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olliereport
Member Posts: 721
I've never seen such a pretty deeply developed game with so many persisting basic problems, and I mean basic problems, core functions. UI, mail, server uptime, exchange/auction, itemization, etc. That's not even getting into balance & content.
No fingers pointing, none of us have the information to accurately point a finger in the proper direction. Myself included.
I won't hammer the devs. At the end of the day, most of them are just employees who inherited weird code. I could guess, my guess is that too much money is siphoned from the game. Or it could be management philosophy. Or culture clash, east vs west. Don't know.
But seriously, wow. There is definitely some kind of disconnect here.
You know, they aren't exactly creating new fans of Star Trek. There's no television series running, and there won't be either. The internet siphoned cash from the entertainment industry, it's just not there anymore. The last movie stunk and cash is being sunk into Star Wars, not trek.
Your customers are a devoted but limited commodity. Treat them decently and they will stay. Treat them decently and they will be happy to pay and stay.
No fingers pointing, none of us have the information to accurately point a finger in the proper direction. Myself included.
I won't hammer the devs. At the end of the day, most of them are just employees who inherited weird code. I could guess, my guess is that too much money is siphoned from the game. Or it could be management philosophy. Or culture clash, east vs west. Don't know.
But seriously, wow. There is definitely some kind of disconnect here.
You know, they aren't exactly creating new fans of Star Trek. There's no television series running, and there won't be either. The internet siphoned cash from the entertainment industry, it's just not there anymore. The last movie stunk and cash is being sunk into Star Wars, not trek.
Your customers are a devoted but limited commodity. Treat them decently and they will stay. Treat them decently and they will be happy to pay and stay.
Post edited by olliereport on
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That way your profit is maximized.
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basic UI functionality, exchange errors, mail errors. loss of real basic core stuff, that's not getting by. that's playing with fire.
Get some new player and everytime he beams up he has to rearrange powertray, he doesnt know that its a bug or want to give benefit of the doubt, he's just looking for a game. After a few times its uninstall and on to the next thing.
Its like that all the way up.
I would say that and a serious disconnect from the Star Trek core audience. PWE only bought this game because they thought the Star Trek IP would instantly make them a ton of money. They also assumed said audience was dumb enough to buy absolutely anything called "Star Trek," and that they could get away with the grindfest moneygrab that they've turned this game into. As it stands now, it appears that this game is in its death throes. I'm not doing doomspeak here -- look at the content they claim to have added. Most of it isn't actually new but it's repackaged and called new. The content they claim to have added included removing fleet actions and giving up on FE's in favor of "repeatable content." It's only a matter of time before this game is abandoned like other PWE games just sitting there without development or ingenuity.
I don't even know how many tickets I've submitted on the tray issues...
I feel exactly the same way about the Fleet System!
perfect world, where games go to die huh? (EDIT: I hope not)
That's too bad, just because Star Trek isn't a ton-of-money-right-now IP doesn't mean it's not valuable
It's something that could provide rent (a good rate of return) for many years, given the ages of the audience.
(EDIT: and, given the ages of the audience, there's more disposable income for things like entertainment, but it won't be spent on something that doesn't work)
PWE isn't looking to gain long term loyal players. They're doing it Vegas style. People come, grind gear, spend money doing it, and leave when they get bored. Others follow and the cycle continues. This game isn't really designed for lifetime subs, but they're around because Cryptic sold them before PWE took over. If they didn't exist already I doubt PWE would introduce them.
apparently :-(
As a vet dev, let me assure you that management is the problem, not QA/QC. QA are not technically minded at all, they simply do what is on the test sheet, and make sure the results match what the sheet says.
I've seen, and left companies (yes, more than one), over management pushing my code out for sale to boost quarterly profit before it was even finished, never mind beta or QA testing.
IMO, that is fraud... selling an unfinished product as a finished one. Not to mention character assassination (imagine how many people were pissed at "that dev", who was me).
Software development, especially MMOs are big business these days... and only one thing matters in big business... the upcoming quarterly financial meeting with the stock holders.
Welcome to capitalism, enjoy being ****ed by the guys with more money than you.
Bingo, I left when the Atrox came into the game, and came back at the end of last month, you know what I've noticed?
Almost called it.
My husband and I were talking about this the other day. There are things we're used to seeing in other games that make game life bearable like being able to instantly port to your friends, being able to see a miniature online friends list in the main ui or above the chat window, being able to drop items from our inventory into the bank remotely so we don't carry around things all the time.
It's the basics of mmo life folks cmon. Can we get a ui specialist to update this game finally please?
Problem is, they've removed everything that makes the IP. Story, exploration, a sense of wonder. Instead we've gotten a watered down plot, basically an endless war against an unbeatable enemy. More and more weapons and gears and power combinations.
The thing that is really irking me right now... we are basically playing Star Gate and Mass Effect with some HALO and bits of other IPs stapled on top. This latest focus on intel and counter-intel and FORCING it on everyone? Doesn't sit very well. Fleet Admirals don't don douchebag glasses, grab a zipline and go sneaking around enemy bases. That's what the lower ranks do.
