Why is GGG caving in to casuals' demands?

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mushioov wrote:

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reboticon wrote:

Desync happens to only 1% of players? What the hell are you smoking. Where can I get some?

I know approximately 50 people that play PoE more or less and not a single one suffers from any kind of constant desync issues. Occasional lag spikes that we all have are not desync.

This is freaking hilarious, gold.

You do realize that the game is fundamentally constantly desynced and certainly not helped by the fact that it uses prediction to the extent that it does?

Ever tried /oos? Played a turbo race recently? Hell how about just using certain sorts of skills or playing efficiently?

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mushioov wrote:

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MrMisterMissedHer wrote:

This is freaking hilarious, gold.

You do realize that the game is fundamentally constantly desynced and certainly not helped by the fact that it uses prediction to the extent that it does?

Ever tried /oos? Played a turbo race recently? Hell how about just using certain sorts of skills or playing efficiently?

I'm a game developer myself so yes I pretty damn well do know how the system works. I have a feeling that you don't understand what is happening under the hood. If you have any understanding about the issue you'd understand that GGG can't "fix" the issue no matter how much people cry on the forums or on facebook comments.

Whether you're a game developer or not really doesn't mean you understand how it works and you clearly don't.

The fact is you claimed it doesn't exist for 99% of the users, this is pure unadulterated bullshit.

Yet you have the gall to claim that I don't know what's happening? Thankfully I only have about a decade's worth of experience dealing with complex mechanical simulation.

I seriously doubt you are a competent game developer given your comments, at least with anything beyond incredibly trivial mechanics.

Do you even know what prediction does? Of course you don't.

My favourite part is that you claim GGG can't fix the issue when it is an issue mostly caused by their choices, design and policy and is not a universal problem, certainly not when you're allowed high throughput and low latency.

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mushioov wrote:

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mushioov wrote:

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I_NO wrote:

Yo I'm still lol'ing that the OP considers PA to make things easier that's fucking amazing.

Not necessarily PA itself, but the issue that GGG caved in under the pressure of casuals constantly whining that they want PA when it wasn't part of the design philosophy of the game. I've always said it's a slippery slope on these areas. Once you "give" something, the demands will just keep coming and coming and unless those who are in control (GGG) stop it, it will end up a mess.

Let me quote a LEGENDARY game designer on this:

"Diablo II and the expansion are the games that we at Blizzard want to play. That is our formula for success. Companies that design games based on focus groups, marketing opinions, and even fan input do not succeed. Although hearing the opinions of others are valuable to us, every design decision must pass the test of whether or not WE would want it in the game. In many cases, we've changed our minds after hearing compelling arguments. But we've decided that PKing is part of the Diablo universe. We are well aware that this does not please everyone. However, you are right: we are not apologetic about it. Not at all. Sure, we could implement a PK switch. It's a trivial coding task. But we wouldn't be being true to ourselves, and our goals as gamemakers.

We are proud of what we've made in the Diablo universe, and the overwhelming success and support of our customers vindicates our core decisions from a business standpoint as well. Sure we've made mistakes, after all, we're just gamers who are fortunate enough to have built a successful game company. We spend each day doing what we love to do: make and play fun computer games. The sales and success are nice, but they are secondary to our goal of making the games that we want to play.

Max Schaefer
Vice President and co-founder, Blizzard North"

So you think this guy doesn't know what he's talking about?

Discuss.

This is great stuff, I had no idea a letter like this existed.

I had a long conversation with an old friend about UO yesterday. Him, his brother and I played for years on the OSI servers and we absolutely HATED PK'ers with a burning passion the whole time we played. (Just like the way people hated on ninjas here) We were all convinced they were ruining the game for everyone and that OSI was negligent by not stopping them or doing anything about it. (We left before the trammel/non pvp servers were up - which was the beginning of the end for UO by many accounts) We now know, this was part of the magic of the game that kept us coming back. The monster AI was abysmal, there would have been no danger at all, no excitement, no fun. We all agree now that this was the case all along, in fact we probably would have never become friends if not for our shared need for protection and survival.

Several of my friends have left PoE over the last season. Nobody was protesting "loot options" as a reason or anything like that... (Several of them even liked PA) I still play PA in pub games because that’s what everyone else does - so whatever. They left because it was not fun anymore. Nobody felt the need to team up and really work together, anyone of us could just join pub games and there was hardly any difference.

People used to complain before loot options were added that PoE is a single player game for them because they refuse to deal with ‘loot tension’. - Now the WHOLE GAME feels much more like single player for many of us who adapted and seriously enjoyed it the way it was. I understand that it’s more accessible now to newer players, and I think that’s great! However, was it really the intent to remove SA and FFA from the game? If so why even give options at all?

Many people agreed that “loot tension” is good for the game, it’s more fun and keeps people focused and in the fray or they lose out, but when that fun comes with added risk, and when playing HC? Every one of us will do everything we can to ensure our characters do NOT DIE, that is the ultimate spoiler of fun. It is just not worth it to take extra risk even among friends.

options ≠ choice

OP is right on...