AJack10600
Elite
- Joined
- Jun 13, 2005
- Posts
- 2,732
- Location
- Switzerland
- Society
- SPU ¦ Smart Professionals United
- Avatar Name
- Larios Semai Niva
MindArk PE AB
Järntorget 8
413 04 Gothenburg
Sweden
Jan Welter Timkrans
Anders Gutenbrant
Bernt Wahlin
Anders Bodin
Magnus Eriksson
10/10/2007
Open Letter to MA
The latest developments around this VU have just shown again that MA is one of the most unprofessional companies ever... Luckily for them, the original business Idea is pure Genius and hence EU is working as well as it is atm.
MA has developed a unique gaming experience which hardly any other game can offer. The concept of an RCE game is genius and after a difficult start MA was able to gather a very dedicated and quite unique player base. The EU community is equal to none. A small community of very dedicated and active player who are willing to pay and deposit much more to be part of this “Special Universe” than any other MMORPG player ever would.
Being part of EU you invest into your avatar, in it’s skills, in it’s equipment. The basis of such investment is some feeling of stability and continuity which will guarantee for my investments for the future like in any real economy. The difference is that we are playing a game. We don’t want the “real” economic uncertainty, the “real” difficulties of life in the form of excessive taxes and other hardship. All of us are happy to pay a price to play. We realise MA is a business which needs to survive and all of us are willing to spend money on ammunition, decay and fees.
But within the last four years of EU, formerly PE, the game has evolved. Not only in terms of features but also with respect to cost of game play. We have seen an increase in decay, we have seen a nerfing of Weapon efficiency, we have seen a reduction in Loot, we have seen the introduction of insane ATHs to mask the fact that in average far fewer HOFs are paid out. The community has voiced concerns every times such changes occurred but after a while most of us tried to get to terms with these changes and to carry on playing, finding ways of minimising losses and to play the most efficiently as possible. I for instance hardly ever use big armours and weapons anymore because I simply can not afford to in the long run…
The Latest VU change has just been another blow to most of us. There are some that don’t care about how much they spend, but many feel like the recent changes will have a serious impact on their cost of playing. We see the introduction of a special tax for changing armour and clothes, masked with a pretty cheeky excuse about lag and as if this wasn’t enough, you introduce another armour piece which forces everybody in this game to deposit some more and to pay even more decay on armour for the future…
Enough is Enough !!!
Can I remind you that your Head of Communications is regularly telling us: MindArk's business plan states that we aim for a cost of 1 USD per hour. (Source: https://www.planetcalypsoforum.com/forums/showthread.php?t=37166) How on earth is this achievable ? Have any of you ever tried playing this game for real? Have any of you got any idea how much time some of us spend in this game, how many hours we spend ? In normal MMORPG I pay 15+30$ max per month and I can play as much as I like, with 1 hour per day that gives me a cost of play of 1$ daily… Ok you will say that EU is different but even if the cost was 3$ which it is not, the game costs me 90$ per month to play. Now cost of playing varies: I can be economical and pay nothing if I chat and trade, or I can blast away 100$ in an hour with my ML if I want to. But in any case, in average, I will never ever be able to play properly for 1$ per hour.
I said that we the players don’t mind paying, we don’t even mind paying more, we are all willing to pay much more to play than anybody else… but why do you keep beefing up the cost of playing for the existing player, why do you keep squeezing more and more cost out of our basic setup? Do you realise that this game becomes unplayable for most of us in the long run?
Why don’t you increase the number of features in EU to generate new sources of income for MA? Why don’t you create new inworld games, new professions, game levels like beacons, the stock exchange, new planets, now continents, now challenges that we would all be willing to pay for if we got some extra ?
Why does MA not increase the size of it’s player base? We all know for fact that MA does not have half a million players, we are a couple of 10k players at max and you know it (even SL has only about 20k active players with their 1.2m registrations), so stop lying to us.
Why don’t you diversify away from the core setup and cost and generate more income through more players, more features. We would all welcome that and support you and make good use of them. I would certainly spend another $ per day if I get something in return for it.
You have one of the best and most dedicated communities out there and yet you totally ignore their advice, their concerns. You keep telling us that you are listening but you are not.
After the last Landgrab the community asked for more info from your Communications Head and gave many many suggestions since then. To this day we have not seen more than a few question sessions. You still have not sent us a questionnaire to make us contribute to your future strategy. Why don’t you listen to your customers ? We are the most loyal customers you could ever have, so why don’t you believe us in what we say?
I know how business is run, and I know that you need to make money. I know that you need to earn money, I don’t live in a fantasy world. But MA is not really short cash, at least it wasn’t before the CRYengine project. If you can’t afford CRYengine, then just leave it. Have you realised that your players have never been whining about more features and more graphix and more funky stuff. We always whined about bugs, about stats changing, game play like LandGrab not working… We like the game as it is. Make it run smoothly first before making it even more and more funky for nothing.
You keep promising and starting things and never finish them in the end anyway.
What about the “Entropian” magazine ?
What about the “PHYsics” hardware support?
What about the Stock Exchange ingame?
What about the Factories?
