[url=https://cityoftitans.com/forum/reminder-come-see-us-pax-west]Read the post here[/url]
—
[center]--------------------------[/center]
[center][color=#ff0000]Interior Map Lead and UI Designer[/color][/center]
Fri, 09/01/2017 - 08:55
#1
Discuss: See us at Pax West
Have fun you guys!
I love conventions but cannot come to this one. I hope you guys have a blast!
[img]https://s15.postimg.cc/z9bk1znkb/Black_Falcon_Sig_in_Progess.jpg[/img]
The ... Cat ... Theatre?!
*squees with delight*
*stows away in someone's backpack*
*waves goodbye*
[center][color=purple][size=16][b][I][url=https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=78N2SP6JFaI]Just a cat from another star![/url][/I][/b][/size][/color][/center]
Sorry, we are too far south, at another convention this week. Have fun!
That went through my mind, too. ^_^
I'll expect a full report next week!
Foradain, Mage of Phoenix Rising.
[url=https://cityoftitans.com/forum/foradains-character-conclave]Foradain's Character Conclave[/url]
.
Avatar courtesy of [s]Satellite9[/s] [url=https://www.instagram.com/irezoomie/]Irezoomie[/url]
SacAnime?
Technical Director
Read enough Facebook and you have to make Sanity Checks. I guess FB is the Great Old One of the interent these days... - Beamrider
[I look forward to a full review as well. Only the Forum AK will be there. I will be with you all in spirit, though!]
[center][color=purple][size=16][b][I][url=https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=78N2SP6JFaI]Just a cat from another star![/url][/I][/b][/size][/color][/center]
Gateway (Strategicon, at LAX). But in light of your Twitch this morning (https://www.twitch.tv/videos/171444501), I will try to be watching that Sunday evening ^_^.
Foradain, Mage of Phoenix Rising.
[url=https://cityoftitans.com/forum/foradains-character-conclave]Foradain's Character Conclave[/url]
.
Avatar courtesy of [s]Satellite9[/s] [url=https://www.instagram.com/irezoomie/]Irezoomie[/url]
Ah, enjoy the con.
(if you were going to SacAnime I was going to ask you to say hello to a cosplay friend of mine who is going there)
Technical Director
Read enough Facebook and you have to make Sanity Checks. I guess FB is the Great Old One of the interent these days... - Beamrider
Good luck guys! Break a leg and all that!
Good luck. Hope you know what you are doing and prove me completely wrong. Guess I'm just a worrier by nature. I probably would have done this next year rather than this. Right now, I see three (relatively) broke "sausage makers" entering a lion's den of mega million dollar hype on a hope that those good old torches have enough light left in them to carry the day one more time. You are banking an awful lot on a community that technically no longer exists. I pray they (we) come through for you. I'm very interested in the turnout and crowd vibe as well as the message from each of the three entities. **Fingers crossed and eyes shut.**
Devs pay no attention to the troll. We all believe in you and hope you have a great time!
[img]https://s15.postimg.cc/z9bk1znkb/Black_Falcon_Sig_in_Progess.jpg[/img]
QFT!
*lights a box of candles for her dear Devs*
*frolics in her couch fort*
[center][color=purple][size=16][b][I][url=https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=78N2SP6JFaI]Just a cat from another star![/url][/I][/b][/size][/color][/center]
I almost never agree with Fire Away, but he's not a troll. He has a very different perspective than most here, but that doesn't make him a troll. It makes him valuable.
Wish I could make it, but have fun MWM!!!
FIGHT EVIL! (or go cause trouble so the Heroes have something to do.)
I won't be there. It's about 2000 miles too far away.
Have fun! Looking forward to hearing all about it.
*Amerikatt scampers from table-to-table, making her presence known*
*takes out her tiny pom-poms*
"2 bits, 4 bits, 6 bits, a dollar. All for MWM, stand up and holler!"
*does a quintuple back somersault and lands easily on her feet!*
*the crowd goes wild!*
*City of Tabbies becomes the greatest MMORPG in the history of gaming*
*Amerikatt takes a pretty pink bow and puts it on her furry little noggin*
*Amerikatt bows*
[center][color=purple][size=16][b][I][url=https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=78N2SP6JFaI]Just a cat from another star![/url][/I][/b][/size][/color][/center]
Agreed. I may not share many of his concerns, or at least not to the same extent, but they are valid.
I actually refer to quarters when I'm giving change to people as "2 bits", "4 bits", etc. I even know the history of that name.
Love the show. ;)
-----------
[color=#FF0000]Senior Developer/Project Manager/Co-Founder... and then some.[/color]
Nothing wrong with being a worrier. You help keep us honest. At this time we are kind of being forced to do this rather than focus on production. Every time we show our progress and work we have this issue of production loss. On the up side we get valuable feedback and suggestions. It's a tradeoff we hope we are using well.
And MWM isn't broke. :) We aren't "rolling in the dough" but we aren't broke either. We have cash enough for a few more years of work - but we don't want to stretch things out that far! We are a corporation and are prepared to disclose our financials if needed. We aren't adverse to more revenue at the moment but we prefer to earn it rather than have it given as venture capital or as loans (we've had such offers). Our transparency makes look like "sausage makers" I agree, but I'd rather work that way when I'm using someone else's money!
-----------
[color=#FF0000]Senior Developer/Project Manager/Co-Founder... and then some.[/color]
STREAM IS LIVE...buffering but live.
https://www.twitch.tv/missingworldsmedia
Second Chance: https://store.missingworldsmedia.com/CityOfTitans/SecondChance/
Dev Tracker: http://cityoftitans.com/forum/fixing-dev-digest
Dev Comments: https://cityoftitans.com/forum/dev-comments
Yup listening to it now
-----------
[color=#FF0000]Graphic Designer[/color]
all in all a good panel. The guy from VO was really long winded, though.
Our guy overcame the video presentation with the GREAT beard!
[img]https://s15.postimg.cc/z9bk1znkb/Black_Falcon_Sig_in_Progess.jpg[/img]
I'm posting this as I did in the other company's forums as a professional courtesy.
I'm accepting requests for the chat logs and copies of the video. Just PM me or email me.
Participants in the video in order of appearance (I forget individual names and I'll only identify by company):
Heroic Games - Ship of Heroes - https://www.shipofheroes.com/
Silver Helm - Valiance Online - https://valiance.shogn.net/home
Missing Worlds Media - City of Titans - https://cityoftitans.com/
-----------
[color=#FF0000]Senior Developer/Project Manager/Co-Founder... and then some.[/color]
Chat has some interesting revelations. SOH and COT both have openings in Fall of 2018 and VO opens in 2020.
all three will have a nemesis system.
