And yes, its an "issue" that they didn't bother supporting a system that didn't make them any money and that many people didn't use. It's an issue like not putting a lot of money into, or closing, unprofitable stores is an issue for big box stores.
I think you can not use the Foundry that often and still consider it to be worth maintaining. I haven't read a lot of fiction books in recent years, and there are some genres I would never read, but I still wouldn't be happy if every bookstore closed and Amazon and every other online outlet stopped selling fiction books.
I don't know, maybe that's a bad example, but the point is you can value something without personally engaging in it that frequently.
Someone mentioned earlier, things have "Soft Value", usually design features that you can't put a money value on in and of itself because they don't make revenue by themselves but, are features or capabilities that may not be requirementsbut make users/Customers happy. it Breeds Customer Good will and happy Customers are ones more likely to spend money and continue to purchase in the future. its why clothing stores have fitting rooms and supermarkets have bakery's, its not a core necessity for a clothing store to have a fitting room, but people who can try on clothes before they purchase are far more likely to put money down on something they like. Fitting rooms don't bring Revenue by themselves and sometimes they get vandalized and it costs money to repair them but they have Soft Value.
If anyone from Cryptic reads this, I guess the one thing I would ask is if there is any possibility of extending the sunset period for another month or two. It's going to be a challenge for those of us who have missions to even salvage anything from them in such a short period of time. It also would be nice to have a bit more time to play what's in the Foundry before it all goes away.
Maybe one month is all that you can offer us, but if there's any possibility of an extension I am sure it would be appreciated.
If anyone from Cryptic reads this, I guess the one thing I would ask is if there is any possibility of extending the sunset period for another month or two. It's going to be a challenge for those of us who have missions to even salvage anything from them in such a short period of time. It also would be nice to have a bit more time to play what's in the Foundry before it all goes away.
Maybe one month is all that you can offer us, but if there's any possibility of an extension I am sure it would be appreciated.
Of course they read this thread. But sadly I can't see them extending the period as they discussion to bring the foundry down across all their titles was being had over a year ago. Remember though for those who have created foundry missions they won't be lost. They are going to be preserved and kept. No missions will be lost. They explored every avenue to keep things going, but unfortunately the man hours and costs involved to maintain what in the gaming world is a dinosaur of a system just isn't cost effective anymore. I know it is hard to believe that those at Cryptic are as devastated as their player base but trust me they are. I can't speak for the devs of their titles, but I know devs here at STO did everything they could to keep the foundry running.
This might be getting closest to a DOOOM and gloom thread after all.
Might be time to shut down this thread? Lots of emotional anger in here. After all this is just a game folks...If you don't like something nobody is forcing anyone into anything. I have been long enough here to see the doom and gloom when this game went F2P, Dead of PvP and Delta rising (gosh loved those signature postings) among other stuff that served to evolve this game.
Maybe is time to chill out, take a walk in the real world and worry about where things go into perspective. Just saying just a bunch of projected pixels not worth building a life around it. You can quote me on that one.
If it were a "doom" thread, such observations would not be completely unwarranted. The fact that the official explanation contains words to the effect of "The guy who knew how to do that doesn't work here any more" isn't exactly indicative of smooth sailing ahead. It's kind of like walking into a restaurant an ordering one of their signature items only to be told "sorry, they guy who made that dish doesn't work here any more." Personally, I would be concerned about the restaurant's future. Transition of personnel shouldn't cause loss of services if the business has a robust succession plan.
Ah well... *tosses the notes of her Foundry built Halloween idea in the trash*
*it joins his notes in the can, where a fire has already been lit*
Bummer, that.
Space Barbie Extraordinaire. Got a question about Space Barbie? Just ask.
Things I want in STO:
1) More character customization options such as more clothing options, letting the toon complexion affect the entire body, not just the head. Also a true RGB color picker applied to all costume and appearance options, which would allow for true appearance customization and homogenous colors instead of "this same exact color looks vastly different on two different pieces."
2) Bridge customization, not bridge packs. Let us pick a general layout and adjust the color palette, console appearance, and chair types, as well as more ready room layout options.
3) Customizable ground weapons, i.e. The aesthetic look of phaser dual pistols but they shoot antiproton bolts. For obvious reasons this would only apply to standard ground weapons.
4) For the love of Q please revamp Plasma Ground Weapons. They look like demented Supersoakers right now.
5) True Vanity Impulse and Deflector effects similar to Vanity Shields.
