A Request for the Power of This Community!

[BruteForce]

no shame ! just realistic

@MRmP
MA (sorry fpc) just released a new 'universe' on a rather new engine (not designet for this at ALL) which EVERYONE have been cry-ing (hehe just had to play with some words) to try, the past 2 (ish) years. and when you get it.. damn spoiled brats!

... You just said it: "not designed for this at ALL"

hardly think EVERYONE of us have been CRY-ing for THIS for 2 years ... Im pretty sure loads of us were pretty happy the way things were (at least graphics wise) ... there have/and will always be minor adjustments that can be made in ANY game. Never satisfying 100% of the base ...

Just imagine your favourite MALL did a Major "upgrade" and you could only buy certain goods -- and it took 4-5 x longer than previous shopping, that beeing said if they didnt just close (CTD) the MALL while you were shopping

... NO, were (most of us) PAYING customers - no reason to be ashamed.

 

[BruteForce]

Well said

Hi John,

checking "what's this at all about" I read here:


Sorry John, this is reality distortion at it's finest. In fact MindArc managed to:

• create a hyper inflation on a few Uber items (Uber armors, Mod/ Adj/ Imp gear)
• kill lots of previous value of a lot of once expensive items (middle class "classical" unlimited gear, and some clothing) *1
• drastically and ongoing reducing the fun in their game, replacing it by steadily increasing gambling.

Add to it that you've hit the most wrong time to both doing any marketing for EU, as well as for asking the community for help.

MA has managed to create huge hurdles for both newcomers as well as established participants, choosing the well known most resource hungry game engine available on the market, and to add to it, implemented it in a way that even dwarfs Crysis, the reference design - EU might be one of the most resource hungry games at all today ...
And it's ridden with bugs and annoyances beyond believe.

If I'd be allowed to offer an advice:

• Immediately stop all & any activities that might cause EU to be mentioned in the media, for now. All & any - whoever would become curious, and would come to check out today, would be lost forever.
• Read a little here, maybe try for yourself - educate yourself about the situation.
• Then go on strike - tell your chieftains that any active marketing at the moment would heavily backfire. Tell 'em that huge parts of the community are very upset, and that the house is on fire. *2

You'd inevitably fail at the moment with any tries doing your job. To put you into a situation where you are able to do your job in a satisfying way, some other people have to repair first what they messed up!

You might not believe me. I know. So I say: try for yourself. Get yourself a fresh computer for about $500 that is labeled "ready for gaming". Install EU, make a new ordinary account, and try your luck. Talk to the people anonymously. Play what a "try-out" would play. Then try $100/ month deposits, pretending what you've seen would have pleased you ... Very soon you'll understand what I'm saying.

Kind regards, and have fun!


*1: To illustrate have a look at the long time markup graphs of two exemplary items, "Katsuichi Honor" and "EMT Kit Ek-2600". Maybe check what happened with certain paint cans a while ago. Even "small people" like me have lost thousands of PED's only due to MA's failed "maintaining value" ...

*2: You might become an epic hero among the community doing such. As you'd easily see reading this forum we participants, or at least a lot of us, feel ignored, and mucked around. Even if we have a huge desire, and interest, for this game (that we love - we're still here after all of this!) to finally improve, and to finally reach a state the great idea it displays would deserve, and to finally reap the success it could have, we, or at least a lot of us, have lost confidence.
We'd really rejoice good marketing, success of this game, bazillions of newcomers, and happiness all over the place, but the current situation is far from offering any opportunity for such.
So our hopes seem to be related to your job?

PS: +Rep as a sign of credit of trust )

Very Well said +rep

 

[JaKst3r]

No offence, but Mindark's PR department should go on vacation,
untill they got an proper working product to sell.

Again, take it step by step, do not rush it.

.

I agree with MRmP - They ARE taking it step by step and have informed us of proposed changes (VU10.1, 10.2 contents etc).. They cannot possibly have tested the entire world environment for a global playerbase. It was incredibly naive for anyone to think we would have 100% perfect product from day 1.

