete ideas about what exactly should be in the Diplomacy expansion and the third expansion and that they are now trying to brainstorm what should be in the expansions. In other words, there never was a grand plan for the content other than "We need to produce three expansions." I'm guessing that at some point in the game's development the officers of the two companies (Ironclad and Stardock) sat in a room discussing the game and agreed that it would be good to produce three expansions in order to sell them and to bring in more revenue (nothing wrong with that).
In other words--the expansions will be, in essence, contrived. If they do a really good job then they will feel like natural progressions and I think that this is the case with Entrenchment.
Mercenary Muffin, why get all worked up over this? I think you're setting yourself up for disappointment if you get emotionally attached to any prospective new game or expansion these days since 95% of what's released is junk (and now-a-days, often consolized, watered-down junk). Even sequels to proven, successful games get FUBARred. The expansion will be finished when it's finished and it might be worthwhile or it might just be poor kitsch. In the meantime, just enjoy the game as it stands now. If you're getting bored playing single player against the AI and seek variety or a greater strategic challenge, then consider getting custom mods and maps or even playing the game in online multiplayer against real human opponents (it's the "Ironclad Online" button). Coming to play it online would almost be like getting a brand new game except you know that you already enjoy the mechanics of the game.
I just think that they are all sick and tired of spending days upon days on coding the very same game.
They must know half of the code by heart and chances are that their nightmares have floating orkies shooting desync bugs in them.
They just cannot understand how anyone would even care to hear anything about this game.They think that when they're fed up, we all are.Everybody can be wrong.
They havent made progress after HOW many months?
Idn, are you daft? Or just like trying to be ignorant?
If they are stuck, they can still say so. Hell, they may be hung up on something that the community as a whole doesnt want. Like maybe they are trying to give the pirates a superweapon or add in some other nerfs, and they could say it, and the community would be like: well, we dont really need or want that, so why not scrap it and move on.
Alternatively, it could be something people really want, and someone gives a simple suggestion that removes ALL the issues the Devs are having and bam! problem solved. With a modding community like Sins has, i find it hard to believe SOMEONE wouldnt find a solution, or at least be interested to know whats happening.
But to not have made progress after 6 months or so (since Entrenchment was released)... wow... tough break...
awwww. the cat is just irresistible! whew.
anyways, this was exactly what i was talking about. i totally agree with what you posted . we need it!!
all I have to say is: its a good thing we have such a great modding community.
Wow, old thread.
Anyway we dont need daily updates:
[German Accent]
"Yar, so zee effecieny of zee point venderfing cade is now ovar 10.546% faster zan before...
...
WE VILL DOUBLE ZAT BY TOOMAROW!!!"
It just ins't cricket. So instead we need rants! Chances for the developers to let off some of that furstration they have worked up:
"This ****ing ass backwards code is ****ed up! It just dosn't ****ing work! Which ****ing idiot did this **** anyway?ME? WHAT THE ****!!? I don't write **** like this! **** OFF!!!Im going to get drunk, you bastard half-wit ****tards! Oh and we added a feature that will blue screen your PC, how you like that you whiney little BASTARDS!!!"
Okay... forget I said anything.
^^lol^^
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