6) A greater payout for hitting T6 Reputations. Currently it takes more time and resources to get from T5 to T6 than it does to get from nothing to T5. Make that grind really pay out at the end.
7) Mirrorverse Refugee event similar to AoY/Delta/Gamma, complete with new Mirrorverse recruits for all factions.
8) Independent Faction, because yo ho yo ho a pirate's life for me!
Btw, "bugger", I've learned from a book about the history of English, apparently is a corruption of "Bulgar".
Granted, I didn't use the Foundry much, I do remember three of the missions I played. Two were: "Risa Hotel" and "Risa Beach House". Wish they could've been imported into the overall game. They made Risa seem less like a compete-dance-and-hunt event happening only one month or so out of each entire year and more like a place to visit *all* year round. The third took place in the exploration cluster (I wish I could remember its name and the mission's name) near Vulcan, which was basically a typical Star Trek exploratory patrol, including inside a broken-down Borg cube. I saw it in a video on YouTube and decided to try it myself. I preferred the video (with the player's dry, yet amusing, commentary).
Maybe everyone gets something to make up for the loss (symbolically)?
I'd say maybe give us the choice of getting a globally-unlocked ship trait of our choice? That would be really nice and consistent, since it would benefit both newbies as well as vets who have plenty of ships.
This would be a lucrative reward, unless it's too much spaghetti code.
They're already giving out rewards.
Consistent rewards. This is basically like I'd steal the bedroom from your house away and giving you a drawing of an apple.
At least a ground weapon or something that you can USE and won't be counterproductive or counter-meta.
It might be too time-consuming, but I wish Cryptic could send each Foundry author a copy of the code for one of their missions. Something to say, "Sorry we had to send the entire Foundry to the abbatoir, but at least you'll have this as a souvenir."
It might be too time-consuming, but I wish Cryptic could send each Foundry author a copy of the code for one of their missions. Something to say, "Sorry we had to send the entire Foundry to the abbatoir, but at least you'll have this as a souvenir."
You mean the code for the author's foundry mission? We can already get that via a chat command. Add to that screenshots, demo record, videos, and Let's plays. We will have mementos.
From my personal perspective as a foundry author, the thing that really helps the most is the fact that they tried. Watching the stream with Ambassador Kael really made a difference. Mistakes were certainly made in the past, but they didn't want to shut the Foundry down. The missions will be saved on a server. So, if the stars align we might get them back. Sure, it's a faint hope... but if nothing else, it's a nice gesture. The Foundry, all its mission and months and years of work won't just disappear into nothingness. I'm still sad, angry even. But I won't take it out on the folks who did their best during the last months.
It might be too time-consuming, but I wish Cryptic could send each Foundry author a copy of the code for one of their missions. Something to say, "Sorry we had to send the entire Foundry to the abbatoir, but at least you'll have this as a souvenir."
You mean the code for the author's foundry mission? We can already get that via a chat command. Add to that screenshots, demo record, videos, and Let's plays. We will have mementos.
Glad to hear it. Hope they give you great memories.
From my personal perspective as a foundry author, the thing that really helps the most is the fact that they tried. Watching the stream with Ambassador Kael really made a difference. Mistakes were certainly made in the past, but they didn't want to shut the Foundry down. The missions will be saved on a server. So, if the stars align we might get them back. Sure, it's a faint hope... but if nothing else, it's a nice gesture. The Foundry, all its mission and months and years of work won't just disappear into nothingness. I'm still sad, angry even. But I won't take it out on the folks who did their best during the last months.
(shuts Pandora's box before the last thing escapes) We'll always have hope. For ten years between ST:TOS and ST:TMP, fans never gave up hoping. Let's just hope the Foundry doesn't take that long to come back, though. What did the late Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. say on the steps of the Lincoln Memorial? "I believe!"
BUT if this means the Devs can spend more time on new content, I'm all for it.
Sadly that is not the case. It's not as if they had a team of 10 devs working flat out on the foundry, they had nobody. The only time any dev resources were used was when it broke after a major update, which was most updates last year. Then they had to spend time fixing it, but whilst it was up they invested no time in it at all, and any assets that were added were done by devs in their own free time. So closing this will have almost no impact to the rest of the game except a resource draw when it would have broken.
I get all that - already had that figured out. My point stands though, the Devs won't be diverting resources to fix it every time an update breaks it, which means they will be quicker with new content and general bug fixes.
***
It's not like the Foundry existed when the game first launched. Things change, and like most things in life you can't have your cake and eat it.
The foundry was launched in Jan 2011 and was in beta test from December 2010, so apart from the first 11 months it's been with us all the way.
