Author Topic: How far would you be willing to go?  (Read 19373 times)

downix

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Re: How far would you be willing to go?
« Reply #40 on: October 20, 2013, 03:31:06 AM »
...okay, I need to know more about this. How on earth did such minor changes so grossly destroy the love the fans had for the game?

Especially a third-person camera. Just don't use it if you don't like it!

What did Pirannha Games ignore from their customers?

I will say the pay-for-cooldown is treading too close to pay-to-win, but it's still not something that, by itself or even in conjunction with an optional camera mode, should be driving customers away in droves.
It boils down to confusing excitement over the property for excitement over the company. The fans did not love the game, they loved Battletech, the property they had licensed. They were ok with the game because it gave them access to the property they loved. When the game became less enjoyable due to a change which violated core tenants of the game they were fans of, even if the changes were relatively minor, it colored the perception. Fans left the game due to this perception, true or not.

Myself, I enjoy the game. I do not find these changes serious. But finding a match is far, far harder than it used to be. I used to login and get into a match in a few minutes. Now I can sit idle waiting for enough people for ages. This discourages me from playing, I don't like waiting for 5-10 minutes for a single battle. And I'm not the only one, this becomes a death spiral for any online game. The perception of issues by a vocal group then becomes a major problem, as issues with the game get blamed on these problems. People no longer want the game, which itself was not what people were excited about.

JaguarX

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Re: How far would you be willing to go?
« Reply #41 on: October 20, 2013, 03:36:25 AM »


Myself, I enjoy the game. I do not find these changes serious. But finding a match is far, far harder than it used to be. I used to login and get into a match in a few minutes. Now I can sit idle waiting for enough people for ages. This discourages me from playing, I don't like waiting for 5-10 minutes for a single battle. And I'm not the only one, this becomes a death spiral for any online game. The perception of issues by a vocal group then becomes a major problem, as issues with the game get blamed on these problems. People no longer want the game, which itself was not what people were excited about.

How I felt about TF/SF in COX exactly. As the population waned, the time it took to form TF/SF/Trial became nuts. Sometimes tried for over an hour just to get enough people. Not fun, to me at least.
And some people blamed that on i13. Even though many already left prior to i13 and thus a lot of times when COX was alive i13 got blamed on killing PVP and causing less people running around when PvP was already dead and the population already was slipping  prior to that  for various reasons.

Floride

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Re: How far would you be willing to go?
« Reply #42 on: October 20, 2013, 03:42:16 AM »
History shows again and again
How nature points out the folly of men

JaguarX

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Re: How far would you be willing to go?
« Reply #43 on: October 20, 2013, 03:45:18 AM »
« Last Edit: October 20, 2013, 03:59:49 AM by JaguarX »

Floride

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Re: How far would you be willing to go?
« Reply #44 on: October 20, 2013, 03:52:22 AM »
... it wasn't exactly a gold mine.

That may be true but... *Sobs on Jags shoulder* it was OUR gold mine! Why god? WHY have you forsaken thee?!
History shows again and again
How nature points out the folly of men

JaguarX

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Re: How far would you be willing to go?
« Reply #45 on: October 20, 2013, 04:01:20 AM »
That may be true but... *Sobs on Jags shoulder* it was OUR gold mine! Why god? WHY have you forsaken thee?!
yeah it sucks.

Like those small town on the outskirts of a major city where everyone is happy but the government/land developers have other plans and kick them off to build a large shopping mall instead and tell them to get lost and find another home.

downix

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Re: How far would you be willing to go?
« Reply #46 on: October 20, 2013, 07:52:05 AM »
That may be true but... *Sobs on Jags shoulder* it was OUR gold mine! Why god? WHY have you forsaken thee?!
For whatever reason, CoH is worth more dead than alive to NCSoft. I have my theories, with some evidence to back them up, but in the end, threads like this one do more harm than good. They give people hope for a miracle that is never coming.

If some company did manage to convince NCSoft to sell, by this point the damage has been done, and is no longer reversible. A year of R&D needed to keep it in the game is gone, erased, never happened. Realize that right now we would be discussing issue 27 or 28 coming out soon. We can never get that time back. Only an effort to produce a CoH2 would have any traction, and we already have three efforts to do such. Someone swooping in to do so I fear would be an opportunist at best, an exploiter at worst. Only someone who understood the community, or had a history of absorbing a variety of properties successfully could manage it, and the number of groups able to do that are few and far between.

I can wish for CoH back, but to dangle hope is not helping anyone. It is just cruelty. We know NCSoft's answer.
« Last Edit: October 20, 2013, 08:08:37 AM by downix »

Hyperstrike

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Re: How far would you be willing to go?
« Reply #47 on: October 20, 2013, 02:56:58 PM »
...okay, I need to know more about this. How on earth did such minor changes so grossly destroy the love the fans had for the game?

Especially a third-person camera. Just don't use it if you don't like it!

