They did make A LOT of sales from pre-orders and word of mouth from weeks before and after HoS went gold. Do you think they care now that they have made their money?
Feed back from TWI. How do you feel?
- Thread starter shadowmoses
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They did make A LOT of sales from pre-orders and word of mouth from weeks before and after HoS went gold. Do you think they care now that they have made their money?
Of course they do. Since Tripwire is a small studio, how well each of their games does after release is quite important from a business perspective. In addition to trying to pull in new players, the company can point to a high player base and give a favorable impression of itself to potential investors (private, as Tripwire is not publicly traded yet), potential job-seekers, and gaming-related media. A popular, well-constructed game will attract new talent and attention to the company. Less importantly, fixing things ensures that existing fans will stick around to buy more of Tripwire's games. Thus, as far as the future goes, RO2's continued success is quite important to making MORE money.
I'd say somewhere between adequate and sub-par. And only 'adequate' is not exactly complimentary in my opinion.
I agree that they misread their core audience, which in itself is mind blowing. To take the #1 thing you have going for you, ignore it and go off in a fairly different direction will never make sense to me.
I play it, but not a lot. I like it, but not as much as I thought I would.
There is time to rescue this game, but it is running out. The next 3 months are absolutely critical and YES that means keeping us and others hooked with as much little bits of info as they can get. You can't tell me it takes THAT much time to create a dev.blog and feed us screen-shots of new maps and a paragraph or two about the progress being made.
You can see people drifting away night after night. It's never been an overly populated game, and for a fairly new game to be down to a handful of truly active servers should tell all of us what we need to either know or do.
I agree that they misread their core audience, which in itself is mind blowing. To take the #1 thing you have going for you, ignore it and go off in a fairly different direction will never make sense to me.
I play it, but not a lot. I like it, but not as much as I thought I would.
There is time to rescue this game, but it is running out. The next 3 months are absolutely critical and YES that means keeping us and others hooked with as much little bits of info as they can get. You can't tell me it takes THAT much time to create a dev.blog and feed us screen-shots of new maps and a paragraph or two about the progress being made.
You can see people drifting away night after night. It's never been an overly populated game, and for a fairly new game to be down to a handful of truly active servers should tell all of us what we need to either know or do.
This will be a little harsh at first, but stick with me. I think that TW thought us RO vets were in the minority because we told all of our friends to put down the money to per-order. We told them that it would be something unique, not Modern Call of Honor: Battle Duty 7. And to think people used to complain that there were too many WWII shooters.
Our friends take our word, they plop down their cash. What we get is a half baked MKb42 run and gun with some serious, god awful bugs and balance issues. No wonder our friends moved on to BF3 and MW3; at least they didn't have an identity crisis. But us RO fans stuck with it, if only because we love TW and know that they pour their hearts and souls into their games. That's why I think they had trouble coming to terms with the rapid drop off in players and the extreme negative backlash they got at launch. But eventually they accepted that the game has flaws and bad decisions had been made. We accepted this too, which is why we didn't ditch the game for the flavor of the week.
Let's jump ahead to now shall we? Once they worked out the really game breaking bugs and reduced the amount of assault class to something more reasonable it became obvious that the game isn't all bad. The movement is improved greatly, the guns handle better than ever and the animations are slick. There is a really great core game here that just needs tweaking so we have ourselves the proper realism mode we want. That's really all that any of us are asking for.
Since we started getting the weekly address from Yoshiro, communication has improved somewhat. Frequency is fine, a once a week post giving us a hey what's up is awesome. But these addresses haven't been that informative. I still don't feel like I know where the game is going into the future besides a vague notion that yes, there will be more realism changes implemented and the SDK will be out soon so that we can get some nice big custom maps into the rotation to supplement the good urban maps that TW has provided for us. Ogledow is an awesome start and really shows what the game could play like with big maps.
In summary, it isn't the frequency with which TW tells us what's up, it's that we need more concrete answers when information is given, not wishy washy "we're working on it" talk.