Jack Emmert, 4/11/2010 to Eurogamer.net
"User-generated content has always been part of our strategic plan for years and years and years. Ultimately I'd like to have it in every game we do in one version or another."
That doesn't mean that Cryptic's developers will simply abandon Star Trek Online and Champions Online to the community though. "No, no," Emmert insisted. "We'll still continue making content. It's just that now you've got more content to choose from. You've got the stuff created by the developers as well as the stuff created by your friends, other people and so forth."
Make of that what you will.
Yes, the first year of the game we didn't have a Foundry to play with - then for 8 years we did, and now we don't. It's no different to any other change that has happened, such as the change to the crafting system, or the mission episodes being sorted into an actual order. Change happens in games like this. And this MMO has changed hands a few times. We can't keep holding them to the promises made when Atari made the game.
Kael has gone above and beyond his duty in explaining why this decision has been made. Yes, I get why you're angry - but dude, please stop lashing out at the rest of the community. You're a Foundry expert - your work is actually being saved, it will not be lost entirely. The Devs may some sort of plan, give them a chance.
My hubby codes for a living, he makes the base code/stuff like this for a living. If he's not being paid for it, and the community expects him to take it home and sort it in his own free time then yes, he would reach a point where he would say - "no more, I have a right to a life too!" The number of weekends he gives up... Yeah, his family (and Devs have them, some have partners and kids as well), get annoyed about his working a seven day week.
I'm not prepared to ask the Devs on this game to do that, and frankly no one else should either. How selfish do you have to be to expect someone to work 7 days a week, 12 hours a day, but only get paid for five of those days, and only 8 hours in each of them? How many of you are willing to do that? How many of you with families and kids are willing to do that? I've watched the Ten Forword Weekly videos and (although it's easy to miss) a lot of the new game improvements and the like have come about because of Devs working on it in their own free time. We're lucky in that regards that some of them are willing to do that. But we can't expect it - or worse, demand it.
The Devs made a hard decision, but it is one that has been well thought out on their part. The peeps who own and run PWE/Cryptic are the ones who make the business decisions, and I guarantee you they are the ones who make all the decisions about the budget the Dev team has for working on STO.
Matt, no one doubts you could do what you say you could do. Instead of leaping on the forum, you should have contacted PWE/Cryptic and spoke direct to them. Maybe something could have come of that. I am sorry for you, I enjoyed the content you created. But after reading you're statement... Have some dignity.
For now, I'm leaving this... Toxic conversation. Once again, a few people have reacted without looking at all the information, and a few others have got the tin-foil out to make new hats. But I'd like to end on a high again, and thank the Devs for all the hard work they do, and for all the free time they do give up to add stuff to the game. The bulk of us do appreciate your hard work. Keep on rocking guys 'n gals :-)
"...a lot of the new game improvements and the like have come about because of Devs working on it in their own free time..."
With all due respect, reading this I wonder how are their "paid time" job priorities stablished then if improvements have to come from free time jobs
Wow, that's a lot (17 pages now ^^) of commentary on a single decision in just a few days; clearly Cryptic's vision for their core values does not match up with a vocal percentage of the player base.
Your analysis of the available data is flawed. Each post does not represent a unique user; in fact, were you to clean the data, I believe you might find there are in fact only a handful of people posting on here, on each side.
(Sorry, but my wife is studying for her bachelor's in data science, so I get to pick up a lot about analyzing data sets from her.)
I wasn't implying that the number of posts in this thread constitutes anything like a majority (hence, VOCAL percentage), just that as in electoral politics, a single irate constituent realistically represents a much larger number of those who were too cheesed off to even verbalize their dissatisfaction. I have no illusions about the discussion; the decision has already been made, but when Cryptic's revenues take a dive, they should also have no illusions as to WHY. Falling back to the nuclear option was not the only way to address the resource issue, but it was the one chosen.
Expendables Fleet: Andrew - Bajoran Fed Engineer Ken'taura - Rom/Fed Scientist Gwyllim - Human Fed Delta Tac Savik - Vulcan Fed Temporal Sci Dahar Masters Fleet: Alphal'Fa - Alien KDF Engineer Qun'pau - Rom/KDF Engineer D'nesh - Orion KDF Scientist Ghen'khan - Liberated KDF Tac Welcome to StarBug Online - to boldly Bug where no bug has been before!
STO player since November 2013
Maybe there were business pressures, etc. I'm sure that no one had nefarious intentions toward the Foundry, but in the end it never really was developed to the extent it could have been.