It's not that simple.  The game was supposed to be a mech simulation.  Not a 3rd person shooter.

The addition of 3rd person DRASTICALLY changes how the game is played.  And, due to the 3rd person perspective, those using it have DRAMATIC increases in situational awareness.  Because, instead of relying on LOS and instrumentation, they simply zoom out and see stuff that SHOULD be hidden from them.

This leads to phenomena like "pop tarts".  Basically a pop tart is a jump enabled mech that simply stands behind an obstruction, and when an enemy is sighted, they pop straight up, alpha-strike the crap out of the opponent, and drop back down into cover.  And this style of play is ONLY viable because of the 3rd person POV.

Quote
What did Pirannha Games ignore from their customers?

Players made it known VERY early in development (as in before they opened to private beta) that 3rd person was something that would ruin the game Pirannha was promising.  And, at the time, Pirannha basically flat out stated that they were going for a mech sim, not a 3rd person shooter.  It was even said as such at the sit down at GenCon 2012.

It's actually bad enough that I refuse to talk about the product in the BT community due to my position.  Because it'd be construed as me shitting on a partner.

downix

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Re: How far would you be willing to go?
« Reply #48 on: October 20, 2013, 04:33:52 PM »
It's not that simple.  The game was supposed to be a mech simulation.  Not a 3rd person shooter.

The addition of 3rd person DRASTICALLY changes how the game is played.  And, due to the 3rd person perspective, those using it have DRAMATIC increases in situational awareness.  Because, instead of relying on LOS and instrumentation, they simply zoom out and see stuff that SHOULD be hidden from them.

This leads to phenomena like "pop tarts".  Basically a pop tart is a jump enabled mech that simply stands behind an obstruction, and when an enemy is sighted, they pop straight up, alpha-strike the crap out of the opponent, and drop back down into cover.  And this style of play is ONLY viable because of the 3rd person POV.

Players made it known VERY early in development (as in before they opened to private beta) that 3rd person was something that would ruin the game Pirannha was promising.  And, at the time, Pirannha basically flat out stated that they were going for a mech sim, not a 3rd person shooter.  It was even said as such at the sit down at GenCon 2012.

It's actually bad enough that I refuse to talk about the product in the BT community due to my position.  Because it'd be construed as me shitting on a partner.
As I said, technically a minor change, but with major impact and now serious customer resentment.

JaguarX

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Re: How far would you be willing to go?
« Reply #49 on: October 20, 2013, 05:13:21 PM »

I can wish for CoH back, but to dangle hope is not helping anyone. It is just cruelty. We know NCSoft's answer.
yeah.

Segev

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Re: How far would you be willing to go?
« Reply #50 on: October 20, 2013, 06:15:31 PM »
I wouldn't agree that threads like this do more harm than good; they're a measure of what interest there is. Admittedly, they're purely hypothetical, along with all the speculation on how much the IP is worth to NCSoft, but if they could garner detailed information about how many people would still be interested and how much they'd spend for a) a life-support sustainment of CoH as it would have been if they'd frozen it at i24 or b) a new effort to re-launch CoH with an intent for future development.

Such measures ARE useful for determining to what price CoH would have to fall as an IP before it would be "worth" buying, and to what end it is worth buying.

"Further development" vs. "Make some money on a nearly-free sustainment mode" are two different prospects with two different price tags which would need to be evaluated.

Where these threads fall short then is in the basic premise: a question on a fan board asking people for anecdotes is only so-so. Still, it's worthwhile to see if there are still those who'd try it for a while, and how long they'd give it. One CAN extrapolate a bit from it.

The other point of failure of these threads is mainly in just how hypothetical they are. Though even then, I suppose they're of interest to MWM, H&V, etc. because they measure in another way the community's interest in the genre.

saipaman

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Re: How far would you be willing to go?
« Reply #51 on: October 21, 2013, 01:02:27 AM »
At this point, I doubt NCSoft has the means to bring the game back.

srmalloy

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Re: How far would you be willing to go?
« Reply #52 on: October 21, 2013, 06:29:32 PM »
That wont happen again. If some company do pick it up, they probably will be looking to coupe the money and I doubt they will simply follow the old COX path as in their eyes, it probably proved to not work, especially a major game company. 2.5 million a quarter or  a year (1%-2% of income) is not even worth bothering with to most major corporations. Most lose more than on every day normal leakage.

To be fair, this is $2.5M in profit for a game that, for all intents and purposes, had zero advertising. Major corporations should already be more than aware of how badly a lack of advertising -- or incompetent advertising -- can hurt sales of a product, and would be able to project what the playerbase and income would be if CoH were to have been marketed intelligently. Someone seriously looking at CoH would take its income record as its rock bottom performance, not its peak performance.

Illusionss

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Re: How far would you be willing to go?
« Reply #53 on: October 21, 2013, 06:57:30 PM »
At this point, I doubt NCSoft has the means to bring the game back.