Our friends take our word, they plop down their cash. What we get is a half baked MKb42 run and gun with some serious, god awful bugs and balance issues. No wonder our friends moved on to BF3 and MW3; at least they didn't have an identity crisis. But us RO fans stuck with it, if only because we love TW and know that they pour their hearts and souls into their games. That's why I think they had trouble coming to terms with the rapid drop off in players and the extreme negative backlash they got at launch. But eventually they accepted that the game has flaws and bad decisions had been made. We accepted this too, which is why we didn't ditch the game for the flavor of the week.
Let's jump ahead to now shall we? Once they worked out the really game breaking bugs and reduced the amount of assault class to something more reasonable it became obvious that the game isn't all bad. The movement is improved greatly, the guns handle better than ever and the animations are slick. There is a really great core game here that just needs tweaking so we have ourselves the proper realism mode we want. That's really all that any of us are asking for.
Since we started getting the weekly address from Yoshiro, communication has improved somewhat. Frequency is fine, a once a week post giving us a hey what's up is awesome. But these addresses haven't been that informative. I still don't feel like I know where the game is going into the future besides a vague notion that yes, there will be more realism changes implemented and the SDK will be out soon so that we can get some nice big custom maps into the rotation to supplement the good urban maps that TW has provided for us. Ogledow is an awesome start and really shows what the game could play like with big maps.
In summary, it isn't the frequency with which TW tells us what's up, it's that we need more concrete answers when information is given, not wishy washy "we're working on it" talk.
I think you're over estimating them. TWI is a very small company and an independent developer. They fund and publish all their games themselves and don't have anywhere near the budgets of monolithic developers like EA or Ubisoft. As such, their reputation is a big selling point for their games. If they didn't support every game they make into the future, it would probably be the death of TWI. This is why we still get updates for killing floor over 2 years since its release; TWI will continue patching and supporting HOS for years.
I think the proof of company intent is in the product. In my opinion every gamebreak issue was dealt with in a time frame that was satisfactory. If you look at the volume of unsatisfied rhetoric that has appeared here since release, coupled with the realities of Tripwires staffing and budget, I'd say the progress has been good. Another thing folks don't look at is human behavior and the dangers of entertaining it in every case. If every significant demand or suggestion appearing here had to be responded to at some level by a paid Tripwire employee, they'd already be bankrupt.
Why are there 4 choices for gods sake.. Its a yes / no answer.. All you have done is diluted any meaningful ratio..
But don't forget that there have been many people, employees included, that have offered to create and maintain Dev Blogs on their own time but those ideas were seemingly shut down.
I don't want to talk to much about how the communication and interaction was just prior and post release, because i have nothing nice to say about it, and if i try i'll launch into a 5 page rant about everything that has transpired both on thease forums and elsewhere.
So let's just focus on what's going on now:
Well there's only one thing going on now, and that's Yoshiro's weekly addresses, which are a step in the right direction, absolutely.
Problem is, they read like form letters, they say a lot without actually saying anything conclusive, they are filled with words like "change is coming", and "we will look into this", but what does that really mean?
Well it means nothing, thease words are so vague and non-commital that the reader can read just about anything into them, or nothing at all.
Guys, where is this game headed? Because we still don't know, we know vague things like "bugs will be fixed", "the SDK is comming soon" and "realism mode and gameplay changes" because that won the poll by quite a margin, but what does that mean exactly? How much is TWI even willing to change the realism mode? Are we talking about minor tweaks of a few things, or are we looking at a major overhaul of the gameplay and mechanics, and if so, twords what endgoal?
And the list of things we don't know is quite extensive.. Will we ever be able to choose what unlocks we want to use? Is attaching/detaching bayonets even beeing considdered for implimentation? Will servers be permitted to select what weapons will be in play in a fully working manner? Is the realism mode intended to be part of the same progression system as the normal mode? And i could keep going for quite a while..
Now i know that as a developer you don't want to start promising features that you don't know if will pan out or not, that's perfectly understandable, and we don't need every little detail.
But we very much do need to know the big picture, where is all this headed? You say "changes", but to what? And how far are you even willing to go with them? What can we expect overall?
So let's just focus on what's going on now:
Well there's only one thing going on now, and that's Yoshiro's weekly addresses, which are a step in the right direction, absolutely.
