The relationship between developers and player community | Forums

[Frag_Maniac]

Some quotes I found profound were...

"EA was rightly criticized in 2017 for including a pay-to-win system in Battlefront 2 that gave the edge to players who were willing to spend money on loot boxes over those who weren’t. The negative PR around EA’s fumble reached such a fever pitch that nowadays ‘loot boxes’ are dirty words across the gaming landscape, and have become regulated under gambling law in multiple countries.


And yet, the campaign to get rid of the loot boxes was, questionably, aimed directly at reactionary parts of society: worried parents and the hungry, uninformed mainstream media, ready to spin the ‘video games are bad’ message at any opportunity."

...and...

“I remember getting a death threat about the fact that there were butterflies in our original trailer,” Murray told The Guardian. “You could see them as you walked past them, but there weren’t any butterflies in the launch game. I remember thinking to myself: ‘Maybe when you’re sending a death threat about butterflies in a game, you might be the bad guy.’”

This kinda makes it obvious why after numerous scientifically conducted studies which showed no correlation to video games and violent behavior, we are now seeing claimed "studies" that prove otherwise. Make no mistake people, when gamers conduct themselves in uncivil ways, it WILL be taken advantage of by spinsters that are quick to paint us ALL as violent lunatics. Even if we have legit beefs about things like lootboxes, they will spin that into a video game developers are holistically evil diatribe.

[Kane_sg]

Lame.

All these 'Gamers are more Powerful' just grows into a new set of b1tching culture which is a new tradition of brainless, unreasonable, train-ride complaining and a lot of drivel.

Just think like a f*cking logical human being is enough:

- Games are not made for you. They are made for those who may like them. You don't need to buy, they don't need you to buy.

- Developers are professionals and human being. They have responsibility for everything that boils down to time and money. They most likely have more rounded up experience in their fields more than your 4ss sitting in front of screen. But they are also imperfect, reflection, and learn, just like yourself.

- Publishers invested money in projects. They are businesses. They are looking for profit; the profit to grow themselves, pay their workers, and invest in future projects. It's only natural for them to monitor, approve projects based on what they think is profitable, and hatch a scheme to exploit the consumer market, just like you would do in your job or business. If you disagree with their scheme, don't spend money on them, and they will decide their future. They don't have authorization to your saving accounts and they never steal your money as a lot of braindead gamers like to claim.

[Paladinrja]

Like I said. There needs to be a better procedure and feedback model than populism. -- One that forces people to step back and really distill their ideas, in order to convey feedback/suggestions concisely.

[Ghost-Ami]

Like I said. There needs to be a better procedure and feedback model than populism. -- One that forces people to step back and really distill their ideas, in order to convey feedback/suggestions concisely.

Perhaps the solution is to switch from using a public forum to private messaging for feedback.

A developer can make clear that it will ignore other social media and will only accept feedback via its own private messaging system.

Any rage or abuse communicated via this private system will also be dismissed as a matter of course.

Sincere players with constructive and doable suggestions will be heard, and if enough people ask for something and/or the devs like it anyway they'll do it.

I would also recommend that developers be afforded the right to work anonymously and be credited in games by recognisable pseudonyms, something that would protect them from doxxing and other abuse while allowing them to build reputation and career via their handles. And everyone working at a studio would be put under the same sort of data protection rules as people who work with financial records or medical data or similar.

I have spoken before about my concerns that gaming has been dominated for many years by, shall we say, a certain type of privileged and entitled person. It's a small step from there to a willingness to actually threaten and harass devs, the most persecuted artists in any medium.

Does George R R Martin get yelled at occasionally by fans for not finishing his Song of Ice and Fire books? Sure. Do women, people of colour, and LGBT folks encounter abuse when they take roles in popular film franchises that have historically gone to straight white cismen? Yes. Do musicians find themselves damned if they do, damned if they don't, loathed by fans if they make something "too different" from what first made them popular or "too derivative" of work they've already produced? Indeed.

But because these media have a far broader consumer base than video games these unreasonable and often abusive voices are far less virulent and are easier to deprive of oxygen

The mob in video gaming is much larger and more entrenched and feels like a special case requiring special containment measures.

Should game developers have to conceal their legal names and limit the feedback they receive to individual suggestions? Of course not. But many of these stories go beyond mere "populism". Some of these cases are quite literally lynch mobs with a genuine desire to do harm to the artists they think are beholden to them.

Letting a mob fuel ithemselves on a developer's official forum emboldens them, and giving the mob personal information on the targets of their ire puts lives at risk.

I have the privilege of total anonymity via the architecture of various heavily encrypted software I use and the extremely stringent control of my personal data I exercise. And yet every time I step onto this forum I am still quietly but utterly terrified of...you people. ((((

[Lunatic LK47]

Perhaps the solution is to switch from using a public forum to private messaging for feedback.


Sincere players with constructive and doable suggestions will be heard, and if enough people ask for something and/or the devs like it anyway they'll do it.

((((

Ha ha ha ha ha. This is pretty damn laughable. What's to say those sincere players WON'T get ignored by the development team? Look at all of the suggestion threads that have been added in the past year. Did anyone from the Dev team act on them for Wildlands? I'm seeing a big "NO" on that one other than "We'll pass it on to the team" and nothing further than that.

[Paladinrja]

Yeah, but populism is always some lynch mob, in one shape or form. That's not to say there aren't social forums where populism is exercised with a healthy dose of social grace.

I think most of the abuse however, is merely due to frustration. It's very obvious some people feel they have all the answers and makes online socialisation, a kinda weird psycho-MOBA. Frankly it gets old fast. As if somehow, quashing/quieting a person or group, is going to "unsay" what's already been said, lol!

As they say, "No good deed goes unpunished", my answer to that has always been, "Lol! spilt milk and other strange facts of life!"

Biggest mistake that's ever been made in online social forum, is the "like/dislike" feature.

[Ghost-Ami]

Biggest mistake that's ever been made in online social forum, is the "like/dislike" feature.

Well, on that we are certainly in agreement.

[KingSpawn1979]

shame what happened with mass effect andromeda's development

it shares many similarity's with ghost recon wildlands
developers making their first open world game on an engine never designed for it

they even released in the same month

Besides its technical Flaws ME:A is an absolutely awesome Game and a great Experience. Imho it's terribly underrated, maybe because of its devastating Starting Issues.
If only those ***** EA Guys didn't always grab all Studios to milk the last Drop out of them.

[KingSpawn1979]

Biggest mistake that's ever been made in online social forum, is the "like/dislike" feature.

I couldn't agree more.

[Mynameisshhhhh7]

I just wanna add someone with a legitimate reason to be pissed off about somethimg does not make them toxic, it’s how they vocalize it, correct?