Stringing on the Kickstarter customer, or Why this game needs to die

While this game is not the game envisioned in CB or "promised" by GGG then, this game is stil by far the most fun ARPG on the market today.

Even with all the technical faults and the hiccups in GGG's decision making, i still have a blast.

I will remain a supporter as long as this game is fun for me, and until proven otherwise i trust that GGG works to keep it that way.

I wonder if threads like this are disheartening for the developers to read.

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DalaiLama wrote:

Other players have given GGG feedback as well. One of the great things about GGG is the way they do listen and consider what the players are saying. Many of the long time supporters hope to see GGG continue this amazing philosophy.

The fact that players are entitled to give feedback does not in any way mean that GGG has to listen to their feedback. GGG can take it or leave it, as they see fit. GGG are the developers, not the players. (EDIT): It's also worth mentioning that it is your status as a player of the game, not your status as a supporter of the game, which entitles you to give feedback.

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For some players, the support for GGG is intended as funding for future development

Fair enough. My point is (and I have already said this, but I'll repeat myself) that this DOES NOT mean that you necessarily get to influence the design of the game. You are not a developer, and GGG is not your employee, regardless of your level of financial support and how "special" (or not) it makes you feel. Therefore, it makes no sense at all to say something like "GGG is taking the game in a direction I think is bad, therefore nobody should support them".

Funding with this intent is ALSO not the same as Kickstarter, because GGG isn't making specific sets of promises with what they will do with your money. The entire premise of the OP is flawed.

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CliveHowlitzer wrote:

I wonder if threads like this are disheartening for the developers to read.

Of course not, there's only one post saying 'they will see not a dollar more from me'.

And about any dissatisfaction with the current state of the game - it stems from choices they made and still make in full awareness of the consequences. I don't think any blowback came as a surprise, the game ultimately took this form because they think it's better this way, if that's the case it's only proper to stand by your decision, take it like a man. And smile, it's important to smile.

If that isn't the case, they made the game according to popularity poll and the motto 'we created the game we would like to play' is no longer valid, they just help it evolve in whatever way the public dictates.

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CliveHowlitzer wrote:

I wonder if threads like this are disheartening for the developers to read.

I hope not. I mean - it is quite a nasty post when you boil it down - but hopefully there's enough people telling these naysayers to man up and/or fuck off to really get them down about it.

The job you are doing isn't perfect, GGG - but be damned if I want to see your game sink :< You keep doing the best job you can - and maybe when I have money I'll throw some more at you >.<

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raics wrote:

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CliveHowlitzer wrote:

I wonder if threads like this are disheartening for the developers to read.

Of course not, there's only one post saying 'they will see not a dollar more from me'.

And about any dissatisfaction with the current state of the game - it stems from choices they made and still make in full awareness of the consequences. I don't think any blowback came as a surprise, the game ultimately took this form because they think it's better this way, if that's the case it's only proper to stand by your decision, take it like a man. And smile, it's important to smile.

If that isn't the case, they made the game according to popularity poll and the motto 'we created the game we would like to play' is no longer valid, they just help it evolve in whatever way the public dictates.

In which case its VERY VERY BAD... (Based on changes proposed by idiots in last year, i say idiots because it seems they had 0 idea about how these changes interact with current game mechanics)

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CliveHowlitzer wrote:

I wonder if threads like this are disheartening for the developers to read.

sure as hell it is. of course it's important who calls your game "just crap", is it one long time supporter who burned out playing it for years and is argumenting from the game point of view or is it some new player who just misses his personal advantage because he is used to certain game mechanics.

my opinion is that the choice of making bex the community manager is one year late, chris made it his personal business explaining things and ran into a tight schedule too often which left decisions unexplained. sure there is the dev manifesto but there are also questions regarding these statements.

then there is another point when it comes to people from the commonwhealth communicating
with the rest of the world: when the english call something: "interesting", the common german understands that as: "spendid idea, will implement asap" when in fact it means: "rather not a good idea". (i learned that the hard way trying to play football in wales when my fellow players called me "unlucky").

and for the people posting here who think that everything in the game can change without irritating a majority of the user base: let me just remind me on ggg trying to change the client's user interface and replacing the globe ladies with some old lookin statues...

I have also stopped playing the game for reasons similar to what was stated by Scrotie and Charan.
I don't hate the game, it's an ok game, but I just grew tired of it.
Too monotone. Too repetitive. Too few choices. Too many noob traps, etc call it what you will.

Will probably come back from time to time, but until then, all the best to the people still playing.