COT and SOH will have auto loot, while VO will have pets who loot the bodies for you.
[img]https://s15.postimg.cc/z9bk1znkb/Black_Falcon_Sig_in_Progess.jpg[/img]
Does a written summary is provided for foreigners ? :) I quickly cast a glance at the twitch channel but i must confess the quality sound and the fact that i'm not used with hearing US language makes it difficult to follow the discussions, questions & answers during this video :)
[hr]
Suivez l'avancement du jeu City of Titans en Français sur https://titanscity.com
http://forum.titanscity.com | www.facebook.com/titanscity | http://twitter.com/TitansCity
[color=red]PR - Europe[/color]
I've already fielded one request for a transcript. I have the video downloaded and I'll be trying to transcribe it as time permits.
-----------
[color=#FF0000]Senior Developer/Project Manager/Co-Founder... and then some.[/color]
Nice to hear that :) As soon as you transcribe it, i'll translate it in French ^^
[hr]
Suivez l'avancement du jeu City of Titans en Français sur https://titanscity.com
http://forum.titanscity.com | www.facebook.com/titanscity | http://twitter.com/TitansCity
[color=red]PR - Europe[/color]
All and all... meh. If you want to declare victory that the audience was larger than the panel and was overwhelmingly cordial and positive it turned out better than I feared. I'm not sure what constitutes "success" or "failure" in terms of player support for any of these efforts at this juncture anyway.
I wish MWM had revealed more than they did. Kudos to you Cyclops for digging out the nemesis thing in chat. Perhaps I did not fully understand the purpose of the panel.
Pet peeve. Will somebody explain the difference between the terms "enemy", "competitor" and "friends who are competitors" to Mr. Downs? Why no, as a player, I do not wish to put my heart and soul into three different games thank you. Does that make me a bad guy? Is this a sink or swim three way proposition?
Quick sidebar: I once adored a game called City of Heroes. Great community overall. But the forum did have a small minority who tried to analytically and subjectively point out areas where the game may not be headed in the right direction in the nicest way possible. Invariably, these people were openly ridiculed for preaching doooom. Perhaps some of you may remember those threads. Well, one day, doooom happened. And there was much wailing and gnashing of teeth. I felt ashamed that even though I agreed with at least some of the criticism, I remained on the sidelines for fear of reprisal. Perhaps we all could have done a bit more to suggest ways to right the CoH ship BEFORE it went down. This time I have vowed that when I support something as much as I do CoT I will let my views be known when I think they may be standing into danger. So, by all means fire away if you disagree but let's not make it personal.
That argument may float if it wasn't for the fact that CoH/V was financial viable at the shutdown. Positron stated during his AMA on reddit that going F2P was [i]very[/i] successful for them in regards to money. It was shutdown for literally none of the reasons that people stated on the forums (e.g. the doomcrying threads) previous to the announcement and widely regarded as completely and utterly arbitrary. Not only that, but there were attempts on parts of the original developers to purchase the IP for continued development, to which an astronomically high dollar value was countered, which clearly indicated that they had no real intention of letting the IP go.
And by all means, make your views known. But as noted by some other forum-posters in the last few months, and not specifically you in this particular case, its become increasingly hostile around here as of late. That's why you haven't seen me posting as much. It seems like many threads are currently devolving into not only establishing what someone's particular point/stance/opinion/perspective is, but now how everyone's is wrong.
I think, in general, people need to take a break from the forums, and maybe the internet in general, and decompress.
This was disappointing for me as well. The lack of show and tell has been one of the most active points of skepticism for this project, and if there was one place to show and tell, it was here. Even if they had rehashed some of the stuff they've shown already, that would have been good. If you want people to believe that you are actually making a game, you need to prove it. No wonder there are so many naysayers out there in this space today. This event really only reinforced that.
Yea, I mean I'm all about the kumbaya, and I do plan to support all three...but honestly, only at the start. Once I've tried all three, I'm gonna end up picking whatever one is best and sticking with it. I don't know how anyone could expect anything more, people aren't rich, so it really is a competition here, even if it is friendly. This means there will be winners and losers, whether people want to acknowledge that or not.
The despite the irony that it'll look like I'm simply trying to prove you wrong the "perception" of increasing hostility around here likely has little to do with people needing to "decompress" from the Internet. Various people will always need to decompress from time to time - there's nothing new about that.
I suspect what's happening to raise tensions here RECENTLY is that we've gone the better part of four years without anything to beta test. Now obviously it was always going to take several years before anything was ready to beta test but we are very quickly getting to the "put up or shut up" phase where our Devs at MWM will no longer be able to comfortably hide behind the idea that "it's way too early to release anything". People collectively only have so much patience before the worry about whether or not we're going to see anything tangible from this game any time soon will become overwhelming. People are getting tried debating in a vacuum the same topics over and over and over again. Basically I doubt the "level of hostility" you've noticed will go down until we finally have something to collectively test and focus our energies on. We've always been told that the Avatar Builder was going to be released well before the main game - if we don't see at least an initial open alpha/beta of that before the end of the year I sadly predict you'll start seeing ACTUAL open hostility.
I try to be a voice of constructive criticism (or at least Devil's advocacy) around here and I will give the folks of MWM every reasonable chance. But time is simply -not- on MWM's side. Until we have something to test the only thing the regular forum posters will have to do is continue to spin around each other and get cranky from constantly getting dizzy all the time.
CoH player from April 25, 2004 to November 30, 2012
[IMG=400x225]https://i.imgur.com/NHUthWM.jpeg[/IMG]
For me it's a question of time investment. I could probably afford to pay for all three (from a money point of view) but I simply doubt I'll have the time to seriously play more than any one at a time. I might eventually give all three a try (assuming they all eventually launch) but there's really no way I'll keep up with all three. Basically like you I'm going to likely pick one and stick with it.
The "friendly kumbaya" between the projects has been admirable thus far. But eventually these Devs need to (perhaps in a friendly way) agree to openly accept that they are going to be "competing" against each other (maybe not money wise but at the very least player base wise) and understand what that's actually going to mean.
CoH player from April 25, 2004 to November 30, 2012
[IMG=400x225]https://i.imgur.com/NHUthWM.jpeg[/IMG]
I really really wish there was some treaty that could be made between at least SoH and CoT, given they are the same engine. Like basically merging, but staying as a distinct entity, like how CoV was originally sold as a separate thing. The problem is that it would be hard to unify the design of UI, character creator, powers, etc, not to mention the fact that at least one game would have to dramatically change it's lore to accommodate the unification of the two worlds. Like a portal opens up and heroes from these two timelines can then travel between the two times lines. The alignment system in CoT would also make it too far of a stretch from the at launch scope of SoH to make such a proposition viable.
