What Do Players Want?

Apologies for the blog silence - between moving house and work getting busy as we approach the holidays and upcoming expansion beta, I haven't had a lot of spare time!  But here for your interest now are some interesting/amusing/just plain odd selections of player feedback submitted over the past week.  (It should be noted I have already implemented at least one of these since seeing it ...)   =)

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Text: I think there should be a zone where it is pitch black and you need infravision to get through along with your personal torch, i think that'd be a fun zone to play in.

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Text: Void Wood. I raid occasionaly on my Ranger and rarely see enough wood dropped when I do. cost of Void wood on Broker 50plat+. Please add this to T9 wood nodes. its rediculous that you cant use good arrows unless you A) Raid and are lucky B) Raid and are luckyor C) Raid and are lucky. ORRRR add like 5 void woods to each and every raid mob in the game, thx. VOIDWOODVOIDWOODVOIDWOOD OMG HELP <<<<((DOMINO))>>>>

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Text: if you do Firiona'vie's outfit ill buy it make it so people can buy it ty.

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Text: Thank you for all of the new(er) quests in Kingdom of Sky. They really help fill out the area and AA needed for this lvl.


See? Positive feedback exists. :)

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Text: Large New Halas housing:

Would it be much trouble to move the spawn point for entering player characters to appear back by the front door, up the on raised step, instead of down on the main floor, away from the front door as they do now?

Many decorators want to put something there over that floor, such as a "Rose Mystique Rug" for example, which is very large and thick. Because the player character spawns down on the main floor instead of by the door, however, he or she arrives buried up to their ankles/knees/waist (depending on race) in carpet, which looks very odd.

Thanks for reading!

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Text: Wouldnt it be more realistic to sit on a flying carpet and not stand? My wizard would love to use the fiery carpet from Lavastorm but wont because of the horrid looking crouch on them. Please oh please make it so we can sit on a flying carpet like it is meant to be!

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Text: Hiya guys um i would like to know when frostfell is coming i love it plzzzzz relpy if u can thanks and is it in qenoys harbour caouse i normally camp here so yeah thx bye =) =)

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Text: fix or repace paladn heals with something useful

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Text: You guys need to add a rare spawn mob in Shard of Love......Cupid or something!

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Text: Here's an idea for a new tinkered recipe for fun and maybe Roleplay. Secret Agent Spy scrolls! Would work like a player writeable book, but can be sealed by the author. Once sealed, it can be unsealed once, which consumes the item, and lets the user who unsealed it to read the contents, but it also includes a "this message will self destruct in 20s seconds" part at the bottom, and after 20s it causes the reader to get knocked down as if from a small explosion.

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Text: This whole damn game is jimmy rigged ... what a joke...

[note: this was sent from within a guildhall, so I have not the foggiest idea what it was referring to]

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Text: find out who the plat scammers are working for. and then send the info to the Better Business Bureau. let them take care of the scammers

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Text: WHAT????????????????????? Totem of Escape changed from a reeediculous 30 mins to 1 Hour????????????????????????????? who made that decision????????


I will call and write to Japan and go to the top!!! Guaranteed

and Scathe that person ... tell me who did it ????????

I'll petition usless CA for the name GUaranteed!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Sick of this Garbage.. you already STOLE our money with S of Fates for your own uses and royally Gyped casual players I have ther Facts!! come meet them !!!

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Text: It would be fun to have a house pet that is a giant (like a fire giant, or one of the regular giants from the Steppes). I'm thinking for the guild halls, having a giant stomping around would be a cool change. :) Just an idea.

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Text: Heya :)

Would be fun if in new xpack some of the raid bosses would drop must have house items :)

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Text: We need to inundate the market with rares in order to bring the prices down some. Prices are getting ridiculous on this server, for rares and the items made with them. Help!!

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Text: I've about fucking had it with you and having to explain how to balance your crappy Joke of PvP in this game. Get your shit togeather already.

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Text: The Day/Night Time of the game., I really do not like the night time! It gets so dark I can hardly see., is there a command to do away with the Night Time? Thanks for listening...

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Text: the guild hall flooring makes me sick.....the flooring that we as players are allowed to place should be one piece....the floor blinks rapidly causing great stress upon me

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Text: When are weapon appearence items going to be in the marketplace? Want some!