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ScrotieMcB wrote:

GGG knows what they need to do regarding unique item design. Mark_GGG stated that a good unique should be something you eventually upgrade past, ensuring that you still can upgrade your gear and thus have something to look forward to. However, they did not do this: instead, they released a slew of build-around-me uniques, like Shavs and Mjolner and Cloak of Defiance, for which any form of replacement would utterly destroy the build in question. It is too late to do anything about this now. Because legacy items.I left the community rather abruptly in August of last year, and I feel I should leave some final feedback. Or perhaps I really shouldn't. But I am going to anyway.

GGG knows what they need to do regarding the economy. Chris has stated that the economy is the most important part of PoE to them, as it should be: a healthy economy demonstrates itemization balance as players strive for wildly different gear sets, and indicates the currency system is resilient against botting/RMT. However, they did not do this: instead, they employed a barebones rare affix system leading to homogenized high-end gear, and allowed bots to stack currency with a criminally high Ex stack size. At this point, fixing these issues is much impossible.

GGG knows how to make action choice matter and encourage dynamic gameplay. One of my first PoE experiences was encountering Invalesco's build guides and looking in awe at what an interesting set of active skills he'd utilize for maximum effectiveness. But GGG didn't stick with that: as Charan's post on AoE says more eloquently than I could, everything has become bogged down in AoE supports, auras and triggers, leading to a single-skill spam metagame. Charan has hypothesized that nerfing these autopilot options with the current playerbase would be like taking heroin away from an addict; he just might be correct.

We know from the initial Diablo 3 release that an extreme majority of players find a rare-driven itemization system with uniques that you upgrade past (i.e. uniques with no properties that make them special or build-optimized) to be underwhelming, unmotivating, and unenjoyable. We also know that a rare-driven itemization system will still inevitably result in homogenized high-end gear. Fundamentally, in the ARPG genre, adding build enabling/ build-around-me uniques is analogous to adding more toys in a toybox. Blizzard realized this is what D3 needed to improve player satisfaction and retention, and subsequently overhauled their item system. It would be a mistake for GGG to head PoE in the failed direction of D3's initial item design.

PoE is currently doing it the best way: good rares and build-around-me uniques. The uniques provide predictable progression vectors that players can set goals for and design around, as well as provide new gameplay experiences by altering skill behavior/mechanics, enabling keystones, improving the efficiency of skills or skill combinations, and so on. To add gameplay changing affixes to the rare affix pool would result in a system that is much too dependent on RNG (and even more susceptible to botters and RMT). In fact, the greatest weapon against duping/cheating/botting/RMT (aside from offering a moddable offline mode) is greater accessibility to items that players design around/set goals for, and a shorter time horizon for completing a build.

If anything, given PoE's focus on temp leagues, short race seasons, and passive tree overhauls/metagame changes every few months, high-end item progression should be made easier. There are many players who have been in standard for 1 year+, who won't even consider spending time in a temp league because they still haven't completed the builds they've been working on or obtained the build-around-me unique that they want to experience the game with.

With respect to being bogged down in supports/auras/triggers, leading to single-skill spam: This is not an itemization problem. It's a problem with monster design and AI, intensified by GGG's problem with desync. Desync limits options for creating enjoyable AI that requires reactive play (such as attacks with visual cues that promote manual dodging, which requires positional certainty to be fun), and disincentivizes controlled twitch style gameplay from the player. In general, the AI lumbers around, is rarely proactive, and there are few monster properties that necessitate behavioral changes by the player. Single-skill off-screen AoE spam will always dominate in this environment (especially when monster wake-up/activation range is less than player sight range and attack range).

Edit: If GGG is reading this, I'd like them to take a look at Dead Island Epidemic. It's isometric with hard blocking, fixed camera, no desync, and responsive/active dodging (monsters that charge, create aoe acid pools, grapple, have properties that necessitate weapon changes (projectile resistant vs. melee resistant), etc., and the capability to proactively and reactively avoid or connect attacks without any delay between command and command execution). How do they accomplish this, with 12 players + monsters in a large arena, without any desync whatsoever, while keeping the game cheat-free? (i.e. 400+ hours played and not 1 speed hacker observed).

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geradon wrote:

let me just remind me on ggg trying to change the client's user interface and replacing the globe ladies with some old lookin statues...

Thanks, I actually love to be reminded of that, that was the one time I saw the community speaking with one voice :)

And the universal outrage was fully justified. First of all, there was absolutely nothing wrong with ladies holding the globes, and the second - globe ladies are among the most sacred traditions of ARPG genre, changing that just isn't done, it's practically taboo.