Thank you so much for capturing something I sort of circled but couldn't quite nail down. This is ALL about that vacuum and seeing past it, the so-called big picture. But I think one of the core factors to PoE is you play it in a vacuum -- it can be so demanding that it really doesn't leave much room for other games.
For those of us who have escaped that vacuum, we can provide a perspective that allows a moment of clarity. A notion that...I dunno, the current idea of GGG 'normal' isn't normal at all. Changes like this are like growing -- day by day, you'll never notice it...
Exiles should consider this incident, this event, like a very unnatural growth spurt. Impossible to ignore and frightening in its connotations.
GGG has already set their vision for the game. It is neither philanthropic nor benevolent. A grindy always online microtransaction model competitive multiplayer focus dynamically balanced video game. The ship has sailed long ago. People aren't in a vaccum even if they pretend to be, players are directly affected by their decision inevitably. What is disturbing is the connotations that people seem to think GGG is full of benevolence and goodwill when I never seen it as such.
Bottom line: GGG fucks things up giving streamers priority and messing up start of the league because of their own mistakes, and as a result some innocent streamers are paying for it ?! To be honest, in the previous leagues, similar things happened as now with the ultimamtum and nobody got banned.
GGG simply improves its image after a disastrous start at the expense of a few streamers.
And the empyrian told the truth, life is not fair. Life is a bitch, deal with. Sure comparing poor kids in Africa with priority in game que its a bit dumb but still its a real thing. Streaming priority was given to him by GGG, not himself. [Removed by Support]
Last edited by Isaac_GGG on Apr 24, 2021, 6:22:30 AM
...And the empyrian told the truth, life is not fair. Life is a bitch, deal with...
I vehemently disagree with this sentiment. Of course we all know life isn't fair. But a game/copetition/sport can relatively easily be made fair, as opposed to life in general.
Instead, the people with the power to ensure fairness explictly added unfairness. Even in RL, people who try to make things more fair are given more admiration than those who just abuse unfair advantages they were given. How much more does that idea apply to the creators of any given system?!
Note: Comparisons between artificially made, relatively simple environments like a game with the messy glory of RL are naive at best and malicious at worst.
Bottom line: GGG fucks things up giving streamers priority and messing up start of the league because of their own mistakes, and as a result some innocent streamers are paying for it ?! To be honest, in the previous leagues, similar things happened as now with the ultimamtum and nobody got banned.
GGG simply improves its image after a disastrous start at the expense of a few streamers.
And the empyrian told the truth, life is not fair. Life is a bitch, deal with. Sure comparing poor kids in Africa with priority in game que its a bit dumb but still its a real thing. Streaming priority was given to him by GGG, not himself. [Removed by Support]
I think u're missing the topic, it's not about streamers and ofc not about mr.africa.
Last edited by Isaac_GGG on Apr 24, 2021, 6:22:53 AM
This community in general is very well known to reward mistakes with their money.
As OP one of the few ones (or the only one) with several amounts of usd spended to "support" this game it's clear that this game eventually will be no better than the activision-blizzard ones eventually.
E-sports garbage, streamer propaganda with privileges (such as events, alpha/beta keys, free things in game to "giveaway")
With a 50-60 million usd every fucking year who wouldnt try to push it futher? lets see how much we can milk.. since the job is pretty easy. Nerf the fuck out of everything, the same league problems every league, nerfs happen but it's already too little too late. Rinse and repeat.
People in this game can't boycott anything.. because their pants are wet when they see the newest trailer on twitch or the newest microtransaction box or set/item daily.
It's inevitable. I do wonder how much some members of this community will be able to handle the constant cycle of sucking the fun out of a video game and keep rewarding them with money for any dumb decision.
Having a very unpopular opinion might not do much in the end since it's people wallets that others don't have access to but it's a matter of sending a message.. people needs to stop rewarding dev's with their moneys for bad decisions. The buyers remorse is really a thing in this game I've seen people having a very "not so great" opinion regarding the league while showing the current support package.
