Dancer Archive
Thread: Hold the Devs accountable. And, report the broken dance.
Schardour wrote:
Warryyr, thank you for clarifying, but that's not what I meantI literally mean that the dance is not broken. The issues with the base dance display run much more deeply than you would think. This is a problem resulting from issues with the basic coding of the game. I've been told that the implications of this 'flaw' in the game code design are much more far-reaching and in depth than what you see with the base dance of a few of our dances. It's probably the same culprit that allows bike-warping and butt-slides. Apparently it has much more to do with information exchange between PC's and servers than it does with faulty coding in our dances.
For instance, NewJedi hardly sees an issue with the state of our base dances. A great connection and extremely close proximity to the servers allows him to view the base dance in nearly the same manner as the performer does. I believe Tiaga offered a short explanation of this somewhere, but I'm disinclined to look for it at this hour of the morning
In short, I'm fine with the fact that the lyrical and formal dances still do not display correctly. (Not fine, but understanding.) Fixing those problems involves much more than looking at a few of our dances and changing the code. These dances move your character and the server attempts to update your new position for the viewer at intervals, resulting in those jerky movements. For this aesthetic change to be made, it appears that the devs would have to undertake a task similar to touching our buff coding. (*shudder*) Why don't we worry more about our functionality, viability, and place in the game? /bug the dance if you'd like, but it's likely going to be on their own time that they work on these issues with display and animation. I just feel that our passions could be better-focused elsewhere.
(Yes, I'm just as unhappy as everybody else that there was absolutely no dialogue with regard to the release / satisfaction with this quest. I feel that they could do a much better job than they're currently doing on that front.)
Well put, 5 stars.
I understand the implications of fixing our dance. I don't understand why we don't deserve the respect given to other professions in regards to an explanation for this, though. Oh well.
It's cool someone's figured out (or just devised a very plausible theory regarding)the dance malfunctioning. But, it would have been nice to have someone reassure us that it's a known issue not related to the dance, maybe a short explanation of it for all who are following this new Quest/dance/song. Even if they said, "it can't be fixed without potentially causing serious problems with the entire rest of the game, but it's in the queue for a fix. It will take a long time to figure out" - that would be acceptable. It would be better than complete silence, that's for sure 
I agree, we have more pressing issues. I just didn't want people who felt cheated by this whole process to not understand they have a voice. When other professions don't get things done right for them, or they are seriously upset over something, they get "vocal." And they get results. When we do it, we get no result and thus feel like "whiners." When, in reality, we only want what others get when their new stuff is put in - enough attention/communication to assure us what can be done will be done. Regardless of the results we achieve, I think it our duty to let the Dev team know that from our end, they dropped the ball with communication.
The dance issue probably won't be fixed for a long time, if ever. That doesn't mean we can't be displeased with them over it, though. Especially with the lack of communication we've had...which would be pretty much 0. Our Correspondents were silenced. It was like the SOE mafia was in charge of creating our Quest
I'd prefer to have those who feel similar to the way I do express their feelings to the Dev team. Not necessarily for us (we're in a hopeless situation, so it would seem), but for any other profession they even think of doing this to in the future.
Just like the Combat Revamp, if they didn't have the proper time to devote to us (couldn't even post anything to us), they should have delayed it until after JTL. And told us so. Instead it was more of, don't have time don't have time, the code is there, formailty of a Feedback thread, set up the "go Live" date for the code, autorun code push to Live and move on with other, more important, issues. If JTL or whatever is more important than us, they should have waited to do it right.
But, what's done is done. There are bigger and more important battles to fight. I agree, the energy should be expended for those. But, since the Quest just came out, we undoubtedly have their ear though we don't get told that. Now's the time where our comments might actually get heard, though a response will likely not happen.
Panthu wrote:
Groovymarlin wrote:
Panthu/NewJedi/Tiaga, any insight...
I was told not to "create" a PR incident. All of my posts on the quest and our Dance reward have to be approved before I post them publicly. I was told this weeks ago. My own threads on the subject were locked or deleted both in here and in the Corr forum on this and two other issues: harassment and the Mind Buff Crystal given in the FS Village quests.
