Let's talk about how streaming effects our game.

Discussion in 'General Discussion' started by Time Lord, Sep 3, 2021.

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  1. Scanphor

    Scanphor Avatar

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    The other issue is that this game has a horrible reputation due to various issues / people etc. Whilst some games (No Man's Sky, Fallout 76 for example) have managed to recover from this I'm not sure if this game will ever get away from those who seem to have made it their mission to follow it around the interwebs and trash talk it....

    Also a lot of gamers it seems would rather just jump on that kind of bandwagon and not ever try the game and make their own mind up (personally I pretty much ignore the "prevailing view" and do just that). I've come up against that speaking to others about this game where I say here's a game I like, they are like "sounds interesting" then come back with "but people are saying its bad" and don't come play...
     
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  2. macnlos

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    Ok, let's assume this is true. The point is what??? If this is what is really driving the market then focus on it, otherwise be a dinosaur. That's short/curt/cruel but it's the truth. It's like blaming the rain but refusing to use an umbrella. Either you go where the market is going or you try and break ranks and lead the way to a new way. I can say with absolute 150% certainty that Portnip/Chris is not in a position or have the ability to do this. So it's either support or continue into dinosaur mode.
     
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  3. macnlos

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    They waived the banner on all this game was going to be. "Ultima" and anything related to it is very personal people. They grew up with it. They are attached to it. Portnip had such a great advantage when they announced because they had a built in player base ready to dump money and time.... and then they didn't deliver. Maybe... and I'm just spitballing here... that could be main reason rather than "oh it's the angry mob that is the cause of all our woes".

    But even if we assume your premise that it was the angry mob of people... they are not wrong. The only thing worse than SotA for me is probably SC.
     
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  4. Scanphor

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    Hey I get that but don't think there's any mileage in getting into all the why's and wherefores... that's been done to death ;) (personally I think there's an inherent problem with crowdfunding games in particular where devs will promise everyone the earth at the initial stage but if you look at all the things said it would simply not be possible to fulfil all of them in a single game - you either end up with what we have here with a lot of aggrieved people or SC where the game's been stuck in feature creep development hell for like a decade now :p).

    I'm also not saying the people who feel the way they feel are either right or wrong. But the practical upshot is that anything about the game anywhere gets mobbed by negative comments. That is acting as a barrier to people coming to the game with no preconceptions and trying it out.

    Personally I threw a small amount at the Kickstarter then came along post-persistence to play having kept out of the process up till then so didn't really expect anything. Do I think its a perfect gem of a game? No. But I've certainly had my money's worth of playtime out of it and still come back for a few weeks here and there and generally have fun doing so.
     
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  5. craftymethod

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    Get all the streamers in a very decorated town/house putting on funny voices method acting characters in perhaps scenarios.

    Im sure that would lead to wonderful things.
     
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  6. craftymethod

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    If bumping into strangers interacting like was possible that would be cool for streaming too! :

    The hilarity in that awkwardness.
     
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  7. Time Lord

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    :D Hahaha!


    Has anyone shot any video or streamed the Giant yet?

    We are always be a single camera angle game, which is the same with all games, yet our Video Trailers have such angles.

    Reviewers can only get to the very begining content and judging all from that view.

    When we decide to make our camera angles something like no other games could do, then every sort of video content coming out of our game is seen like no other.
    Story Telling is always something we need to look into doing better :)
    ~TL~
     
  8. evillego6

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    Have to disagree. It's not exactly like the news stories are swarmed with negative comments. The percentage of negative vs positive is about equal, which fits pretty squarely with the steam reviews to be honest. People seem to be hot or cold on the game overall, which may not be our opinion, but it doesn't make any of their opinions invalid. Most of the articles I've seen about sota haven't been inundated with negative comments, in large part they seem to draw a few comments that lean toward the negative but have a few defenders.
     
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  9. Scanphor

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    I guess we're reading MMO news in different places then lol :D
     
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  10. Time Lord

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    Here's some interesting views which highlight some of the great comments here from you all. This subject has many branches which touch many facets in many directions in our game and "just as within this segment of Laz & Jacks show" have even more connections than we've thus far gotten to. We have many different great streamers and dreamers here in this thread and that's got to be healthy for our game to reckon with. I know I've learned allot thus far from all your comments, much more than if I just investigated from an independent study of it.

    Here's some comments and highlights of your comments from Laz & Jack, our longest running dynamic duo in sota streaming...


