I think it's possible that part of the reason why the new graphics reveal resulted in so much negative feedback is because it coincided with the absence of developer chats in exchange for a five minute video and alpha tester only Q&A sessions. I think it might be an error to avoid a developer live stream in September. Those monthly streams where we heard Joppa or Roenick or Kyle talking about the development of the game were the main way I followed development, and without them I feel disconnected from the game. Again, that combined with the sudden shift in art style and five minute presentation was jarring.
I believe that most of their efforts are into preparing Pantheon to go 24/7. I would rather them continue to focus on that than spend time making live streams. You are right that the live streams were good and I do miss them, but the focus has changed to them buckling down on work and we can't really fault them for that, IMO.
I believe that we will be getting a lot more gameplay content through content creator live streams when they go 24/7 and that is what many of us want to see.
I personally don't mind that Chris and Kyle and all the other Dev's are busy and focused on building the game and can't take time to be doing content. Dev's have an excuse to be nose to the ground working hard to reach milestones and project targets.
But I do also remember that Tony 'Minus' Guidi was specifically hired as a 'Content Creator' and Ben 'Machail' Dean's only titles on the Team page are 'Director of Communications' and 'Web Design'. Neither of these 2 individuals are coders, artists, or designers.
Now it's possible they may be helping with other jobs behind the scenes, but their primary roles in the company are specifically about creating content specifically for the purpose of communicating with the community. I also understand that perhaps they have been working these past few months on some larger communication projects which will be launching soon, and Jamie 'Savanja' Henry has alluded that this is the case.
I just would think that if your actual job title is basically 'Talk to the Community' and it's been 3 months that you haven't talked to the community... we start to wonder 'What are they paying you for?'.
I will point out that Minus is quite active on Discord and does spend a lot of time talking with the community on there and he has been trying to address some of the questions people have had, but most of this is just chat and not specific communications for purposes of passing on specific informations.
Hopefully we will very soon get to see what they have been working on and will be getting lots of new 'Beans'.
Imo Discord chatter does not sell pledges or get investors interested. Not meaningfully anyway.
But convincing videos on YouTube might.
It's not so much that, as this game has been in development way too long and went through a full redesign already. It's a really bad sign when you see them completely flip on the art style and graphic design. I haven't been keeping close tabs on this game and have not watched livestreams in about a year. But I check in every few months and now I see we are in very choppy waters. If they are willing to do a complete 180 on the art/graphics what else will they compromise on? This isn't some minor graphical downgrade or a slight shift in style.
I personally don't mind that Chris and Kyle and all the other Dev's are busy and focused on building the game and can't take time to be doing content. Dev's have an excuse to be nose to the ground working hard to reach milestones and project targets.
Normally, I would agree, but this is almost as big as if they said, "we are putting in quest hubs and quest pathing, solo-able throughout and detailed maps". This is a major change, whether you agree with the style or not, makes no odds. This is a major change in direction and should not be treated by VR in this way; personally, I mind immensely that this has been handled with such a rude approach. This is a big change that should definitely have been addressed by both Chris', David and Kyle and everyone at the top involved with this decision. They should have had a discussion before and they should be addressing our concerns now. If they had discussed this before, then maybe there would be less irate people here, now.
BamBam: I dont feel the community should feel entitled to get information in general and there must be a reason why...
I just dont agree. With the fact VR have always shared their directions and reason and with this being such a big change, I feel very entitled to having this information before it was dumped on us from a great height. They should either kept this back until such time they could talk to us, or they should have done a much better job in handling this farce in the first place. Changing tact on what seems to be a whim is against everything they have done and said before now. We all put money into this, I think that give us some entitlements.
chenzeme said:BamBam: I dont feel the community should feel entitled to get information in general and there must be a reason why...
I just dont agree. With the fact VR have always shared their directions and reason and with this being such a big change, I feel very entitled to having this information before it was dumped on us from a great height. They should either kept this back until such time they could talk to us, or they should have done a much better job in handling this farce in the first place. Changing tact on what seems to be a whim is against everything they have done and said before now. We all put money into this, I think that give us some entitlements.
I kind of agree with this. I don't feel "entitled" to the information, per say, but I do think they could have gone about this in a better way. I'm actually surprised the 5 minute video was all they released. Following that and the increase in interest, I would have released another video to keep the hype/anger trains rolling. Good or bad, people talking about your game is better than people not talking about your game.
I think it's a mistake to go quiet at this point, but I also have no idea what's going on internally, so maybe it makes perfect sense to release that and then clam up. Who knows. But Sav said last month that Champion's should be on the lookout for news regarding Alpha in the next 2 months. Which she would have already been aware of the art change at this point, so who knows. Maybe the silence is in prep of something cool.
I do not feel entitled to any information. The only things I feel entitled to are the specific things listed in the pledge package. Entitlement to name reservation, probably shortly before release. Entitlement to be a tester when the time for the test that goes with the pledge package arrives.
Of course, I also feel entitled to abandon interest in Pantheon, not pay for a subscription beyond the time given in the pledge package, and never upgrade the pledge. Thus, it is not necessarily *wise* for VR to only give us what we are *entitled* to.
VR knows this, of course. I assume they have a reason for what they are doing. That it is a reason that would make us happy if we knew about it - that is a very different matter indeed.
