Snip.....
I really, really hope that E2 is worth it.
My enthusiasm died when I see yet another season come out with no changes to old bugs and even more problems added to the mix. Given what I have seen to date E2 will be all hype followed by even more disappointment and a game that resembles Star Trek even less.
QM (Quality Management) is very expensive, because it costs a lot of time. Therefore almost all software developers have a definite point when they simply stop the quality control. It is the point, where the product satisfies the majority of the customers. Investing into QM further than that point is a waste of time & money.
Unless of course said customers can be duped into paying for the privilege of testing your software for you by releasing the buggy software early and I'm not sure what developers you could be referring to, unless they have a monopoly on an application they couldn't afford to let their quality control slide or their competition would certainly benefit.
Perhaps I'm too critical and I don't want to cast a broad net of condemnation over the entire Cryptic staff, I have no doubt there are probably a lot in that crew that groan and roll their eyes whenever some manager walks into the conference room with the next idiotic idea to foist upon us.
If something is not broken, don't fix it, if it is broken, don't leave it broken.
It worries me that long term contributors to the community are giving up. Last time I saw that was SWG before servers started being closed down to condense populations.
Oh I wouldn't worry about it at all. Long term contributors are "special" because they've simply lasted longer than most of their contemporaries. That doesn't make them immune though to the same process of waining interest, it just means they haven't succumbed to it yet. Even with a healthy game and community you have these sorts of posts simply as the last cry for attention from someone who didn't realize what point they were coming to in their playtime.
Bipedal mammal and senior Foundry author.
Notable missions: Apex [AEI], Gemini [SSF], Trident [AEI], Evolution's Smile [SSF], Transcendence
Looking for something new to play? I've started building Foundry missions again in visual novel form!
Because not everyone finds bugs all that important. What use is a bug-free game with no inch of enjoyable content?
Bugs can stand in the way of enjoyable content, shooting stuff. They aren't a positive, deisrable feature. But they are not always the top important thing.
And that's why bugs are still in the game. Or in any software, really. A removed bug does not always provide the same impact as an added feature. I'd bet that most people would be more happy about 10 uniforms, then having 10 old uniforms have less clipping issues with certain combinations. But the effort to deal with either may in fact be the same.
Sorry, but not be able to see my weapons in space is a REALLY IMPORTANT bug. Sorry, but not be able to play n some zones because the fps lag is terrible, that is a REALLY IMPORTANT bug. Sorry but not be able to use the loadout system, a must-have feature since the day 1, that is a REALLY IMPORTANT bug. Sorry, but the powertray slotting bug that is with us since ages ago, for a lot of people is a pain, and that is a REALLY IMPORTANT bug. I could go on. Nobody seem to care at all about these issues, something that makes me wonder what the hell you people expect for this game, seriously. And still, so many people trying to "defend" the hamsters... its getting ridiculous.
Sorry, but not be able to see my weapons in space is a REALLY IMPORTANT bug..
Actually I haven't seen this happening since the 9.5 update. Could just be my system and the particular fights I've been in, but the worst offenders (CCE and Space Battlezone) have been working just fine in this department.
Bipedal mammal and senior Foundry author.
Notable missions: Apex [AEI], Gemini [SSF], Trident [AEI], Evolution's Smile [SSF], Transcendence
Looking for something new to play? I've started building Foundry missions again in visual novel form!
Yeah...I think of myself as a somewhat decent supporter, I mean I spend some RL money here and there and I usually in Cryptic's corner...but more and more it just gets harder and harder.
I know I got pretty damn angry after 9.5...but I don't know...it's kinda hard to stay away as stupid as that sounds. I may take long breaks but I come back...if this game wasn't based on Trek I would of gone and never came back...but I love Trek to much. I grew up with it...it's one of the few memories I have of my full family...
But yeah...as time goes on it does get harder and harder to come back from, they just neglect everything in the name of money...including 2 out of 3 of the factions :mad:
Dude, don't worry about it, it's a f2p game, as long as it's here, it's here for you to come back to.
Frankly, I've never found STO to be engaging enough for more than a few weeks' play at a time, but because I get a hankering for a Star Trek vibe, I've always come back to the game every few months, and it definitely scratches that itch, for a while.
In fact, while people complain about the grind, the rep grind is something I've actually completed just by this gradual method over the years, so I really appreciate that the game has had this long-term thing that I've been able to gradually complete.
Really, I've never understood why people think they HAVE to "live" 24/7 in an MMO, at least any non-sandbox MMO. I mean, I can understand people living 24/7 in EVE, because EVE is all about player-to-player relationships. But any themepark MMO? How could any development team possibly create enough content to keep people happy? They're never going to do it.
For reall long-term 24/7 play, it's all about human relationships. Either you have the sandbox thing, or you make things so hard you have to team up (but that won't fly nowadays), or you have what Cryptic seem to have accidentally invented (and forgotten all about) with CoH: you have a game in which PUG-ing is so addictive it builds community all by itself.
Other than that, the subscription model was pure evil for MMOs, it made developers chase a pot of gold at the end of a rainbow that doesn't exist: it's simply not possible to keep anybody addicted for that long, unless, possibly, it's their very first MMO and they're enchanted by the magic of playing online with other people for the first time. But that's got nothing to do with anything special developers can do, it's like virginity, it can only "pop" once. For everyone else, it's a strain for developers to keep having to come up with stuff, and it's a strain for players to keep playing.
Let f2p be f2p, enjoy it whenever you want to enjoy it, forget about it when you don't enjoy it.
Actually I haven't seen this happening since the 9.5 update. Could just be my system and the particular fights I've been in, but the worst offenders (CCE and Space Battlezone) have been working just fine in this department.
still happens every single time I log into a ce, or other large scale event..
I like their response to it though.. when there is to much going on, it chops "your" weapons graphics.. it seems to me the reasonable way to have incorporated removing graphics would be to remove "others" graphics from your screen.. just always seemed silly that they decide to remove the "users" graphics lol..
Not sure what software companies you've ever worked for, but in the real world this is not true in the least... with the exception of Cryptic of course.
