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councilspectre
Member Posts: 138 Arc User
Hey Authors,
This is most likely an age-old question. Should an author give direct feedback to commentators?
Would it really serve any purpose other than the author feeling vindicated for a review they didn't feel was necessary?
For me, when I see those reviews giving me 1-2 stars due to a Cryptic asset or map issue, I try to let it go. However, as authors, should we have dramatic license to tell the stories how we would like to tell them? Example: Using a uniform or bridge design that the player doesn't use, but we feel fits the story better.
TLDR: Do we standup to the integrity of our art or do we let is slide? Perhaps we should take a lesson from Hollywood. JJ Abrams doesn't have blogs dedicated to putting whining fans in their places.
With much love to reviewers!
-Councilspectre
This is most likely an age-old question. Should an author give direct feedback to commentators?
Would it really serve any purpose other than the author feeling vindicated for a review they didn't feel was necessary?
For me, when I see those reviews giving me 1-2 stars due to a Cryptic asset or map issue, I try to let it go. However, as authors, should we have dramatic license to tell the stories how we would like to tell them? Example: Using a uniform or bridge design that the player doesn't use, but we feel fits the story better.
TLDR: Do we standup to the integrity of our art or do we let is slide? Perhaps we should take a lesson from Hollywood. JJ Abrams doesn't have blogs dedicated to putting whining fans in their places.
With much love to reviewers!
-Councilspectre
AKA @contactpsi. Foundry Author of: "No Prize for Second Contact", "Welcome to the Milky Way", and "The Tyranny of Hope".
Post edited by councilspectre on
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Comments
Yes, of course. But the flip side: As consumers, players should have the right to judge the stories as they are told.
Your example raises one of the interesting challenges of the foundry as a medium for fiction: You only get to write half of the story, the player writes the other half. Imagine writing an episode of Star Trek. You have the entire universe at your hands and infinite freedom to create new scenarios, you get to costume all the guest stars and you do all the sets.
But then the viewer gets to pick what ship and crew performs it, a cast who's had hundreds of episodes worth of adventures and development that they don't share with you. A cast who they may have a great deal invested in. A cast which may for many of them contain their own personal Mary Sue.
You may have written a fantastic episode of Voyager, Torres and the Doctor at their best. But I picked the Defiant as the crew and now I just can't understand why, or for that matter how, O'Brien just turned off Bashir's holoemitter.
This is, by the way, the same reason Tovan Khev isn't universally loved - a character with his own name, personality, and motivations thrust onto a player who otherwise has total casting control.
I'm not saying it's fair you should get all the blame for this, but how would you feel if I contacted you about one of your missions and said it would fit my story better if the bridge was larger and the good guys were all Caitian and the bad guys were Cardassian and also it was set in the mirror universe and the captain is a half-Q? Because I guarantee you there's somebody out there with a bio like that, and that is the other side of the same coin.
This seems to get a few dislikes from community. From a clearly story standpoint, calling someone "Rear Admiral, Second Half" just doesn't convent the same sense of familiarity and that a captain would have with their crew.
There is no such defense when you decide somebody else's characters have a familiarity or informality that their characters, as they "wrote" them, wouldn't tolerate. You've dictated and possibly altered a detail of their story to make it better fit yours.
As a general rule, I only follow up with a negative review if I can see where they ran into problems and my advice can help, or I need further clarification on how they got stuck. Often times, they don't write back. Sometimes I can begrudgingly get enough information to deal with the issue. Every once in a while my attempt to reach out calms them and they appreciate me attempting to rectify their issue.
Also not all feedback should be acted upon, it's up to you to decide what is and isn't a reasonable change. By the same token, its good to keep an open mind about feedback. Don't sacrifice the intent behind the mission, but there are always ways to improve.
I'll end off by saying that for me every bad review stands out. It's human nature to focus on the negative. So I did a little math and found that only about 8% gave the mission less than 4 stars. The negative detractors may be loud, but they are far from a majority.
There's always some good feedback to be gleaned. Obviously ones that are just "You suck this was a waste of time" you pretty much just have to ignore, but with a lot there's some good feedback. The ones who leave that good feedback are often willing to talk.
For example, Season 4, my one mission at the time was not completable. After a fix I sent mail to everyone who was unable to complete. I got a lot of good responses, some nul responses, and no to minor bad responses. If it is a bug, I will either thank the person directly, or explain where the issue is. Often, I get good responses if any at all.
But something like someone 1 starring me for "dum" (spelled that way), "nope", or a low rating for "Never in any universe would the Klingon Empire loose to the Federation! I deny your alternative future that I destroy anyways," I'm... gonna ignore it and move on.
In a case where the players talk to me, either to complement or share grievances, I am always happy to respond if they initiate the communication. It sometimes goes well, other times... not so well. But they key thing is they open the discussion, that means they are willing to talk (in most cases).