Changes are coming thick and fast to the system, which is now very much playable for almost all with current gaming pcs.

They are not promoting SGA launch date yet.

There has been less frustrating bugs with this launch than I have experienced with other online multiplayer games purchased for cash in games stores (CoH for example)

The main thing thats frustrating me at the moment IS the lack of a constructive and common sensical community.

Good luck John, get them excited. We are about ready for them.

@Centech... as a new player right now I would last longer in game with a beautiful world to explore than I would reading some of the whining posted on this forum at the moment

 

[sledgehammer]

John, let me get this straight:

A) Mindark/FPC actively manipulates which items drop, and wich items do not drop in the game.

B) One of the "features" of this manipulation is that we haven't seen a modfap, a piece of shadow, or an impmk2 (hell even a drop of tiger or jag armor would have been nice) in how many years now?

C) The midlevel armors and guns that did have value have now been totally devalued, or are on their way to such, as a result of the limited weapons and armors that have become the standard for this "game". This has further increased the price of the high end armors as there is no comprable L armor available, and the ones that come close are ridiculously priced, and volume controled by Mindark.

D) You don't like hyperinflation?

E) The above statements being known as fact by the community (with the exception of D, which we find to be gross exageration, if not outright lie), you want us to vote our support for EU?

Of what will you take these votes as a sign? I certainly do not wish to encourage you further down the path that you are already taking us. Neither do I wish to have a lot of potential players join the game right now. It's broken, and you know it. So do we. During the server downtime, we were perfectly happy to wait for the game to be "ready" for play, rather than the very beautiful trash with which we were presented. However, the simple fact is that faced with the option of preparing things properly so your CUSTOMERS (yes, we are your customers, I don't care what name you put on it) could operate the game properly, or getting the revenue stream back, up, you chose the easy and sloppy option.

I'll make a deal with you, John. Mindark makes the game work properly, and you start dropping the items that allow us to build ourselves up in this game (not the limited tripe you've been serving us, and I'm not talking about the 1k SGA items that will never drop again either), make the game work properly again, and at that time I'll think about giving you a vote of confidence.

 

[JingyiDai]

Honestly I think MA should stop any and all marketing initiatives at the moment. If a new player were to download this game and start playing today I can't imagine they would last more than 5 minutes, and they would mostly likely be lost as a customer forever. Even most of us diehards who have been playing for years can't stand to play right now, I can't imagine what a total noob would do.

Yeh Centech is right lol -> you have no idea how hard it is lol not even new players... old players are hard to keep around...

It is very simple -> people who can look the sunset and sun rises are veyr happy . But the most who cant log in , stucked, crashed and see nothing but white or black -> oh boy they are pissed lol

Make the bug fix as priority number one... very very important, if you meet someone for the first time in bad manner, people usualy dont like you

 

[Kemp]

Who the f*#k is John Bates?!?

 

[JaKst3r]

Just want to highlight that John is talking about ideas for discussions on the agenda for the South by Southwest (SXSW) Interactive Festival being presented March 12th - 16th, 2010


Balancing the Only Virtual Economy Backed by $USD

Evolving Platforms Race to Control the Metaverse

Deathifier's Proposed Topic

Entrepreneurs Building Virtual Businesses
Inside Online Virtual Worlds


Deadline for adding discussion points to the main programme are 4th Sept 09, hence the request now.

Thanks.

 

[sledgehammer]

Who the f*#k is John Bates?!?

Marketing and Advertising exec for Mindark in North America.

 

[NightwolfAA2k5]

Yeh Centech is right lol -> you have no idea how hard it is lol not even new players... old players are hard to keep around...

It is very simple -> people who can look the sunset and sun rises are veyr happy . But the most who cant log in , stucked, crashed and see nothing but white or black -> oh boy they are pissed lol

Make the bug fix as priority number one... very very important, if you meet someone for the first time in bad manner, people usualy dont like you

My only hope is that VU 10.1 and/or 10.2 are out before Deathifier takes EU on the road to three conventions 'round the great down under, or else it's going to be a fiasco as far as new players go.