To me support packages means that certain content you felt you deserve to reward the dev's to others is "look at the shinny pixxel that wont load cuz textures in 3.14"
Here here. When D4 or literally any other decent arpg comes out this game is Dead and I'll be glad. This launch is the greasiest pile of BS I've ever seen.
This type of statement always gives me good laughs. It's like there are always these prophets around the internet saying over and over that this or that game will die because of some other game being released...i remember hearing this type of crap about WoW since 2007 and like it or not Wow's still very much alive.
To say that D4 will be the dead of PoE is pretty much having no idea about how things are or just being but hurt about the latest PoE "sin" of giving priority to streamers...which i couldn't care less.
Just move on dude and have fun playing video games.
This type of statement always gives me good laughs. It's like there are always these prophets around the internet saying over and over that this or that game will die because of some other game being released...i remember hearing this type of crap about WoW since 2007 and like it or not Wow's still very much alive.
To say that D4 will be the dead of PoE is pretty much having no idea about how things are or just being but hurt about the latest PoE "sin" of giving priority to streamers...which i couldn't care less.
Just move on dude and have fun playing video games.
Here’s the summary: on April 17th, 2021, GGG gave priority access to an otherwise locked league launch to a number of high profile streamers.
One of them, a well-known streamer of other games, was paid to be there and legally had to receive 2 hours of launch day stream time. Most of the others were local celebrities, who were not paid to be there, and their partners, friends, guild members, etc. Everyone else, regardless of support level or community contribution, could only watch as this elite few received priority treatment on a crucial launch day. This completely contravenes the spirit of Path of Exile’s ‘fairness for all’, and to continue giving them money after that is to send an unhealthy message of compliance if not encouragement. It was also false advertising: it showed a working PoE on launch day to viewers when PoE has a long-standing history of server overloads and crashes whenever a new league lands.
GGG’s ensuing statements made clear that this was indeed about money (see GGG’s official post-fact statement below), so it follows that the only response is a financial one.
Path of Exile is a free to play game, so play it for free. But I urge you to think twice before buying any more support packs or mtxes from Grinding Gear Games. If they can choose a streamer over ‘a normal player’ once, they’ll almost certainly do it again. Maybe not in the same way, but I think it’d be naïve to believe that this is the only method they have of ensuring streamers, whose involvement and willingness to play PoE they see as ‘literal piles of money’, keep playing and keep their game looking good.
Play PoE but boycott GGG. They don’t need your ‘little person’ money (see financial statements) and if they’re going to gamble big on big-shot streamers as their source of revenue, do not provide them a safety net when that gamble falls through.
What I originally wrote.
I had a nice long rant typed, but it doesn't matter who I am or what I've done. If you know, you know. If you don't, you've still been screwed over all the same by this event. You've still been treated with utter contempt by a company you supported.
If being openly shown that streamers get preferential access to a new league isn't your breaking point to stop supporting PoE, if 'reset the league' would be enough for you, then I seriously question what it'd take.
GGG has openly shown they 100% choose profits over people, which for a free to play game shouldn't even be possible. YOU are GGG's profits.
It's time to remind them of that. One person can't make a difference. I, more than many, know this. That's why I'm saying it to all of you.
Don't take this as just 'GGG being GGG' and 'of course they give streamers first dibs'. Don't see this as the price you pay to play 'the best ARPG around'. Surely being treated like a lower priority for what should be a fair start for all is too high a price to pay. Because it's not just that they did this; it's that they knew you'd see them doing it via streams and didn't care that you'd see it. They're assuming you'll just get over it, forget about it once you're back to playing. Like the good little PoE junkies you are.
I can only conclude that is exactly what they think of you. How helpless and stupid they think you are.
Exiles: Boycott GGG. It claims to be a free to play game. So play it for free. See how that turns out for them while they're coddling their toxic, parasitic mouthpieces.
GGG have shown you who they are now. Show them that it's unacceptable.
Boycott GGG.
GGG’s official statement at the end of the day, and a few notes on certain claims.
