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I missed most of the giveaways
farranor
Member Posts: 559 Arc User
I only just found out that I missed promos for two spec points and a costume, even though I check the launcher's news area every day. Even after finding out, I initially didn't see it on GNN or the main site news because I was searching for "promo" and not "giveaway."
Can the launcher news be set aside for actually important things instead of stuff like "we went to Vegas" and "Chase Masterson"? There's only room for a few items there, so when it's spammed with a bunch of new entries some of them never see the light of day.
Or maybe there can be some kind of help tooltip popup on the C-Store button when there's a giveaway? That would be my preference.
And before you ridicule me and blame me, yes, I admit that there were things I could've done but didn't, like check multiple news areas a day instead of just one, or ask ESD zone chat every day. But, again, I actually am looking for this sort of news, every day, and I didn't see it. Since the point of these things is to be seen by players who want to see them, maybe some change to consistency (one source instead of multiple scattered sources) or visibility (help tooltip) would be good.
Just a suggestion. Thanks.
Can the launcher news be set aside for actually important things instead of stuff like "we went to Vegas" and "Chase Masterson"? There's only room for a few items there, so when it's spammed with a bunch of new entries some of them never see the light of day.
Or maybe there can be some kind of help tooltip popup on the C-Store button when there's a giveaway? That would be my preference.
And before you ridicule me and blame me, yes, I admit that there were things I could've done but didn't, like check multiple news areas a day instead of just one, or ask ESD zone chat every day. But, again, I actually am looking for this sort of news, every day, and I didn't see it. Since the point of these things is to be seen by players who want to see them, maybe some change to consistency (one source instead of multiple scattered sources) or visibility (help tooltip) would be good.
Just a suggestion. Thanks.
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Why should players have to "learn lessons" about how to get the marketing materials they're interested in? They're marketing materials. They should be made as easy and painless as possible to find, not scattered among multiple non-overlapping news sources. Players shouldn't even have to look for it: it should show up where they can't help but see it, such as an in-game popup near the C-Store button (a marketer's dream come true). This is why stores send out mailings instead of posting a notice on the front of the store... and a different, more complete notice on the side of the store, and a third notice in the overflow parking lot that just points to the complete notice.
I'm not denying that. Unfortunately, the most competently-made Wonka Wiener is still a Wonka Wiener. I think it could be done better, for everyone's benefit.
If she'd done her job well, more people would have known about it.
you could try checking the web page every day I doesn't take long to check the top stories and you have more time to look as the web page wont disappear like the launcher does.
you will find it here > http://www.arcgames.com/en/games/star-trek-online/news
if you cant be bothered to have a quick look there you cant want free stuff very much.
When I think about everything we've been through together,
maybe it's not the destination that matters, maybe it's the journey,
and if that journey takes a little longer,
so we can do something we all believe in,
I can't think of any place I'd rather be or any people I'd rather be with.
an in game popup is not much good as a promotional tool as the idea of these giveaways is to get people into the game, if they are already in the game they should be aware of these things by checking the news items
here > http://www.arcgames.com/en/games/star-trek-online/news
before they play.
same could be said for the launcher news spot especially if you have auto engage set as I do.
having said this doesn't it say on the news blogs these items are all claimable up to August 18th?
or does that just count for the last one? I`m sure it said the same for each item given.
When I think about everything we've been through together,
maybe it's not the destination that matters, maybe it's the journey,
and if that journey takes a little longer,
so we can do something we all believe in,
I can't think of any place I'd rather be or any people I'd rather be with.
It depends on whether her job is to get people to know about it, or to deliver this news on certain sites in certain formats. If it's the latter, there's no way she could've done that well enough to achieve the former. I just want to suggest improvements.
You still haven't explained why it's okay that one news source (the launcher) delivers a different "news" experience than other news sources do. Of course it doesn't take long to check one specific source... but you have to know which one. Why is that okay? Why would Cryptic/PWE want people to not be aware of their promos?