- Nightwolf

 

[Droops]

Who the f*#k is John Bates?!?

Nah cant be this one

[YOUTUBE]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=K96GKpxUdjY[/YOUTUBE]



Crap music btw

 

[ALEXANDER]

Can there be a panel about updating the graphics of a game and then releasing the game in an incomplete form so that you essentially alienate a large part of the community you are asking for help?

Who the f*#k is John Bates?!?

* create a hyper inflation on a few Uber items (Uber armors, Mod/ Adj/ Imp gear)
* kill lots of previous value of a lot of once expensive items (middle class "classical" unlimited gear, and some clothing) *1
* drastically and ongoing reducing the fun in their game, replacing it by steadily increasing gambling.

right on guys !

 

[Robin]

good luck with this hope you get support...atm I cannot log into the game on my own computer which limits my time extremly on entropia( I can log in very small amounts of time on another comp but very rarely)..I need a new computer now to play it, and as a real life person out of work for an extended period of time it will be a while till I can aquire a new one that will work with entropia.I'm supporting the game when I can and know others who can log in and play are supporting it too.Just gonna take time for me now to get things fixed in RL so I can play again.

 

[Wody]

Now, I am asking you to give the two topics we came up with a Thumbs Up at SXSW Interactive.

Hi John, I am glad you seem to care about the community. It's a great thing!
Unfortunatly, SXSW does not, and voting or not voting will not make any difference!

If you check the 'rules' of the panelpicker, you will see that the complete community, will have a total influence of 30%! Not more! This means that even if 100% of the community wants strawberry icecream with Bombardo, Papplon, and Haimoros fruit mixed in (but not Caroot because it tastes funny), we will still get vanilla icecream without any whipped cream, and if you complain, you go to your room now, without any icecream, mister! See if you like that!

And really, I am too old for that. I want to decide what icecream I like to enjoy today, and not let some other folks I don't know do whatever they want anyway, while claiming I got to pick what I got.

Yum, icecream.

 

[Kemp]

Marketing and Advertising exec for Mindark in North America.

Now interprete my question once more, but then try to audiolise a sarcastic undertone....

 

[Woodger]

well... your all still here, so you must still want to play EU regardless of any post VU bugs, which we all know happen

Why not just help out promote a game you play and like ?

 

[Lavawalker]

well... your all still here, so you must still want to play EU regardless of any post VU bugs, which we all know happen

Why not just help out promote a game you play and like ?

But isn't that how we continue repeating history ?

We promote, not much gets done - Round 2 - We promote it, not much gets done. Round 3 - erm.

I think the message is beginning to become clear.

Sure, there is a line and a point to which the envelope can be pushed by us all;
And sure Marco is doing the best he can in his new-shoes position.

But the bubble has been building for so long, some have been trying to point of being totally drained and sick of it.

How about we say screw the promoting, get FPC/MA to actually fix things up and start delivering a little and then go promote something that is worthwhile promoting.

Or would you prefer getting the next boat load of people in.

Have a read, do we really want to promote this service at our expense so competitors can laugh in our faces for doing the hard yards at our expense ?

https://www.planetcalypsoforum.com/...a-universe-game-investment-2.html#post2035393

& from 2 posts down

Addition:

The saddest part of all of this is that MindArk probably doesn't even realise that they are greatly increasing the spawn potential of competitive services (companies) making an entry into the RCE FME market that intend to keep to their word in not producing a casino, such as Afterworld and others underway; That in the end will take from Entropia's market share - less participants involved in the Entropia economy.

MindArk & Partners outlay the funding to promote the service, we pay the bills as their customers, the new customers come and see the service for what it is - They leave looking for alternatives such as Afterworld (And others upcoming).

The competitors say, thankyou muchly MA & crew for doing the work for us and footing the bill, laughing all the way to the bank on providing a proper RCE service and not a gambling outfit with entertainment built in.

Sure the above posted is on the RCE side, the same applies with everything else in its current state - game play, technical issues, support department which doesn't know which way is up when it is clearly marked for them, community fraying at the seams. etc.