Actually its patently true in the real world. Its only in imagination land where QA is able to put an indefinite hold on development to work out absolutely every concievable technical issue. Just look to any defective product you've ever bought, its not that the company though that shipping TRIBBLE was a good idea. It just wasn't cost effective to work out development to that fine a point where bugs/defects couldn't possibly happen.
Bipedal mammal and senior Foundry author.
Notable missions: Apex [AEI], Gemini [SSF], Trident [AEI], Evolution's Smile [SSF], Transcendence
Looking for something new to play? I've started building Foundry missions again in visual novel form!
still happens every single time I log into a ce, or other large scale event...
Also, just played CCE just to be sure. Weapons no longer disappear on my machine. I can't say why this is happening, given nothing specific in the release notes, but for the record my weapon effects are turned down to "medium."
Bipedal mammal and senior Foundry author.
Notable missions: Apex [AEI], Gemini [SSF], Trident [AEI], Evolution's Smile [SSF], Transcendence
Looking for something new to play? I've started building Foundry missions again in visual novel form!
Being here since closed beta and a lifetime subscriber whose paid that fee and then some into the Z-store, I've been more patient than I feel i should have with the shortcomings of this game, but since 9.5 and the disaster that is the DOFF'ing and crafting UI, i'm through playing for now.
For one, when my power tray gets hosed up or cleared whenever i start a mission or STF...STILL TO THIS DAY...one would figure that issue would be put high on the list of priorities to fix. Cryptic, if you guys are actually worried about quality of your product, then get a grip on it starting with KEY FEATURES that need to work without a hitch in order to play the thing. That's a simple expectation of the game by every player.
I won't get into how many of us felt about the exploration aspect of the game being reduced to farmville-level mechanics, but as long you insist on BS'ing us on what the Foundry has to offer, that's a clear indicator to me that the dev team simply does not have the resources to create content at a steady pace, so they're relying on the player-base to create their own. The foundry is cool, but it's also being used as a crutch. That's just bad business. Not to mention that the foundry keeps breaking with every major patch.
I realize this is a F2P model and the dev team works very hard with limited resources, but there comes a point when we have to be honest with ourselves. There are other F2P games whose quality of their product far exceeds that of STO. I can play my characters in those games cleanly without having to worry about the UI or mechanics malfunctioning on me.
The days of City Of Heroes are over, and so they are for the inherent engine. It is outdated rubbish. Your software is bug-laden and you're taking in revenue from charging ungodly amounts of money for people to bankroll your supply of duct tape. ($125 for a pack of ships you'll only use once, anyone? you going to rob people for that kind of stuff in the next expansion?)
I don't know what X2 holds, but the dev team as well as PWE executives should really take a step back and consider the future of this game in its current state: STO, while it has it's strengths, is mechanically broken. You know it and I know it.
Yes, i know a re-write of the software is a massive undertaking, but maybe it shouldn't be ruled out on the roadmap.
Sincerely,
someone who feels like they are boldly going to everywhere i've been before.
Also, just played CCE just to be sure. Weapons no longer disappear on my machine. :P
well then, you mus have been in a ce where no one was chain popping off stuff. cause its not just me, its a lot of people still complaining about it..
and it has nothing to do with your machine.. it has everything to do with the server choosing to prioritize effects to help keep the frame rates from sinking..
also, my machine is built for eqn, it can take sto and chew it up and spit it out without batting an eye.. lol.. so yeah, its not machine based..
well then, you mus have been in a ce where no one was chain popping off stuff. cause its not just me, its a lot of people still complaining about it..
and it has nothing to do with your machine.. it has everything to do with the server choosing to prioritize effects to help keep the frame rates from sinking..
also, my machine is built for eqn, it can take sto and chew it up and spit it out without batting an eye.. lol.. so yeah, its not machine based..
My machine was simply referring to my end. I wasn't trying to give a diagnosis. As for what we were doing, I was using the most effect-intensive build I could manage and I didn't see anything unusually mundane in what other people were using either. Usual stuff for the PVE. This also follows with the general experience I've been having in all my CCE's since 9.5 and in the Voth Space Battlezone (consistently no weapon effect issues.) I'd like to know why (since otherwise I'm forced to consider that I've just been riding along the tail end of a probability distrubtion curve for the last week, Ie. I've been obscenely lucky) but from my experience overall (which is all I can pronounce this from) it seems like something has been fixed. Maybe you're seeing something else, but at this point it might be worth taking a closer look (I'll certainly be.)
It is depressing when an objectively verifable fact of life (QA has limits) can be put away so by an emoticon.
But them's the internet.:rolleyes:
Bipedal mammal and senior Foundry author.
Notable missions: Apex [AEI], Gemini [SSF], Trident [AEI], Evolution's Smile [SSF], Transcendence
Looking for something new to play? I've started building Foundry missions again in visual novel form!
still happens every single time I log into a ce, or other large scale event..
I like their response to it though.. when there is to much going on, it chops "your" weapons graphics.. it seems to me the reasonable way to have incorporated removing graphics would be to remove "others" graphics from your screen.. just always seemed silly that they decide to remove the "users" graphics lol..
They just need to tone down the glitter that's cluttering the screen anyway and I'm sure it will do wonders. You know, over the top effects like the GW, TR or other TRIBBLE consoles like the black goo, Undine poo, consoles that have over the top graphics for the entire AoE or even the new "SHOOT HERE DUMBASS" mega-arrow on the new SA.
I can't even start to understand why do they keep putting more and more over the top glitter in the game when they're aware it creates such issues...and much of it is not Trek like anyway. They need to tone down this stuff and I'm sure we won't have problems seeing our weapons or being invisi-torped.
I have been playing STO for more than 2 years now, but in the last couple months, I don't get excited anymore with the thought of playing STO every night. It's not there any more. The game has changed, all the new content is the same as the old... just reputation grinds and shoot-em-ups.
Truthfully, I hardly ever played the Exploration Cluster missions, they were something that was a (perhaps bad) representation of this game being a part of Star Trek.
Now that's gone. Removed with no hope of it being finally fixed and made into something that could make STO unique versus other MMOs, besides character and ship skins.
Ships. I usually grind for all the "free" ships... now... meh. They turned the Anniversary event into a TRUE grind now. The summer event... SERIOUSLY?! A cruise liner? Seriously? For an event that I was looking forward to last year and played it everyday... this year... I ran my 2 alts through it to get the corvette and that was it. The most of the C-Store ships are just copies of each other with every little variation.