I wouldn't say nefarious, there is no evidence of that. Incompetence, perhaps.
The business case for how we got here seems plain to me.
The Foundry was conceived as a method of adding low cost content to the game while increasing the sense of player ownership, interest and good will. Costs of code maintenance would originally be covered by the subscription model STO had at launch assuming that enough interest and good will was generated by this and the game as a whole to result in a large enough player base.
The concepts of interest, customer ownership and good will have actual value in the business world. You will see them even given a dollar amount on some balance sheets although they are very hard to measure and typically only come into play when a company is brought out. Most of the time they are undefined 'soft dollars'. But despite their vague valuation, these factors make up the baseline that marketing elements work from and hope to improve.
That original model changed when STO switched to F2P instead of subscription and elements of the game were monetized. Lacking a method of monetizing the Foundry meant that the Foundry itself no longer had a directly and easily measured funding source. It could only be justified on the merits of those hard to define soft dollar factors.
Cryptic decided that whatever the value of these factors were- it did not justify maintaining the Foundry code with the cost of its own team- and thus the team was let go. They were judged important enough to justify stop-gap patching for the next few years.
And now the stop-gap patching has become too expensive in their judgement to continue, and Cryptic is now willing to take a hit to their 'soft dollars' value. This means is they are willing to lose both current and future customers and sales. They are just betting that the loss will be less than the now very high cost of maintaining or updating the Foundry code.
And that is that. Very simple.
It is the people paying for new micro-transactions that will determine if the bet pays off or not. Cryptic is betting that most of their player base won't care and they can go forward with a major expensive removed from the ledger.
I think they're right, but I don't have to help them be right.
That's a very interesting analysis and I tend to agree with you on that. I must admit I´ve played quite very few Foundry missions but enjoyed them a lot, some of them are creative gems indeed. It's a real pitty to see it gone
BUT if this means the Devs can spend more time on new content, I'm all for it.
Sadly that is not the case. It's not as if they had a team of 10 devs working flat out on the foundry, they had nobody. The only time any dev resources were used was when it broke after a major update, which was most updates last year. Then they had to spend time fixing it, but whilst it was up they invested no time in it at all, and any assets that were added were done by devs in their own free time. So closing this will have almost no impact to the rest of the game except a resource draw when it would have broken.
I get all that - already had that figured out. My point stands though, the Devs won't be diverting resources to fix it every time an update breaks it, which means they will be quicker with new content and general bug fixes.
***
It's not like the Foundry existed when the game first launched. Things change, and like most things in life you can't have your cake and eat it.
The foundry was launched in Jan 2011 and was in beta test from December 2010, so apart from the first 11 months it's been with us all the way.
Jack Emmert, 4/11/2010 to Eurogamer.net
"User-generated content has always been part of our strategic plan for years and years and years. Ultimately I'd like to have it in every game we do in one version or another."
That doesn't mean that Cryptic's developers will simply abandon Star Trek Online and Champions Online to the community though. "No, no," Emmert insisted. "We'll still continue making content. It's just that now you've got more content to choose from. You've got the stuff created by the developers as well as the stuff created by your friends, other people and so forth."
Make of that what you will.
Yes, the first year of the game we didn't have a Foundry to play with - then for 8 years we did, and now we don't. It's no different to any other change that has happened, such as the change to the crafting system, or the mission episodes being sorted into an actual order. Change happens in games like this. And this MMO has changed hands a few times. We can't keep holding them to the promises made when Atari made the game.
Kael has gone above and beyond his duty in explaining why this decision has been made. Yes, I get why you're angry - but dude, please stop lashing out at the rest of the community. You're a Foundry expert - your work is actually being saved, it will not be lost entirely. The Devs may some sort of plan, give them a chance.
My hubby codes for a living, he makes the base code/stuff like this for a living. If he's not being paid for it, and the community expects him to take it home and sort it in his own free time then yes, he would reach a point where he would say - "no more, I have a right to a life too!" The number of weekends he gives up... Yeah, his family (and Devs have them, some have partners and kids as well), get annoyed about his working a seven day week.
I'm not prepared to ask the Devs on this game to do that, and frankly no one else should either. How selfish do you have to be to expect someone to work 7 days a week, 12 hours a day, but only get paid for five of those days, and only 8 hours in each of them? How many of you are willing to do that? How many of you with families and kids are willing to do that? I've watched the Ten Forword Weekly videos and (although it's easy to miss) a lot of the new game improvements and the like have come about because of Devs working on it in their own free time. We're lucky in that regards that some of them are willing to do that. But we can't expect it - or worse, demand it.
