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Development insights from Tacofangs
devtracker
Posts: 66 Arc User
Interesting comments about Champs from Tacofangs over on the STO boards:
http://sto-forum.perfectworld.com/showthread.php?p=14501981#post14501981
You have a very odd understanding of how game development works.
People are hired, quit, move between projects/companies CONSTANTLY. Dan going to a new project is not some omen of abandonment. Champions has it's own team. That team is the size it is because that's how much Champs brings in. If it were a bigger game, it would have a bigger team. People aren't removed from the team to punish players, the team is scaled to the revenue being generated.
In addition, you say that CO is tapped to fill out the STO & NW projects. . . ok, sure. In that anyone who works at any company long enough is going to work on multiple projects, and therefore WILL be removed from their previous projects. Keep in mind that City Of got tapped when we started making Champions (well, Marvel). And STO/NW people will be taken off to new projects as those games go through their natural life cycle. Just as those games will lose people to help build further games.
Cryptic North is alive and well. And while they're a small team, they've been doing a fantastic job with new stuff: Alerts, Vehicles, Auras, Costumes, Events, etc.
http://sto-forum.perfectworld.com/showthread.php?p=14501981#post14501981
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That's interesting, because for a few months in 2012 (or like half the year) we had like, zero development, just around the time when Neverwinter was in open beta. While I do believe what Tumerboy says, and I know it's not done to punish players, Champions was left with what seemed like no development. You can't tell me that it was making no money at the time.
Until further notice, I will operate on the assumption that Cryptic is content with CO's death spiral, and that Cryptic North developers can and will be taken from us, without notice or remorse, until Jack Emmert or his string-pullers at PWE tire of us.
They're not there in the beginning, but when your story ends / Gonna last with you longer than your friends
And look how swimmingly that worked out for City. Cryptic got booted, a new team took it over, and that team turned it into the super-hero game it should have been all along once Emmert & Friends mismanagement was removed from the equation.
Let's fast-forward a few years, and now after years of mismanagement Emmert & Friends get Das Boot from CO, and a shiny new team takes it over...
Usually I'd say this statement was making a lot of assumptions but considering not much else was put up for sale last year this may ring a lot closer to the truth.
I really doubt that that period of time where we had nothing going on had nothing to do with Neverwinter. It can't be a coincidence.
Things are going as normal > Neverwinter starts gearing up for beta/launch > Nothing happens over here for months > Our old team is gone and currently stationed at Neverwinter, and we get a new team.
I doubt the game started making more money off lockboxes and vehicles just because they stopped development.
It was making money. Just not to CO....
And playing by myself since Aug 2009
Godtier: Lifetime Subscriber
1) I should read more often STO boards
2) STO was always highly profitable and there was not an actual comeback from the death after ATARI sold Cryptic.
IDK if I'd say STO was *always* "highly profitable", but I think it has always been *more* profitable than Champs. That said, STO did go through a time period where nothing was happening(similar to Champs now), but it came out of it and has been on the rise ever since.
"Without data, you're just another person with an opinion." -- W. Edwards Deming
it came out of it, because PWE put resources beyond what STO was actually bringing as profit. It is called investing.
During ATARI times, devs told us that they were not doing much development in either game because none of them warranted that investment. I highly doubt that suddenly more people started to play STO after PWE bought Cryptic, just happened.
In general, I have come to terms with CO development realities but it upsets me a bit those PR answers that I might have bought if I was not here since 2009.
The things people were really wanting(read: had been requesting for quite a while), costume sets and auras, didn't hit the Z-Store last year until the holiday season started up. From January to September it was mostly vehicles, the dance emotes were July. Vehicles and keys were practically all there was for a major part of the year. Every vehicle listed in the Z-Store that isn't a Hovertank was added last year.
I don't have access to Cryptic's financial records but I find it hard to believe that the game wasn't making money when the development practically stopped.
Dunno Pargon and Cryptic both seem to have had the same type of game plan.
Take a good Super MMO make it a p%$? poor FTP. Watch game die. I will add Paragon reached the game getting canned part faster than Cryptic did.
Never realized how much City and CO are alike :P
Nepht and Dr Deflecto on primus
They all thought I was out of the game....But I'm holding all the lockboxes now..
I'll......FOAM FINGER YOUR BACK!
Our "drought" was in late 2012, if I remember correctly. I didn't say that it wasn't making any money (in fact I said the opposite - "You can't tell me that it was making no money at the time"). We heard from Turtle directly that the game was sustaining itself and that a shutdown was nowhere on the radar.
What I'm saying is that I don't think that during that time, lockboxes and vehicle sales were so amazing that the game started making more cash than before, during a period of little to no development, resulting in us getting a development team.