As far as the enemy NPCs, we should not be able to solo Borg cubes. Plain and simple. They should be "adapting" to us - that's what Borg do, but not in STO.
General gameplay, failure is not an option, literally. My feelings are not going to be hurt by failing in a game. I'll just work harder... that's what having the option of failing does for you.
Just my personal situation, I log on too late to be able to join up people that I know, so it's PUGs or solo.
STO has become my Farmville. All in all this is actually for the better, I'm getting more sleep now.
Star Trek Battles Channel - Play Star Trek like they did in the series!Avatar: pinterest-com/pin/14003448816884219Are you sure it isn't time for a "colorful metaphor"? --Spock in 'The Voyage Home' SCE ADVISORY NOTICE: Improper Impulse Engine maintenance can result in REAR THRUSTER LEAKAGE. ALWAYS have your work inspected by another qualified officer.
My advice to all those whose enthusiasm has dimmed:
Take a break. Play another game for a while. We'll still be here when you're ready.
I do this myself - sometimes I play one game too much, it palls for a time, and I play something else. Currently, I'm taking a short break from my perennial favorite, CO, and playing some STO, and some Knights of the Old Republic on my ancient, primordial XBox. Occasionally, my son and I will play a little Minecraft on the 360 - I've recently shown him the fun of laying out long, elaborate minecart tracks in Creative mode. (It's like having a model train set you can ride, and without having to set aside a room of your house for the trains!)
Variety is the spice of life, they say.
And for those who have graphics issues - sometimes the issue is with your end, for one reason or another. Please stop accusing those who don't have your issues of lying. (When I played on my laptop, the graphics would go stop-motion whenever there were more than three ships on my screen. That wasn't an indicator something was wrong with Cryptic, nor that those who said things flowed smoothly were fibbing; it was an indicator that my graphics card, while fine with a lot of single-player games, just couldn't handle the requirements of STO. For that matter, maybe some of you are using Verizon, and part of your trunk goes through Level 3, which means your connection speeds would suddenly drop to far less than you're paying for, because Verizon and Level 3 are feuding...)
They just need to tone down the glitter that's cluttering the screen anyway and I'm sure it will do wonders. You know, over the top effects like the GW, TR or other TRIBBLE consoles like the black goo, Undine poo, consoles that have over the top graphics for the entire AoE or even the new "SHOOT HERE DUMBASS" mega-arrow on the new SA.
I can't even start to understand why do they keep putting more and more over the top glitter in the game when they're aware it creates such issues...and much of it is not Trek like anyway. They need to tone down this stuff and I'm sure we won't have problems seeing our weapons or being invisi-torped.
Do you see those hardware manufacture logos at the bottom the this webpage? Just sayin'
Star Trek Battles Channel - Play Star Trek like they did in the series!Avatar: pinterest-com/pin/14003448816884219Are you sure it isn't time for a "colorful metaphor"? --Spock in 'The Voyage Home' SCE ADVISORY NOTICE: Improper Impulse Engine maintenance can result in REAR THRUSTER LEAKAGE. ALWAYS have your work inspected by another qualified officer.
My advice to all those whose enthusiasm has dimmed:
Take a break. Play another game for a while. We'll still be here when you're ready.
I do this myself - sometimes I play one game too much, it palls for a time, and I play something else. Currently, I'm taking a short break from my perennial favorite, CO, and playing some STO, and some Knights of the Old Republic on my ancient, primordial XBox. Occasionally, my son and I will play a little Minecraft on the 360 - I've recently shown him the fun of laying out long, elaborate minecart tracks in Creative mode. (It's like having a model train set you can ride, and without having to set aside a room of your house for the trains!)
Variety is the spice of life, they say.
And for those who have graphics issues - sometimes the issue is with your end, for one reason or another. Please stop accusing those who don't have your issues of lying. (When I played on my laptop, the graphics would go stop-motion whenever there were more than three ships on my screen. That wasn't an indicator something was wrong with Cryptic, nor that those who said things flowed smoothly were fibbing; it was an indicator that my graphics card, while fine with a lot of single-player games, just couldn't handle the requirements of STO. For that matter, maybe some of you are using Verizon, and part of your trunk goes through Level 3, which means your connection speeds would suddenly drop to far less than you're paying for, because Verizon and Level 3 are feuding...)
True. We know these things, but sometimes it takes someone else to remind us.
I personally tend to obsess, perhaps an avoidance of issues going on in RL. Need to obsess about something else.
Star Trek Battles Channel - Play Star Trek like they did in the series!Avatar: pinterest-com/pin/14003448816884219Are you sure it isn't time for a "colorful metaphor"? --Spock in 'The Voyage Home' SCE ADVISORY NOTICE: Improper Impulse Engine maintenance can result in REAR THRUSTER LEAKAGE. ALWAYS have your work inspected by another qualified officer.
Sorry, but not be able to see my weapons in space is a REALLY IMPORTANT bug. Sorry, but not be able to play n some zones because the fps lag is terrible, that is a REALLY IMPORTANT bug. Sorry but not be able to use the loadout system, a must-have feature since the day 1, that is a REALLY IMPORTANT bug. Sorry, but the powertray slotting bug that is with us since ages ago, for a lot of people is a pain, and that is a REALLY IMPORTANT bug. I could go on. Nobody seem to care at all about these issues, something that makes me wonder what the hell you people expect for this game, seriously. And still, so many people trying to "defend" the hamsters... its getting ridiculous.
They are important to you, but to how many people is it actually important? Considering that you complain that it's not talked about much - maybe you are one of the few that feel strongly about that.
ANd do you know what it will "cost" to fix this? How long it will take, how many people will need to be involved, what kind of side effects it could have, what would need to retested that the bugfix doesn't break something else?
Maybe it's just a single line of code that needs a small fix, and Cryptic is just lazy.
Maybe it requires rewriting a major aspect of the SFX code and graphics architecture, or changes to the network layer which will take QS a month to fully vet.
We don't know, and most likely we will never know. We will only always know when Cryptic is asking for more info, and when Cryptic says the bug is fixed.