I never go on the offensive as it were to "defend my work"; I expect it to defend itself. JJ has his issues because he is touching Star Trek, the king of Nerd Lore IPs. His choice to allow him to do anything he wanted within the first scene... was important and I think smart, but, that aside; his call if he wants to go and defend it proactively. We... aren't JJ Abrams, and shouldn't do things like that. If we think we've made choices or things big enough to do that, we need to stop back, look in a mirror and take a deep breath.
But, those are my thoughts.
Don't be so sure. Every major and minor plot point from the new movies, I've seen pretty much every single one scattered throughout the myriad Foundry missions.
I'm just talking about author created stuff and defending it tooth and nail (and I think I may have miss read something in there about blogs). Our choices and creations as authors are what I am talking about with that statement about us not being JJ.
Don't get me wrong, I think I have included a reference to Helna into more than half of my missions. Every time I see a tiny call out to Amanda Barclay I squee like a little girl. And some deep dark portion of my soul I dare not feed hopes that Sugihara's "personality" in the romulan episodes was influenced by how I portrayed him in a mission.
But...
We're not big motion pictures officially licensed. We're just making missions for an Online Game subsidy... thing... and depending on your definition, it is still just fan fiction not fit for Memory Beta.
We deal with basically two groups
-Gamers - those who play because they like the game, but aren't necessarily die hard Trek fans
-Star Trek Gamers - die hard Trek fans who play for that reason
Obviously that's the black and white version, probably most folks are on a spectrum with those at the two ends.
JJ Abrams has to deal with:
-Hard core Trek fans
-Casual Trek fans
-General movie-going audiences
-Critics
-Studio suits
-His own employees
-The judgement of History
I don't blame him for wanting to defend his work. He's under attack from some of these groups constantly and with a level of hate that makes me think he must have come to their homes and shot a puppy on their front doorstep or something. I'd say we Foundry Authors get off easy
If they just don't like the mission or whatever, then I just let it go. There's no point getting in a pissing contest with someone who just doesn't like your mission. That's their opinion and they are entitled to it.
There will always people who don't like your mission. You can literally be looking at a string of like 20 5 star reviews, with maybe a couple of 4 stars mixed in, and then you'll get a 1 star review that says "Sucks!" or "Worst mission ever!".
Click here for my Foundry tutorial on Creating A Custom Interior Map.
I've gotten that response actually. "Excuse me, my bridge is X, my uniforms are X, and my science officer wouldn't smile."
I get those. The "Sucks!" 1 star mixed in with over 100 5's. I let it go. I wonder why of course, but not for too long.
I expected the missions to be a bit odd or have their own spin according to the author. That's fine. I didn't expect them to be a continuation of the Featured Episode I just finished playing.
Isn't it a healthy attitude to go into a Foundry mission and just take it for what it is? Enjoy the story (or don't if it's not your thing), and think of it in context of the mission itself. It's a one-off. It's meant to be explored and enjoyed for what it is, fan content.
If they get my bridge wrong, well, of course there's a chance they're going to do that. If my operations officer say some more Human-oriented dialog even though he's Vulcan, well, roll with it.
I would rate a mission on these factors:
Does it use high-school level grammar and spelling?
Can you follow the plot-points in the mission?
Is the plot interesting?
Are the antagonists interesting?
Are the fights interesting and varied?
Does the dialog, the mission, and the overall feel resemble Star Trek?
There are a lot of "interesting" requirements in there. Basically, does it hold my attention and keep with the feel of Star Trek? To what degree does it do or do not do this?
What do you reviewers and authors think about that thought process?
I hada few complaints that i admit, one was about how i made some mirror universe terrans nice, but i pointed out not veryone is a stereotype, there are bound to be "good" terrans
i never do scenes "on my ship" mainly cos..i dunno what others have on their ship
Sorry, but I doubt they deal with the URGENT issues, like for example:
GROUND COMBAT!!!!
I really like star trek online, but the ground combat parts of ANY mission are just something you want to finally get it over with to do some fun in space
Sure, the idea to put ground and space combat into the same game is very interesting, but ground combat is FULL OF BUGS
Where to start?
Well, the rock- throwing lizard enemies (the ones who have a ranged attack where they pick up a rock from the floor and toss it at you)...
How can a rock like that have 100% accuracy and also fly through walls and completely ignore any shields you have? (I mean, come on, it is a rock, not some super- advanced weapon)
Where is the point to crouching and searching for cover when there are LOTS of attacks that simply pass through ANY cover and completely bypass your shields (on the lowest difficulty)
Ground comnat should get fixed as soon as possible (and please give the character you are playing a voice, because the character you are playing DOES say something, but all we get is to read some text)
And please do something about the selection of ships of the Romulans (just look at the range of ships used by the federation)
Note:
there are 2 ships that NEED a role in the game as a playable ship:
-) The Scimitar (the ship used by the antagonist of the movie "Star trek nemesis"; romulan
badass ship with Thalaron weaponry
-) The USS Vengeance (The black warship of the movie "Star trek- Into darkness")
According to Khan, it is a ship designed 100% for battle, 2x the size of the enterprise, 3x
the speed... Dreadnought class, made with the idea of taking on the Klingons all by
itself