Oh I see, you're that guy from the Internet. Yeah, the fact that there are multiple news sources and I have to know which one is actually useful means that I don't want free stuff. Very reasonable suggestion.
People who don't already play aren't going to know what something like "specialization points" even means. I don't see how that could possibly be intended for new players, who won't even be able to use their specialization points until 60.
"Should be aware of these things" because we should simply know which news source out of several is the good one? The only way to know which one is the good one is to have an experience like this, where we thought we had a good one but then find out that we were mistaken. Is that something that should happen? Is that good? If a car gets recalled by the manufacturer, should dealers contact owners, or do you expect everyone to scour the news for recall alerts? If someone reads the Globe rather than the Tribune and sees a notice about the Focus that they don't have but not the one about the Malibu that they do have, would you just tell them "you should've known" after their car spontaneously catches fire? If you get a new job and a close friend doesn't find out until weeks later, do you tell them "you should've checked my Twitter feed, not my Facebook feed"?
And, like I said several times, I check the launcher every day. I didn't see any mention of the giveaways. It currently has three items:
Note how there are multiple entries just from today that push out older but still-relevant entries like the giveaway. I had been using the launcher news as my news source, but now I know that it gets spammed with too many entries and is therefore unreliable. Great... but why should that have to happen to anyone? There's no benefit to that.
And no, the giveaways are not all claimable. As of a couple hours ago, only the ship slots were available. The rest is gone.
in answer to your comment - ""Should be aware of these things" because we should simply know which news source out of several is the good one?" I think its pretty obvious which is the good one, it is the one where you can read all of the news stories, not just the last few.
the place I would suggest you can read all of the news is here >
http://www.arcgames.com/en/games/star-trek-online/news
you would not buy a newspaper just read the front page and then moan that you missed all the news from the back page, it is pretty obvious that the launcher news spot only shows the last few news stories posted, if you want to know all of the news you must check the web site or risk missing out on important information such as this.
the news as its listed in the launcher may not be important to you but may be important to someone else, what gives anyone the right to dictate how these items are listed, they may not be important to you but that's just the way it is.
news pages from games are very important to potential new players sure they might not know what it all means but its enough to get a feel for the game and the mere fact they can see that players are given free items from time to time can be a big selling point even if they don't really know what those items are or what they do.
the first thing I did before ultimately choosing to join was check the news page, and I`ve been checking the news page almost every day since before I play.
p.s. the car analogy doesn't really work here, I can assure you, you will find all the news about sto on the news web page but you would not expect to find news about another game there just like you would not expect to see a car recall news story in a cooking magazine.
likewise its not a good idea checking out the daily echo to find up to date news about sto.
When I think about everything we've been through together,
maybe it's not the destination that matters, maybe it's the journey,
and if that journey takes a little longer,
so we can do something we all believe in,
I can't think of any place I'd rather be or any people I'd rather be with.
I claimed all the goodies so far.
whaaaahaaaa hahaa aa ha.
I know there are a lot of people out there that refuse to jump on the social network bandwagon just on principle. But honestly corporations have caught on that they can reach the most people through it. And so theyve moved most of their efforts on to those sites to advertise.
Now I dont disagree that their own site and such should have a better layout for the purpose of easy access from the customer/consumer. Startrekonline.com is clunky and messy in my personal opinion. And it should definitely feature the latest information. Its possible that the system is just as clunky and messy on their end as well and posting things to the site can be tedious. Making sites like Reddit, Facebook and Twitter the more obvious route to advertise and announce things. I dont know who would make the call for better organizing their website but I suspect that no one at Cryptic has the choice in the matter as its is all tied into arcgames. Its also possible that their data shows that very little in the way of visitors to the site actually bother with what news they do post beyond anyone being directed there from these social networks sites.
My only suggestion would be to get a twitter account. Its simple to set up, theres nothing forcing you to actually use it beyond receiving updates from whatever twitter account you decide to follow. And you can ignore it otherwise. My twitter account is pretty much useless to me beyond updates coming from people and games that I follow. The very moment a promotion or new addition to the game is announced I know of it.