Now is just bad timing - More destructive than productive.

More negatives will come about in the media on what a failure VU10 was than the probable positives of what a success it is;

If it is somewhere in the middle - There will still be a fallout war which will end up warding off the luring of new business to Entropia.

At least get it upto a point where it has a chance to combat history and have a productive/positive impact for the time & money invested into promoting Entropia.

Oh wait ! This is JB we are talking about.

Sure the guy loves Entropia,
But he just gets too far ahead of himself.

As I posted in MS9's profile,
JB ends up with egg on his face nearly every time.

There are many (A portion of the ~ 800k registered users & their friends whom they may have shared their experience with) ready & waiting to stab Entropia through the heart out there in the gaming community if given the opportunity to do so.

That is the reality of it - Bad timing, especially in this state.

Nice graphics (CE2) only has a WoW effect for so long before it becomes the norm for each new entry into the system, then what ?

 

[Kemp]

well... your all still here, so you must still want to play EU regardless of any post VU bugs, which we all know happen

Why not just help out promote a game you play and like ?

I have promoted PE/EU quite a few times:
- With positive posts and remarks on fori.
- By voting to try and get PE/EU higher on lists of popular games.
- With telling friends about it.
- ...

I am also still here because indeed I still play and want to continu to play. But...

This is just a real dumb moment to ask the community for input. And not only the timing is wrong, the person doing so is also not the right one. Why not you ask?!

Well, for one, I don't know John Bates. I also did not "talk to him on the phone last night" like some other people that really seem to be into MA. I am just your regular longterm PE/EU player that indeed always knows best because he has been there, seen that, done that....

That's why I stated "Who the F&#k is John Bates ?" in an earlier post in this thread. Even though I know his name and somewhat think to know what he somehow seems to be doing for MA, I never have seen something coming out of his hands that has been a concrete contribution to the development of EU.

But maybe that is just my lack of knowledge...
Is it...?!?!
Or isn't it strange that I doubt the value of a contribution from someone that has bounds with MA since end 2006/early 2007 or so, with 31 posts in all these years on this forum.
And all of a sudden asking for help, for input, from what he describes as a great, warm, super, extraordinary, strong whatever community?!

Entropia Universe Evangelist.... Pfffff

The only person that could ask for this is Marco. but his question should be:
Dear community, this year MA/FPC won't make a dime profit. damn the investors and shareholders. All profit will be consumed again before the yearbook is closed. And that money we will equally spread over 3 issues:
1. 1/3 to fill up the lootpool, and meanwhile decrease the amount of really large HoFs to increase the average return for the average Joe that plays for 6= years and has put $15k into our system.
2. 1/3 to massively speed up the implemtation and bugcorrection within VU10 and beyond.
3. 1/3 to advertising bigtime after point 2 has been done, to lure in lots of new players with positive and more important effective advertising campaigns.

And then he can ask us, the completely happy community, to help him putting up add campaigns and publicity stunts that will make every other MMORPG company drool.
Because that is what is needed to restore alot of the faith and enthusiasm that has been lost.

We are indeed probably the greatest, warmest, most super, extraordinary, and strong community in gamesland. But there is a limit on the amount of ignorance a reasonable humanbeing can take.

Until then, it's Via Dolorosa for me, but I 100% understand the disappointment of many others.

Btw, did I mention that I quite like this update?! Not what it is now, but what it can be after the Beta testing has been done by the community.... Again....
Not quite a good moment to attract lots of players... In Beta stadium... not the general play for fun people... More the diehard idiots and curious suckers come for Beta... Ah yes, our community... Fits in quite well

 

[Centech]

well... your all still here, so you must still want to play EU regardless of any post VU bugs, which we all know happen

Why not just help out promote a game you play and like ?

Like I said in my previous post, I think introducing new players to this game right now, in the state it is, is a terrible and counterproductive idea. Hell, if >I< discovered this game right now I'm quite sure I wouldn't play. Anyone who tries the game for the first time now will most likely think it is a broken piece of @%$! and be lost forever as a player.

