No problem. I won"t be revealing anything here for the first time anyway. As far as addressing epidemics, or perceived problems, I will do that as a player. Obviously how I feel as a player will at times translate into GMG, there are way too many people that are smarter than I when it comes to what I do and don"t do or want and don"t want. What I like or what I THINK players like is, in my opinion, where a lot of designers get into serious problems.Cadrid said:
I think this is a valid perspective, but one done in a small window of time. Every comparison done in here, for the most part, is done with EQ, EQ2 and WoW as the models. Not sure that"s fair or right, but I am not sure it"s wrong either. As a creator I think you have to have a vision of what you want it to be, but I think the key is in holding to that vision as the development process moves along. You also have to have a company of people that buy into your vision because of THE VISION, and not the person.Cadrid said:
One thing I"ve always realized, and most of the perspective comes from listening to hordes of Sox fans "recommend fixes" for the team.
Not being "inside" greatly clouds your ability to understand what can and can"t be done. That"s not to say that ideas presented aren"t worthwhile or intelligent, but in a lot of cases said fixes or ideas just aren"t physically possible due to a pre-existing set of conditions within the work enviroment.
Any good company uses customer feedback, but the great companies only do so where it works best for them, the product, and the customers. If you can meet those three criteria you win. If not all three, then you don"t do it.
The MAJOR component to this is "We blew it with this mechanic....".Cadrid said:
That indicates that you are seeing something major BEFORE we are done with it. That"s a major problem these days imo. Companies are in such a rush to get your eyes IN and ON their games that you are seeing things, IMO, WAY TOO SOON.
That scenario leads right back to the issue talked about earlier. If you let players into your game at a time when there is still a lot to be done, and you are counting on major input to "finish" things then you"ve done a few things wrong.
1) Picked the wrong creative and technical people to make your game
2) Don"t have the confidence in your people to make a great game
My thoughts are this. If you open your beta, and you"ve designed something great, does it matter how far into completion you are? If it"s a great game it"s a great game, regardless of when you as players, see it. The key is in knowing when and where to expose your game and creation to the public. You, as a company are aiming to complete some objective when you launch into public beta right? IMO that can"t be FINISHING your game. To me Beta is about "cleaning it up" and fixing minor issues you feel more comfortable with the masses deciding. That means addressing your server load issues if need be.
I just feel that Beta, if you are a top tier company, is more about early exposure to advertise your great product as much as anything.
Pretty sure that GMG is going to be ahead of the curve when it comes to the media and public relations aspects of this business. Let me also add that GMG will possess the best customer service department this industry has ever had. That"s a promise from me as the President of the Company. You cannot promote (within or without) an operational philosophy founded on character, integrity, principle and accountability and allow what will end up as the most important aspect of your company (CS) to be handled by someone else. We will create an in house core team of CS people that will follow these guidelines.Cadrid said:
The media aspects of this are actually one of the selling points of GMG when we presented ourselves to our soon to be partners in this venture. At some point in the near future you will be seeing another press release in which our partnerships have been agreed upon and I think when you do hear this you will understand, and see, how serious we, and our partners in this venture, are.
Your only real error above is in assuming that we would use this forum as an advertising space. When you are talking about a product, and an IP, with the potential of a $60+ million budget you don"t, or shouldn"t, see the FOH board as an big time advertising venue. This board is PERFECT for guys like me and our community guys to talk, argue, and solicit input on things in the MMO space.Cadrid said:
I mean honestly, can you envision a company that would use a board where members user names are "F#@ $#@"???
This forum is at times a fantastic way to garner opinions and get a feel for a niche of the MMO world.
Ya passion would be an understatement WoW has done two things to new companies looking into the MMO space. It has opened up numerous VC opportunies for third party folks. It has given people unrealistic expectations of what can be achieved to others.Cadrid said:
My goal, with this first title, is to bring something epic in every sense of the word, to the MMO gamespace. We know what"s out there, we know what"s not. What we won"t do is assemble bits and pieces to create a hodge podge of concepts into a game trying to please every MMO player on the planet.
You don"t think someone could assemble a team of creative genius to appease both sects? I do, and I think we already have quite a few of those people on board. Not to mention I think all of our ideas and concepts to this point work on so many levels to so many players.....Cadrid said:
I won"t go into detail on this stuff now.Cadrid said:
No need to apologize. If you aren"t dropping f bombs left and right and your post is thought out and rational (at least to me) then if time presents itself I love to chat on this stuff.Cadrid said:
None of what you posted was anywhere near difficult to talk on. I am excited about the give and take here and in some other forums and looking forward to RA jumping in at some point to add stuff if time presents itself.
No problem, was somewhat fun for me to be a part of as well!Cadrid said:
Curt