But my point being, I wonder if the benefits of making some sacrifices to the game story and design would be worth it to minimize the competition between these games, and make it a situation where they really aren't competitors at all, but rather collegial and allied worlds. Like maybe CoT could be the redside to SoH's blue. Again though, I really don't think it's possible.
If I could magically "snap my fingers" to make the projects unify under a single banner I'd do it in a microsecond.
The thing that frustrates me the most is all the wasted efforts between the multiple projects. They are all having to do things like create basic body models, create basic costume items, create multiple missions, create multiple enemy factions, and so on. Instead of 3 games each with "x" numbers of these things we could have had (in a perfect reality) potentially ONE game with 3x amount of all these things. All the "infrastructure" of these games would have only been needed once, not 3 separate times.
Obviously this is a fun little pipe dream that's not going to happen in real life. Still I continue to day-dream of the single "mega-game" we might have had instead of the three vaguely derivative games we'll probably end up with.
CoH player from April 25, 2004 to November 30, 2012
[IMG=400x225]https://i.imgur.com/NHUthWM.jpeg[/IMG]
Yeah, CoH had doomsayers. They were all wrong in the reason the game would close though, as mentioned already. Also figure, the game had to be making enough of a profit for the devs of it to want to purchase it.
I agree with Lothic, that some of the negativity likely comes with the KS saying the game would be up by now (at some stage I believe, maybe not complete). Of course, there'll just be disagreements in things :p Every poster is going to hope for something else. :p
As for the victory of the panel, I would guess the victory would be in that they had one.
I can see it now. Shortly after COT launches a message is received of an impending arrival of a floating world that would take a year to arrive (while they work on a way to combine the games). This message sends a ripple through Titan City and divides. Some who believe they can have a better life on this new world so they choose to destroy the one they are in(this spawns the different villain factions), and those who see this arrival as a threat so they prepare themselves for a great battle. Once SOH is fully integrated, the ship arrives. Visually, it is seen floating hundreds of miles above Titan City. The ship is a host to aliens and alien technology and the only way to enter the ship is through portals(like kidrad mentioned). To COT/SOH players, this opens up new content and new abilities learned from each respective world and endless new lore to dive into. Id be totally into it.
Too bad this would never happen though for so many reasons.
-----------
[color=#FF0000]Graphic Designer[/color]
Yeah, portals between worlds, never happens...
[img]https://vignette.wikia.nocookie.net/paragon/images/d/d8/Mystical_Construct_Portal_2.jpg[/img]
:P
Seriously, though, the lore issues are probably the least of the difficulties you listed. If there's any sharing between the projects that takes advantage of the common engine, it would be behind-the-scenes stuff and not involve the players or their characters.
In the rest of the tech industry, companies cross-license their patents to each other all the time. If it made business sense to do the same thing, a way would be found, more likely later than sooner, though.
Speaking only for myself, I like competition. Yes, there will be duplication of effort. That's not an unmitigated evil. The JSF program didn't start going off the rails until the F-32 vs. F-35 competition ended back around 1999. Then it turned into an endless stream of feature bloat. The PC industry has benefitted from the competition between Intel and AMD, even though it's always looked like Intel was the only game in town. Back when we were moving to 64-bit, Intel proposed an all-new architecture with little to no backward compatibility to x86, while AMD developed an architecture that was backward compatible, and eventually won. In graphics, we have the competition between nVidia and ATI/AMD. And so on.
I've heard that some aircraft manufacturers have multiple teams developing the ame hardware to the same spec. They get two different designs of the same thing, and put one of each in the aircraft. If there's a bug in one, it likely isn't in the other one, so you have actual redundancy instead of redundancy theater.
There's a huge amount of duplicated effort in all these cases, but it's worth it. I just can't buy into the mythical man-month thinking that says we'd be better off with a monoculture.
[i]Has anyone seen my mind? It was right here...[/i]
When speaking of snapping your fingers to make a merger of projects happen, keep in mind that there is a very fundamental risk involved with such a things - what do you do with the people made redundant as a result?
It is only when we stand up, with all our failings and sufferings, and try to support others rather than withdraw into ourselves, that we can fully live the life of community.
[color=#ff0000]Business Director[/color]
meh... I'm all for some friendly competition... aslong as it stays friendly, nothing underhanded and no suing allowed, just 3 companies trying to make better content than their competitors.
not my video just one I lke ===> https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=U6-SdIN0hsM
[CENTER][URL=http://www.nodiatis.com/personality.htm][IMG]http://www.nodiatis.com/pub/24.jpg[/IMG][/URL][/CENTER]
Sure you can always cherry-pick generalized cases where living with some form of "competition" spurs everyone to work harder. Still there are plenty of specific cases where "wasted effort" serves no practical purpose.
For instance we can assume that all three projects will have some variation of "angel/bird" wings for their player characters. It's going to take the collective Devs involved with that X amount of time to implement each version of those wings for each game. Now if the three groups of Devs involved only had to create those wings ONCE (for a single hypothetical mega-game) then theoretically the same Devs involved could have created three DIFFERENT types of wings in roughly the same time period.
Obviously that three-to-one time savings wouldn't be possible in all situations - I don't literally think it would've only taken 1/3 the time to finish an entire hypothetical single "mega-game" as opposed to the three separate games currently being worked on. But clearly had the wasted duplicate efforts of these three games had somehow been heavily mitigated the single "mega-game" would have either been far, far further along than what we currently have or at the very least it would have had much, much more content at launch than we're likely going to get from any of the three separate efforts.
Again I understand this is all just a nice "what-if" thought experiment. Getting back to reality I just don't see how the current "friendly relationship" of the successor projects is going to continue, especially if one manages to launch far ahead of the others.
CoH player from April 25, 2004 to November 30, 2012
[IMG=400x225]https://i.imgur.com/NHUthWM.jpeg[/IMG]
Also? How about an agreement? Like nothing legal, but rather a very public announcement by everyone involved that, if an outside force, like another company outside of this trinity tries to bring one of the games down, that they would all push together all the resources they could manage, without bankrupting themselves or their companies, to defend that game. Again nothing legal, but just a big promise everyone in the respective games could see that they would atleast try to do this. Failure to do so in that case would be not appearing as honest as they where before.
not my video just one I lke ===> https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=U6-SdIN0hsM
[CENTER][URL=http://www.nodiatis.com/personality.htm][IMG]http://www.nodiatis.com/pub/24.jpg[/IMG][/URL][/CENTER]
This whole friendliness thing only goes so far as being each others cheerleaders in the game industry. There is no way SOH and COT are not going to compete with each other in 2018 for the COH player base. And in 2020 when Valiance comes out, it would be smart for them to see how SOH and COT performed and try to do better. Its just business. I too will pick the one that I like the most. My hopes are on COT.