Star Trek Online Advancement: You start with lowbie gear, you end with Lobi gear.
I admit I might be in the minority here, but I don't care about new ships. I have been using the same ship for three years now, and unless Cryptic adds the Arcadia to the game, I don't see myself changing any time soon.
Oh wow....I'd buy that for my Orion pirate captain in a millisecond. Can we get a Leiji Mastumoto 3-pack that also includes the Yamato and Andromeda?
Car Companies have to make product recalls. They have bugs in their cars that are so serious that it's better to get it back in the shop, and risk loss of image and hefty repair cost.
A colleague of mine bought a remote control (supposedly for his daughter ) car. The car started to have problems just 10 minutes into play. He got it replaced. The car wouldn't even start because the remote control and the car didn't even connect.
His wife was using an "optical based" home banking solution, where a sensor in a card-reader device was supposed to read some blinking lights on the monitor - which almost never worked and took probably around quarter an hour to work.
All major software companies have repeatedly released software with security vulnerabilities. Some have been in and well known for years. For a long time, no browser conformed 100 % HTML 5 and CSS3 standards, despite most of them touting compatibility and support for them.
IF you buy a new novel, there is a good chance you will find at least orthographical errors, if not grammatical ones.
TV shows and movies regularly come out with glaring plot holes that can hurt believability of the whole story.
The opening of the new airport in Berlin (Germany) has been delayed for several years because fire regulations were ignored.
At what point did you get the impression that in some company QA gets the absolute final word and the necessary time to find all bugs, and a development team giving the time to fix them all?
And we all know what happens to games and game development companies that spend forever to make the perfect game, like, say Duke Nukem Forever?
Star Trek Online Advancement: You start with lowbie gear, you end with Lobi gear.
They are important to you, but to how many people is it actually important? Considering that you complain that it's not talked about much - maybe you are one of the few that feel strongly about that.
Ah, Mustrum, if you'd take off your pointy hat for a second and stop shooting crossbows at the burser, just for a second.
Speaking personally, I find the loss of weapon effects irritating rather than truly annoying.
I can still see my weapons firing from the HUD, so there's a workaround.
Nobody lies having to use a workaround, but it is there.
However, just because its not important to me doesn't mean I get to talk down whats important to another player.
It's like the wretched disco balls. I hate them, but then I have to remember some people log on for them.
It'd be a funny old world if we were all alike.
As for dev time to solve problems, unless someone is asking for a full engine overhaul, we don't really know how much of an imposition a fix will be.
Obviously sometimes it'll be a ground up fix, but sometimes it'll be a matter of merely reverting to a slightly earlier build that wasn't failing and adding in the new UI.
Tuning weapon and AOE effects, so as not to overwhelm the engine, may not be all that difficult. Or it may takes weeks, who knows?
Point is, let's try to keep the negativity out of a thread regarding someones dying enthusiasm.
It's a bit like discussing the will at the bedside of the terminal patient.
However, just because its not important to me doesn't mean I get to talk down whats important to another player.
But that works both ways. I don't get to decide what is important to you, but you also don't get to decide what is important to someone else, or the majority.
The "majority" opinion isn't decided by any one individual, but by the congregate. And maybe it is not as important to the majority. Maybe it is, but it's also a very complex, complicated bugfix that cannot be taken lightly and thus has to be prioritized down, even if the impact is large.
Star Trek Online Advancement: You start with lowbie gear, you end with Lobi gear.
They are important to you, but to how many people is it actually important? Considering that you complain that it's not talked about much - maybe you are one of the few that feel strongly about that.
ANd do you know what it will "cost" to fix this? How long it will take, how many people will need to be involved, what kind of side effects it could have, what would need to retested that the bugfix doesn't break something else?
Maybe it's just a single line of code that needs a small fix, and Cryptic is just lazy.
Maybe it requires rewriting a major aspect of the SFX code and graphics architecture, or changes to the network layer which will take QS a month to fully vet.
We don't know, and most likely we will never know. We will only always know when Cryptic is asking for more info, and when Cryptic says the bug is fixed.
It is talked about considerably in the bug forums. Above anything else Player Effects should be the last thing to be turned off in this graphics priority scheme and alot of these problems would be solved and a lot people made happy if there was a slider that let players turn down the amount of graphics spam there is in a high population area, giving their ship priority over what gets toned down last. I'm hoping the answer to this conundrum isn't that they are too lazy to fix it, but my fear is that they have added so much TRIBBLE to this old engine and tweaked so many things that they've reached a point where they just don't know how to fix it.
If something is not broken, don't fix it, if it is broken, don't leave it broken.
But that works both ways. I don't get to decide what is important to you, but you also don't get to decide what is important to someone else, or the majority.
The "majority" opinion isn't decided by any one individual, but by the congregate. And maybe it is not as important to the majority. Maybe it is, but it's also a very complex, complicated bugfix that cannot be taken lightly and thus has to be prioritized down, even if the impact is large.
Agreed, to an extent.
Essentially, as players, when we talk of majorities or minorities, we're talking about unknown numbers or proportions. We simply are not in a position to get true numbers.
Thus, testing the waters of the player base is a tricky proposition. And not just for players, also for the devs. It's not a science, although it can be informed by it, it's an art.
As for the specific bugfix in question. I'm not convinced it necessarily is a complex problem.
Unless you have data to the contrary, in which case, do tell.
I feel the real issue here though is just how do the devs 'test the waters' of the playerbase, and to what extent do they care about the results.
Is there a danger in making decisions that keep the majority happy but keep a discrete minority unhappy?
Does there need to be a shift in the thinking about this away from a zero sum game mentality?
Is there no strategy that makes everyone happy? Or at least content enough to spend money now and then?
As has been said many times before there is a greater mass of players who never frequent the forums so it really is activity on the server and cash flow in the c-store that will be how developers determine how well or poorly their changes are being received by the user base.
I don't think we should have any illusions about the actual importance of these forums.
If something is not broken, don't fix it, if it is broken, don't leave it broken.
My enthusiasm isn't quite dead, but it's on life support. I haven't played this game in a few months because I've been busy, but what I found when I logged on yesterday made me unhappy.