Trendy did announce all the giveaways so if you missed them, you weren't paying attention.
the sto news web site might be clunky and messy in your opinion but all the information about these giveaways was there to see but to see it you first had to visit the site, many of the complainers who missed the giveaway only rely on the news highlights they see on the sto launcher.
the problem with the launcher is it only shows the last few stories posted on the main page so although you might have seen the giveaway posts if you had activated the launcher at the right time the later postings soon push the giveaway posts out of sight.
sure they could have made the giveaway posts later but then someone who plays earlier could miss out because news of the items being given away had been held back for the players who log in later.
I am certain if everyone who has missed out on this giveaway had only visited the sto news site on the first day nobody would be complaining now, the only draw back is to make sure you never miss out on anything you really need to visit the news page every day, it only takes about two minutes to see which items were not there the day before and what they are about before you can decide whether there is any news there that needs a closer look or if there is nothing there of any great interest to you.
if you cant spare two minutes to check the news page then how can you spare any time at all to be playing sto in the first place.
When I think about everything we've been through together,
maybe it's not the destination that matters, maybe it's the journey,
and if that journey takes a little longer,
so we can do something we all believe in,
I can't think of any place I'd rather be or any people I'd rather be with.
And why is it perfectly fine for so many people to only know now? I don't understand how people are defending this. We want to know about the giveaways, Cryptic/PWE want us to know about the giveaways, that didn't happen, this is a suggestion to make it more likely to happen.
I refuse to get a Twitter account because Twitter is on the same level of stupidity as Instagram.
I was paying attention... to something I thought was a suitable news source. Were you paying attention when I said that earlier? I love how some people are saying "well obviously you need to check the main news site," and some are saying "well you should obviously get a Twitter account," and you're saying that I [/i]obviously[/i] need to use Reddit and an "unofficial dev tracker," whatever the hell that is. Is it in the bottom of a locked filing cabinet stuck in a disused lavatory in the cellar with a sign on the door saying "Beware of the Leopard"?
I'm not too lazy; I just thought the launcher news was all that was needed. I'm not crying over it; I'm just suggesting that maybe these things should be advertised in some other way. But thanks for being that guy from the Internet.
Who in this thread has said that they know they should be checking the main site's news page but are simply too lazy to do so? Are you now just making things up entirely? I think strawman arguments are supposed to have at least a seed of accuracy. Thanks, guy from the Internet.
I knew people would jump into this thread spouting this kind of garbage. I thought I would head it off by clarifying from the start that, although there was certainly more I could've done, I thought I was doing enough, and the result was not finding out about something that both the company and myself wanted to find out about. You can see from this thread that I'm far from the only one. I just thought I'd give some suggestions for delivering the higher-priority news items to players who want to see them.
There's no reason anyone should be fired for this. It isn't even close to a major issue. I just thought I'd give some suggestions for delivering the higher-priority news items to players who want to see them.
To everyone: RELAX.
USS Casinghead NCC 92047 launched 2350
Fleet Admiral Stowe - Dominion War Vet.
Your post is a good reminder that I should have updated my Fleet's Message of the Day like I did last time; if you're in my Fleet, I apologize for not getting around to doing that.
and who is to dictate what is high priority, some other players could care less about the giveaway but might want to see the items that are there at any given moment.
as far as I am concerned cryptic and PW did their bit by posting this on the news web page, its up to the players to read that news it`s not up to cryptic and PW to ensure they do.
I am sure cryptic and PW are just as eager for players to see any of the news items that are posted otherwise they would not bother posting them in the first place.
When I think about everything we've been through together,
maybe it's not the destination that matters, maybe it's the journey,
and if that journey takes a little longer,
so we can do something we all believe in,
I can't think of any place I'd rather be or any people I'd rather be with.
Devs, please make it visible when an older post has new content--there was no way of knowing that the post had been updated or for us to know that we had to click on the old post for new news instead of looking for a post with a newer timestamp on it.