I think a major problem is also the mentality of “release now and patch later”. That was unthinkable 20 years ago and you saw the difference in the quality of games.
Yes. After 20 years of silence, they decide to use a ~280 character plattform to communicate.
That’s just sad.
Pretty sure d2 was a good example of that model. Maybe not to the same extend as d3 later, but it was already there.
Just look at the a4 quests. Alot of content was cut.
Yeah. The “old” way of making games still very much exists today, but pretty much only in console games, and only for offline games. PC and online games have become GaaS, where they just dont care about release quality.
yes… and no… i mean if your asking does it ever happen… well yes it does… frequently… but it really depends… just as often a game is broken by the devs NOT listening to the community.
it really depends on the game company and the fans.
how the devs maintain contact with the fans… what the relationship is… and how much the devs and fans are in agreement and how often wanted changed get implemented.
and its not just the devs and the fans… at lot of the times the publisher can force things that neither the fans OR the devs want.
having a healthy relationship with the fans and the publisher and devs is VETY important to keeping the games healthy.
the best example i can think of of this working well together is Sony and Insomniac games…
the worst example… well there far too many too list, and im sure u can some up with way more than i can…
but games like “league of legends”, assassins creed, ( unity online in particular), come to mind for me, but there are countless more.
I heart EVE Online. 
PC games are probably the worst for release now and patch later.
This “community” sure does.
Best example I can think of is From Software. I sure never see them ask players how they should design one of their games. They release a game, and it is what it is. They might release a few tiny patches afterward, and then back to silence for some years until another game is released.
Now this might be a misconception due to being a Japanese studio. Maybe they do communicate with Japanese fans more directly.
Yeah, that is what I meant (PC and online games suffering from release now and patch later). I can see that my sentence might read the other way around, went back and changed it.
I used to…spent a good decade of my life living there and playing D2 on the side between ops.
The game changed too much for me and the player-base has them by the Baals.
Alarm clock all the things, set up logistics, review/change/add doctrines, and prep for fleets was life.
Built my own doctrines, ran a JF down myself, made sure everyone got a ship, unlocked and ran the fleet. Best years of my life doing all that. Gave my buddy my Nyx and liquidated the rest in case the devs ever fix small gang warfare and bring back brawling comps.
I am not 100% sure about that, if I ask for change and this change is implemented, then I am at least partially responsible.
100% agree on this one.
I misspoke sorry, what I meant was that it seems like general idea is to create game which is good to play only, rather than the game which is good to play and can be played and played over the years. (not sure if I accurately explain my thought)
This so much. Imo From is now what Blizzard used to be. I remember reading some article, ages ago, before SC2 was released where author claimed that reason Blizzard games are so good, is because they dont do what players want, but they do what they think is best for the game.
There’s something to be said about quality of player base in this equation. PoE has been classically full of critically thinking analytic adults. Not sure how it is these days, but that was how it was.
I get asked to work on features all the time, and a general rule of thumb for me is that I only consider it— if it is not intrusive. Any requests, that:
- Bloats the code.
- Slows runtime.
- Decreases user friendliness.
- Changes what other users have grown accustomed to.
Are ignored.
And I don’t care to set up a poll, hope that everyone attends, and go “So 61.5% thinks…” Because not only does it waste my time, and theirs, it’s ultimately bollocks. No matter what changes I make to the program, someone is going to dislike it. The people who are requesting features will not get pissed by not receiving them, because they clearly got into the program- and want to continue to use the program- even without them. So I’m safe by ignoring people who request change.
The only time this does not count, is when the program is designed to suit the needs of a specific company, and they’re the only ones who use the program. Even if they have a sibling company who use the program, as well. If their sibling company complains, then they’re not going to direct their complaints to me, and if they do, I direct them to their parent company. Because that’s their in-house problem, not mine.
Clients have a general idea of what they want, but they know nothing of the details or challenges, and they do not take ANYTHING or ANYONE else into consideration. They don’t even read analytical reports, and the few times they do, they don’t truly understand what it hints towards.
Yes, this can happen. Players often don’t fully understand the repercussions to design choices. Design philosophy and player psychology are really important areas for designers to deeply understand.
It is human nature to want things in life to be easier, and this mentality often leaks into games. Players are constantly complaining for changes in games to make them easier, or to allow for their choices to be less final in case they make the wrong choices.
Often, when developers listen to these complaints, it leads to a game losing its challenge, and removing decision making also removes much of the potential satisfaction players get out of the game. Then, players get bored due to lack of challenge, and if decisions they make become meaningless, they lose motivation to play entirely.
This has been happening with WoW for a long time. And it’s also why Classic WoW was so appealing and successful. This can also be seen when comparing Diablo 2 to Diablo 3. Decision making is nonexistent in D3 and that has had major repercussions. Dark Souls and Bloodborne on the other hand are great examples of challenge and decision making done right.
As much as I like Bloodborne (as a lower quality version of a Souls game), it sure took away a lot of decision making (removing much of the build options), and also in general the easiest SoulsBorne game. And it seemingly did so without player input.
I’d argue that D3 likewise removed most decision making, and most depth, before it released. Again without player input. Heck, a bunch of us was yelling at Blizzard pre-release of D3, that everything they showed from the game looked like something that could only go wrong; especially the itemization, but the skill system also seemed worse every time they showed it.
It is easy to blame players, but I stil think developers have by far the most responsibility here. Like 99%+. Often they assume they know what the players want. Wrongly. And as said earlier, it is also their responsibility to not do anything and everything that players might ask of them. Both when devs listen too much, or too little (and WoW has examples of both tbh), the devs are the ones who did something wrong.
Bloodborne is more a prime example of challenge, rather than decision making. I personally found it to be one of the harder Fromsoft games, but maybe that’s due to playstyle. However, decision making in different types of games can vary greatly. Decision making in Bloodborne is primarily in the split second combat decisions you make, which can lead to serious consequences. It is embedded with the challenge. I agree that decision making pertaining to build and items is not quite as important but it still exists. It is still an important factor which weapon you commit to investing resources, and if you overcommit to a weapon you end up not liking, or want to switch to another weapon late game, you can really screw yourself since the resources for the higher level upgrades are very limited.
Diablo 3 yes, it was ruined before it even came out, and a fault of poor development decisions.
Ultimately developers are at fault in addition to when they listen to players with bad opinions.
Yes.
The Team Fortress 2 community and DotA comunity often ask for changes
It goes both ways though. Fans know what they want sometimes.
Look at classic wow and the infamous “you think you do, but you don’t” comment. Then finally blizzard relented and released classic wow and it was more popular than BFA for a good while.
Then blizzard killed the golden goose they had found by trying to add more monetization to it and folks lost interest.
Devs need to take what fans want into consideration, but they also need to know when changing something would be detrimental to the game itself. It can be a tricky thing to handle and not all dev teams are capable of it.
Players should always be allowed to offer feedback on any game. It is the job of the devs to figure out what changes would ruin the game and what ones would be beneficial. That is how games become great a partnership of players and developers working together to make a game great. Sure we have had those that never had forums that the devs made great games anyway. But that is not the case with those devs that want feedback from their players.
We are talking games where there are no places to offer feedback to the developers. Some of those games in times past have been great and some have not.
But when both developer and players get together. They do it right, you have a formula for a successful game.