I've been with the game since season 4, so I've seen a number of changes. Some good, some bad and some very ugly. Unfortunately, most of the more recent changes are in the latter two categories: bad and very ugly.
Crafting: What have they done to crafting? Yes, it kind of sucked after they started requiring dilithium for even level and upper level gear, but at least we could still craft. Now it's all done by duty officers and, as the original poster said, consists mainly of watching the clock. You can't even enter the Memory Alpha system anymore. There were about 5 little side missions in there you could do for little bits of XP (good if you were almost to getting promoted and needed a little push) and diplomacy XP. I guess you can't do those anymore either. Worse, I have VA characters that were max level crafters, they're now level 0 crafters. Also, they decided to change the crafting materials, but none of the ones in my character banks changed. I still have stacks, some up to the max level, of old crafting materials in my banks.
Exploration: What happened to the exploration missions? I really liked those. Those were good if you just wanted to grind for some XP or dilithium or even if you just wanted crafting materials. Some of us actually like grinding and hate that it's basically been removed.
With the removal of the old crafting system and (especially) the exploration missions, my motivation is really getting thin in this game. The only thing left to do now is to create a new character and play through the story missions again, though even that's not as much fun as it used to be because they've made the early story missions "easier" so that you can go through them more quickly. Honestly, when they start trimming down their best content, you know the game is truly screwed.
My advice to all those whose enthusiasm has dimmed:
Take a break. Play another game for a while. We'll still be here when you're ready.
I seriously think this. It's the new way of playing MMOs. MMOs nowadays just aren't such beasts as are attractive to live in 24/7, they're made for dipping in and out of.
Originally, the concept of an MMO was of a persistent, virtual world that you engaged mainly with other players, online. Even the PvE content in the "themepark" precursors like Everquest were a pretext for getting a bunch of people together to play with.
What they've turned into is second-rate single player games with added specialized team content.
And as that, all they're good for is dipping into now and then, depending on if you like the lore theme of the game.
Seriously, I think the only MMO that's left nowadays (that's still "active") that's still the sort of MMO you can "live in", and is designed to be that way, is EVE Online. Maybe ArchAge will be like that too.
But it's not a themepark vs. sandbox thing, because as I say, the themepark precursors had that sense of community and living in too. The relative richness or paucity of PvE content ought not to make any difference, it's more the degree to which the developers focus on creating conditions for community to blossom, that's the deciding factor. But it's something developers have seemingly lost sight of over the years, which is ironic, because it's the one main USP of that thing called "MMORPG".
tl;dr MMOs are no longer MMOs, but hybrid single-player/multiplayer games set in vestigial persistent virtual worlds. As such, they're only worth dipping into now and then, if you like the "theme".
I'm confused. What happened between S9 and S9.5 that's got everybody in hardcore doom mode? You're all acting like the crafting revamp turned you into angsty teens.
and yes kirk, if my friends list (which is quite sizeable) and fleet, and friendly fleets are any indication of how "well" things are going, then I guess things are not well at all. I remember a time in this game (first 2 years) that I could log on, and my friends list was busy, people asking me to queue with them, and my fleet was busy.. now, im lucky if there is 3 fleet members on, and 5 friends on in the friends list. kinda dead to me..
I also remember a time when it was hard to get into the same instance as your friends because so many would fill up very quickly.. it has been a long while since I have had to say "sorry, your instance is full, I cant xfer.."
This is quite possibly the greatest tragedy. The only reason I started playing this game was because I had a ton of IRL friends that got me into it. I made many more online, and that was how that began. Long story short, my friends list is now perpetually empty too.
*sigh* another entitlement claim *points to the quit door to centersolace in suggestion and then points at the sign stating "i quit threads not allowed but please come back at any point if you want"*. the devs have never responded to entitlement claims in the past, this one wont be any different.
ive stopped caring to respond about the game state as much as i used to, devs have their own way eventually. god knows what insane idea they bring next to the table and with such a track record i expect it, frankly you should of as well.
Oh mirrorchaos, some things never change. And certainly not you. :P
This wasn't intended as an attack on the devs, or a "claim of entitlement", it is simply a critique and a complaint about a product. A product I have spent a great deal of money and time on, but has now become soured mismanagement, bad ideas, poor PR, and the mishandling of beloved elements of this game. Nothing more nothing less.
I'm confused. What happened between S9 and S9.5 that's got everybody in hardcore doom mode? You're all acting like the crafting revamp turned you into angsty teens.
For me, i think its less to do with the perceived weaknesses of the new systems (and, if we're being fair there were some decent things in season 9) as much as the cynical way they're being introduced.
Give us feedback, say Cryptic, here's the system on tribble.
It's given. Some of it a bit ranty, but that should tell a tale too. However much of it cogent, sensible and constructive.
System is introduced to holodeck from tribble, virtually void of any evidence of listening to feedback.
Lead designer goes on podcast and, essentially, says he saw no useable fedback.
I know, it's an age old story. We shouldn't be suprised.
But, after a while, it all gets just a bit blatant.
And, eventually, straws turn camels into basket cases.
I don't think expansion 2 will have the desired effect of resurrecting sto, so long as Cryptic continue to be the way they have been over the last year or so...
Expansion 2 is a do good or bust situation:
1. They have been gambling their resources into the expansion.
2. They have been racking up popularity.
Comments
Perhaps I'm too critical and I don't want to cast a broad net of condemnation over the entire Cryptic staff, I have no doubt there are probably a lot in that crew that groan and roll their eyes whenever some manager walks into the conference room with the next idiotic idea to foist upon us.
Oh I wouldn't worry about it at all. Long term contributors are "special" because they've simply lasted longer than most of their contemporaries. That doesn't make them immune though to the same process of waining interest, it just means they haven't succumbed to it yet. Even with a healthy game and community you have these sorts of posts simply as the last cry for attention from someone who didn't realize what point they were coming to in their playtime.
Notable missions: Apex [AEI], Gemini [SSF], Trident [AEI], Evolution's Smile [SSF], Transcendence
Looking for something new to play? I've started building Foundry missions again in visual novel form!