-----------
[color=#FF0000]Graphic Designer[/color]
I haven't been able to watch the whole panel yet, but I was wondering if Tyche made the announcements he mentioned in this post?
https://cityoftitans.com/comment/124789#comment-124789
Also, as for people getting antsy, I get it. I feel it. I think one of the main difficulties for myself is the "seeing is believing" mindset I have at this point(after so many years). One of the most impactful updates to me lately was all of the different demonstrations of power customization. It was huge, exciting, colorful, but most of all it showed me something very important: the game.
I have seen this mentioned before on this forum, that one of the main thing hype trains that Ship of Heroes has going for it is that they built their world soooo early in development, so they can showcase stuff (the world, powers, characters) all in motion and also have eye candy. Difference being with MWM that they go/went about it entirely differently building each detailed part of their system, lore, and all else away from each other. Not showing us in-game renders of things until arguably recently.. but the thing about what MWM shows it that it's not actually the game yet. Not everything is compiled into a "game" per-se, at least not from what they have publicly shown.
It is difficult to keep the faith and the trust that this game is being compiled, assembled, made, etc. They have showed us more in the past 6ish months than we have ever seen before.. That's something, yeah?
What I feel like I need to see is the actual "game", with as many of their different working pieces together in a map, running. They do have the convenience of doing it all at their own pace, whatever that may be, because at the end of the day they are all volunteers. They are not paid game designers with publishers and hard deadlines. If needed they could push the game back another 3 years, as they have said many-a-time to us. Will they? Likely not. But, they could. They are doing what they want, when they want, but mostly when they [i]can[/i].
I really do hope some good, exciting announcements came outta this PAX panel. Now would be a VERY good time to hear some really awesome news, and see some really amazing footage. The competition exists and its becoming more real.
P.S. Also, a different type of MMO ballgame, but I heard that Ashes of Creation was accepted very, very well at PAX and that the combat was very interactive. The footage I saw looked like a bit too much of slamming on meatbags, but alas I did not play it myself... But that's another contender with a very successful Kickstarter expecting a beta in the same timeline.
Since it would literally take "magic" to do what I was suggesting then obviously the same "magic" would make all the Devs involved perfectly integrated into the single mega-game organization so that everyone would be working at full capacity and there would no longer be any wasted effort between them. Magic is funny that way. ;)
Obviously if such a merger were to actually happen without the aid of magic there would likely be some redundant engineering/management positions. But remember such a merger would likely only take place in the first place if there was some pretty sharp management going on to do their best to integrate the various Devs together into cohesive new groups.
Bottomline the projects would likely only choose to merge if they could virtually guarantee the move would increase their overall productivity. I suppose if they couldn't figure out how to gain any production advantages from joining up they could simply continue with the current status quo of three roughly identical games all competing for a relatively small player base. I guess we're going to see how that turns out...
CoH player from April 25, 2004 to November 30, 2012
[IMG=400x225]https://i.imgur.com/NHUthWM.jpeg[/IMG]
I hope the 3 projects can remain friendly competitors. I like that paradigm far better than any of the ideas of merging or world interaction. Though I wish them well, I don't like the concepts behind the other 2 games, and I would not be happy if I were forced to play one of them to have the full spiritual successor experience instead of getting the whole thing from CoT. When the X-Men comics started to do so many crossovers that I was forced to buy titles I thought were really substandard just to continue the story, I stopped buying comics altogether.
Now had the successor projects never split and instead had been a single vision from the start - that I would have supported. (Well, as long as that vision had been CoT.) But at this point for them to do any more than co-promote or share some minor assets (where possible) seems to me to have the potential to do far more harm than good.
Spurn all ye kindle.
Getting back to the theory that the only way these successor projects would ever likely merge would be "via magic" I would naturally (being pro-CoT) assume that the other two projects would essentially abandon their ill-fated efforts and "bend the knee" to their MWM overlords. Frankly to this day I still think the SoH idea (of a superhero city in space) is a little too "convoluted" and VO has simply never impressed me compared to CoT.
No, my idea for a perfect merger would simply involve all the manpower I now see being "wasted" on those other two projects being applied to the only one of the three that's likely going to succeed in the long run. Yes I know that makes me totally biased towards CoT but who cares... I am posting this on the CoT forums after all.
It's funny but this whole idea of whether or not the various projects can continue to be friendly and/or even potentially share any resources at this point reminds me of the classic comedy movie "It's a Mad, Mad, Mad, Mad World".
Now for you millennials out there who were born -after- movies used to be good this movie (set in the 1960s) was about a bunch of random people on a highway who learn of a secret buried treasure from this guy who dies after crashing his car. At first (just like the CoH successor projects) all the people who hear of the treasure start off trying to be "civilized and fair" about it (i.e. trying to negotiate "equal shares" among everyone). But after just a few short minutes everyone starts to realize no one was going to stick to any rules and it was just going to be everyone-against-everyone in a race to get to the treasure first.
I literally think we're getting to that tipping point where the projects realize it's basically "every man for himself" and drop this strangely unnatural pretense of being "all for one and one for all". I don't think the projects will get completely nasty towards each other overnight, but likewise they'll eventually need to drop the warm fuzzy "kumbayas" and just treat each other as the natural competitors they are.
CoH player from April 25, 2004 to November 30, 2012
[IMG=400x225]https://i.imgur.com/NHUthWM.jpeg[/IMG]
I'm not sure if this was an *official* announcement, because I have heard this mentioned before earlier in the year in random youtube comments, which I then had confirmed by Doc here on the forum, but he did say that they are shooting for pre-alpha by the end of the year, maybe full alpha depending on how well they can integrate stuff. So count on playing the game in the very near future, if things stay on schedule. Fingers crossed.
On Ashes of Creation, yea, I saw that too, and it looks really amazing. The scale and vision of what they want to do is impressive. It definitely has a very nice look to the gameplay, and I like the unique different types of pvp that they have come up with. Definitely one to keep an eye on for sure.
The analogy to It's A Mad Mad Mad Mad World is not completely appropriate, because in that movie there was one finite amount of money, it was all in one place, in a state that made it completely portable, and the person who got there first could definitely make off with all of it, presumably.
