Honestly given some of the stuff i’ve read, that would be an understatement.
I’ve had some quarrels with some actiblizz people on the forum myself but i feel like people here are beating on a dead horse on points already made very recently.
We’re just taking the piss for the sake of it at this point.
I get both sides entirely, but as an (admittedly) smaller content creator - this is why the embargos with the top dogs sting as much as they do.
I like to make, scripted, well thought out and less ‘sensationalized’ content but am now at a huge disadvantage because those big guys all get the jump before the rest of us.
Personally, I prefered it when everyone had equal opportunity to make content on the game, but I understand the benefits.
100% honesty? Yeah, content creators are WAY more important, they kind of create what we play. We are secondary(but important too). Now weather we like what they push out? That is PURELY subjective and they just need more yes’s than no’s.
Is a painter as important as the painting or to go further the person who is looking/buying the painting? The creator is first always in all things. EVERYTHING ELSE is important but secondary.
Don’t expect this level of wisdom from me on these forums ever again. Live well and free.
Its that simple.
Even if there had been an NDA around the idea of the call itself, it still would have been very telling that a bunch of people who were feeling rather hopeless, and openly saying so, suddenly are not saying the same things as before.
Even if they do not say why or do not even say that they are, the absence of what had existed before would have been a red flag that gave away the existence of the meeting itself, especially given that we now know that such meetings exist.
Fair. In which case I’d like to suggest that it be fed back that something such as a roadmap is long overdue and would help revive the hype.
We’re more than 2 years into this now. The current situation is far below what many have come to expect from Blizzard. That expectation is itself a credit to Blizzard devs in general but it’s also crucial that Blizzard recover their high standards reputation.
If the main game is going to be abandoned the devs need hype for OW2. Streamers saying what is essentially “trust me bro” isn’t going to cut it.
I understand, and to be honest, I wish we could have a 1:1 relationship with every OW content creator in the same way we do with what roughly the top 15-20% of our creator community.
I mentioned this to you in another thread, but it’s on me to define how we support content creators at each step of their journey. Nothing else to share here, aside from that it’s something I’m working on.
Can you not? I’ve seen enough conspiracy posts yesterday. We don’t need more 
. Or maybe we do 
Personally, I’m on the side of “it’s not a fair question”. lol… it makes perfect sense (especially after reading Andy’s original post in this thread) why content creators would gain access to certain information before the player base.
As it’s been pointed out… the content creators’ livelihoods rest on the success of both this game and Blizzard… avg player, yeaaaaaaaaaaah not so much.
So in essence all this means is, the next time content creators find out something before the players, both blizz and the creators wont say a word about it until it’s ready because what the playerbase doesn’t know won’t hurt it lol
When the ball gets rolling a little more, I can only assume we will get more communication which will help bridge that ‘Creators knowing everything, players knowing nothing’ gap. Shaping it into ‘Creators get a little heads up, but players can prepare in their own ways too’ would be great.
Appreciate the frequent updates on here either way, and I’m looking forward to seeing how these things develop to foster an even better Overwatch creator + player community!
They’ve spoiled that themselves. The least popular seasonal event missing just a couple skins set off a firestorm of outrage, because this company and this game’s rep is in the trash and players have run out of patience. Whoever is in charge of “major beats and announcements” is doing a bad job.
Like, what do you think is going to happen when your big, mind-blowing OW2 reveal extravaganza happens, and players inevitably notice one or two less-than-ideal features, and that becomes the entire focus everywhere online because no one has any patience left and you’ve burned all your goodwill ages ago?
LOL
You guys should hang up a sign – “It has been [one] days since Blizzard made a promise that caused more harm than good.”
I suspect the only reason the call happened because some youtube metric dropped below a critical value
“we need to prevent the free labour who advertise our products switching to a competitor”
“spend $500 on each of them and show them some info, that’ll keep them for another 6 months”
No offense, but kind of a bad take^
Most updates to this game, save for a few very rare exceptions, have been met with derision, toxicity and bad mouthing of the devs. It has more to do with the impatience of the community.
What does this even mean? You know “content creators” is just another term for “annoying guys with webcams,” right? As in, streamers and Youtubers. It doesn’t mean developers, the people that DO make the game.
Literally what I just said, players are impatient. They were not impatient on day one. It wasn’t always the case and it didn’t happen at random.
YouTube metrics and Twitch analytics are only a single data point in how we decide how to support creators.
My first 3 months on the job consisted of dozens of 1:1 calls with content creators from all backgrounds (among other things). During those calls, these creators shared with me what frustrates them, what they need from us, and what could be leading them to moving away from Overwatch content.
Anyone who has been in a management/leadership/vision setting position knows that strategies and their associated tactics take months to formulate, means test, and drive alignment behind. Taking in data from as many different sources as possible is an integral part of that process.
Yeah I saw that other thread yesterday. I couldn’t read it without wincing; that was quite the harsh thrashing being doled out there. I used to think I was the harshest critic around here, but whew. I have now witnessed a lot of players who finally found that straw that broke the proverbial camel’s back.
Not even kidding here, you my have sympathies there. Looking at how you explained things, it feels like a somewhat reasonable choice, even if it did not turn out as expected.
If you consider creators valued partners, why are certain they allowed to do things that are a detriment to the community without it affecting them at all.
For example, there have been content creators who have done things like create malicious new accounts for the purpose of playing against people below their rank.
Another example is there have been content creators who have went to the forums for their streams and mocked people openly for their opinions, including opening their profiles for the purposes of ridicule. This has even lead to out of game harassment.
Coca-Cola would never do such a thing. And while I would not want to see content creators be purely sanitized corporate shills who’s content is overly controlled, I do think that there should at least be some kind of responsibility to acknowledge the elevated position these people are in and discourage that kind of thing.
I know of at least one coming here and lying that their voice isn’t anymore elevated than anyone else’s as justification for bad behavior. And we aren’t able to discuss them like limited public figures but as regular players despite them functioning as such.
OMG this business jingoism lol… just got out of a meeting like this today with my companies CEO. Let me guess… Blizz wants everyone to read the “12 Week Year”? haha
Pretty much what we’re seeing is the equivalent of that one friend who always says, “I’ll pay you back,” but they never do.
We haven’t really got a reason to even have a semblance of faith in the development team as of recent—some rightfully so. If anything, “jaded” is probably a better word to describe the current state of affairs within the community?
hm… yeah you’re right… I suppose what I was getting at is I’ve never seen an addition to this game that wasn’t harshly bad mouthed, so from where I’m standing, the players have always been impatient.
But I didn’t start playing this game from day 1 (a year after is when I started) so maybe things were different towards the very beginning? I wouldn’t know
Too bad you all don’t have a lot of these types of conversations with the forum community.
While I appreciate all the recent blue posts, the majority of time if it’s a thread on balancing it’s a community manager making a joke about what was being said then disappearing.