Commando Archive

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StarNick wrote:

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How is the "not really communicating with the the CU Sandbox testers(in a very open manner).." a good thing? How is lack of comunication good unless you are trying to hide something. They have been doing the same thing to the alpha testers that they have been doing to the general public ie giving as little info as possible. How are we " the alpha testers" going to do our job without complete information? It is the fact that are giving only limited info that causes misunderstandings and worry.

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I didnt say it was a good thing...but its not entirely a bad thing either. Really, hell its neither. The fact that they're working on it, usually isin handwith silence. Its ironic, but its their style apparently and its been their style for as long as I can remember...however Im not denying that more communication on exactly where we're heading is needed...

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I note that you avoided the last question and my comment on posting direct critisim of the devs in the alpha forums.

There have been periods of silence that they have just been avoiding the community and not working. For example just go read the smuggler revamp posts and look at the last time they posted. Are you trying to say that they have been to busy to post an update on it because they are HARD at work on the smuggler revamp??

Now that you have read their last post and seen the date. You see that your arguement doesn't hold water.

Frankly the Devs alwasy talk about improving communication between them and the players but they never make the changes in thier procedures to actually improve communication. Secondly they see us as unequal partners in this game. They are certain they know best and the players know nothing. They don't feel that they owe us any communication, they feel that they are doing us a favor revamping the game. Or so it seems by the tone of thier posts and their frequency.

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aeuralis wrote:

The Alpha testers will be kicked out if they disagree?

Testers can disagree, and have many times....the devs went back to a nice chunk of the CU and changed it for the better because of Testers disagreeing. HOWEVER, trolling and hardcore flaming to the point where you're insulting the Devs and your fellow testers aren't tolerated. The CU Forums are treated with a manner of business and professionalism...same thing applies to the Correspondent forum/program. Its not so much of what you say, but of the manner of how you present it.

Yeah but if i posted congratulating TH on 5 months since he said "alpha will start in a few weeks", you and i know it would be locked or deleted in minutes.

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Message Edited by StarNick on 02-28-2005 04:27 PM

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aeuralis wrote:

It feels weird replying to these thread rather then starting it. But being how i have been unable to post for the last 3 days, I will have settle for repling.

Now that 5 months have past since TH posted it would start "in a few weeks" I have to say that i am less and less tolerant of the continuing delays. Even though I am in the Alpha testing, it seems that the Devs are dragging their feet and making changes to systems that work fine as they are. While they have given us some new infomation, they have not given us 3/4 of the total information that we need. They have shown the correspondents all the info so it is done in some form. I would rant on the CURB forums but it would just get me kicked out of the alpha.

The Devs seem intent on changing everything. In essence, the CURBG is SWG 2.0. That the moment i am not sure if that is good or bad. I have some severe reservations about their changes(not about commando because i don't know anything about the new commando. I know about their old plans but not their new ones. ) That is not to say that the new system will not be fun or better overall. But the the transistion between the old system and the new seems to be catastropic for alot of people at the moment.

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StarNick wrote:

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Aeuralis wrote:

Frankly the Devs alwasy talk about improving communication between them and the players but they never make the changes in thier procedures to actually improve communication. Secondly they see us as unequal partners in this game. They are certain they know best and the players know nothing. They don't feel that they owe us any communication, they feel that they are doing us a favor revamping the game. Or so it seems by the tone of thier posts and their frequency

Well, we -have- seen lots of improvements in the recent months...have they been steller? Maybe not, but they have been improvements. For unequal partners...maybe SOE woke up and started listening to us a bit more, maybe not directly....but afterall, the CU was delayed another 2-3 months due to Alpha tester feedback...

Frankly i don't think they started listening to us, I think they saw the subscription numbers plummet with the release of WoW. I think that drop scared the life out of them. I think thatis whythey have been making changes.I think up to that pointthey all believed whatHaden Blackman said aboutthe forums and them being filled with the disgrunted minority whilethe majoritywere to busy happilly playing the game to post on the forums. Yeah the testers delayed the the CURB but theDEV's had workedon the plan for 4 monthsbefore the testers saw it. They should have had it right by then. I have seen nothing in the alpha forums to make me change my mind on the devs and how they work. I continue to see the same pile of crap over and over from them.