What about the Night, Day, Sandstorm features announced in 2003?
What about that Cash Card?
What about the regular Community Relations promised. The last post from Marco on EF was on 27.08.2007.
What about that Landgrab overhaul ?
What about that Chinese Business Deal ?
MA is a master of releasing funny press releases but if a journalist ever wanted to check on what actually happened with these new gimmicks, one would wonder…
All I want to say is that you at MA need to seriously review your strategy and your response to your customers, your customer relations and your way of doing business.
You are in the unbelievably lucky position to have a community which is willing to help you with ideas, feedback and which is willing to pay the price for good game play. The way you are walking now you will make EU just another expensive Computer game which people will try out for a few months. But you are scaring away the long term players with big investments, the real community players. There are several games out there which are experimenting on the same business model and you can see the day coming when SONY or some other big Company will release a game with the same model, 10 USD monthly subscription + RCE. Don’t you dare introducing that feature because you will just be like any other MMORPG when you do and you can not win that race…
We can help you make EU unique, we know what the players want, we know what makes EU a cool game, we know what we are willing to spend money for…
I urge you to have a very careful read through all Support Cases you have received following this VU, I urge you to read all the posts on Entropia Forum and to stand up and to review some of your decisions.
I feel cheated, I feel insulted, I feel Ripped Off atm and I am writing this after having slept over it. Take this chance and Fix it ! Most of us are more than willing to stay your loyal fanbase and to keep playing.
Yours, Semai
---------------------------------------------------
To the Community,
I might not be saying what everybody thinks but for those who do think like me, pick one of the guys on top of this list and send them this Letter by mail as I will. I am not sure they have any clue what is going on atm and I want the heads at MA to know what is going on. If you don’t like it, write something yourself but I am happy for anyone to take this letter and forward it to them in hardcopy. If you find their E-mails, use those but they are not officially published so it’s a bit hard to prove if they work.
I just want EU to be the best computer game in the world and I want the community to stick together in this and to maybe achieve something, help to make it better. I don’t want to quit just yet because I hope that we can maybe achieve a little…
Thx, Semai
--------------------------------------------------
[Update: Thx for all the +reps and the support everyone. I hope that you do manage to send a hard copy letter and I am sure MA will listen to us. Don't make this a nasty campaign, we don't want to ruin the game, we want to improve it. I am not gonna be able to +rep all of you back so please just accept this as a big thank you.
Thx again, Semai]
-----------------------------------------------------
[Update: This has gone out to MA, I have excused myself for the harsh tone and I have told them that I would publish any reply here on the forum]
Thx Semai
Järntorget 8
413 04 Gothenburg
Sweden
Jan Welter Timkrans
Anders Gutenbrant
Bernt Wahlin
Anders Bodin
Magnus Eriksson
10/10/2007
Open Letter to MA
The latest developments around this VU have just shown again that MA is one of the most unprofessional companies ever... Luckily for them, the original business Idea is pure Genius and hence EU is working as well as it is atm.
MA has developed a unique gaming experience which hardly any other game can offer. The concept of an RCE game is genius and after a difficult start MA was able to gather a very dedicated and quite unique player base. The EU community is equal to none. A small community of very dedicated and active player who are willing to pay and deposit much more to be part of this “Special Universe” than any other MMORPG player ever would.
Being part of EU you invest into your avatar, in it’s skills, in it’s equipment. The basis of such investment is some feeling of stability and continuity which will guarantee for my investments for the future like in any real economy. The difference is that we are playing a game. We don’t want the “real” economic uncertainty, the “real” difficulties of life in the form of excessive taxes and other hardship. All of us are happy to pay a price to play. We realise MA is a business which needs to survive and all of us are willing to spend money on ammunition, decay and fees.
But within the last four years of EU, formerly PE, the game has evolved. Not only in terms of features but also with respect to cost of game play. We have seen an increase in decay, we have seen a nerfing of Weapon efficiency, we have seen a reduction in Loot, we have seen the introduction of insane ATHs to mask the fact that in average far fewer HOFs are paid out. The community has voiced concerns every times such changes occurred but after a while most of us tried to get to terms with these changes and to carry on playing, finding ways of minimising losses and to play the most efficiently as possible. I for instance hardly ever use big armours and weapons anymore because I simply can not afford to in the long run…
The Latest VU change has just been another blow to most of us. There are some that don’t care about how much they spend, but many feel like the recent changes will have a serious impact on their cost of playing. We see the introduction of a special tax for changing armour and clothes, masked with a pretty cheeky excuse about lag and as if this wasn’t enough, you introduce another armour piece which forces everybody in this game to deposit some more and to pay even more decay on armour for the future…
Enough is Enough !!!
Can I remind you that your Head of Communications is regularly telling us: MindArk's business plan states that we aim for a cost of 1 USD per hour. (Source: https://www.planetcalypsoforum.com/forums/showthread.php?t=37166) How on earth is this achievable ? Have any of you ever tried playing this game for real? Have any of you got any idea how much time some of us spend in this game, how many hours we spend ? In normal MMORPG I pay 15+30$ max per month and I can play as much as I like, with 1 hour per day that gives me a cost of play of 1$ daily… Ok you will say that EU is different but even if the cost was 3$ which it is not, the game costs me 90$ per month to play. Now cost of playing varies: I can be economical and pay nothing if I chat and trade, or I can blast away 100$ in an hour with my ML if I want to. But in any case, in average, I will never ever be able to play properly for 1$ per hour.