The Devs made a hard decision, but it is one that has been well thought out on their part. The peeps who own and run PWE/Cryptic are the ones who make the business decisions, and I guarantee you they are the ones who make all the decisions about the budget the Dev team has for working on STO.
Matt, no one doubts you could do what you say you could do. Instead of leaping on the forum, you should have contacted PWE/Cryptic and spoke direct to them. Maybe something could have come of that. I am sorry for you, I enjoyed the content you created. But after reading you're statement... Have some dignity.
For now, I'm leaving this... Toxic conversation. Once again, a few people have reacted without looking at all the information, and a few others have got the tin-foil out to make new hats. But I'd like to end on a high again, and thank the Devs for all the hard work they do, and for all the free time they do give up to add stuff to the game. The bulk of us do appreciate your hard work. Keep on rocking guys 'n gals :-)
"...a lot of the new game improvements and the like have come about because of Devs working on it in their own free time..."
With all due respect, reading this I wonder how are their "paid time" job priorities stablished then if improvements have to come from free time jobs
That 'Devs working on it in their own free time' concept makes me wonder.
If they're salary, it's a nonsense statement. I've been salary for decades in IT and I've worked 80 hour weeks to get things done because that's what it took. I didn't earn an extra penny, but I wouldn't call it "my own free time"- working until the job is done is just part of the job. Americans are rather infamous for putting in insane hours like that.
If they're hourly, I wonder if it's a violation of labor laws. When I worked hourly, I know that such behavior would be unacceptable but that may vary depending upon where the work is done. I also wonder how their accounting department adjusted their general ledger to reflect all the free labor and if management came to expect it when developing project plans.
If anyone from Cryptic reads this, I guess the one thing I would ask is if there is any possibility of extending the sunset period for another month or two. It's going to be a challenge for those of us who have missions to even salvage anything from them in such a short period of time. It also would be nice to have a bit more time to play what's in the Foundry before it all goes away.
Maybe one month is all that you can offer us, but if there's any possibility of an extension I am sure it would be appreciated.
I'll bet 4/11/19 is the target date for their next "new content" drop (which will break the Foundry); so, that's why they picked that date
Formerly known as Armsman from June 2008 to June 20, 2012 PWE ARC Drone says: "Your STO forum community as you have known it is ended...Display names are irrelevant...Any further sense of community is irrelevant...Resistance is futile...You will be assimilated..."
Just heard about this. I haven't put as much time as I would like into this game over the years, but when I have the Foundry really enriched my experience, especially after the random 3 missions thing was added to almost every system. As a mostly f2p player I could never justify the time investment of sitting down to make the many missions I wanted to when there was dilithium to grind :P but having mission-making experience from another game I was always wowed by the Foundry's potential and some of the authors out there made truly brilliant use of the tools at hand to tell some terrific Trek stories.
I must admit that I haven't played a Foundry mission in a long time - but when I did play them years ago, I was really impressed with the quality of some.
Some of those missions could easily have competed with official episodes in terms of story, character development and so on.
Formerly known as Risian4. Risian6 is my new PS4-account. Fleetcaptain5 is my main PC account. I hope to actively play again on PC in a few months.
Now that that's made clear... on to the next issue: when are playable Voth coming, and where's are my T7 Vesta and C-store purchasable real life shuttle?
Ultimately it's an understandable decision, sad as this news may nevertheless be.
While there has indeed been support in terms of fixing the foundry after updates, I've always had the idea that it was considered as a nice little extra thing - in terms of how much was done with it. This isn't mean as criticism, but more could have been done with the Foundry in terms of promotion (official promotion that is - the enthusiasm from the authors themselves definitely hasn't been lacking) and making the creation of missions a bit easier (I've tried it once, and found the interface used to create missions just too difficult to work with).
Anyway... can we get the exploration clusters back then?
Formerly known as Risian4. Risian6 is my new PS4-account. Fleetcaptain5 is my main PC account. I hope to actively play again on PC in a few months.
Now that that's made clear... on to the next issue: when are playable Voth coming, and where's are my T7 Vesta and C-store purchasable real life shuttle?
I imagine that exploration clusters have about as much chance of returning as the Foundry (bugs, poor UI, etc.) has of being allowed to continue beyond April 11. Or of a snowball surviving in a very very very hot place.