So while this was all going on, we managed to also commit a pretty big faux pas and enrage the entire community by allowing streamers to bypass that really slow queue we mentioned. The backstory is that we have recently been doing some proper paid influencer marketing, and that involves arranging for big streamers to showcase Path of Exile to their audiences, for money (they have #ad in their titles). We had arranged to pay for two hours of streaming, and we ran right into a login queue that would take two hours to clear. This was about as close as you could get to literally setting a big pile of money on fire. So we made the hasty decision to allow those streamers to bypass the queue. Most streamers did not ask for this, and should not be held to blame for what happened. We also allowed some other streamers who weren't involved in the campaign to skip the queue too so that they weren't on the back foot.
The decision to allow any streamers to bypass the queue was clearly a mistake. Instead of offering viewers something to watch while they waited, it offended all of our players who were eager to get into the game and weren't able to, while instead having to watch others enjoy that freedom. It's completely understandable that many players were unhappy about this. We tell people that Path of Exile league starts are a fair playing field for everyone, and we need to actually make sure that is the reality.
We will not allow streamers to bypass the login queue in the future. We will instead make sure the queue works much better so that it's a fast process for everyone and is always a fair playing field. We will also plan future marketing campaigns with contingencies in mind to better handle this kind of situation in the future.
It's completely understandable that many players are unhappy with how today has gone on several fronts. This post has no intention of trying to convince you to be happy with these outcomes. We simply want to provide you some insight about what happened, why it happened and what we're doing about it in the future. We're very unhappy with it too.
(Bold mine for emphasis. I have edited out the technical explanations – you can find them at the link below)
The most important part of this statement is an admission of guilt. These are very rare in official company responses; admission of guilt leads straight to culpability and potential legal action, typically. But admissions of guilt are now part of GGG’s official post-mortem statements, so users expect them and do not see them as potential avenues of attack. They are, essentially, part of the image. Sincerity, it would seem, is optional – as proven by what GGG said next.
They knew two things on launch day: they'd paid an outside streamer a lot of money to play on launch day for two hours, and their launch days are traditionally very rocky. Reading between the lines, and knowing that they could make a 'hasty decision' to let this streamer skip the massive queue, we can see that they were prepared for a rocky launch and had a contingency plan. The decision might have been hasty but the system was always in place. This isn’t surprising; they likely need to have a backdoor to check what’s going on internally. That they were so quick to tap that system not only to fulfil a legal obligation but also give their 'top streamers' priority access (for no discernibly good or smart reason) indicates to me that they had at least considered the possibility that they’d need to do something against GGG's ethics based on this agreement.
The addition of other streamers was particularly egregious. They were not legally bound to be there, and it seems to me that they were added not to 'leave them on the back foot' but so as not to create envy and bitterness in GGG's regular, unpaid revenue streams. It would be a very bad look if an outsider got log-in privileges to an otherwise locked server and your most watched streamers did not. Immediate schism, but not between players and streamers (which is an acknowledged and almost encouraged schism between elitists and plebs) but between actual players and ring-ins. This would look like GGG chose a complete outsider over their own faithful streamers. Absolutely unacceptable.
The problem is GGG couldn't easily facilitate all of this without everyone seeing. They could have informed their chosen few of the decision privately but everyone watching would have seen the top streamers suddenly get in all at once and form their own conclusions. So of course GGG did openly; the damage was done by then, although players (and probably most streamers) didn't know it.
Let's address the worst line in there: 'literally setting a big pile of money on fire'. Now and then GGG try to skew candid and honest (yet another gamble), but in this case they just plain showed their hand. Not allowing a paid streamer their play time even if no one else had that playtime on a free to play game that is 'fair for all' would indeed be a massive financial hit. Had they allowed this person in and no one else and said simply, 'we had no choice', I think people would be at least somewhat more forgiving. Instead they doubled down and let a bunch of non-paid folk in, not to mention their cohorts, because that too avoided setting some piles of money on fire down the track. So instead of simply doing what they were legally obligated to do and admitting THAT was the mistake, GGG went overboard, admitted it was 'for money', and then, and only then, claimed there was a mistake. No, GGG. You made several here. But the big one was gambling on your servers being stable on launch day. You gambled on that and you lost. You might still have your big pile of money, but in that moment, everyone saw who you really are.