Sorry, but not be able to see my weapons in space is a REALLY IMPORTANT bug. Sorry, but not be able to play n some zones because the fps lag is terrible, that is a REALLY IMPORTANT bug. Sorry but not be able to use the loadout system, a must-have feature since the day 1, that is a REALLY IMPORTANT bug. Sorry, but the powertray slotting bug that is with us since ages ago, for a lot of people is a pain, and that is a REALLY IMPORTANT bug. I could go on. Nobody seem to care at all about these issues, something that makes me wonder what the hell you people expect for this game, seriously. And still, so many people trying to "defend" the hamsters... its getting ridiculous.
Actually I haven't seen this happening since the 9.5 update. Could just be my system and the particular fights I've been in, but the worst offenders (CCE and Space Battlezone) have been working just fine in this department.
Notable missions: Apex [AEI], Gemini [SSF], Trident [AEI], Evolution's Smile [SSF], Transcendence
Looking for something new to play? I've started building Foundry missions again in visual novel form!
Dude, don't worry about it, it's a f2p game, as long as it's here, it's here for you to come back to.
Frankly, I've never found STO to be engaging enough for more than a few weeks' play at a time, but because I get a hankering for a Star Trek vibe, I've always come back to the game every few months, and it definitely scratches that itch, for a while.
In fact, while people complain about the grind, the rep grind is something I've actually completed just by this gradual method over the years, so I really appreciate that the game has had this long-term thing that I've been able to gradually complete.
Really, I've never understood why people think they HAVE to "live" 24/7 in an MMO, at least any non-sandbox MMO. I mean, I can understand people living 24/7 in EVE, because EVE is all about player-to-player relationships. But any themepark MMO? How could any development team possibly create enough content to keep people happy? They're never going to do it.
For reall long-term 24/7 play, it's all about human relationships. Either you have the sandbox thing, or you make things so hard you have to team up (but that won't fly nowadays), or you have what Cryptic seem to have accidentally invented (and forgotten all about) with CoH: you have a game in which PUG-ing is so addictive it builds community all by itself.
Other than that, the subscription model was pure evil for MMOs, it made developers chase a pot of gold at the end of a rainbow that doesn't exist: it's simply not possible to keep anybody addicted for that long, unless, possibly, it's their very first MMO and they're enchanted by the magic of playing online with other people for the first time. But that's got nothing to do with anything special developers can do, it's like virginity, it can only "pop" once. For everyone else, it's a strain for developers to keep having to come up with stuff, and it's a strain for players to keep playing.
Let f2p be f2p, enjoy it whenever you want to enjoy it, forget about it when you don't enjoy it.
still happens every single time I log into a ce, or other large scale event..
I like their response to it though.. when there is to much going on, it chops "your" weapons graphics.. it seems to me the reasonable way to have incorporated removing graphics would be to remove "others" graphics from your screen.. just always seemed silly that they decide to remove the "users" graphics lol..
Actually its patently true in the real world. Its only in imagination land where QA is able to put an indefinite hold on development to work out absolutely every concievable technical issue. Just look to any defective product you've ever bought, its not that the company though that shipping TRIBBLE was a good idea. It just wasn't cost effective to work out development to that fine a point where bugs/defects couldn't possibly happen.
Notable missions: Apex [AEI], Gemini [SSF], Trident [AEI], Evolution's Smile [SSF], Transcendence
Looking for something new to play? I've started building Foundry missions again in visual novel form!
Also, just played CCE just to be sure. Weapons no longer disappear on my machine. I can't say why this is happening, given nothing specific in the release notes, but for the record my weapon effects are turned down to "medium."
Notable missions: Apex [AEI], Gemini [SSF], Trident [AEI], Evolution's Smile [SSF], Transcendence
Looking for something new to play? I've started building Foundry missions again in visual novel form!
Being here since closed beta and a lifetime subscriber whose paid that fee and then some into the Z-store, I've been more patient than I feel i should have with the shortcomings of this game, but since 9.5 and the disaster that is the DOFF'ing and crafting UI, i'm through playing for now.
For one, when my power tray gets hosed up or cleared whenever i start a mission or STF...STILL TO THIS DAY...one would figure that issue would be put high on the list of priorities to fix. Cryptic, if you guys are actually worried about quality of your product, then get a grip on it starting with KEY FEATURES that need to work without a hitch in order to play the thing. That's a simple expectation of the game by every player.
I won't get into how many of us felt about the exploration aspect of the game being reduced to farmville-level mechanics, but as long you insist on BS'ing us on what the Foundry has to offer, that's a clear indicator to me that the dev team simply does not have the resources to create content at a steady pace, so they're relying on the player-base to create their own. The foundry is cool, but it's also being used as a crutch. That's just bad business. Not to mention that the foundry keeps breaking with every major patch.
I realize this is a F2P model and the dev team works very hard with limited resources, but there comes a point when we have to be honest with ourselves. There are other F2P games whose quality of their product far exceeds that of STO. I can play my characters in those games cleanly without having to worry about the UI or mechanics malfunctioning on me.
The days of City Of Heroes are over, and so they are for the inherent engine. It is outdated rubbish. Your software is bug-laden and you're taking in revenue from charging ungodly amounts of money for people to bankroll your supply of duct tape. ($125 for a pack of ships you'll only use once, anyone? you going to rob people for that kind of stuff in the next expansion?)
I don't know what X2 holds, but the dev team as well as PWE executives should really take a step back and consider the future of this game in its current state: STO, while it has it's strengths, is mechanically broken. You know it and I know it.
Yes, i know a re-write of the software is a massive undertaking, but maybe it shouldn't be ruled out on the roadmap.
Sincerely,
someone who feels like they are boldly going to everywhere i've been before.
well then, you mus have been in a ce where no one was chain popping off stuff. cause its not just me, its a lot of people still complaining about it..
and it has nothing to do with your machine.. it has everything to do with the server choosing to prioritize effects to help keep the frame rates from sinking..
also, my machine is built for eqn, it can take sto and chew it up and spit it out without batting an eye.. lol.. so yeah, its not machine based..