First, there is already quite a bit of serious, entrenched competition among the big game and comicbook companies who are in the MMO market ALREADY and have been for years. Theoretically, DCUO, CO and Marvel Online Omega have already "gotten there first" on us, yet we're still making a game. That is your real competition, if you ask me, and I'm not sacred of it. So in the MMO market, getting there first is, to me, pointless. There are already zillions of games and they come out with more like every day. So you've already NOT "gotten there first" unless your game is called Ultima Online, maybe.
Secondly, people try a game, then drop it, then maybe come back to it later. If you can generate enough interest to get them to try YOUR game, then you at least get the up-front purchase, which for some people is the only money they're ever going to give you. Beyond that, it's all about quality.
Third, there is not a finite, unchanging amount of MMO players, at least not in terms of how people act. Some people can and will buy multiple games. Some people will like one game more than the other, based on any number of different aspects of the game, which might be very minor things to us but might be a huge sticking point for some people. Some people who are currently playing other games and are tired of them will try one or more of these games for a change of scenery.
If you ask me, the take away message here should be to make a GOOD game, even if that takes longer, to try to make it really enjoyable for new players coming in, and to advertise it as best you can. The word of mouth generated by players who genuinely like (dare I say LOVE) your game is what will make you successful. I don't think you become a successful game by getting there first (or, for that matter, by making your game cheaper and less expensive than the other guy, not that anyone has said that). Those are sound marketing strategies in some markets, but not this one. Gamers who actually have the ability to spend money just want a GOOD game that's enjoyable and don't want to be made to feel like they're being cheated or ripped off.
The only urgency in rolling a game out sooner is the burn rate of your invested capital. A second chance for donations ought to make that problem evaporate if it ever was one, from what Doc T had said.
R.S.O. of Phoenix Rising
Realize, beyond this panel, I spent the past 7 days hanging out with other game developers. You know what? Nobody there was competitive. Guys from Defiance were hanging out with folk from Ashes of Creation. Wound up having lunch with guys who worked on DC Universe Online and Wildstar. And everyone was encouraging CoT.
Technical Director
Read enough Facebook and you have to make Sanity Checks. I guess FB is the Great Old One of the interent these days... - Beamrider
Goood luck peoples! :)
Long life for CoT! ;)
[img]http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v367/erishk/zuera/ca_logo/ca_coh_logomenor.jpg[/img]
Obviously my reference to "It's a Mad Mad Mad Mad World" was only related to the relationship the successor projects have to each other regardless of any other game. They started out all "nice and friendly" with each other but in the long run their only real competition is going to be with each other and I sincerely believe in the end there will be "only one" to use another theatrical reference.
I think we've talked in the past about whether the existing superhero games (i.e. DCUO) are ever going to be in "direct competition" to any of the successor projects and I've already discounted that potential relationship because clearly NONE of the current games serve the need the successor projects will provide. Think about it: If a game like CO was already providing the specific need for a true "spiritual successor" to CoH then why would MWM and the others be busy making their own games to fill that need? I realize it "looks" like CoT is going need to go "head-to-head" against games like CO or DCUO (because they are all "superhero" related) but in reality they are going to live on two completely different planes of existence.
It'll be interesting to talk about this again when one of the successor projects manages to launch, especially if that one remains the "only one" of the projects on the market for a significant period of time. There's a key reason why Magic the Gathering is still around when dozens of other (arguably better) card games have come and gone - MtG was pretty much the FIRST collectible card game to hit it big. Being "first" meant pretty much everything to it.
CoH player from April 25, 2004 to November 30, 2012
[IMG=400x225]https://i.imgur.com/NHUthWM.jpeg[/IMG]
No one said you couldn't be friends with the Devs of these other games. And of course guys from DCUO and/or Wildstar can easily wish CoT well because they know (as I just pointed out in my last post) you guys are never going to be "competing" for the exact same segment of the overall MMO playerbase. It's like a football player wishing a basketball player well - why wouldn't they be friendly?
One more time I think it's grand you've been able to maintain a cordial relationship with the other successor projects. I just seriously don't want you to keep thinking that when the "rubber meets the road" you guys -aren't- going to be vying for the same group of people to be your solid long term playerbase. There might be a small handful of future players who'll be egalitarian enough to play (and pay for) all the project games but the VAST, VAST majority can/will not do that for all sorts of reasons. Once again call me extremely biased if you must but I'd much prefer it if CoT had the lion-share of the potential future playerbase of -any- of these games.
CoH player from April 25, 2004 to November 30, 2012
[IMG=400x225]https://i.imgur.com/NHUthWM.jpeg[/IMG]
There are countless similar examples on this point. However, I think this only applies to those who truly "hit it big". It is unlikely that any of these games will ever reach the size of WoW or even CoH, and I know some of them are building their business model around that fact. I don't know if this is true for CoT.
I don't think anyone assumes that there is going to be some hostility or non-friendly attitudes between these projects eventually. I hope things can stay courteous and collaborative through the lifespan of all of these games. What seems to be missed in this discussion is that even if it is friendly competition, that does not negate the competition part of the equation. There is a real competition for a finite amount of players, which equates to the financial sustainability of the game. Unless you plan to do this for free, or at your own expense, then you are competing. This is why people kind of scratch their heads when you say you aren't.
Oh, certainly there is friendly competition, even with much bigger games. Someone comes up with a better idea, it's the nature of the industry for it to be studied and redone over, and over, and over again. What we don't want to see is for anyone to fail, because that hurts the players most of all.
Technical Director
Read enough Facebook and you have to make Sanity Checks. I guess FB is the Great Old One of the interent these days... - Beamrider
I'm not implying (like everyone seems to like to do with every brand new MMO) that any of the successor projects will be the "next WoW-killer". But I will gladly imply that among the small pool of CoH successor games "being first among equals" will be better for whichever game is "first" than it will be for any of the others. None of these frogs will likely ever make it to the "big pond" but being the biggest frog in a small pond is worth the effort.
Exactly. Again I get that folks like Dr. Tyche seem to be bending over backwards to paint a rosy picture of "complete friendliness and cooperation" among the successor projects. I'm just worried at some point he's going to brake his back trying TOO HARD to maintain a reality that's simply not going to exist once any of these projects make it to launch day.
CoH player from April 25, 2004 to November 30, 2012
[IMG=400x225]https://i.imgur.com/NHUthWM.jpeg[/IMG]
Magic: the Gathering wasn't just first, it was the ONLY game if it's kind for a long time, and it caught on like wild fire in the beginning to the point where they couldn't keep up with demand. That's a quite different thing than being the latest and greatest MMO to roll out recently, and clearly that ship has sailed even on the Superhero MMO concept, as CoX was the first. Also, Pokemon and Yu-Gi-Oh were not what I'd call unsuccessful. I mean, M:tG is the only CCG game I'VE played, but then on the other hand 1) I'm not from east Asia where those other games are generally more popular, as I understand it, and 2) M:tG never had it's own cartoon show on this continent or off of it. Also, I remember a store owner once telling me at the height of the Pokemaon craze: "I've never once sold a Magic card to a person who didn't already know it was a game. People come in to buy Pokemon cards having no idea what they're asking for. It's like a flat Beanie Baby."