Wouldn't bother me so bad if there was more to the story than "Vaadwar rise in power, they are puppets of this power, which might also be puppets themselves." REALLY? Again? We just sat through how many seasons of puppet-of-a-puppet-of-a-puppet? And you want to EXTEND it again?
Goes to show our staff writer A) has no idea what she is writing, this is NOT STAR TREK. and
It's almost like someone said "Turn Star Trek into Stargate and Mass Effect as quickly as possible. Those IPs make a ton of money so lets copy them directly." And it was also said "Know what sells in other games? Stealth. Lets make the Federation all about sneaking around gathering intel and performing sneaky stealth ****."
And that's on top of the abandoned parts of the game.... no more fleet holdings? No more fleet grind-maps? No new relevant fleet gear? No the new hotness is the REPUTATION SYSTEM which will be quickly abandoned now for the SPEC POINT SYSTEM. Next season look for new exciting IP-themed specializations such as FEDERATION NINJA, COUNTER-INTEL OFFICER, INVISIBLE SPACE MARINE and SPECIAL OPS OFFICER. All directly lifted from rival IPs.
We were doing SO WELL with LOR and the Dyson Sphere. And we've taken such a huge step back. Seriously, we're screwed if this keeps up because there is no reason to log into Star Trek when it is no longer Star Trek.
The excessive grind is my largest complaint by far, that needs to be fixed up, might be with the next season but it does need to change.
Hear Hear!
Where did Exploration Sectors go? The Genesis system (randomly generated Exploration content) wasn't the best, way too much combat, but it was something..
I've got both a Fed and a Romulan (KDF-Aligned) into T4, where's my introduction to Diplomacy?
Crafting has gotten better (click my Signature, the resemblances are uncanny!) but it's still not as representative of the IP as it could (and should) be.
The T5 Defiant and Gal-X are understandable (canon considerations), but why the hell do Starfleet ships (The T6 Intel ships) have cloaking devices? I mean, what the heck? Were there no KDF players upset by this? Why aren't the forums burning down from the fact that they basically eliminated any differences between the factions at the cap?
Quite frankly I'm still not happy with Carriers in the game, much less Fed Carriers, and I don't care (and never have) how much fans of other Sci-Fi IPs want them..
Almost called it.
You were doing fine, until the above part.
Just... step away from the keyboard. Seriously.
Welcome to the current state of software development. This is a result of too many "programmers" and not enough people who have actually studied computer science. No patience or knowledge of software design, impatient management and general lack of dedication to detail. The motto in today's software development world is get it done, hire cheap, bypass QA, contract out the work and call it agile.
I've been wondering why we have playable Talaxians in game when we've been begging for Cardassians since FOREVER.
WE care. PWE has made it this way one purpose because they think their grindfest POS game structure is one-size-fits-all. Make it a grind and we'll get it because ALL Trek people are equally obsessive. It's insulting to our intelligence.
Wrong. Endgame is only about buying currency with real life money. What you actually do with it means NOTHING to PWE.
The level-gated content is so insulting. Even the FE's didn't have that (though they did have a minimum level). It reminds me of when they opened Defera and you have to do everything in order every time you did it. Are we all a bunch of TRIBBLE children? Trek people are not sheep, either. But PWE doesn't care how we experience this game and what the Star Trek IP actually means to us.
Jesus... is the HUD doing something we don't know about?
That reeks of unoptimized, possibly unfinished code. And it's been that way the whole time.
The game tends to draw EVERYTHING, even stuff that's hidden beneath other stuff. Also, some windows, like the rep project windows and the skills window, they seem to be polling the server a lot and constantly redrawing themselves over and over. So yeah, not very well optimized and poor use of server time.
I think we have to face the fact that with Galors in Lockboxes we'll never see The Cardassian Union or the True Way as a playable faction. PWE will never authorize a way for players to earn a Galor through normal non-grinding play.
Agreed, Corporate people who only look at quarterly profit reports do not know how to make or run an enjoyable video game.
True, but I was referring to the attitudes of players in-game and on the forums.
Indeed, I came back recently, and I deleted all my old toons when I left, so I've had to start from the bottom. Three weeks and two toons at T4, and while I've seen some new content (early KDF, early Romulan, Nimbus III) none of it has been of the quality I came to expect from the Mission revamps or the Featured Episodes (the last of which I played was The 2800.. Which as far as I can tell was the last real Featured Episode Series).
Everything since then has been "expansions" which have each basically been big fancy introductions to extra Cash Shop Items with a few minor additional endgame missions to use it with).
I'm just.. So disapointed with how the playerbase seems to have.. given up on fighting for the game. Like all the fire has gone out of them..
It's more likely that the real fighters have simply been driven away or silenced via forum bans, but that's just as sad, really.
Almost called it.
Genesis was never a part of the actual game. It was a dev tool they used to randomize map creation, nothing more. Peeps whined about it for week, then got over it, the same as every other thing they whine about.... SILENCE KILRATHI HATER!!!! :P
Hehe... but seriously, carriers are fun. they make for a different playstyle beyond regular ships.
My character Tsin'xing