Btw, I do agree that they feel they think they know whats best for the game...its a hassle, and something Garvin warned me about...

Sadly, i didn't need to be warned. I have known it for far too long.

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aeuralis wrote:

Frankly i don't think they started listening to us, I think they saw the subscription numbers plummet with the release of WoW. I think that drop scared the life out of them. I think thatis whythey have been making changes.I think up to that pointthey all believed whatHaden Blackman said aboutthe forums and them being filled with the disgrunted minority whilethe majoritywere to busy happilly playing the game to post on the forums. Yeah the testers delayed the the CURB but theDEV's had workedon the plan for 4 monthsbefore the testers saw it. They should have had it right by then. I have seen nothing in the alpha forums to make me change my mind on the devs and how they work. I continue to see the same pile of crap over and over from them.

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Actually, from what I've heard this is a misconception...SWG's subscription numbers have actually gone up unbelievably (I could be wrong though in recent months...heard thisa fewmonths back)...Yes, a lot of veterans left SWG, but for every 1 veteran that leaves, typically 2 to 3 new players replace them...SWG, from what I've heard, has pretty much grown each month in subscriber base since they launched.

I think SOE realized their numbers could go so much higher if they KEPT the veteran players along with the new subscriber growth...but SWG has never, as far as I know, been hurting or running scared. All of the recent actions have been issues on their list they've been wanting to get too. My guess is that they felt pressure to get the first expansion out to prove to Lucas Arts that they were "here to stay" and growing the product in a financial way (they are a business)...they probably had a timeline commitment with Lucas to get that expansion out (it's a common thing in the industry to have timelines set for expansions before a game even launches). The expansion came out in October, but before then, SOE was committed to that for SWG. After October they put their full commitment over into the CU and making these changes, but were understaffed to get things done as fast as we'd like, thus, 20+ new programmers were hired recently with a prime focus on making the changes like we've seen lately, which is likely the reason why we've seen a surge in awesome new changes and new features (as well as a growth in the CU plans)...I don't think any of those 20 new programmers are working on the CU, but their presence at SOE likely freed up the CU programmers from working on other projects as well)...This is all hypothetical of course as I'm not an SOE employee and don't know truthfully their inner workings or how they run their business, but it's based off of what I've read about SOE, their press releases, and the sense of committment I got when I visited their offices back in August.

Basically...I believe all the changes we've seen lately are things SOE has very much wanted to put focus into, but before they got the 20+ new programers, they were spread out to thin between the expansion, the CU, and other ingame/hardwarebugs (there are TONS of them being worked on constantly I'm sure).

Message Edited by garvin on 03-01-2005 08:53 AM

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garvin wrote:

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aeuralis wrote:

Frankly i don't think they started listening to us, I think they saw the subscription numbers plummet with the release of WoW. I think that drop scared the life out of them. I think thatis whythey have been making changes.I think up to that pointthey all believed whatHaden Blackman said aboutthe forums and them being filled with the disgrunted minority whilethe majoritywere to busy happilly playing the game to post on the forums. Yeah the testers delayed the the CURB but theDEV's had workedon the plan for 4 monthsbefore the testers saw it. They should have had it right by then. I have seen nothing in the alpha forums to make me change my mind on the devs and how they work. I continue to see the same pile of crap over and over from them.

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Actually, from what I've heard this is a misconception...SWG's subscription numbers have actually gone up unbelievably (I could be wrong though in recent months...heard thisa fewmonths back)...Yes, a lot of veterans left SWG, but for every 1 veteran that leaves, typically 2 to 3 new players replace them...SWG, from what I've heard, has pretty much grown each month in subscriber base since they launched.