If any one of the three successor projects ends up being "the one that succeeds" while the others fail, that won't happen because the "good one" got there before the other two, I predict. It will happen, in this case, because it was the one that appealed to gamers the most. And there's no guarantee that there will be exactly one "winner" anyway. For years now there have been Coke, Pepsi, and other brands. For years now there have been McDonalds, Burger King, and other places, etc. That hasn't stopped new brands from dipping their toes in those markets.
R.S.O. of Phoenix Rising
The thing that's going to "benefit" the potential future players of any of these successor projects is -not- that ALL the projects end up lingering on with some kind of acceptable degree of mediocrity. The best "benefit" will come from having AT LEAST ONE of these games surviving for an extended period of time. Now if that goal can eventually be accomplished while still having all/most of the projects surviving then that'd be great. But to accomplish the goal of having a "viable CoH successor" on the market only ONE of these games needs to survive. Even "benign/friendly" competition will inevitably promote one of these games into becoming generally "better" than the rest in the eyes of the overall playerbase.
The goal from the player's perspective is to have a functional long-lasting CoH successor. If that can best be accomplished with only ONE game on the market then that's the way it'll be.
CoH player from April 25, 2004 to November 30, 2012
[IMG=400x225]https://i.imgur.com/NHUthWM.jpeg[/IMG]
My take on the successor projects is that each of them is sufficiently Different, that the game's Devs might have an idea or a piece of tech which would not work well in their own game, but could boost another. Friendly rivals can help push each other to greater success. I look at the relationship between 'competing' game Devs and see Opportunities for advancement, not a flaming battlefield of destroyed dreams.
I wish other posters on these forums could always find the positive things, rather than getting caught up in negativity.
Be Well!
Fireheart
You keep lumping the successor projects into the same bin as "just the next MMO to be released". The successor projects are only going to be "competing" with each other - if you seriously want to compare how CoT might stack up against DCUO or CO you're going to be sorely upset for a very long time.
I didn't say MtG was the ONLY successful collectible card game still around. But I did point out it continues to greatly benefit from being first. I've recently been to several Japanese collectible card stores (I was just in Akihabara about 10 days ago) and while Pokemon and Yu-Gi-Oh are still big there MtG (and its dozens of follow-on expansions) continues to dominate the majority of the available floor space in these stores.
It's true that the "best" game might do the "best" in the long run. But if the "first" game is out like a year or two before any of the others it may take a very long time before the "best" game supersedes it (assuming the "first" is not also the "best" game). And yes there's no guarantee there will be only one "winner" in the end. But let's just say it'd foolish not to bet that one of these games is likely going to end up doing much, much better than the others. The pretense that these games will be able to cleanly slice the playerbase into exact thirds and have it stay that way would be the very definition of a miracle.
Right because the "playerbase" (a.k.a. customer base) for these products are HUGE and easily big enough to support all these brands simultaneously. I hate to be the bearer of bad news but I'd frankly be amazed if there were enough players of ALL the successor projects to keep them ALL in the black for more than a few years tops.
CoH player from April 25, 2004 to November 30, 2012
[IMG=400x225]https://i.imgur.com/NHUthWM.jpeg[/IMG]
I wish other posters on these forums could always find the reality of the way things are instead of thinking that the "very special snowflake" relationship the successor projects have shared thus far will last forever. *shrugs*
For your sake maybe each successor project will be "different enough" from each other to find enough of a playerbase to keep them all treading water as long as possible. I simply see one strong game being better in the long run than a handful of runts.
CoH player from April 25, 2004 to November 30, 2012
[IMG=400x225]https://i.imgur.com/NHUthWM.jpeg[/IMG]
Quite true, the developers aren't competitive - they may end up working with the lead designer of their product's primary rival in less than a year on an entirely new project, for example. It's the business departments that tend to lean towards that manner of thinking. I think we all know that game development is actually non-zero sum - once a major technical problem is solved by one company, they're quite likely to make it available to everyone for a reasonable fee. Cooperation works far better than serious competition in such a dynamic.
The way I see the industry, the rivalries are more like those between Scottish/Irish Clans, not Feudal Lords. You come to a fight, end up destroying the pub, and then spend the next few weeks having the greatest time rebuilding it together. :)
It is only when we stand up, with all our failings and sufferings, and try to support others rather than withdraw into ourselves, that we can fully live the life of community.
[color=#ff0000]Business Director[/color]
Sorrry, Lothic, I reject your 'reality' in favor of my own. I simply don't see the matter in the way that you describe in your posts.
I do agree with the hope that 'one true game' can come out of the current jumble. Personally, I have many years invested in CoT and there are elements of both SoH and VO which don't match my ideas of a 'good game'. A single game that was as strong as CoH would be much better than the 'three runts' you mentioned. So far, I am seeing the game I want in CoT.
But I don't see that any judgements can be made, until the games actually Launch. In the meantime, I prefer a brighter, more positive environment and the unremittingly negative outlook of some of the posters on these forums makes things uncomfortable.
Be Well!
Fireheart
I remember a story Stan Lee told once.
Stan Lee was friendly with many of the DC artists and writers and they would regularly have lunch or drinks together. One time the DC guys let slip that they were trying to figure out why Marvel was selling better than DC. They had come to the conclusion it was because of the covers. So DC would copy aspects of Marvel covers, things like colors, poses, fonts and so forth. Stan Lee would then go back and change those aspects for the next issue and Marvel would do just fine. This went on for a fairly long while and became a kind of friendly ribbing that Lee would do to his friends in a rival company.
In the end, it turned out that Marvel was not selling significantly better than DC. I can't remember which video Stan Lee talks about this but this one kinda goes into it.
[youtube]sixiKdwwpRQ[/youtube]
Marvel and DC were friendly but they never forgot they were competitors.
I hope this is the kind of attitude all three games developers will have, friendly but competitive.
The Superhero MMO market is what it is. It's not like everyone's only choices are CoT, SoH or Valiance. They can also decide to play Destiny 2, Guild Wars 2, DCUO, etc. You could, in theory, win all the awards for "Best CoX Successor Project" by a landslide and still have a game that almost nobody plays or has heard about except the handful of people on this forum. I wouldn't call that "winning" nor would I make it a goal, just to beat out the other two games. If the other two games collapse completely are we going to start high-fiving each other and declare victory before a game is even published? No. I want a game to play and I want it to be a lot of fun. That's my end game here. Not just beating out two other projects and ignoring everything else. That's not what I signed up for when I donated to the Kickstarter. I want a good, fun game to play for years to come, not just some terrible waste of time that's bad but still better than the other two awful entries into the "competition" because it was released first of those three games.