I said that we the players don’t mind paying, we don’t even mind paying more, we are all willing to pay much more to play than anybody else… but why do you keep beefing up the cost of playing for the existing player, why do you keep squeezing more and more cost out of our basic setup? Do you realise that this game becomes unplayable for most of us in the long run?
Why don’t you increase the number of features in EU to generate new sources of income for MA? Why don’t you create new inworld games, new professions, game levels like beacons, the stock exchange, new planets, now continents, now challenges that we would all be willing to pay for if we got some extra ?
Why does MA not increase the size of it’s player base? We all know for fact that MA does not have half a million players, we are a couple of 10k players at max and you know it (even SL has only about 20k active players with their 1.2m registrations), so stop lying to us.
Why don’t you diversify away from the core setup and cost and generate more income through more players, more features. We would all welcome that and support you and make good use of them. I would certainly spend another $ per day if I get something in return for it.
You have one of the best and most dedicated communities out there and yet you totally ignore their advice, their concerns. You keep telling us that you are listening but you are not.
After the last Landgrab the community asked for more info from your Communications Head and gave many many suggestions since then. To this day we have not seen more than a few question sessions. You still have not sent us a questionnaire to make us contribute to your future strategy. Why don’t you listen to your customers ? We are the most loyal customers you could ever have, so why don’t you believe us in what we say?
I know how business is run, and I know that you need to make money. I know that you need to earn money, I don’t live in a fantasy world. But MA is not really short cash, at least it wasn’t before the CRYengine project. If you can’t afford CRYengine, then just leave it. Have you realised that your players have never been whining about more features and more graphix and more funky stuff. We always whined about bugs, about stats changing, game play like LandGrab not working… We like the game as it is. Make it run smoothly first before making it even more and more funky for nothing.
You keep promising and starting things and never finish them in the end anyway.
What about the “Entropian” magazine ?
What about the “PHYsics” hardware support?
What about the Stock Exchange ingame?
What about the Factories?
What about the Night, Day, Sandstorm features announced in 2003?
What about that Cash Card?
What about the regular Community Relations promised. The last post from Marco on EF was on 27.08.2007.
What about that Landgrab overhaul ?
What about that Chinese Business Deal ?
MA is a master of releasing funny press releases but if a journalist ever wanted to check on what actually happened with these new gimmicks, one would wonder…
All I want to say is that you at MA need to seriously review your strategy and your response to your customers, your customer relations and your way of doing business.
You are in the unbelievably lucky position to have a community which is willing to help you with ideas, feedback and which is willing to pay the price for good game play. The way you are walking now you will make EU just another expensive Computer game which people will try out for a few months. But you are scaring away the long term players with big investments, the real community players. There are several games out there which are experimenting on the same business model and you can see the day coming when SONY or some other big Company will release a game with the same model, 10 USD monthly subscription + RCE. Don’t you dare introducing that feature because you will just be like any other MMORPG when you do and you can not win that race…
We can help you make EU unique, we know what the players want, we know what makes EU a cool game, we know what we are willing to spend money for…
I urge you to have a very careful read through all Support Cases you have received following this VU, I urge you to read all the posts on Entropia Forum and to stand up and to review some of your decisions.
I feel cheated, I feel insulted, I feel Ripped Off atm and I am writing this after having slept over it. Take this chance and Fix it ! Most of us are more than willing to stay your loyal fanbase and to keep playing.
Yours, Semai
---------------------------------------------------
To the Community,
I might not be saying what everybody thinks but for those who do think like me, pick one of the guys on top of this list and send them this Letter by mail as I will. I am not sure they have any clue what is going on atm and I want the heads at MA to know what is going on. If you don’t like it, write something yourself but I am happy for anyone to take this letter and forward it to them in hardcopy. If you find their E-mails, use those but they are not officially published so it’s a bit hard to prove if they work.
I just want EU to be the best computer game in the world and I want the community to stick together in this and to maybe achieve something, help to make it better. I don’t want to quit just yet because I hope that we can maybe achieve a little…
Thx, Semai
--------------------------------------------------
[Update: Thx for all the +reps and the support everyone. I hope that you do manage to send a hard copy letter and I am sure MA will listen to us. Don't make this a nasty campaign, we don't want to ruin the game, we want to improve it. I am not gonna be able to +rep all of you back so please just accept this as a big thank you.
Thx again, Semai]
-----------------------------------------------------
[Update: This has gone out to MA, I have excused myself for the harsh tone and I have told them that I would publish any reply here on the forum]
Thx Semai
Last edited:
I don't see that is personal either tbh? Not meaning I wont do it - just thought, that collecting signatures and send a whole bunch with a letter from the whole community might work better or the changes that more will respond might be bigger? 