"But Sav said last month that Champion's should be on the lookout for news regarding Alpha in the next 2 months"
Sorry, this isn't quite what was said. Unless you know of a statement different from the one I am thinking of.
It wasn't last month it was August 9. Almost 2 months ago.
The statement never mentioned alpha although some people *hoped* that news would be about alpha. The comment was more general and applied to testing or game development - it could have meant news about pre-alpha. In fact, the news could already have been released. Maybe it was about testing the new art.
The statement did not say 2 months - the statement said couple of months. This is generally interpreted as meaning about the same thing as two months but is somewhat vaguer. Thus, I will tell you something within two months means by October 9 - no ambiguity there. But within the next "couple of months" could easily mean at any time by the end of the second month from now - to wit, October 31.
BamBam said: I dont feel the community should feel entitled to get information in general and there must be a reason why VR have said they will hold back with info the next couple of months. I do however look forward to seeing more of the new style and overall progress once VR is ready to show us.
Entitled? No. But is there an expectation that communications happen routinely? Yes, absolutely. Why can VR not keep to a simple monthly schedule? They have 3 people in Marketing & PR and 2 people in Community Management and with all that they cannot come up with something, consistently, once a month?
Vandraad said:They have 3 people in Marketing & PR and 2 people in Community Management and with all that they cannot come up with something, consistently
This was my point. I understand Joppa and other actual coding and art Dev's being busy. Yet they have a team of people who do not do any code or art or writing and who's only job is to communicate with the community.
Savanja claims that they are working on new systems of getting information out to us with a different schedule and this is why they went dark for the past few months. Yet after those few months when they finally decide to announce this new Art style, which they knew would be a huge deal, all we get is a quick little 5 minute video and then dead silence again. Did Minus's computer blow up and they are waiting for a new one to be delivered?
I do like Minus and I know that he helped build PantheonPlus up before he got hired by VR. I normally try not to be hyper critical but I have to say I have been less than impressed with the content that has been created by VR lately. And while this may seem like I'm picking on Minus, it's entirely possible that this is not on him at all because he answers to the powers above him and he could be specifically being held back. It seems like their entire Marketing & PR plan lately is to avoid any Marketing & PR.
dorotea said:You may well be right - you certainly are right about the thread title but I wouldn't hold her to that since the statements she was replying to were not specifically about alpha but more about how testing worked and the process of development. We will see.
I feel that the majority of folks want a show of progress, 24/7 uptime, content creators streaming the game and a better representation of the Alpha roadmap than live streams. While I wholeheartedly agree that the communication has not been acceptable, just talking about things will only get folks asking more questions than VR is ready to give. I don't think anything other than what I laid out will satisfy folks. We have more questiosn than VR is ready to answer right now, so them 'talking' to us won't be all that helpful. Whether it's praise for the new art style or disappoinment and condemnation, nothing they can say right now will be enough for the community. They have to SHOW us, not tell us at this point. Even though the wait was terrible, I felt that they should've said November instead of September, because they didn't have enough of a full presentation to do it justice, because it is a big reveal. Folks were trickling in asking questions, but the consistent community was already aware of the 'heads down' process back in June/July.
I also think that VR made a miscalculation thinking the 5 minute reveal would be better received and they had other similair things ready, but held off because of the response. Even folks who accepted the art change did not like the way it(a 5 minute video) replaced the live stream.
Putting a date for a live stream on the October calendar and then having more delays and such would not be good right now. Confirming and consistently stating that they are hard at work and will show us more when ready would be the best thing to do. Simply put, they are not ready to give us what we(most of us and in my opinion) want yet and throwing a live stream together would only make things worse considering how the last one went.
Simply put. It is no coincidence that the public output from VR went to zero just before the announced change in direction was delivered. Simply put, VR didnt want to deal with the inevitable backlash that some of us feel. Simply put, it was handled with little no regard to people who helped VR get to this point. Simply put, something of this magnitude should have been discussed fully, before its occurance. Simply put, there are people here that feel totally let down. Simply put, this is just shoddy customer relations.
Simply put, VR do better!
So why did they up and change the models? They had put so much work into how they was making them look, only to go a completely different way months later. I guess the new models will be an upgrade from EQ1 but not quite EQ2 quality tho. This game seems to make huge changes out of the blue and that kinda worries me.
Toem45 said:So why did they up and change the models? They had put so much work into how they was making them look, only to go a completely different way months later. I guess the new models will be an upgrade from EQ1 but not quite EQ2 quality tho. This game seems to make huge changes out of the blue and that kinda worries me.
Prevenge said:Toem45 said:So why did they up and change the models? They had put so much work into how they was making them look, only to go a completely different way months later. I guess the new models will be an upgrade from EQ1 but not quite EQ2 quality tho. This game seems to make huge changes out of the blue and that kinda worries me.
It seemingly went from running on a decently equipped PC to being able to run it on your iPhone.
We got led into the game with decent graphics, now we're being offered coloured cartoons. How many folks would have jumped in if the graphics started out as cartoons?
I wouldn't have and that's just my IMHO.
It seems to me stuff changed after Brads passing. Again, that's just my opinion. I'll keep watchng of course but the graphics dont inspire any confidence in me as to the final product.