if you were a dev, how would you approach these forums

I guess if I was a dev I would set a standard right away. I would state that we are going to have community input or if we will not have community input. If I stated that we had community input then I would involve the whole community, not have segregated levels of community members. If I did not have open development I still would allow people to submit Ideas but they would not be known if they where going to be used or not. It would be a good surprise later to find out if your idea was put into game though. I would open up QA to all backers as to test limits and even if you got duplicate bug reports you still had tons of metrics to see.

 

make a flames section

 

A good example of a PR person is Robert DeNiro in the movie 'Wag the Dog'

 

not even want to think about this
Highly respect for all Devs need to find a balance between founding this game, thinking about value of players input and making their dreams with this game come true also...thats a task and for me they make a good job even not all is pleasing me

 

My suggestion for the devs approaching this forum -
Be honest with us and communicate.

A lot of the changes that happen which spark so many arguments are just done with no explanation as to why it was felt this was necessary or what was hoped to be achieved by it.
We all know this is alpha, and things will get changed, balanced etc. But because this is alpha, it is our responsibility to say when those changes are detrimental to gameplay or make the game less appealing/fun. A lot of it comes out as argumentative and people agree/disagree - but if we had that reasoning up front there'd be a lot less of that, I think.

Too often there are sneaky stealth-changes, with no explanation as to the logic, and players are left to 'discover' these issues and become upset about it.
If you're nerfing something, just tell us. We're nerfing this because xyz. Or get the PR to tell us gently.

In order for us to help shape things and provide good feedback, include us in what your overall vision is.
What kind of players are you hoping to attract/retain? What does this most recent change hope to achieve?
What problems are you encountering? Let us help brainstorm solutions before the changes hit and leave us feeling crippled.

What you have here is several hundred people testing your product for free. Many of us have given money for the privilege of testing. We're investors, we want to see the game succeed too, so stop trying to hide things and just be straightforward, it will prevent a lot of having to explain / shut down threads later on.

 

Communicate properly - which is a two way process where you ask people questions, consider the replies, and explain your reasoning for what you decide to do.

Explanations are way too rare, and too often when they do appear are hopelessly vague - for example, forced pvp zones is apparently for 'the good of the game' - well maybe it is, but without any reasoned justification for that, it's just a standard politician's 'motherhood and apple pie' non-answer. Surely none of the developers would ever dream of doing anything that is NOT 'for the good of the game', but that's in no way a decent, reasoned or balanced answer to the inquiries about WHY it was decided on... and before people rush in to explain what they think it was about, I don't actually care what we as players interpret the reasoning to be, I want to know the reasoning by the people who actually made the decision. That's what will make me want to stay involved in the game, rather than just play it occasionally.

If we are the valued and important people we are told we are, then damn well talk to us properly and engage, most of us are adult enough to hold reasonable conversations with the devs if they want to have them - and the more often I see no explanations, or non-explanations, the more I think the 'valued and important' stuff is just smoke. Reticles in combat just dropped on us from nowhere, system changes happen out of the blue and for often obscure 'reasons' - I really like the Dev team and appreciate what they are trying to do, but please, make better use of us as a resource, talk to us, listen to feedback, and let us help make things work better (and ideally do it in public on the forums, unless you want yet more conspiracy theories about who is influencing your decisions) not do stuff only to then have to unwrap it all a couple of days after we get to see it because it's not working, or addressing the wrong problem in the wrong way, or worst of all we find that in practice the 'changed' system simply is less fun.

The only reason to play a game is to enjoy it - nothing else will keep people engaged, so if you want to change something we are getting used to and in many ways enjoying, at the very least give us a reasoned case why you are doing it.....

 

I would post a lot of polls, to get feedback about features I was thinking of implementing/changing.... not so much yes/no but more "how" options... just to get a pulse on changes before they go in.