Problem is, they read like form letters, they say a lot without actually saying anything conclusive, they are filled with words like "change is coming", and "we will look into this", but what does that really mean?
Well it means nothing, thease words are so vague and non-commital that the reader can read just about anything into them, or nothing at all.
Guys, where is this game headed? Because we still don't know, we know vague things like "bugs will be fixed", "the SDK is comming soon" and "realism mode and gameplay changes" because that won the poll by quite a margin, but what does that mean exactly? How much is TWI even willing to change the realism mode? Are we talking about minor tweaks of a few things, or are we looking at a major overhaul of the gameplay and mechanics, and if so, twords what endgoal?
And the list of things we don't know is quite extensive.. Will we ever be able to choose what unlocks we want to use? Is attaching/detaching bayonets even beeing considdered for implimentation? Will servers be permitted to select what weapons will be in play in a fully working manner? Is the realism mode intended to be part of the same progression system as the normal mode? And i could keep going for quite a while..
Now i know that as a developer you don't want to start promising features that you don't know if will pan out or not, that's perfectly understandable, and we don't need every little detail.
But we very much do need to know the big picture, where is all this headed? You say "changes", but to what? And how far are you even willing to go with them? What can we expect overall?
A lot of the features that the community are asking for is simply not techniqally hard to implement into the game. As I said before, its very logic: if one manage to develop a game like RO2 these features the community seems to be asking for is nothing. So the question isnt if its possible but rather if they want to do it.
When it comes to the sales of RO2 the game probably and mostly sold because of a) the title b) the marketing. Neither the marketing or the brands name felt right. Personally, I was dilusional enough to buy RO2 just because of the name. I watched and read interviews and that was about it. I did the same thing with OFP Dragon Rising. I jumped 10ft up in the air when I saw the name Operation Flashpoint.
Regarding the future, TWI do care about the current state of RO2. They must do so. They're an independent gaming company. No matter how much RO2 sold there is still a future ahead. RO2s reception, and how the player base is treated, will directly affect the sales of RO3. If you look at the peak of players in RO2 the first week its downfall pretty much points to that the small percent of the mainstream players that expected RO2 to be the next BF were turned of by the game. Its not hard to understand why. Because RO2 is far from being accessible and its simply to ragged and rough for most people to even be enjoyable. I don't expect many of them to put more faith into RO2 as a fullblown arcadegame, and I don't expect myself to buy any upcoming RO game unless I get what I want, because I want to spend time in the game, not waiting, writing, voting on this board forever hoping for something to change.
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So how about the future?
Well, its just a matter of decisions, nothing else. Not if its possible or not.
TWI are game developers. They have developed RO2. Its not logical in any sense that it isnt possible to remove the lockdowntimer, the upgrades, skillpoints, and implement features into the realism mode. Its a question if they want to do it or not.
When it comes to the sales of RO2 the game probably and mostly sold because of a) the title b) the marketing. Neither the marketing or the brands name felt right. Personally, I was dilusional enough to buy RO2 just because of the name. I watched and read interviews and that was about it. I did the same thing with OFP Dragon Rising. I jumped 10ft up in the air when I saw the name Operation Flashpoint.
Regarding the future, TWI do care about the current state of RO2. They must do so. They're an independent gaming company. No matter how much RO2 sold there is still a future ahead. RO2s reception, and how the player base is treated, will directly affect the sales of RO3. If you look at the peak of players in RO2 the first week its downfall pretty much points to that the small percent of the mainstream players that expected RO2 to be the next BF were turned of by the game. Its not hard to understand why. Because RO2 is far from being accessible and its simply to ragged and rough for most people to even be enjoyable. I don't expect many of them to put more faith into RO2 as a fullblown arcadegame, and I don't expect myself to buy any upcoming RO game unless I get what I want, because I want to spend time in the game, not waiting, writing, voting on this board forever hoping for something to change.
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So how about the future?
Well, its just a matter of decisions, nothing else. Not if its possible or not.
TWI are game developers. They have developed RO2. Its not logical in any sense that it isnt possible to remove the lockdowntimer, the upgrades, skillpoints, and implement features into the realism mode. Its a question if they want to do it or not.