Btw, I never encountered any Borg dynasties when the exploration clusters still existed. But I did have some fun random missions that were even more fun than system patrols. Unfortunately over the last roughly 5 (out of 6) years, I didn't dig deeply into the Foundry. I wish I had. Watching Foundry spotlights on YouTube will never equal playing the actual missions. Like getting a postcard from heaven: nothing like the real thing.
With the death-date of the Foundry announced, I'm finding that I still spend about the same amount of time each day (about 30-60 per character, and about 3 characters per day). But now it's with a feeling of, "This is depressing. The game never had a fair chance when it was rushed into release in Feb. 2010, the exploration clusters are gone, and now the Foundry's being kicked into the gutter."
I know that in the end it's just a game. Games like this aren't reality. They're (even the sci-fi ones) ultimately fantasy. We pretend we're someone who never was and play in a world of dreams that someone else created. And without enough and frequent infusions of money (and support from the powers-that-be) even the best games run their course and die. That doesn't mean I have to like having it happen to STO.
I never got a chance to play "Star Wars Galaxies" before it died. At least I've been able to play STO. I will keep hoping that it lives long and keeps prospering.
But most of all, I hope that in the future STO remembers to stay true to its Star Trek core (even if the powers-that-be could care less about that core, except of course when there's lots of money to be made from it). To me, Star Trek is about hope, is about learning, is about not being afraid to travel to new places, is about meeting strangers and trying to become friends with them, and is about the acceptance of the differences that make every being (human and otherwise) unique, important, and valued. I would like to think that Archer, Kirk, Picard, Sisko, Janeway, and Pike would agree with me. A Star Trek game should never be mostly based on violence. But I guess it would have even fewer people interested in playing it if one couldn't blow up the enemy and fly around in cool ships. Plus ca change, plus c'est la meme chose.
This is still bogus, and to cut a big part of the game while doing a lifetime sale just screams shady. The words say they hope STO still has a decade left in it, but the actions say otherwise.
To those believing that we will get something else in the future to replace it, don't do that to yourselves! They have a system that works right now, albeit buggy, that they are dumping. If they won't pay someone to properly maintain something that is working, I don't ever see them paying to give us a replacement for it. They are just telling us that because some will believe it.
People want to talk about the missions not being lost, but if they are locked away on a server and unplayable, they might as well be!!!!!
I bought a lifetime a year or two ago, and have spent $3000+ on this game over the years and I know people that are way higher. I will not spend another real penny on this game. Any new "official" content is over far too quickly, and we go back to running the same stuff we have run over and over for years. Thanks, but no thanks
Sorry to see it go. I know people put a lot of work into them. I hope some authors/players do some play thru videos of the missions on YouTube so the stories aren't lost forever.
I greatly enjoyed the foundry and the creativity/passion of the authors. It was a key reason I played STO as it differentiated amongst other STOs. I agree with all that said it is a sad and potentially huge negative. I feel in desperate need as a fan for outlets of fresh ideas and story content in the Star Trek universe. On April 12th, I will shift time to other games as too much content is continually being cut or too slow to come out that leads to STO boredom.
Sorry to see it go. I know people put a lot of work into them. I hope some authors/players do some play thru videos of the missions on YouTube so the stories aren't lost forever.
Nothing will be lost. All created missions are going to be preserved and kept.
Comments
Someone mentioned earlier, things have "Soft Value", usually design features that you can't put a money value on in and of itself because they don't make revenue by themselves but, are features or capabilities that may not be requirementsbut make users/Customers happy. it Breeds Customer Good will and happy Customers are ones more likely to spend money and continue to purchase in the future. its why clothing stores have fitting rooms and supermarkets have bakery's, its not a core necessity for a clothing store to have a fitting room, but people who can try on clothes before they purchase are far more likely to put money down on something they like. Fitting rooms don't bring Revenue by themselves and sometimes they get vandalized and it costs money to repair them but they have Soft Value.
Maybe one month is all that you can offer us, but if there's any possibility of an extension I am sure it would be appreciated.
Click here for my Foundry tutorial on Creating A Custom Interior Map.
(And yes I did tip)
Of course they read this thread. But sadly I can't see them extending the period as they discussion to bring the foundry down across all their titles was being had over a year ago. Remember though for those who have created foundry missions they won't be lost. They are going to be preserved and kept. No missions will be lost. They explored every avenue to keep things going, but unfortunately the man hours and costs involved to maintain what in the gaming world is a dinosaur of a system just isn't cost effective anymore. I know it is hard to believe that those at Cryptic are as devastated as their player base but trust me they are. I can't speak for the devs of their titles, but I know devs here at STO did everything they could to keep the foundry running.
