Developer Interview - Matt, Narrative Designer

Fantastic interview. I love the small behind the scenes insights, especially the screenshot of the spreadsheet.

Lore, YES
Please consider expanding lore related to Delve
Flavour text of the rings (Uzaza, Ahkeli, Putembo) feel like fragments of a uncomplete story of an ancient civilization and their leaders/kings, and how Aul leaded his people to rise against Putembo(?) (Aul's uprising), probably succeesfully (Crown of the tyrant). This story caught my attention the most and it would be really really nice if you could put more hints about it.
Other delve bosses feel like expansions of the Vaal (Ahuatotli) and the Abyss (Kurgal), but im mostly interested in Aul.

More of these please. Also, PoE NOVELS! Even eBooks would be cool. Graphic Novels and fan fic only go so far. We need written cannon stories!

Great interview! Looking forward to encountering more lore in the game! Welcome to the team Matt! Keep up the great work, all of you!

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TradeImprovements wrote:

I was waiting for something like this :)

Nick Kolan next one please!

They interviewed Nick in 2017.

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TradeImprovements wrote:

I was waiting for something like this :)

Nick Kolan next one please!

Just listen to the Front Seat Podcast, it's great stuff.

Ok, I need to find some of this graffiti now.

ps4 2026 release? 15.03.2019!!!rip

The answer to the "Do you have a favourite storyline in the game?" question was amazing.

I like this interview. It isn't super overly polished like most developers are when they address things, it's just candid and interesting (would have preferred video next time though!) regarding the insight into the internal process of someone working on the game.

I also appreciate the notion of GGG looking for ways to thrill the customers/gamers as an exciting part of their job. Far too often developers are not making this the top priority and forget about the "game part of the game" and instead focus on anti consumer practices to net a few extra dollars.

Not to kiss GGG's butt too much, but the game is solid and I've been enjoying it since I came back after 5 years this league (betrayal). It's a bit of a breath of fresh air in an otherwise polluted and toxic industry.

I've had a few minor hickups (inifinite hang time, unexpected DC's that are def not on my end, etc.) but I figure this is par for the course for ftp.

My only major criticism is the microtransactions are so damned expensive. I'm not a stranger to dropping a huge chunk of change on a game accumulatively, but the value doesn't feel right at those prices to feel ok purchasing.

I get why, GGG is a business and they've determined their price point, but I would like to offer a thought here:

Pump out more cosmetics and make them much cheaper and people will end up spending a lot more on them in total, at least I would and I'm sure a bunch of other people would too.

As the client base grows over time (and lets be honest PoE is a well established franchise at this point and has outlived AAA published D3 and is a far better [regarding depth and enjoyment] game), and the trove of cosmetics piles up, I think it makes more sense to reconsider price points because you'll end up making more overall. It's much easier for me to spend $5 on a cosmetic 5 times than it is to spend $25 on a cosmetic once, i just won't do it.

I know that makes little sense because the dollars are the same, but as a consumer, I feel more value that way and I think a lot of people would feel the same.

Plus this doesn't stop you from selling those massively overpriced whale cosmetics, it just makes the general customization more accessible to a general audience.

If you guys listen at all, I know I can't be the first to say this, but please do consider what I'm saying here :) I am specifically the guy who drops 1k on a game over a year if I really love it, but I can't really be asked to spend $25 on a single cosmetic, it just hurts my inner being from a value standpoint.

This would also open up the doors for people that can't afford to spend a thousand dollars on a game in a year to maybe drop five bucks here and there from players that are otherwise ftp, and that can add up because while I don't have the exact statistics from your servers, if it's like literally every other ftp game, a large chunk of folks are ftp only and opening the market to them for $5 can add up fast.

While this would require more manpower (probably another someone with their full time job just doing cosmetics), they can probably get a design in, render it and get it approved and rigged with a new one every week for whatever the going rate is for a designer (maybe 80k first year for some quality?) and that will pay for itself in no time if the purchases are affordable for a general audience, not to mention in time they will start to innovate new prospects. Sure, that's an extra promo each week from marketing, but that's also MORE MARKETING and MORE PRODUCT.

Even if it's only half that for the sake of quality, once every 2 weeks (plus also accounting for financial fatigue of customers), that's 25 more cosmetics a year, $125 of casual spending at 5 bucks a pop over the course of a year from a player base that might otherwise spend $0.

To cover cost they would need to sell 16k copies of 25 different cosmetics, which at five dollars is going to move a lot faster than at 25 or even 42 dollars for a set. Lets just round up to 25k copies to say they get a killer benefits package too. That's 1000 of each cosmetic. That's nothing at 5 bucks each and everything past that is pure profit with added value to the customer. I'm sure they'd be worth at least 3x that.

Additionally, more customization at a more accessible price point is likely to increase concurrent players over time.

Just my two cents.