    :D~TL~
     
    Last edited: Sep 10, 2021
  11. Powersurge45

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    Here is an idea I just thought of....is there a way to give the starting players a version of a lev 100 character with full GMs in a particular set of magic/weapon skills for a very short span of time inside a "dream/hallucination" at the start of the game to give them a taste of what "could" be available once they get some xp under their belt. Other games do this all the time to hook the player on trying to achieve that level of progression "one day". Let them make a choice and "try out" a pre-built character with gear appropriate for that particular version. Like choose healer and allow them to be a life/sun mage. Choose "tank" and allow them to wield weapons and have GM earth skills and armor. Choose "archer" and let them be tactics spec'ed with good bows and charge mechanic tutorials...

    This could be too complicated to code...but giving them an early vision of what their character could be might be the key to opening their mind past the "tutorial" content where they simply cannot see what their character could become. Or even if it is filled with cinematic scenes depicting an owner of a POT, or perhaps a merchant with vendors in multiple towns, or even a farmer/crafter. Or of course an adventurer....just something behind the current new player experience....which is a bit underwhelming... Just some thoughts...

    Our game is too good and complex for it to not have more people playing it.
     
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  12. Time Lord

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  13. Zeek Latreck

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    Any game is streamable its up to the streamer to be the content provider not the game necessarily just playing a game on Twitch YouTube or whatever platform you prefer is not always enough if you are going to stream for three hours and you want there to be good content it would be best to plan out what you would do during that stream and then riff off the conversations that happen within the stream. its true in shroud and most game that there is really only so much you can do in the game so if you yourself can be engaging it wont really matter what kind of content you do in a game though some things can attract viewers better than other things. side note I have noticed people really respond to giveaways but personally I wouldn't recommend it eventually it is not sustainable unless you have a sponsor who can give you items or cotos or whatever to give out.
     
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  14. Zeek Latreck

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    few things I'd like to add you know what made Runescape classic so big? their Devs at the time would stream the game and do really silly content that was insanely engaging to the viewers they also had an amazing community manager at this time who went on to work at bigger companies but the role of a community manager is super important a little back story on my I went to IU and got a degree in business management I graduated in 2009 one of the biggest things they talked about was marketing and I have taken classes in the past six months on community management and what I learned is its really just marketing but with someone who is really really front facing to the community dev interaction with the people should never be discounted this doesn't mean they need to show what they are working on but really just engage with the community in a meaningful way now you might be asking what does this have to do with streaming? I could lay out the exact ways things should be done but that would be a very long amount of text and I cant give shroud all the secrets unless they pay me ;) but it will drive more viewers to people who play the game and their streams. And this takes more than just retweeting something or sharing a stream on a tweet or FB post never doubt the importance of community engagement and what it means for the game or the people who share their love for the game.
     
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  15. Time Lord

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    Good comment @Zeek Latreck :) Question time...
    How to Claim a lot in Shroud Of the Avatar
    161 views
    Jul 13, 2021
    thunbs up = 10

    That being your top viewed video with your next highest having 8 views, is this what we should be happy with?
    I think those 161 views came from having posted that video here in our competition thread:

    https://www.shroudoftheavatar.com/forum/index.php?threads/catnip-games-monthly-screenshot-video-contest.167287/page-9#post-1324679
    Is there nothing to improve these low view counts?

    I'm looking for a way to bring a few streamers in who's after stream videos each bring in well over 100,000 views within a week. I need a vehicle that can help those streamers get to heavy combat and back given 20 minutes to an hour if their attention can be held for that long, which most sota video/streams do not rise to that level of excitement.

    What should we do with them, how do we get them there to the exciting content, more exciting than let's say, an NPC conversation, a fishing contest or crafting tutorial content?
    Do you think we can do more than leave them yawning o_O?

    RuneScape as of 2018 has earned over 1 billion usd in revenue and it's development staff is not counted on one hand as ours is.
    Not to be a killjoy, but just another view, 121 views with 10 thumbs up on YouTube as a resume, and SOTA will never be a carbon copy of RuneScape or earn $50 million a year after wages, development and operating costs as RuneScape does, no matter what amount of word salad is thrown at it.

    I think we're missing something and I think the the industry is missing somethings as well, we just have yet to have found any of those somethings.
    Our Youtube advertising depends largely on what content people see, how they see it, and how it's entertaining while moving through any of our exciting content.

    I think our current streaming is only pacifying those who already play our game, not those who see one of our YouTube streams/vids.
    I personnally don't want to make another pacifier, I want to strive for more unique, I don't want to be content with sota steaming normal.

    I don't have any good street credentials in this either, but I can say I've seen enough to cause me to want to see better being done here with sota streaming.
    I have a cousin who's an assistant to the producer for many box office movie titles. I've seen her work, I've been on some of the sets and though I'm nowhere near doing anything with Arnold Schwarzenegger, I look at our game and I think there are better, more entertaining ways of presenting it which would be fun to aim towards to achieve those goals.