 

[sledgehammer]

Now interprete my question once more, but then try to audiolise a sarcastic undertone....

My appolagies for misunderstanding the question. He is MA's offical corporate ballwasher. Keeps the wedding vegetables nice and clean for every time they get ready to ram another one home.

 

[bass]

Like I said in my previous post, I think introducing new players to this game right now, in the state it is, is a terrible and counterproductive idea. Hell, if >I< discovered this game right now I'm quite sure I wouldn't play. Anyone who tries the game for the first time now will most likely think it is a broken piece of @%$! and be lost forever as a player.

That's plain true. And I really can't understand how MA can put out there a piece of software that has so many problems - not for us "community", but for newcomers: this is simply a bad, bad move. Think about those who has problems to *LOGIN* (leave alone the gameplay).

For the future. Many big software houses rely on long-term customers for beta testing. MA, why don't you pick up 10/20 trusted users, and let them do some REAL end-user BETA testing? Don't disclose their names, keep them secret, make them sign NDA, whatever.

Ok, VU 9->10 is a one-time move, but honestly it could have been handled a little bit better. And the non-existant communication (MA always says things when they already happened) makes things worse.

To stay on-topic, I like the game and will support it in any way, as soon as it will work just fine again.

 

[Stutoman]

This will be interesting.

No pun John, but another bag of on why, is not going to go down well for those who follow you around as part of MindArk in the media.

Keep it real silicon surfer.

As a side note, I fully understand you work for MA so your hands are tied somewhat.
Please don't take it to heart, it is to invoke thought, not conflict.

Here is a reflection to improve upon, incase it helps.

http://www.dailymotion.com/relevance/search/entropia/video/x8o61d_john-bates-segment

Oh yeh. What happened to the new players being able to take part? You said it yourself john but when it came to the land grab I planned for my society to partcipate but found that it was only the top 50 skilled societies which were able to take part.

There are a lot of things which get said in the media which almost never become a reality; maybe its time to start "Keeping it Real".

What really needs to be remembered here is that the only new players arriving are ones who are being invited by other players (i.e. me. And I am having a very hard time at that too with the amount of bugs and things that still need to be re-implimented!!!) and also those who haven't found another game which is better (very few people haven't.)

So basically mindark are relying on its current userbase at the moment for its financial income. I wouldn't exactly call it a very stable one at the moment if that is the case. And upsetting the community is a bad idea, mindark have lost people thousands which could have been put to better use while the few people such as Deathifier and Neverdie who just got in early are now dead rich because of it.

At the moment its like Robin Hood but reversed, Take from the poor and give to the rich.

 

[Droops]

Why not just help out promote a game you play and like ?

IF i could play so forget about the promotion for a while nothing to Promote .

 

[Stratos]

Beside to the question if it is the right time to ask the community for help, i´m impressed about the questions to be discussed with JB during SXSW.

So i will look forward and will see if and how such questions will be discussed and/or answered like :
"How does MindArk balance the inputs and outputs of the Entropia Universe? " or
"Who are the key players in the MMOG platform race and what are their differences?"

Depends on discussion and answers , what if the community realize that the balance is rigid controlled or a player is not be able to be successful if he´s not a "key player" ?

 

[XingTianNu]

Ty for the link:

http://www.dailymotion.com/relevance/search/entropia/video/x8o61d_john-bates-segment

Now I get why you used the BS emote.

So how many noobs got new LA.

Basically they took Marco DNA and cloned ?

 

[JohnBates]

Hi John,

I wrote this:

“Something did strike me from (John K Bates) “Why is hyperinflation such a dire threat to virtual economies?” wonder what he will say about it (maybe someone will record the conference).

Is little contradictory as it seem, because MA took some steps in EU we seen the hyperinflation (not to drop uber gear and armors kind attitude lead to the hyperinflation, rare = expensive) so am bit curious what he will say on that.

“Why is hyperinflation such a dire threat to virtual economies?” one may wonder if someone from MA think it is, then why not take steps to stop it ? ”

Care to comment? Or just hook us up on what you planning to tell in the conference?