My machine was simply referring to my end. I wasn't trying to give a diagnosis. As for what we were doing, I was using the most effect-intensive build I could manage and I didn't see anything unusually mundane in what other people were using either. Usual stuff for the PVE. This also follows with the general experience I've been having in all my CCE's since 9.5 and in the Voth Space Battlezone (consistently no weapon effect issues.) I'd like to know why (since otherwise I'm forced to consider that I've just been riding along the tail end of a probability distrubtion curve for the last week, Ie. I've been obscenely lucky) but from my experience overall (which is all I can pronounce this from) it seems like something has been fixed. Maybe you're seeing something else, but at this point it might be worth taking a closer look (I'll certainly be.)
It is depressing when an objectively verifable fact of life (QA has limits) can be put away so by an emoticon.
But them's the internet.:rolleyes:
Notable missions: Apex [AEI], Gemini [SSF], Trident [AEI], Evolution's Smile [SSF], Transcendence
Looking for something new to play? I've started building Foundry missions again in visual novel form!
They just need to tone down the glitter that's cluttering the screen anyway and I'm sure it will do wonders. You know, over the top effects like the GW, TR or other TRIBBLE consoles like the black goo, Undine poo, consoles that have over the top graphics for the entire AoE or even the new "SHOOT HERE DUMBASS" mega-arrow on the new SA.
I can't even start to understand why do they keep putting more and more over the top glitter in the game when they're aware it creates such issues...and much of it is not Trek like anyway. They need to tone down this stuff and I'm sure we won't have problems seeing our weapons or being invisi-torped.
I have been playing STO for more than 2 years now, but in the last couple months, I don't get excited anymore with the thought of playing STO every night. It's not there any more. The game has changed, all the new content is the same as the old... just reputation grinds and shoot-em-ups.
Truthfully, I hardly ever played the Exploration Cluster missions, they were something that was a (perhaps bad) representation of this game being a part of Star Trek.
Now that's gone. Removed with no hope of it being finally fixed and made into something that could make STO unique versus other MMOs, besides character and ship skins.
Ships. I usually grind for all the "free" ships... now... meh. They turned the Anniversary event into a TRUE grind now. The summer event... SERIOUSLY?! A cruise liner? Seriously? For an event that I was looking forward to last year and played it everyday... this year... I ran my 2 alts through it to get the corvette and that was it. The most of the C-Store ships are just copies of each other with every little variation.
As far as the enemy NPCs, we should not be able to solo Borg cubes. Plain and simple. They should be "adapting" to us - that's what Borg do, but not in STO.
General gameplay, failure is not an option, literally. My feelings are not going to be hurt by failing in a game. I'll just work harder... that's what having the option of failing does for you.
Just my personal situation, I log on too late to be able to join up people that I know, so it's PUGs or solo.
STO has become my Farmville. All in all this is actually for the better, I'm getting more sleep now.
SCE ADVISORY NOTICE: Improper Impulse Engine maintenance can result in REAR THRUSTER LEAKAGE. ALWAYS have your work inspected by another qualified officer.
Take a break. Play another game for a while. We'll still be here when you're ready.
I do this myself - sometimes I play one game too much, it palls for a time, and I play something else. Currently, I'm taking a short break from my perennial favorite, CO, and playing some STO, and some Knights of the Old Republic on my ancient, primordial XBox. Occasionally, my son and I will play a little Minecraft on the 360 - I've recently shown him the fun of laying out long, elaborate minecart tracks in Creative mode. (It's like having a model train set you can ride, and without having to set aside a room of your house for the trains!)
Variety is the spice of life, they say.
And for those who have graphics issues - sometimes the issue is with your end, for one reason or another. Please stop accusing those who don't have your issues of lying. (When I played on my laptop, the graphics would go stop-motion whenever there were more than three ships on my screen. That wasn't an indicator something was wrong with Cryptic, nor that those who said things flowed smoothly were fibbing; it was an indicator that my graphics card, while fine with a lot of single-player games, just couldn't handle the requirements of STO. For that matter, maybe some of you are using Verizon, and part of your trunk goes through Level 3, which means your connection speeds would suddenly drop to far less than you're paying for, because Verizon and Level 3 are feuding...)
Do you see those hardware manufacture logos at the bottom the this webpage? Just sayin'
SCE ADVISORY NOTICE: Improper Impulse Engine maintenance can result in REAR THRUSTER LEAKAGE. ALWAYS have your work inspected by another qualified officer.
True. We know these things, but sometimes it takes someone else to remind us.
I personally tend to obsess, perhaps an avoidance of issues going on in RL. Need to obsess about something else.
SCE ADVISORY NOTICE: Improper Impulse Engine maintenance can result in REAR THRUSTER LEAKAGE. ALWAYS have your work inspected by another qualified officer.
They are important to you, but to how many people is it actually important? Considering that you complain that it's not talked about much - maybe you are one of the few that feel strongly about that.
ANd do you know what it will "cost" to fix this? How long it will take, how many people will need to be involved, what kind of side effects it could have, what would need to retested that the bugfix doesn't break something else?
Maybe it's just a single line of code that needs a small fix, and Cryptic is just lazy.
Maybe it requires rewriting a major aspect of the SFX code and graphics architecture, or changes to the network layer which will take QS a month to fully vet.
We don't know, and most likely we will never know. We will only always know when Cryptic is asking for more info, and when Cryptic says the bug is fixed.
Oh wow....I'd buy that for my Orion pirate captain in a millisecond. Can we get a Leiji Mastumoto 3-pack that also includes the Yamato and Andromeda?
Car Companies have to make product recalls. They have bugs in their cars that are so serious that it's better to get it back in the shop, and risk loss of image and hefty repair cost.
A colleague of mine bought a remote control (supposedly for his daughter
His wife was using an "optical based" home banking solution, where a sensor in a card-reader device was supposed to read some blinking lights on the monitor - which almost never worked and took probably around quarter an hour to work.
All major software companies have repeatedly released software with security vulnerabilities. Some have been in and well known for years. For a long time, no browser conformed 100 % HTML 5 and CSS3 standards, despite most of them touting compatibility and support for them.
IF you buy a new novel, there is a good chance you will find at least orthographical errors, if not grammatical ones.
TV shows and movies regularly come out with glaring plot holes that can hurt believability of the whole story.
The opening of the new airport in Berlin (Germany) has been delayed for several years because fire regulations were ignored.
At what point did you get the impression that in some company QA gets the absolute final word and the necessary time to find all bugs, and a development team giving the time to fix them all?