I have noticed this as well....tid bits like yoshiro stating a few weeks before crissy... "we are testing a new map which those that played RO1 will enjoy"
But no time frame... and no map yet. (it gave the ompression when read in conjunction with the rest of his post that it seemed it could be around for Christmas.)
That poll was bull cr&p... cant beleive they even put that up.
This does not stack up. The online forum community is not the whole.
I am not even sure if the features being asked for are clearly defined.
What defined by you? I think TWI are the best to make the descions on what features should be added or removed....no one else....certainly don't what a game made by committee.
What does independant game company actually mean? It makes no diffrence.. they are more likely to dump supporting the game because they are a independant company....imagine if they where floated on the stock exchange and the exchange was waiting this release!!
I agree... been waiting 3 months for it to be fixed and some new content so i can start enjoying it... but i feel like all i am doing is waiting for the game.. it really is the only game im interested in yet i am still waiting for it even though i own it and can play it....
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These are your personal prefernences and do not neccesarily match others.
I like upgrades and the Lockdown timer and skill points... the features you want in Realism mode i am not sure...but i can only assume.
Most of things you want i dont want....only old RO1 players.
The online forum here demostrates the people who will play RO2 in the long run. This 0,99% argument is as stupid and incorrect as it gets. The 8% of the 99% have left the game to play COD and BF agian at the moment and they wont return. They wont break away from these games because RO2 is to ragged for them. Without a committee and/or a developer that focus their games on tactical gameplay it wont exist. Then we may aswell make RO2 into COD. Because the majority of people want that. If TWI didn't want feedback this board wouldnt exist. It exist because they want feedback. You argue like Sion Lenton of Codemasters. He argued like that aswell, babbling about the 0,99%, and he was stubborn enough to never listen to the community that was the majority of active, dedicated players, instead he was ignorant and thought they, Codemasters, were the ones who decide exactly how the game should be and what people should enjoy. Unfortunately, its not possible to decide whats fun for other people. That's not how it is in business. You must give what people want, or else you will end up developing Burger King racing games with Sion thinking of what went wrong.
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I think communication is 10x better than release. The last month or so has been better but it would have done more good to have this when there was still a buzz around the game. Its now an old game by modern gamers standards, especially since the reception has been lukewarm, and after TWI already made it clear what their gameplay focus was on with the initial release. The way issues were ignored for so long, or threads even locked (remember mkb thread?) because they didn't want to consider they may have released an unpopular sequel added tp the unhealthy forum atmosphere. Its all pretty negative and this is part of my lack of interest in the game.
The idea of the devs changing RO2 against their own wishes also makes me hesitant to stay interested. Some of the design decisions don't even look like they were made by people with an interest in Ostfront's style of gameplay. I am wary of TWI changing stuff without feeling it themselves, I mean if you have to tell them about half this stuff and have polls on it then there is something wrong with leadership at TWI. I don't want to have changes forced onto a dev team, it should only come because thats the game they want to play themselves. Making a game for other people without liking it yourself is a dangerous thing to do, it won't lead to good gameplay just trying to judge what others may like. I feel like they should have just not called it Red Orchestra in the first place and then released the game they wanted without people expecting too much coming from Ostfront.
The idea of the devs changing RO2 against their own wishes also makes me hesitant to stay interested. Some of the design decisions don't even look like they were made by people with an interest in Ostfront's style of gameplay. I am wary of TWI changing stuff without feeling it themselves, I mean if you have to tell them about half this stuff and have polls on it then there is something wrong with leadership at TWI. I don't want to have changes forced onto a dev team, it should only come because thats the game they want to play themselves. Making a game for other people without liking it yourself is a dangerous thing to do, it won't lead to good gameplay just trying to judge what others may like. I feel like they should have just not called it Red Orchestra in the first place and then released the game they wanted without people expecting too much coming from Ostfront.
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TWI already has developed the game they wanted to make.
There game making is not a democracy.
It is kind of ironic really that you are taking the line on one hand that they should listen to the community (you and this forum mostly old Ro1ers).... then on the other saying they should make a game the community (WAR FPS total online community) wants as in what this Sion gentleman did not do.