If it were a "doom" thread, such observations would not be completely unwarranted. The fact that the official explanation contains words to the effect of "The guy who knew how to do that doesn't work here any more" isn't exactly indicative of smooth sailing ahead. It's kind of like walking into a restaurant an ordering one of their signature items only to be told "sorry, they guy who made that dish doesn't work here any more." Personally, I would be concerned about the restaurant's future. Transition of personnel shouldn't cause loss of services if the business has a robust succession plan.
*it joins his notes in the can, where a fire has already been lit*
Bummer, that.
Things I want in STO:
1) More character customization options such as more clothing options, letting the toon complexion affect the entire body, not just the head. Also a true RGB color picker applied to all costume and appearance options, which would allow for true appearance customization and homogenous colors instead of "this same exact color looks vastly different on two different pieces."
2) Bridge customization, not bridge packs. Let us pick a general layout and adjust the color palette, console appearance, and chair types, as well as more ready room layout options.
3) Customizable ground weapons, i.e. The aesthetic look of phaser dual pistols but they shoot antiproton bolts. For obvious reasons this would only apply to standard ground weapons.
4) For the love of Q please revamp Plasma Ground Weapons. They look like demented Supersoakers right now.
5) True Vanity Impulse and Deflector effects similar to Vanity Shields.
6) A greater payout for hitting T6 Reputations. Currently it takes more time and resources to get from T5 to T6 than it does to get from nothing to T5. Make that grind really pay out at the end.
7) Mirrorverse Refugee event similar to AoY/Delta/Gamma, complete with new Mirrorverse recruits for all factions.
8) Independent Faction, because yo ho yo ho a pirate's life for me!
Btw, "bugger", I've learned from a book about the history of English, apparently is a corruption of "Bulgar".
Granted, I didn't use the Foundry much, I do remember three of the missions I played. Two were: "Risa Hotel" and "Risa Beach House". Wish they could've been imported into the overall game. They made Risa seem less like a compete-dance-and-hunt event happening only one month or so out of each entire year and more like a place to visit *all* year round. The third took place in the exploration cluster (I wish I could remember its name and the mission's name) near Vulcan, which was basically a typical Star Trek exploratory patrol, including inside a broken-down Borg cube. I saw it in a video on YouTube and decided to try it myself. I preferred the video (with the player's dry, yet amusing, commentary).
Consistent rewards. This is basically like I'd steal the bedroom from your house away and giving you a drawing of an apple.
At least a ground weapon or something that you can USE and won't be counterproductive or counter-meta.
You mean the code for the author's foundry mission? We can already get that via a chat command. Add to that screenshots, demo record, videos, and Let's plays. We will have mementos.
From my personal perspective as a foundry author, the thing that really helps the most is the fact that they tried. Watching the stream with Ambassador Kael really made a difference. Mistakes were certainly made in the past, but they didn't want to shut the Foundry down. The missions will be saved on a server. So, if the stars align we might get them back. Sure, it's a faint hope... but if nothing else, it's a nice gesture. The Foundry, all its mission and months and years of work won't just disappear into nothingness. I'm still sad, angry even. But I won't take it out on the folks who did their best during the last months.
Glad to hear it. Hope they give you great memories.
(shuts Pandora's box before the last thing escapes) We'll always have hope. For ten years between ST:TOS and ST:TMP, fans never gave up hoping. Let's just hope the Foundry doesn't take that long to come back, though. What did the late Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. say on the steps of the Lincoln Memorial? "I believe!"
"...a lot of the new game improvements and the like have come about because of Devs working on it in their own free time..."
With all due respect, reading this I wonder how are their "paid time" job priorities stablished then if improvements have to come from free time jobs
I wasn't implying that the number of posts in this thread constitutes anything like a majority (hence, VOCAL percentage), just that as in electoral politics, a single irate constituent realistically represents a much larger number of those who were too cheesed off to even verbalize their dissatisfaction. I have no illusions about the discussion; the decision has already been made, but when Cryptic's revenues take a dive, they should also have no illusions as to WHY. Falling back to the nuclear option was not the only way to address the resource issue, but it was the one chosen.
Savik - Vulcan Fed Temporal Sci
Dahar Masters Fleet: Alphal'Fa - Alien KDF Engineer Qun'pau - Rom/KDF Engineer D'nesh - Orion KDF Scientist Ghen'khan - Liberated KDF Tac
Welcome to StarBug Online - to boldly Bug where no bug has been before!