Ty for the time sincerely Xing.

I think that for some virtual economies total hyperinflation, or maybe the more correct way to put it is devaluation is coming since they have no real grounding in the concept of scarcity and value. I think that some things going up in value/cost is fine, but if the whole underpinning comes out because it's not being managed well that's bad. In my other post I mention that the actual content is still being worked on, and indeed, being lived, so more later.

 

[JohnBates]

new panel suggestion.

Can there be a panel about updating the graphics of a game and then releasing the game in an incomplete form so that you essentially alienate a large part of the community you are asking for help?

Uh, I guess I could. I certainly know what it feels like now!

 

[JohnBates]

See my post... SXSW is next year, voting is now, though.

Honestly I think MA should stop any and all marketing initiatives at the moment. If a new player were to download this game and start playing today I can't imagine they would last more than 5 minutes, and they would mostly likely be lost as a customer forever. Even most of us diehards who have been playing for years can't stand to play right now, I can't imagine what a total noob would do.

So, I have to deal with the timing... JKB

 

[AlphaGeek]

Am I speaking an alien language of something.

You may be... didn't they outsource support to Mexico?

 

[JohnBates]

OK, ok, I get it... My responses to the major issues I heard.

Hello everyone and thanks for posting in this thread and being involved whether you love me/MA/FPC or hate me/MA/FPC. Here's what I have to say right now...

First off, I understand in retrospect that it is unique moment to be asking for your help with this, given that we're in the middle of the biggest VU ever and experiencing all the issues that go with an undertaking like that. I understand that people are all over the place about it. Some people are stoked on the new look and having fun already and some people are pissed off and can't even log in. I admit that I had to overnight some more memory to myself for my 2006 laptop so I could get in with any kind of style. It cost me well under $100 to go from 1Meg to 4Megs, though. I was very frustrated for a moment. So, I appreciate everyone who is interested at all. Those of you who are angry and upset are clearly committed to Entropia or you wouldn't care. So, I thank you for your willingness to engage and to beat me up in the process. I know you wouldn't kick my a$$ all over the map if it didn't matter to you!
That said. the timing isn't up to me. I am living into a bright and exciting future and this conference doesn't happen until March 12th, 2010. +Rep to JaKst3r for noticing! I promise we'll have this stuff worked out before then! However, the panels are being chosen right now, by people voting on the Internet. So, we can either be there, or be irrelevantized by our own infighting. It's a really important and excellent conference and I am committed to getting us there. I believe the VU issue is a momentary problem we're working through.
As for the topics, yes, they're controversial and I didn't give you much info about what I will say. That's cause I don't know fully yet. I will have a lot of new, interesting and different information to share by the time the conference comes around, so I am only trying to give an idea of the direction I am going. The actual content is still being lived out and I will finalize what I have to say a lot closer to the date I actually say it.
And, about the land grab... I think it surprised everyone how it turned out. I am very adamant about having newcomers be able to win things, and I like the idea of contests among peers being available so I advocate for that whenever possible. I don't make the final decisions and choices for FPC, but I have some influence so talk to me nicely and I will see what I can do. If you're disappointed about something, or have ideas for making things better share them and you will be heard. Maybe not implemented, but there are a lot of factors that go into the final choices FPC and MA make and it's a never ending story! Thanks for putting my feet to the fire, lavawalker. I mean to keep it real, for sure.
Bottom line is that we have a successful, fun, amazing, ground-breaking, trend setting, wonderful, fantastic and extraordinary thing here because of all of YOU who PARTICIPATE. "It's the community, stoopid!" Right? So, know that I think of you all the time and I thank you every day. I may not post a lot, but I make my own contributions.
Finally, I say: Thank you, thank you, thank you.

JKB

 

[Stutoman]

I mean to keep it real, for sure

Nice to know my post was read I got that phrase from Ali G lol.

Thank you for your added viewpoint and further explanation, it makes things a lot more understandable.

[Hint]Now all I need is a 28k hof for my new pc[/Hint] lol < That bit will get ignored for sure, the loot is never talked about by officials!