We should really differentiate between what you mean by community.
I want a game that is accesiable, can easily bring more people in without having difficulty increased as some form of psuedo Realism.
I have seen about 15 ideas on the forums that could help acheive this and i would be happy with.. but im sure most wont be happy unless it is RO1 which is just wrong.
I am happy for TWI to assess this themselve with some input and referal to the forums etc.. but not to be bullyed into it.
They will know what the game needs they are very aware of the mechanics and what is acheivable and will work.
I trust there judgement and vision. not someone else because they want more gun sway.
The only gripe i have with TWI... get it done. I think they have been to slow in finising it and getting it up and running as it should be.
Then champion the "normal" mode, it's not going away, it'll still be there, and the players who want that gameplay are as free to try and mold that into a good game-mode as we are in trying to mold a good "realism" mode.
You think there are good ideas for making that more accessible? Good, bring them on, hell knows the "normal" mode isen't perfect and could use some good ideas, and you can help shape them, build a better mousetrap as it where.
But the "realism" mode is not aimed at you, it was allways marketed as beeing "the mode for the RO fans", you know, the core community that has existed here for allmost a decade now, who where playing RO and supporting TWI long before you even knew they existed.
It failed on it's arse on release with it's intended audience, yeah, and no wonder because Ramm only spent a couple days coding it, it wasen't just half-finished, it was barely begun, and now it needs to be finished, TWI made promises about this mode they have yet to deliver.
Sorry mate, but you're stuck with us, Ro2 needs more players more than anything else, and there's tons of players who would pounce on this title if it only got the proper realism mode that was promised, so that needs to happen regardless of how you feel about it, nobody cares if you won't be interested in playing it, go play the "nomal" mode if you're not, it will still be there for ya.
It SO warms my heart to see all the posters who were all "trust TWI with all your heart and gtfo with your suspicions" whining on the forums today. Oh, a lot has changed from 2009-2011 hasn't it?
One could almost say "I told you so" when I posted in 2010 saying stats tracking, mkb and recon plane will make this game fail. I almost hit the spot years before the game was out.
Funny how recon plane doesn't get much hate though. It was promised to arrive with a minute or two delay and only see people it could actually see, and now it's basically instant CoD-UAV that doesn't see in the buildings but pretty much everywhere else. Hah.
One could almost say "I told you so" when I posted in 2010 saying stats tracking, mkb and recon plane will make this game fail. I almost hit the spot years before the game was out.
Funny how recon plane doesn't get much hate though. It was promised to arrive with a minute or two delay and only see people it could actually see, and now it's basically instant CoD-UAV that doesn't see in the buildings but pretty much everywhere else. Hah.
Exactly. Almost nobody wanting a proper realism mode is proposing changes to the normal Relaxed Realism mode, so those players saying we (ROOST Vets) want to change it are just flat out wrong. Unless TWI takes it upon themselves to change it, I'm sure those players have nothing to worry about.
I'm sure some proper changes to the Realism mode would bring in new blood, bring up the player number significantly and populate many more servers, which in itself is a good selling point (lots of populated servers that is).
I just can't figure out how those players miss seeing that
Exactly. Almost nobody wanting a proper realism mode is proposing changes to the normal Relaxed Realism mode, so those players saying we (ROOST Vets) want to change it are just flat out wrong. Unless TWI takes it upon themselves to change it, I'm sure those players have nothing to worry about.
I'm sure some proper changes to the Realism mode would bring in new blood, bring up the player number significantly and populate many more servers, which in itself is a good selling point (lots of populated servers that is).
I just can't figure out how those players miss seeing that
+1:IS2:
Perhaps moving slightly off topic, I think that this has been my feeling all along. I have never thought that they would or should replace the current game with a different/more realistic one. I know it would take more effort than it's worth to turn the game into something else. It's just not realistic to even think about that.
I have no worries about playing a game where I only play one 'Realism Mode' over the other half dozen or so modes the game has to offer. I've always been a niche type player and it wouldnt bother me in the least if I was to be a niche player to the sequel of a once niche game (perhaps its even more niche now?).
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