STO player since November 2013
That's a very interesting analysis and I tend to agree with you on that. I must admit I´ve played quite very few Foundry missions but enjoyed them a lot, some of them are creative gems indeed. It's a real pitty to see it gone
That 'Devs working on it in their own free time' concept makes me wonder.
If they're salary, it's a nonsense statement. I've been salary for decades in IT and I've worked 80 hour weeks to get things done because that's what it took. I didn't earn an extra penny, but I wouldn't call it "my own free time"- working until the job is done is just part of the job. Americans are rather infamous for putting in insane hours like that.
If they're hourly, I wonder if it's a violation of labor laws. When I worked hourly, I know that such behavior would be unacceptable but that may vary depending upon where the work is done. I also wonder how their accounting department adjusted their general ledger to reflect all the free labor and if management came to expect it when developing project plans.
I'll bet 4/11/19 is the target date for their next "new content" drop (which will break the Foundry); so, that's why they picked that date
PWE ARC Drone says: "Your STO forum community as you have known it is ended...Display names are irrelevant...Any further sense of community is irrelevant...Resistance is futile...You will be assimilated..."
I must admit that I haven't played a Foundry mission in a long time - but when I did play them years ago, I was really impressed with the quality of some.
Some of those missions could easily have competed with official episodes in terms of story, character development and so on.
Now that that's made clear... on to the next issue: when are playable Voth coming, and where's are my T7 Vesta and C-store purchasable real life shuttle?
While there has indeed been support in terms of fixing the foundry after updates, I've always had the idea that it was considered as a nice little extra thing - in terms of how much was done with it. This isn't mean as criticism, but more could have been done with the Foundry in terms of promotion (official promotion that is - the enthusiasm from the authors themselves definitely hasn't been lacking) and making the creation of missions a bit easier (I've tried it once, and found the interface used to create missions just too difficult to work with).
Anyway... can we get the exploration clusters back then?
Now that that's made clear... on to the next issue: when are playable Voth coming, and where's are my T7 Vesta and C-store purchasable real life shuttle?
Btw, I never encountered any Borg dynasties when the exploration clusters still existed. But I did have some fun random missions that were even more fun than system patrols. Unfortunately over the last roughly 5 (out of 6) years, I didn't dig deeply into the Foundry. I wish I had. Watching Foundry spotlights on YouTube will never equal playing the actual missions. Like getting a postcard from heaven: nothing like the real thing.
With the death-date of the Foundry announced, I'm finding that I still spend about the same amount of time each day (about 30-60 per character, and about 3 characters per day). But now it's with a feeling of, "This is depressing. The game never had a fair chance when it was rushed into release in Feb. 2010, the exploration clusters are gone, and now the Foundry's being kicked into the gutter."
I know that in the end it's just a game. Games like this aren't reality. They're (even the sci-fi ones) ultimately fantasy. We pretend we're someone who never was and play in a world of dreams that someone else created. And without enough and frequent infusions of money (and support from the powers-that-be) even the best games run their course and die. That doesn't mean I have to like having it happen to STO.
I never got a chance to play "Star Wars Galaxies" before it died. At least I've been able to play STO. I will keep hoping that it lives long and keeps prospering.
But most of all, I hope that in the future STO remembers to stay true to its Star Trek core (even if the powers-that-be could care less about that core, except of course when there's lots of money to be made from it). To me, Star Trek is about hope, is about learning, is about not being afraid to travel to new places, is about meeting strangers and trying to become friends with them, and is about the acceptance of the differences that make every being (human and otherwise) unique, important, and valued. I would like to think that Archer, Kirk, Picard, Sisko, Janeway, and Pike would agree with me. A Star Trek game should never be mostly based on violence. But I guess it would have even fewer people interested in playing it if one couldn't blow up the enemy and fly around in cool ships. Plus ca change, plus c'est la meme chose.
To those believing that we will get something else in the future to replace it, don't do that to yourselves! They have a system that works right now, albeit buggy, that they are dumping. If they won't pay someone to properly maintain something that is working, I don't ever see them paying to give us a replacement for it. They are just telling us that because some will believe it.
People want to talk about the missions not being lost, but if they are locked away on a server and unplayable, they might as well be!!!!!
I bought a lifetime a year or two ago, and have spent $3000+ on this game over the years and I know people that are way higher. I will not spend another real penny on this game. Any new "official" content is over far too quickly, and we go back to running the same stuff we have run over and over for years. Thanks, but no thanks
Nothing will be lost. All created missions are going to be preserved and kept.