Bradik_Losdar
04-30-2009, 02:31 PM
Okay, honestly why all the secrecy?
How, in anyway, can the subjects hiding under V&M and SS be so sensitive that even mentioning them will give Turbine's competitors so much of an upper hand it will drive Turbine completely out of business?
I mean really, that's the way sounds.
Just for example, let's say Super Secret refers to DDO being ported to work on consoles. Big deal. How is releasing info like this going to impact Turbine in a negative way? It's already in the works. Cryptic, Blizzard, etc. probably already have similar programs (the MMO world is very small and even with NDAs ideas get around). So impact on Turbine's bottom line...nil.
The same could be said of just about ANY subject Super Secret or Vast and Mysterious would cover.
I remember a little while ago, a popular morning talkshow on TV had a big announcement that they were going to make, something that would be a huge positive change to the show. They hyped it for a full week. Finally on Friday after all the build up during the previous five days...in the last two minutes of the show the secret was revealed. Amid a drop of some cheap confetti on the hosts, the producer announced the show would now be broadcast in HD!!! Umm...woo hoo?
And I have a feeling the V&M/SS announcement is going to be similar in DDO.
All this secrecy does is alienate the very folks who want to see DDO be a huge success. I am reminded of a major disaster in the MMO industry due to secrecy - - Star Wars Galaxies. Everyone I'm sure at this point knows that some time ago the producer at SWG was secretly building two games simultanously while the player base was crying out for more content. The first game was the "Combat Upgrade" and was a modest change to the way the game was played. People were used to the old combat system and the changes were some what frowned on, but more importantly the player base was upset that development time had been taken away from introducing more content into the game. Then the atom bomb dropped...very shortly after the 'CU' was implemented, the "New Game Experience" - the second game secretly being developed - was pushed to the live servers. It was a HUGE change in character classes, game mechanics, etc. It was completely uncalled for, absolutely nothing existing player base had asked for, and a PR nightmare. Players went berserk with rage - nearly all the develpment time they had been asking for to add content to game had been used to build not one, but two separate new games in secret. The NGE not only didn't pull in a huge new group of players, it actually drove off a large chunk of existing players fed up with a developer (Sony) who had kept them in the dark.
I hate to say it, but the amount of time its taking to get Mod 9 out, sadly is mirroring the circumstances surrounding SWG's NGE debacle. So please Turbine listen to your player base, don't make Sony's mistake. Start comunicating with us, almost any information released regarding DDO is not going to hurt your business model - and in fact, just might save it. Give some idea of what is coming so we can either help hype it through word of mouth (like say, player content is coming near the end of the year) or give you a heads up of impending diaster (DDO is being recoded to exactly mimic the World of Warcraft click and wait combat system).
We know things change in development, but if you keep an open line of communication, people will understand.
How, in anyway, can the subjects hiding under V&M and SS be so sensitive that even mentioning them will give Turbine's competitors so much of an upper hand it will drive Turbine completely out of business?
I mean really, that's the way sounds.
Just for example, let's say Super Secret refers to DDO being ported to work on consoles. Big deal. How is releasing info like this going to impact Turbine in a negative way? It's already in the works. Cryptic, Blizzard, etc. probably already have similar programs (the MMO world is very small and even with NDAs ideas get around). So impact on Turbine's bottom line...nil.
The same could be said of just about ANY subject Super Secret or Vast and Mysterious would cover.
I remember a little while ago, a popular morning talkshow on TV had a big announcement that they were going to make, something that would be a huge positive change to the show. They hyped it for a full week. Finally on Friday after all the build up during the previous five days...in the last two minutes of the show the secret was revealed. Amid a drop of some cheap confetti on the hosts, the producer announced the show would now be broadcast in HD!!! Umm...woo hoo?
And I have a feeling the V&M/SS announcement is going to be similar in DDO.
All this secrecy does is alienate the very folks who want to see DDO be a huge success. I am reminded of a major disaster in the MMO industry due to secrecy - - Star Wars Galaxies. Everyone I'm sure at this point knows that some time ago the producer at SWG was secretly building two games simultanously while the player base was crying out for more content. The first game was the "Combat Upgrade" and was a modest change to the way the game was played. People were used to the old combat system and the changes were some what frowned on, but more importantly the player base was upset that development time had been taken away from introducing more content into the game. Then the atom bomb dropped...very shortly after the 'CU' was implemented, the "New Game Experience" - the second game secretly being developed - was pushed to the live servers. It was a HUGE change in character classes, game mechanics, etc. It was completely uncalled for, absolutely nothing existing player base had asked for, and a PR nightmare. Players went berserk with rage - nearly all the develpment time they had been asking for to add content to game had been used to build not one, but two separate new games in secret. The NGE not only didn't pull in a huge new group of players, it actually drove off a large chunk of existing players fed up with a developer (Sony) who had kept them in the dark.
I hate to say it, but the amount of time its taking to get Mod 9 out, sadly is mirroring the circumstances surrounding SWG's NGE debacle. So please Turbine listen to your player base, don't make Sony's mistake. Start comunicating with us, almost any information released regarding DDO is not going to hurt your business model - and in fact, just might save it. Give some idea of what is coming so we can either help hype it through word of mouth (like say, player content is coming near the end of the year) or give you a heads up of impending diaster (DDO is being recoded to exactly mimic the World of Warcraft click and wait combat system).
We know things change in development, but if you keep an open line of communication, people will understand.