And we all know what happens to games and game development companies that spend forever to make the perfect game, like, say Duke Nukem Forever?
Ah, Mustrum, if you'd take off your pointy hat for a second and stop shooting crossbows at the burser, just for a second.
Speaking personally, I find the loss of weapon effects irritating rather than truly annoying.
I can still see my weapons firing from the HUD, so there's a workaround.
Nobody lies having to use a workaround, but it is there.
However, just because its not important to me doesn't mean I get to talk down whats important to another player.
It's like the wretched disco balls. I hate them, but then I have to remember some people log on for them.
It'd be a funny old world if we were all alike.
As for dev time to solve problems, unless someone is asking for a full engine overhaul, we don't really know how much of an imposition a fix will be.
Obviously sometimes it'll be a ground up fix, but sometimes it'll be a matter of merely reverting to a slightly earlier build that wasn't failing and adding in the new UI.
Tuning weapon and AOE effects, so as not to overwhelm the engine, may not be all that difficult. Or it may takes weeks, who knows?
Point is, let's try to keep the negativity out of a thread regarding someones dying enthusiasm.
It's a bit like discussing the will at the bedside of the terminal patient.
A little in bad taste.
The "majority" opinion isn't decided by any one individual, but by the congregate. And maybe it is not as important to the majority. Maybe it is, but it's also a very complex, complicated bugfix that cannot be taken lightly and thus has to be prioritized down, even if the impact is large.
Agreed, to an extent.
Essentially, as players, when we talk of majorities or minorities, we're talking about unknown numbers or proportions. We simply are not in a position to get true numbers.
Thus, testing the waters of the player base is a tricky proposition. And not just for players, also for the devs. It's not a science, although it can be informed by it, it's an art.
As for the specific bugfix in question. I'm not convinced it necessarily is a complex problem.
Unless you have data to the contrary, in which case, do tell.
I feel the real issue here though is just how do the devs 'test the waters' of the playerbase, and to what extent do they care about the results.
Is there a danger in making decisions that keep the majority happy but keep a discrete minority unhappy?
Does there need to be a shift in the thinking about this away from a zero sum game mentality?
Is there no strategy that makes everyone happy? Or at least content enough to spend money now and then?
I don't think we should have any illusions about the actual importance of these forums.
I've been with the game since season 4, so I've seen a number of changes. Some good, some bad and some very ugly. Unfortunately, most of the more recent changes are in the latter two categories: bad and very ugly.
Crafting: What have they done to crafting? Yes, it kind of sucked after they started requiring dilithium for even level and upper level gear, but at least we could still craft. Now it's all done by duty officers and, as the original poster said, consists mainly of watching the clock. You can't even enter the Memory Alpha system anymore. There were about 5 little side missions in there you could do for little bits of XP (good if you were almost to getting promoted and needed a little push) and diplomacy XP. I guess you can't do those anymore either. Worse, I have VA characters that were max level crafters, they're now level 0 crafters. Also, they decided to change the crafting materials, but none of the ones in my character banks changed. I still have stacks, some up to the max level, of old crafting materials in my banks.
Exploration: What happened to the exploration missions? I really liked those. Those were good if you just wanted to grind for some XP or dilithium or even if you just wanted crafting materials. Some of us actually like grinding and hate that it's basically been removed.
With the removal of the old crafting system and (especially) the exploration missions, my motivation is really getting thin in this game. The only thing left to do now is to create a new character and play through the story missions again, though even that's not as much fun as it used to be because they've made the early story missions "easier" so that you can go through them more quickly. Honestly, when they start trimming down their best content, you know the game is truly screwed.
I seriously think this. It's the new way of playing MMOs. MMOs nowadays just aren't such beasts as are attractive to live in 24/7, they're made for dipping in and out of.
Originally, the concept of an MMO was of a persistent, virtual world that you engaged mainly with other players, online. Even the PvE content in the "themepark" precursors like Everquest were a pretext for getting a bunch of people together to play with.
What they've turned into is second-rate single player games with added specialized team content.
And as that, all they're good for is dipping into now and then, depending on if you like the lore theme of the game.
Seriously, I think the only MMO that's left nowadays (that's still "active") that's still the sort of MMO you can "live in", and is designed to be that way, is EVE Online. Maybe ArchAge will be like that too.
But it's not a themepark vs. sandbox thing, because as I say, the themepark precursors had that sense of community and living in too. The relative richness or paucity of PvE content ought not to make any difference, it's more the degree to which the developers focus on creating conditions for community to blossom, that's the deciding factor. But it's something developers have seemingly lost sight of over the years, which is ironic, because it's the one main USP of that thing called "MMORPG".
tl;dr MMOs are no longer MMOs, but hybrid single-player/multiplayer games set in vestigial persistent virtual worlds. As such, they're only worth dipping into now and then, if you like the "theme".
I Support Disco | Disco is Love | Disco is Life
You should hit me up some time. I play a ton of TF2. Particularly these days. :rolleyes:
This is quite possibly the greatest tragedy. The only reason I started playing this game was because I had a ton of IRL friends that got me into it. I made many more online, and that was how that began. Long story short, my friends list is now perpetually empty too.
Oh mirrorchaos, some things never change. And certainly not you. :P
This wasn't intended as an attack on the devs, or a "claim of entitlement", it is simply a critique and a complaint about a product. A product I have spent a great deal of money and time on, but has now become soured mismanagement, bad ideas, poor PR, and the mishandling of beloved elements of this game. Nothing more nothing less.
For me, i think its less to do with the perceived weaknesses of the new systems (and, if we're being fair there were some decent things in season 9) as much as the cynical way they're being introduced.
Give us feedback, say Cryptic, here's the system on tribble.
It's given. Some of it a bit ranty, but that should tell a tale too. However much of it cogent, sensible and constructive.
System is introduced to holodeck from tribble, virtually void of any evidence of listening to feedback.
Lead designer goes on podcast and, essentially, says he saw no useable fedback.
I know, it's an age old story. We shouldn't be suprised.
But, after a while, it all gets just a bit blatant.
And, eventually, straws turn camels into basket cases.
1. They have been gambling their resources into the expansion.
2. They have been racking up popularity.