    But being content with what we have isn't one of them.

    Watch for RuneScape about 2016...
    ~TL~
     
    Last edited: Sep 11, 2021
  16. oplek

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    This is a meaningless statement, in regards to whether something is "streamable". It does not mean that you can technically hook it up to a stream, and the internets will send it along. That would mean that literally everything is "streamable" and nothing isn't. The word/phrase becomes pointless. It's about whether the thing you're streaming is itself bringing something valuable to the table.

    If someone is streaming paint drying - the epitome of something that is horrendously boring - and has 10k viewers, it's guaranteed that people are not there for the paint. Something else has been added to the equation, such as doing some kind of challenge or charity, etc (example: desertbus.org). Drying paint is not a streamable activity by itself. It's something else that's also there.

    Streaming SOTA is almost entirely watching paint dry.

    Saying something is streamable after you add something else is the equivalent of saying "the game is fun with friends". By that equivalent, there's literally no unfun games.
     
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  17. Zeek Latreck

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    So I don't have a YouTube presence other than my music (which is bigger on Spotify) of course I will not get many views lets just get that out of the way as far as my credentials go I actually worked in the industry as a consultant for a few years until I sold my company what I was trying to say is that more could be done in a way of community management to possibly bring in more people being a mimic of things that are proven to work could help which is why I used Runescape as an example and as far as my statement of being paid was more joking if Chris reached out to me directly of course I would help where I could but as we all know college cost me money and so did the classes I took recently and if you want good knowledge or help nothing is free in this world everything has a cost time, money or whatever I'm not going to lay out in a forum post things companies do right and or have done wrong. that would be better suited for a power point presentation lol and as you pointed out most of the viewers are just people who play the game already and a video on placing a house is super generic and not very compelling but I put something out there per the contest thing I think its a good video but its not really great content.
     
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  18. Zeek Latreck

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    hmm I think a lot of you misunderstand what "Content" means in the streaming world doing a challenge could be considered content but if the streamer themselves is not really engaging well you are right the paint is drying. any sandbox game it is the streamers job to figure out a way to make what they are doing meaningful though a game could help with things like a raid or something but some of the best streams I had ever had in the past was just me fishing and communicating with everyone or when I did astronomy night I played the game from my observatory in Arlia and hooked my telescope up to my laptop and we had a stream looking at the moon and some planets it would take a lot to get shroud in the world of 10k viewers but nothing is impossible just at this moment in time a lot of obstacles to over come but hey Coswalds content sure beats watching someone do east reach gap all day.
     
    Last edited: Sep 11, 2021
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  19. Time Lord

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    I think what you did and what you have done is fine work. I myself have nothing to show at all.
    I want a cinematic look to things, but most all I have seen is generic angle shots all worked up in post production and never seen done in live.

    • Wide Shot,
    • Medium Close Up,
    • Close Up,
    • Extreme Close Up,
    All these basic sized shots either come in the same angle as the character is facing or the motion of the character must stop to acheive the shot, while the others cannot be hit at all due to that one character being the only view provider.

    As far as personallity entertainment value, that's a standup comedy, which has nothing to do with tech, other than if the comic is operating off cue cards like The Tonight Show or SNL.

    I'm almost convenced that this is like the indians that first saw the Spanish boats. First they saw the people from the boats and then much later, they realized the Spanish came from the boats, but they never noticed the boats before they put two and two together and then realized they were being invaded and not visited by the gods.

    If a movie were shot using only our current video gamer Avatar's view, it would surely flop.
    If a live TV show were shot using only our current video gamer Avatar's view, it too would surely flop.
    But when Billy Crystal's City Slickers shows extreme close ups of Billy Crystal's back side and extreme close ups of his face and eyes, that's what made City Slickers gross over $100 mil, or it would have looked only like a stand up.

    • Wide Shot,
    • Medium Close Up,
    • Close Up,
    • Extreme Close Up,
    That's all just basic film making.

    Our game can put on a bad play with a good set, yet flops due to the wrong framing and inability to stream any camera angle or framing effects live.
    ~TL~
     
  20. Zeek Latreck

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    My suggestion is this for anyone who wants something specific out of videos or steaming go out and do it yourself and make some good content and if you all would like to have a conversation on content creation where I can convey more reach out to me on discord shaner9er and I will setup a stream tonight or whenever and we could talk about all of it but to be honest I'm not big about writing on forums and I think alot is being lost in what I'm trying to convey across.
     
    Last edited: Sep 11, 2021
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