I have chosen to be quiet out here and let you guys handle this however you are going to with out a corr rather than have my own opinions doctored in an effort to make you more ok with this. *shrug*
I can't say anything more than that, or I'll most likely lose my position. Then I won't be much help to anyone.You can probably guess how I feel about this, but I can only advise that you all continue to make your concerns known in an orderly fashion. Use the other channels available to you. I'm sorry that I can't be more help, but this seems to be one of the weak spots in having a player representative that is company controlled and monitored. Usually I think the corr program is helpful, but this has just been a very frustrating case where it wasn't allowed to be.
/hug Panthu
This game feels like some kind of oppressive police state when it comes to communication with us.
Who's in charge of SOE - Emperor Palpatine? Jesus.....
Panthu wrote:
I was told not to "create" a PR incident.
They have nothing to fear from you. Play it cool, as you always have. Sit back and watch the fur fly. We need you. You've done a great job, and all you could - so thank you so very much. I'd send you flowers if I knew where to send them to. Thanks for trying so hard. Let them lie in the pits they've dug for themselves and let things be for now.
If they want us to shut up and keep quiet, brother do they have another thing coming. Seems like some gaming sites would be very interested in hearing of this incident, and the complete lack of communication that paying SWG customers are receiving. However, I know their tricks, and I'm not falling for them. They played the ol' CYA (which does not mean see ya) and played it well. Just....not well enough. If it's a PR incident they want to avoid, they know they did wrong. And they WILL be called on it, and they will take responsiblity for their service. I pay for this service, as we all do. When I don't get the service I deserve, I take it directly to those who impact SOE the most - the wonderfulconsumer! Oh, what powers they possess. Wonderous, indeed.
I shop for DVD's and CD's all the time. It's sort of a problem I'm trying to get a handle on I've spent a lot of time grabbing DVD's and reading them near the computer games. Give ya a hint - it's in the section where computer games start with S. You'd be surprised (well, maybe not) that a fair amount of potential social profession players come by and pick up SWG. I talk to em, say hey that game is cool, but only if you do combat professions. The social professions are fun with friends, but stagnant with content. The Developers seem to act like we don't exist, and AFK players make more money than live Entertainers. Sure, a couple say thanks and might think I'm a weirdo (who cares) but I've seen folks put the game back and thank me, talk to me about what I do in the game and what I think of other professions or other games. I figure Isaved them the trouble of finding out what we all know.
The key is not to be too aggressive about it, not like you're some nutball obsessive jaded customer with one bad experience. The great thing about us social folks is we talk to each other like civilized human beings. At least, we try to most of the time
Word of mouth is incredibly powerful. It gets around fast.
Strongarming us into silence will do no good - in fact it's just annoying me more. No one can "create a PR incident." They already have one to deal with.
Maybe I'll go by Best Buy. Man, I can NOT touch the Christmas funds....lol. I want that new Shawshank Redemption DVD, though.
LOL
AG-941 wrote:
Warryyr wrote:
Who's in charge of SOE - Emperor Palpatine? Jesus.....
Man, Iwish Jesus was in charge!
*searches for those WWJD bracelets to give to the devs*
Ra'ano
I literally mean that the dance is not broken. The issues with the base dance display run much more deeply than you would think. This is a problem resulting from issues with the basic coding of the game. I've been told that the implications of this 'flaw' in the game code design are much more far-reaching and in depth than what you see with the base dance of a few of our dances. It's probably the same culprit that allows bike-warping and butt-slides. Apparently it has much more to do with information exchange between PC's and servers than it does with faulty coding in our dances. 
We *did* get some unusual instructions relating to JTL and the NDA that I never completely understood. But I was never told to shut up.
Groovymarlin wrote:
Good God, that's horrible Panthu. But I don't understand...how does leaving the information about our quests going live out of the patch notes have anything to do with you creating "a PR incident?" Did they purposely leave it out of the patch notes because they are trying to hide the fact that these quests exist?
I DON'T GET IT.
It's been weird having people ask me "what new song and dance?" when I mention it. There are a lot of non-Entertainers who were excited too, and had some choice words for the Devs since they didn't tell anyone they were in the game. The people who listen and watch us are excited to have something new to take in! Just don't see why they told no one, and put this in as a hotfix. Very bizarre, indeed.
Sriva wrote:
I was trying to think whether we had any avenues that might eventually pay dividends, or even give us some relief as a venting mechanism. Writing to the developers obviously does no good. Quite simply, they don't give a s--t about us, that's abundently clear. Is there some contact point at Lucasarts we could email? I have to think they're less than happy with the way these arrogant cretins are stonewalling and insulting their fanbase (that want ad they posted for a licensee liaison person that someone posted several weeks ago made me think of this). Maybe we should email them a little ammunition?