 

As a Dev I would not read the whole forum, but the bug-reports and DEV+. For anything else you need your forum-team to point you to those threads that might need your attention. Beside that I would never ever post outside of DEV+ and even there only scarcely, because players twist everything you ever write to their needs and fantasies. That's why you so rarely find a dev-post beside Berek in the forum-boards...

 

I would take player inputs as consideration, but will execute the plan based upon the team leadership decision. After all, people are paying me to develop the game, not to let a bunch of people dictate the team what to do. This is not Bright locker.

After all, when Steve Jobs made the first aluminum MacBook, iPhone, iPad, he did not run his ideas by the entire Mac community. He designed, created,and delivered the product to his consumers based on his vision.

I mean, some folks here at Portalarium have experience on developing games over 20 years. They should not let the collective groups of people who do not have more experience in game the development and mostly express their opinions based on personal experience to dictate the game design.

It's one thing to take feedback from players and improve the game using their discretion and experience. It's a different story when they have to run all their ideas by players for approval. Nothing will ever get done especially if they need to spend extra time to convince people. It's nice if they do, but it's almost impossible to get everyone to agree on certain things.

The majority voices on the current active players could actually just be the minority relative to the potential market. The minority voices could represent the entire world who just haven't had a chance to try the game.

 

Some voices are minority, but some aren't. It can't be assumed that just because someone speaks in a forum that their interests do not represent the interests of many others. It's up to the devs to distinguish between the minority voices and the larger playerbase voices, and reconcile all that with their vision for the game.

That is where we have to rely on the wisdom of our devs to shine through.

 

In this Forum It's too hard to pick out good game ideas from all the whining, crying, and expectations. To many people feel like they bought and paid for a game in a Kickstarter and their expectations are way to high for the dev team. The Comunity is to fractured and close minded to even come together on one simple idea.

In my mind it all comes down to Trust, and a lot of players coming from games that have either Burned, Scammed, grieved, or scarred them are seriously lacking in that area.

Communication would be nice to have, but lock the thread immediately so the Devs are not spending 8 hours reading flames every time they make an announcement.

Hiring a team to spin your announcements in a positive way is just a waste of crowd funding. I would prefer not to get a fluffed up feel good answers, just tell me how and why.

It is Nice to see a game try to bring together such a broad base of MMO, Single Player, and PVP players. But in doing so their is going to be a lot of chest beating and grunting. These play styles have very different ideas that are in direct conflict with each other.

 

That is an interesting idea. Like Standup Corner vs Standup Commentary. Have a locked announcement thread where devs post the announcement and their responses to feedback from it, but a separate thread where players list their feedback and commentary. A lot of times official responses to feedback get lost in pages and pages of comments by players.

 

I'd approach the forums the same way I do as a non-dev. I'd consider people's opinions and provide feedback based on my own opinion and, as a dev, my insider knowledge of the direction the game is intended to head towards if I were free to share that information. I think that's pretty standard. Transparency when it comes to info that you are allowed to share is key imo. People want to hear as many official statements by devs as possible to their questions and concerns.

I mean, I already work as an info gatherer on the forums every weekday to keep my guild informed on what other players are talking/complaining about and what devs respond with. There are many dev responses hidden deep within threads that describe changes they plan to implement that don't appear anywhere else on any official dev posted thread. At least not yet.

 

I'd stay as far away as possible.

 

If we have devs not showing up in the tracker, please let me know which ones! We honestly do our best to be as transparent and open as possible. If it doesn't appear that way simply because of an awareness issue, then we can fix that .

 

I love the Dev Tracker, really helps me keep an eye on you guys!! But still, some days it loads, others not.. not sure what can be done there, but just sayin! I love it when it works. This is the best way to watch what is incoming.

edit: it is loading today!

 

With my sword drawn and shield ready. j/k

 

I would agree with this. Sounds like a reasonable way of approaching it.

 

Tss Tss Tss.
*MEEEEEP*
Wrong answer.

Spoiler