I think SOE realized their numbers could go so much higher if they KEPT the veteran players along with the new subscriber growth...but SWG has never, as far as I know, been hurting or running scared. All of the recent actions have been issues on their list they've been wanting to get too. My guess is that they felt pressure to get the first expansion out to prove to Lucas Arts that they were "here to stay" and growing the product in a financial way (they are a business)...they probably had a timeline commitment with Lucas to get that expansion out (it's a common thing in the industry to have timelines set for expansions before a game even launches). The expansion came out in October, but before then, SOE was committed to that for SWG. After October they put their full commitment over into the CU and making these changes, but were understaffed to get things done as fast as we'd like, thus, 20+ new programmers were hired recently with a prime focus on making the changes like we've seen lately, which is likely the reason why we've seen a surge in awesome new changes and new features (as well as a growth in the CU plans)...I don't think any of those 20 new programmers are working on the CU, but their presence at SOE likely freed up the CU programmers from working on other projects as well)...This is all hypothetical of course as I'm not an SOE employee and don't know truthfully their inner workings or how they run their business, but it's based off of what I've read about SOE, their press releases, and the sense of committment I got when I visited their offices back in August.

Basically...I believe all the changes we've seen lately are things SOE has very much wanted to put focus into, but before they got the 20+ new programers, they were spread out to thin between the expansion, the CU, and other ingame/hardwarebugs (there are TONS of them being worked on constantly I'm sure).

Message Edited by garvin on 03-01-2005 08:53 AM

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I only know what i see, and I KNOW that the popluation of Bria has dropped BIG TIME. I can see it everytime i go to Cnet starport. I saw it really drop about the time WOW started. Last July , on average there were about 150-175 people in cnet starport. Now there are on avereage 20-30. some of that is due to space and the starport wait changes. But not all of it. Last july there were average of 5-8 docs buffing, now it is rare that there are 3. I know they say that they have gained not lost people but i tell you that i see a MASSIVE difference in Bria's population. I know that of the 78 people on my friends list, 67 of them have quit/canceled since WoW was released.

So they can say what they want, the facts on bria don't seem to support their statements.

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nerfherder321 wrote:

i remember a couple months ago...i heard...taht Lucas Threatened to Pull the game away from SoE if they did not shape up (hire more people etc) and give the game to obsidian. I was all for the Pulling the game and working on SWG2, which could have been made by taking this game, changing the engine, changing the models and time frame, but keep everythng they have now (like space and jedi)

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Message Edited by aeuralis on 03-01-2005 11:22 AM

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aeuralis wrote:

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nerfherder321 wrote:

i remember a couple months ago...i heard...taht Lucas Threatened to Pull the game away from SoE if they did not shape up (hire more people etc) and give the game to obsidian. I was all for the Pulling the game and working on SWG2, which could have been made by taking this game, changing the engine, changing the models and time frame, but keep everythng they have now (like space and jedi)

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The CURB is in essence SWG 2.0

Message Edited by aeuralis on 03-01-2005 11:22 AM

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nerfherder321 wrote:

i remember a couple months ago...i heard...taht Lucas Threatened to Pull the game away from SoE if they did not shape up (hire more people etc) and give the game to obsidian. I was all for the Pulling the game and working on SWG2, which could have been made by taking this game, changing the engine, changing the models and time frame, but keep everythng they have now (like space and jedi)

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garvin wrote:

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nerfherder321 wrote:

i remember a couple months ago...i heard...taht Lucas Threatened to Pull the game away from SoE if they did not shape up (hire more people etc) and give the game to obsidian. I was all for the Pulling the game and working on SWG2, which could have been made by taking this game, changing the engine, changing the models and time frame, but keep everythng they have now (like space and jedi)

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That was a rumor that was proven wrong (was spread by a misinformed web site) when Lucas Arts not only praised SOE publicallybut pumped more money into the project so they could higher more folks (they strengthened their commitment). SOE has apparently done so well with growing their subscriber base and the launch of their expansion that, business wise, I'm sure LA couldn't be happier...

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