The lockboxes and vehicles didn't "save" the game. They did keep the game afloat, and it makes sense to me that those things would continue to sell during a low development period because of player churn. Random Guy A doesn't know that there hasn't been development for months, doesn't know there won't be development for months - to him it's all just stuff to buy. He leaves, Random Guy M takes his place, same thing happens.
I mean, yeah I could be wrong since I don't know all the facts, but it doesn't seem logical to me at all.
You're talking about 2012, I'm talking about last year. Whatever money CO made in 2012 was used in 2013 to make those mini-events and whatever money CO made in 2013 is probably going to fuel the development we'll get this year. 2012 had little development, especially during the Neverwinter drought, but that was still enough to give us what we got last year which was more than what we got in 2012.
I'm not saying key/vehicle sales are or will save the game but since most of last year's goodies were tied to lockboxes, and there were a lot of goodies in those things, they'll probably be responsible for a large part of what we'll get this year.
Pssst, TT, LordGar. THIS IS YOUR CUE.
(Seriously, I wonder if these guys enjoy putting out fires more than preventing them...)
They're not there in the beginning, but when your story ends / Gonna last with you longer than your friends
Oh, I guess we're talking about different things... I don't disagree with this stuff.
CoH added some amazing new powersets (with more in beta), some great new story content, and thought they were doing just fine. They were actively developing their game.
The dev team -- including management -- were as shocked as anyone else when the hammer fell. Even NCSoft indicated the game was doing all right, it just wasn't the style of game they wanted to continue with.
While I am enjoying CO right now, given the choice, I'd still be in CoH. If nothing else, just because there was so much more content. I could take different characters through a variety of leveling paths -- and skip content I didn't particularly care for.
I like most or the story content in CO, there just isn't very much of it in comparison to other MMOs I play. But then, the first two MMOs I played were CoH and LOTRO (still playing), which really spoiled me with the amount and variety of storyline content available.
That is still to be seen, I doubt we are in any danger. But CoX was online for about 8 years, while we are just past CO's 4th.
Let us also not forget that STO an NWO have much bigger companies watching how Cryptic handles their license. Losing that license can have a lasting impact on not only the games, but the company behind the games.
The first line I'm not going to be address too closely, unfortunately. There are things that go on backstage that we can't talk about, mostly because we're a publicly-traded company. What I can say, though, is that sales of lockboxes, vehicles, etc. didn't magically change the equation at Cryptic or PWE; they are a solid addition to our sales, but we have a long-term view of the game.
We have a long-term commitment to CO, and while that quiet period did happen, it wasn't like we pulled the plug and then changed our mind. We're a business, but Champs has proven itself as a solid product, and we're smart enough to think long-term instead. It was unfortunate, it was unavoidable, and it is past.
Re: the second line of conversation, I think we can all agree that the last UNTIL Field Report over-committed us. When we needed to be flexible and responsive to new opportunities, we'd publicly set out an agenda that was static. We don't want to be in that situation again, so we're not announcing things until we're confident we can deliver, and that it's the best plan for Champions.
That being said, this timing is excellent: I spent much of yesterday putting Jira tasks in. I can't say any more right now, until we're confident in the contents, but stay tuned -- we've got some good stuff planned. Cryptic North's been making good-quality content, and I'm happy with what I've seen.
And if it helps, here's a piece of info. I'm the guy who handles the weekly reports for our studio -- it's one of my jobs as the rookie product manager -- so I see the numbers. Champions isn't selling more than STO, of course, but it's doing quite solidly. From a financial standpoint, we're rather pleased with Champs right now.
It's really cool that you can be up front with some of this stuff. The rest of the stuff, I'm pretty sure it's understood by all that you can't comment on it.
While the quiet period was really unfortunate (I was actually pretty unhappy with the game for quite a while... yeah, me! :biggrin:), I'm quite happy with Cryptic North and the stuff they've been putting out. Some of the things they've done have been pretty ambitious, and I like that they listen to the players and consider their ideas. I'm definitely looking forward to what they come up with this year.
Back before the field reports first started, a lot of us told the developers that we understood that things that are in the planning stages might not get completed, but that we just wanted to know what they were planning. It's a shame that can't continue (well, I don't know if it will or not), but it was always fun getting a look into the possible future. I do hope you guys bring back something like that, even if it's just a bunch of "Stuff we'd like to do."
As for my thoughts on the conversation: I think we're trying to read too much in what's happened in that past period. It happened, it's over with, let's just move on.
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I shouldn't waste time on this one, but ill bite, co is 8 years old? never knew that.
They're not there in the beginning, but when your story ends / Gonna last with you longer than your friends
since I started this furball over at star trek online, I want to say why I did it, I wanted to know that champions had a future, this game has so much so much that could go into it.