To suggest that they did this to 'offer viewers something to watch while they waited' is an insult, flat-out. No one likes to watch someone else doing something they themselves really wish they could. It's like rubbing it in their faces. No, not 'like'; that's exactly what it is. And it's made all the worse by the fact that this 'offer to watch' confirmed something many players suspected but didn't want to believe: GGG do in fact give streamers priority treatment beyond relatively harmless things like mtxes. Do and can and did. I remain astounded that anyone could type that line and not see it for the 'massive faux pas' that it is. Astounded.
Finally, the last line: 'we're very unhappy too'. After all this talk of setting piles of money on fire and giving streamers priority access and seeing this as somehow a 'gift' to all the other players, I'm left wondering what exactly GGG are 'very unhappy about': are they unhappy that they were forced to make this decision? Because they weren't -- they put themselves in that position. Are they unhappy that we all got to see them choose 'a pile of money' over their own integrity? That's a pretty selfish thing to be unhappy about. Are they actually unhappy that so many people were unhappy? Well, whose fault was that? There is little to no empathy in that last line. I've no doubt that Chris and GGG are very unhappy, but I seriously question whether they're unhappy for the same reasons as their faithful, loyal Exiles, past and present.
Summary: typical admission of guilt, candid explanation, a few moments of Freudian truth, and a promise to do better. Feel free to accept the apology and believe the promise to do better. Just be aware that this was not a mistake in the moment alone. This was a chain of bad calls, and the worst of them was neither rushed nor forced. It was motivated by a need or desire to make 'a big pile of money.'
On April 20th, 20 users were 'banned' (suspended for the duration of the league – 3 months, roughly) for abusing an exploit. It is known that at least some of these users were among the priority queue for streamers and their friends/family/guild members, and one of them insulted their viewers when the unfairness of the priority queue was brought up. This is both only to be expected and very convenient for GGG, who needed a scapegoat and a win after the streamer priority queue debacle. I'm reminded of that parable about the frog carrying the scorpion across the river only to be stung to death by the scorpion halfway across, but I can’t tell in this case which is the frog and which is the scorpion.
Whatever the exploit, users were quick to point out that yet again the damage had been done. Whatever ill-gotten goods these people created/acquired, they’re already in the market. Still, for a brief moment, GGG looked like 'the good guys' again – for doing the bare minimum expected of them when someone is 'caught' cheating. In fact, many people also pointed out that had a non-streamer been caught cheating, they'd have just been banned outright, permanently. Just more evidence of GGG giving their revenue-generating streamers preferential treatment.
Would a boycott work? Don’t GGG make a lot of money regardless?
A boycott would not bring GGG down, no. Absolutely not, and if I thought it could, I wouldn’t call for one -- I still care about the people working there and I want them to continue to working on this game, given it seems to be all they'll be working on for the foreseeable future. Company destruction is typically not the intention of a boycott. The intention is to make enough of a dent in their revenue that they can’t but help notice it and want to change their ways as a result. But even that isn't really the goal in this case. The goal here in fact is not what GGG do, but what players do. This is all about not rewarding bad behaviour. GGG treated their normal player base, regardless of support status, with open contempt that day, and they did it to save themselves a lot of money, or to prevent the loss of potential revenue.
If you like the mtxes or support packs, that's fair enough. You are buying them for your own pleasure, and getting 'your money’s worth'. But if you're a supporter because you've always been a supporter or because you think GGG are morally upstanding or have your best interests at heart, I think you should definitely consider playing for free from now on.
As for GGG's financials, they’re public record and I’ll link them below. As others have noted upon trolling through this (and likely other) documents, GGG pull in roughly 77 million USD from customers a year. So yeah, they're doing just fine without or without your few hundred a year chucked in. Surely it's worth more to you than to them...
PS: Please do not quote or even name specific players/streamers in here. Other threads have been locked for doing this as a form of 'personal attack', and I'm willing to bet they're just looking for an excuse to bury this one too. They've already tried once.
Random picks:
"..‘fairness for all..."
"..is an admission of guilt"
"..I still care about the people working there..."