That said, I don't think it's fair to judge CoT by the sort of scale and numbers that DC and Marvel can generate just from comics and movies and the fact that they have such well-enfranchised fans already. So am I going to call CoT a failure if it doesn't do better numbers than DCUO, no, but I'm going to hope it ends up being a game _I_ want to play and I would expect others to feel the same.
R.S.O. of Phoenix Rising
That is rather how things have gone already. For example, in an off handed comment, Casey once mentioned how CoT had shown spandex patterns, and not clothing on people. So, we decided on having a bit of fun at that comment, and added funny hats to our pre-alpha build.
Technical Director
Read enough Facebook and you have to make Sanity Checks. I guess FB is the Great Old One of the interent these days... - Beamrider
I think I get it now.
The devs of each game are like children playing with each other at the beach, building sand castles and sharing their tools, and marketing is like the parents watching from afar and making little comments about which child is better.
-----------
[color=#FF0000]Graphic Designer[/color]
That's good to hear and generally what I expected. Even in the stream that kind of attitude was apparent.
I would like to say that I think you guys should either enlist or appoint a dev to handle all updates. Preferably someone who has studied or worked in that area.
In the stream you mentioned that you have a lot of information you would like to release but because everyone is busy developing the game the actual writing of the updates takes a back seat. It's commendable that you have a heavy focus on development but it is my belief that those updates are important as well. You seem to agree with this as your tone when talking about this indicated that you regret not being able to release this information better.
This isn't about just us getting the information, it's also about stopping confusion, assumptions and general hostility before it happens. There are so many different views on what this game will offer, how far along you are, monetary needs and so on among the people following the development that it has created a slightly contentious environment in the forums. If you had one person who was in charge of all information releases, including responding to questions on the forums, it would go a long way to quelling things.
One professional quality voice giving out information offers consistency. That one voice would still allow for individual developers to speak to the audience but instead of an unprepared comment which has a greater possibility of confusion it would have gone through this 'communications' person and be filtered into a more informative statement. You can save the fun dev interactions for things like Pax or through the twitch streams.
Just my thoughts on the topic.
If you know anyone, have a volunteer recruiter waiting.
Technical Director
Read enough Facebook and you have to make Sanity Checks. I guess FB is the Great Old One of the interent these days... - Beamrider
That doesn't seem like someone you should just passively wait to fall into your lap and volunteer themselves. Just saying...
That is the only way we can. We do not have the time to seek someone out, for if we did, we'd have someone who has enough time to do it in the first place.
Technical Director
Read enough Facebook and you have to make Sanity Checks. I guess FB is the Great Old One of the interent these days... - Beamrider
It would take only slightly more time than it took you to write that comment as it would take to write a Facebook post, or an additional forum post of it's own. I mean, I can write 'em for you if you want, and you can just click the share button. Honestly, the commitment of 30 minutes to make a blast to the internet on various mediums, once every couple weeks seeking someone to handle your promo and improve communication, in order to eliminate confusion and frustration in your supporters, seems like a worthwhile investment of time. If it means we can actually see what you are pouring all your time into, don't you think that would be worth it?
I mean, honestly, do you think you can go on forever without a real dedicated media person? As I've said previously, with all due respect for the hard work you are doing, I think you massively underestimate the importance of PR.
Its frustrating that I don't have the skills that you are looking for otherwise I would be more than happy to help out. If was a modeler or whatever else you need, I would drop everything and volunteer all my time and effort into this game!
BUt having someone doing this kind of scouting would be ideal. They could look up peoples work on deviant art or youtube and reach out to them. Explain what they would be getting into in terms of purely volunteering and the potential of being hired full time. You should definitely look into that.
-----------
[color=#FF0000]Graphic Designer[/color]
Honestly, you don't need a skilled artist. All you need is someone who can take the message of where the project is, what milestones were reached over the last month, and the ability to upload screenshots or videos to a Facebook page. In this day and age, that's a really low bar of talent.
I also want to point out, in the nicest way possible, that you have the time to make funny hats for the game, but no time to make a post expressing interest in a media person? Seems like a bit of misplaced priorities, but what do I know. ????
We have a PR group, who handle our social media and moderate the forums here. But that's not what is being discussed. What is being discussed is someone who is intimate with the various parts of the game, with the time to dedicate to producing updates and PR material based on those parts.
Technical Director
Read enough Facebook and you have to make Sanity Checks. I guess FB is the Great Old One of the interent these days... - Beamrider
So then you don't need to hire anyone, you need someone involved already to take a more active role in posting updates. Even if you post a weekly screenshot without any commentary, it would be light years better than what is being done now. I know it's all a work in progress, but so does everyone else. I really think if you open up and share your work, as primordial as it may be at this stage, I and many like me would turn from whining to hyping. Screen caps, short gifs, or any other real images from the game on the regular. Short paragraphs of what you worked on this week. Stuff like that. I know it sounds arbitrary, but I am telling you, it is something I know many would appreciate greatly.
It would have to be someone who has already been working on the game, or maybe even a forum user. There are tons of users here that have been here since the beginning and understand a lot of the development and some are exceptional at expressing themselves. If you want someone that has to be intimate with the game, they need to start now.
-----------
[color=#FF0000]Graphic Designer[/color]
If it's so easy, perhaps you should volunteer. Point being, they'd need someone who wasn't already up to their nipples in alligators. I suspect everyone on the team already has no time to spare for such things.
Be Well!
Fireheart
I honestly considered volunteering. I have experience running a business social media page. But I also only came about this game within the last year, and am not very knowledgeable about it overall. I know what I see from their media presence as it is, which is very little. It seems like I don't understand what it is exactly they are looking for, because when I mentioned my level of skill set (making posts, putting up images), doc said they needed something more than that. So I dunno.
As a Kickstarter supporter, and regular on this site, I've been following everything they release about the game. For a long time It was like twice a month they'd release some new thing about the game. A lot of that was lore, and a lot of people didn't care, but they ARE and HAVE BEEN releasing stuff to keep us in the loop. And not just a still shot once in a while. Now we're up to a full hour of video or so every Friday on Twitch. I don't think having a dedicated czar of public relations is going to improve the quantity of the updates at this point, honestly. I suppose it might free up some dev time that could be spent doing dev stuff instead of public outreach maybe. It might be nice for us fans if there were a single contact person (preferably a charismatic energetic communications pro who knows how to act, emote, make good videos, edit, light, direct, etc for advertising type stuff) from whom we get all of our new info, but the only value added would be that the videos would maybe be a little more well-produced, e.g. fewer barking dogs, less coughing into microphones, etc by virtue of some person with some level of authority being the cinematic director of that stuff.