I want to say thank you tt, for setting of our worries to rest.
It didn't help that they took a whole year to release their first real content expansion: Vibora Bay. NemCon was a nice endgame lair added while waiting but it definitely wasn't enough.
Whatever window of opportunity that was present for them to quickly build up on content additions (even very small ones count) to keep player interest after they've experienced everything that the game had to offer at launch level, it's already long-closed. It seems that MMORPGs need to constantly expand to stay relevant in the market and I can honestly say that CO has failed in that aspect. I don't know exactly what it is that happened within the company and its dealings with its publishers, but I can safely say that CO is getting the much smaller (smallest even) share of the budget basket compared to STO or NWO.
So with all that has happened, I'm keeping my expectations realistic. CO isn't getting the funding needed for what I believe most of us want to see added in the game. We're going to have to be satisfied with what we have right now and expect a couple of new shinies added to the store along with periodic event-themed alerts. Expecting anything further than that just invites disappointment that I'm already numbed from and can't be bothered anymore to feedback to Cryptic to expand the game like they should have been doing much more often in the past.
And playing by myself since Aug 2009
Godtier: Lifetime Subscriber
Thank you, TT. Hopefully we can start to grow the game, just as we saw STO start to grow a ways back.
While the Until report may have had too much, the not talking or giving us updates is just as bad. It lets the mind wonder to other games whose publisher and developers said they were doing fine, then a month or two later reading a report that the games servers would be closed.
Those other two games still get regular State of the Games, while our last one was in June 2012. Even looking at the other websites, there is a lot more activity going on. Including a livestream where questions get answered, the answers are often generic I can't talk about that yet, but at least it is something.
The aura system starts showing some in game incentive, such as in game drops and q store/ lockbox unique auras. I miss unique in game drops especially everything lost to On Alert.
A Sidekick system starts appearing. A system where we can gear them, choose their powers and can use them whenever we want to fill up vacant spots in our teams.
Start seeing a real permanent 100% live all the time content that takes more than a few hours to complete. This isn't asking much since its been years since Whiteout.
Cryptic North wraps up unfinished add ons. A LOT of costume sets were not finished such as skins that are only for the torso and not the legs? Hideouts were half done. On Alert is still not finished (convert those missing pieces and bring back those purple devices already).
Do not want more auras. And with all the nuance a sidekick system could involve balanced against what we've seen in terms of fully fleshed as opposed to skeletal projects, have to disagree there.
I want an enemy to give me pause in a map layout that is wholly unfamiliar. I think smoochy's plan of a scaled down architect using existing assets would help.
Far as I can tell, the sky has been firmly nailed in place for a good year now.
My super cool CC build and how to use it.
And playing by myself since Aug 2009
Godtier: Lifetime Subscriber
But I am not going to buy into "We have great things planned" until I see proof. Not anything against you but it is something we have heard before, and such was not delivered. I am a bitter player, but I am one who does look forward to being proved wrong.
Until we see what is coming, I will expect nothing.
Judging from the development the 2 games are getting, they arent even comparable. STO gets lots of new playable/mission type content on a regular basis. Champs gets mainly fluff, with a new alert every now and then. As someone who plays both games, they are worlds apart in the development they are getting.
We just started getting auras. I rather get more auras than vehicles.
There is no real balance issue with adding Sidekicks as they are for filling up the empty spots in your team. The only difference is that you would be able to outfit them into what your ideal team should be.
I'm still waiting for the unicycles that TrailTurtle EXPLICITLY stated we were getting.
My super cool CC build and how to use it.
Link to the post please.
http://co-forum.perfectworld.com/showpost.php?p=3584951&postcount=32
- David Brin, "Those Eyes"
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Guys, turn on your jokeometers.
Biff you'll have more luck demolishing a house with nothing but headbutts than you will trying to convince some of the forumites that jokes are real.
I have a real thick skull, dude. :biggrin:
- David Brin, "Those Eyes"
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I wasn't making a joke. Where's my unicycle? Ur a dev right? Gimme. s( u3u )z
My super cool CC build and how to use it.
They're not there in the beginning, but when your story ends / Gonna last with you longer than your friends
(Alerts: no questionite for PvP, no balancing of reward for missions
Vehicles: people wanted travel powers, not... that.)
Wicks and Things: NW-DI4FMZRR4 : The Fenwick merchant family has lost a caravan! Can you help?
Beggar's Hollow: NW-DR6YG4J2L : Someone, or something, has stolen away many of the Fenwicks' children! Can you find out what happened to them?
Into the Fen Wood: NW-DL89DRG7B : Enter the heart of the forest. Can you discover the secret of the Fen Wood?