The value of the property was at least [AT LEAST! AND MAYBE MUCH MORE] halved they day NC wiped all the servers, regardless of any attempt to resurrect the game. And you just know they've wiped them by now.

All of our work: gone as though it had never existed. What mattered to the playerbase? Their own personal stuff. Which is now GONE....

Pardon my French: screw NC. I would get on an emulator, but I am done living in fear - as I would be doing were NC to reopen the game, and the majority of the space in my head dedicated to MMOs is now focused on raising my people from the dead in a new, SAFE environment. I am done living in fear.

I think resurrecting the game is #100,000 on their list of Top Ten Things To Worry About. IMO it is a dead issue as well.

JaguarX

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Re: How far would you be willing to go?
« Reply #54 on: October 21, 2013, 07:00:21 PM »
To be fair, this is $2.5M in profit for a game that, for all intents and purposes, had zero advertising. Major corporations should already be more than aware of how badly a lack of advertising -- or incompetent advertising -- can hurt sales of a product, and would be able to project what the playerbase and income would be if CoH were to have been marketed intelligently. Someone seriously looking at CoH would take its income record as its rock bottom performance, not its peak performance.
Of course but have to take into consideration that more than likely that even if the game came back on tomorrow let alone few years down the line, that it probably wont make 2.5 million/quarter probably for the first year or so at least. And of course those factors of advertising or not have been factored or rather will be factored into the actual purchase value of the IP. Then them one have to spent on that marketing on top of the other stuff such as studio set up and possbly personnel costs to get it up and running.

And that is assuming advertising actually works and bring as many as expected. Either way unless they can get back every single player that was there plus some extra to cover the extra money put into the advertising, then the path for performance still in the end will be different than the path that NCSOFT took. Usually that means changes to the game that may or may not be considered classic COX like, which if it aint classic COX like, then that would drive the old players away, and make it uphill battle to convince new players to play a game that is already 8 years old. Meaning more than likely marketing or not they are taking a great risk and the path that they take will be different than the path NCSOFT too in the end.

One travel I10 all the way, the other go I20 to I75 south. Either way will get ya to Florida.

Terwyn

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Re: How far would you be willing to go?
« Reply #55 on: October 21, 2013, 09:06:04 PM »
Unrelated hypothetical question: How would people feel about a former CoX player investing heavily enough into NCSoft so as to effectively challenge current control of the company, for the key purpose of ensuring that they never again turn their backs on loyal customers?
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JaguarX

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Re: How far would you be willing to go?
« Reply #56 on: October 21, 2013, 10:02:00 PM »
Unrelated hypothetical question: How would people feel about a former CoX player investing heavily enough into NCSoft so as to effectively challenge current control of the company, for the key purpose of ensuring that they never again turn their backs on loyal customers?
well you might get called a ncsoft shill at first. :p

I started the process but have long way to go. Got a couple of more people already invested. One, the biggest investor of the bunch is still on the fence.

Hop on in, the water's fine.

johnrobey

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Re: How far would you be willing to go?
« Reply #57 on: October 22, 2013, 02:04:11 AM »
Interesting discussion.  Back to the OP:  Of course I'd be willing to subscribe again!  Like many, I never let my subscription lapse even under the F2P model.

Unlike some, I am not willing (nor able) to invest in NCSoft - but if some number of fans here can gain a controlling/influential interest, well, excellent!
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saipaman

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Re: How far would you be willing to go?
« Reply #58 on: October 22, 2013, 02:11:36 AM »
If we had the money to gain control of NCSoft, we could just save ourselves lots of money and simply pay them their outrageous asking price for CoX.

Probably the real truth here is that NCSoft has long forgotten about CoX.

JaguarX

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Re: How far would you be willing to go?
« Reply #59 on: October 22, 2013, 02:45:18 AM »
If we had the money to gain control of NCSoft, we could just save ourselves lots of money and simply pay them their outrageous asking price for CoX.

Probably the real truth here is that NCSoft has long forgotten about CoX.
Indeed.

But remember as stock owner, by definition, ya part owner of the company and thus can sit in the stock holders meeting. While owning small piece means the voice is small, but think about who else are in those meetings? Many times the big dogs or their representative. You go to these stock meetings and you'd be surprised what corporation own part of this and that corporation. While sometimes you get looked down upon as a peasant, but majority of the cases big or small 1 or 3 million shares, you are one of the guys/gal for that time. And thus you have their ear as a fellow stock holder. Ya don't have to have enough to take over, just enough to get into the door.

Ex-customer- complains, probably in the trash can.
Stockholder-small time complains- might get a pre printed letter.
Stockholder mid sized- might get a reply from some lower end executive
Stockholder large sized- Probably some actually typed or written letter custom
Stockholder jumbo- You have their attention.

Now of course we don't have enough hanging about here to become jumbo. But think, even small time, is a foot in the door to the ear up the ranks. People that makes 2.5 million a quarter look like couch change.