This has been an absolute fiasco. Stonewalling us was bad enough, but muzzling our correspondent is unforgiveable. Someone outside of Sony should be informed of this kind of thing, whether it's Lucasarts, the gaming journalism community, somebody. Anyone have any people we could send our complaints to?
Well, Lucasarts might be interested to hear what we have to say. Wouldn't hurt to send things their way.
I've been visiting a lot of product review sites and giving my 2 cents on SWG in it's current state. From what I've seen, people are appreciative of the info.
A fair amount of people look at those reviews and actually take them into account. A lot of them are outdated, and if you phrase your review as an update for the game in it's current state, people find it pretty helpful.
amazon.com and epinions.com are my faves. circuitcity.com also has reviews, i think. Try contacting gaming sites, too. The surge of cancellations after the Combat Revamp reschedule, combined with nasty letters to gaming sites, got that Hayden guy in an interview regarding it - remember that? He cameacross rather poorly, taking a sort of cheap shot at forum people and writing them off as the whining of the vast minority, most people are actually playing the game and enjoying it instead of complaining,or something along those lines. Nevertheless, the Dev community realized a lot of people were angry to the point of cancellations, and suddenly - oh gee, they started asking for "quick little fixes that would make the game better" and pumped out some little fixes for annoyances. That Candyland lasted a very short time, then it was back to their limited mindset of JTL and Jedi.
I'm not surprised about the muzzling of Panthu. JTL is an important release with a lot of money behind it. Unfortunately, they don't understand that their actions are causing current customers to tell/inform potential customers of the problems evident with this game, and the development of it. Their silence to us and the rest of this game's players is hurting their sales. Their treatment isn't news to us, but it might be to the person finding JTL and SWG rated so low on review sites.
Word of mouth is also effective, I recommend piping up when you see someone pick up SWG at the local electronics or game store. Don't be overly pushy or emotional, just tell em the game is cool because of the friends you play with, and only if you do combat professions, and even those have been abandoned for JTL and Jedi. You'll probably get asked questions that you'll know all the answers to, so people get excited when they have someone really informed about the game.
People listen, especially when it's a matter of $30 for a game and $15 per month. A lot of people find that expensive enough (about a $50 startup total isn't small change), and don't seem as enthusiastic about the game when they know they'll feel like their money isn't as important as other players' money. Some folks have said, "That's messed up" (not exact words lol) when I tell them that JTL and Jedi have consumed the Devs, with everything else pretty much on hold for months now. Any potential Entertainer has been riveted with hearing my tales of our Entertainer Quest woes. I've had people thank me and put the game back after hearing of it. If it's not that story, it's the answer to the question, "Can I make money in the game just playing music or dancing?" that gets them leary of signing up.Any statement of AFK buffbots makes them reallyreconsidergetting the game. I feel bad that things have gotten to so bad in SWG, buthappy knowing I might have saved someone the grief of learning about it themselves after they put a lot of time into their characters. I do, of course, also tell them of the good times Entertainers have in-game with what we have, and that it can be a lot fun - events, concerts, great conversation. Some folks still seem interested, some don't, some look at me like I'm nutty when I say the first few things to them, some decide they'll do a Combat profession.
It's sort of like hanging out with newbies in-game, but instead of the pixels, they're right in front of you lol - you avoid all that darn typing to answer questions.
Who knows, you could make a new friend in your area who plays SWG. How cool is that?
If they're still interested, tell em your in-game name and that you'll help them out if theymake a character onyour server. They'll think they struck gold in the game store!
Aside from all of that, there's nothing else to do but hit the Cancel button and go read a good book.
Panthu wrote:
Groovymarlin wrote:
Panthu/NewJedi/Tiaga, any insight...
I was told not to "create" a PR incident. All of my posts on the quest and our Dance reward have to be approved before I post them publicly. I was told this weeks ago. My own threads on the subject were locked or deleted both in here and in the Corr forum on this and two other issues: harassment and the Mind Buff Crystal given in the FS Village quests.
I have chosen to be quiet out here and let you guys handle this however you are going to with out a corr rather than have my own opinions doctored in an effort to make you more ok with this. *shrug*
I can't say anything more than that, or I'll most likely lose my position. Then I won't be much help to anyone.
Message Edited by DarkY0da on 10-16-2004 10:00 PM