R.S.O. of Phoenix Rising
Except sometimes it's an hour of just coding clicky cape, and sometimes it's just an hour long screenshot of the costume creator in which nothing actually happens. Which is not very interesting to me or many other people I would imagine...You're right though, the twitch is great, and I wish they would do them more regularly and in a more focused and presentable manner, showing more of the actual game in action. From what I am seeing, they only did one stream in the month of August.
I agree with this. Even if it was one well produced video a month, a highlight reel of the development progress, voiced over, that would be great, and really not too hard to do. It doesn't take an expert to edit video shots together and voice it over. I'm not asking for AAA level promo here, I'm just asking for a basic level of regular and open updates on the project. Some of the updates have been great, like the bank map stream. Others, like the clicky cape coding, yea, not so much.
Actually, now that I think of it, you had a bunch of those clip videos from earlier in the year. Those were sweet. Do more of those!!!
I'd like to comment one final time on the competition thing because I think it's an important point. The reality (thankfully) is the market is going to decide this period. It is going to have very little to do with how good of friends the devs are or how much they did or didn't cooperate. It will have everything to do with who ends up making, marketing, and supporting a better product and on timing.
Look, I didn't make up the KS results. People voted with their wallets. And you know what? They will again. Now you can speculate about how or why that happened (MWM was lucky for being first, people soured on KS in general, etc.). There are probably as many different reasons as there are KS contributors. But somebody made out very well and two other somebodies didn't.
Now given this, if I led MWM, my first inclination would NOT be "We need to put all the CoH successors in the public eye so the world can see we are not competitors (?????)". Let's not kid ourselves about who was the driving force behind this panel in the first place. There was no public outcry for this to happen at PAX West 2017 as the overall attendance to this panel in a sold out venue clearly reflects.
MWM is a chameleon that constantly sends out mixed and often conflicting signals. It drives me nuts. They are a corporation. They are the anti corporation. They are volunteers. They have enough resources. They don't have enough resources. They are making a game for profit. They are the advocates for anyone who "carries the torch" for CoH. They are players. They are developers. The answer changes depending on who asks the question and when. Sooner or later this type of thinking results in a lack of focus and difficulty in achieving measurable goals on time. It may be a good thing for not limiting the creativity to come up with the "great idea"... not so much for making that idea a reality.
I get criticized all the time for not being positive. So let me put it another way. Hey, MWM! Even though I am not a torch carrying kinda guy, you had me heart and soul at Kickstarter. I am positive that if you make the game you say you going to make it will be a success and you will have many happy players. As to the other games... well I am sorry but I pretty much don't care how they turn out. Please don't hate me for that. It does bother me some when others emphasize professional development and hitting milestones. But, I am not anti anybody else. I am super pro you. Go CoT go!
I don't see MWM as putting 'all the successors in the public eye'. VO and SoH seem to be managing that just fine for themselves. However, if there's a big event like PAX and a presentation about the successors, then it absolutely behooves MWM to get involved. Also, to share the results. As far as I can tell, MWM is the only one with the video.
Be Well!
Fireheart
?
Ship of Heroes made a trailer full of flashy-fun things [i]just[/i] for PAX:
https://www.shipofheroes.com/pax-west-trailer/
And while I (personally) think most of it looks like placeholder crud, it's still a pretty impressive pre-alpha demo all things considered; and unless I missed it I don't think MWM had some comparable? If they did please link it! I would be very excited to see something like that!
Nate said specifically he sacrificed the ability to show a video for the sake of streaming. Not sure why exactly it had to be either or. SoH was able to take video of the panel for later production and voice over, which they are going to be releasing this week, as well as showing a video AND slideshow. From a purely visual perspective, SoH stole the show.
Regarding placeholder crud, for a game less than 2 years in development, it was hella impressive. Placeholder crud is better than just words.
Not trying to knock Ship of Heroes, really, I am happy to see a superhero MMO in motion with gameplay. I just think there is a lot of room for improvement.
I completely agree.
Tyche specifically said that they have a lot of information they want to release but just don't have the time because they are focusing on development.
It's also not so much about quantity as it is about consistency. Having one person in charge of updates means the information is consistent in it's presentation, including the inevitable follow up questions forumites have when an update is released.
Eh, I'm not really that impressed with SoH PAX demo... I mean, the smooth operator video, showed off way more than that what with the character actually being able to move while he was using his powers, and also the fact of aesthetic decoupling being a thing. I like the things promised in CoT more than I like the things promised SoH, if people like the things promised in ship of heroes, well then to each their own...
not my video just one I lke ===> https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=U6-SdIN0hsM
[CENTER][URL=http://www.nodiatis.com/personality.htm][IMG]http://www.nodiatis.com/pub/24.jpg[/IMG][/URL][/CENTER]
I think the conversation at hand here has focused less on the content, and more on the promise itself. Promises are words and faith is the belief in said words.
From what I have been reading these last several posts, a lot of the concerns is in consistently with showing off those promises. More of a [url=https://media.giphy.com/media/26DOs997h6fgsCthu/giphy.gif]show me what you got[/url] situation.
I am not trying to be negative but I am trying to be realistic. I do have immense faith in MWM or I would not be here anymore. I just really, truly feel like with all else that's going on, it's definitely time to start [i]really[/i] showing off the game they've worked so hard on for years.
The reason I'm big on SoH has less to do with what they show in their videos (although for the short time they've been around, I do find it impressive), but more to do with what I will term "shit-togetherness". They have a schedule made publicly available, and they stick to it rigidly, releasing their progress clearly and consistently as they go. They have a dedicated media person who runs their Facebook page, posting images, gifs, and videos every week, and responding to comments and questions. The fact that they have a fully designed main map is certainly helpful, but even if they didn't, their approach to communicating their progress is the one thing that leaves me impressed and always anticipating what they are going to show, no matter how small the update is.
Which is not to say I'm not a huge fan of CoT. I am all in on the vision, and what has been shown so far is so impressive, I believe you can pull it off. But to a more casual observer, who has to dig for info, and who sees spotty and inconsistent updates and messaging, repeated delays, and confusing priorities (as much as I was entertained by the dancing power set, and funny hats, is that really where the supposedly limited time should be going?), it is easy to understand why there are many skeptics.
Pages