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Text: You guys could take Stonebrunt, Sinking Sands, Tenebrous Tangle, Pillars of Flame, and a couple of the void instances and make one helluva golf course. Just saying.

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Text: You should put some chain-looking options for cloth wearers in the appearance section. Specifically pants.

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Text: Can you port /gems from EQ1 into EQ2?

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Text: Re: Things running slowly

In Greater Faydark, strolling, me
A prowler, running, I did see
His limbs full stretch, as if to reach
Some far-off distant strond, or beach
And yet though round and round he went
His labours clearly were mis-spent
For though he seemed to want to run
His dreams were dashed, by someone
A higher being than this poor dog
Had deemed that he should ever slog
And, while seeming to be going fast
He's doomed to prowl slow till the last.

:(

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Text: Void warped wood drops need to be higher, I believe.

Also, can we have armadillo pets.... kthxbye. :)

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Text: There should be giraffe and zebras mounts from the Commonlands.

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Text: Hello,

Do you think players would like some quests in which you get some attackers or unexpected visitors when you are in your own home and maybe in your own guild? Thanks and regards

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Text: This game needs fingerless gloves. In some way, shape, or form. Even if it's Station Marketplace bought. It'd be awesome to have some.

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Gamer Entitlement Going Too Far

Anyone who works in or even near the game industry is probably familiar with the phenomenon of entitlement - how people who play games feel they are entitled to rather a lot more things from a game than the game's developers, or legal terms of use, might actually reasonably expect.

This happens in other areas of life too of course, but for some reason computer game players seem to get particularly passionately attached to their games of choice, and can sometimes react unexpectedly strongly to the most minor things.  I've read feedback reports from my own game where people have said they're quitting the game over ridiculously tiny things - to give one example, because we changed the little picture that appeared on the coins in our game (graphics only even visible a tiny portion of the time).  I've read submitted feedback that compared the developers on my game to pedophiles, Saddam Hussein-followers, and much worse language too.  A week often doesn't go by without seeing someone in the feedback saying that at least some of us should be fired, are incompetent, could be replaced by a 3 year old, or clearly have no brains/sense/right to life.  And you need only stop by the discussion forums of pretty much any MMO to see similar passion is alive and well in discussions of most games.

I don't agree this is right, and although I understand how someone who loves a game can be so passionate about it, I think it's a misguided sense of entitlement that leads people to cross the line between politely stating an opinion or objection, and personal insults or even threats.  Happily, the majority of people who play the game I work on are generally polite and sane, despite a few apparent exceptions.  However, I read an article on Kotaku today that made me really fume about the misplaced sense of entitlement that some groups of gamers can develop, and somehow manage to justify:

Minecraft Apparently Under Siege

The gist of the article is that a group of players are disappointed at how slowly developer Notch is putting out updates to the small independent game Minecraft, and have decided to try to "force" him to work faster by launching a DDOS attack on the Minecraft servers.  Their thinking, apparently, is that if they prevent ANYBODY from playing Minecraft then Notch will lose money and have to do what they want.

From the article above, a post purportedly from the people responsible for the attack:

"It's purpose is to send Notch a clear message of how the future of minecraft will turn out unless he gets to work, namely by influencing the amount of sales taking place, due to the attacks.
Start providing your customers with the updates that you promise them.
We have roughly 83,000 bots available, and preserved for this seizure, we could if we wanted to keep this going for weeks, however we have decided to give it a week, and see whether or not your attitude, and commitment will change, we believe it will when money stops rolling in for the time being..."

I just haven't got the words for my disgust at this behaviour.  As a human being and democratic citizen, I resent some other group of people impinging upon my freedom of choice by deciding for me what I can and can't play and what I do and do not want. As a gamer who happens to be enjoying Minecraft, I am perfectly happy with the level of updates in Minecraft and I don't appreciate someone else telling me I should not be, let alone attempting to prevent my playing it.  And as a game developer, I am disgusted by the damage that this group is trying to do to a small, dedicated independent developer.  From what I've read, Notch is a very smart and talented programmer who has managed to create a really captivating game pretty much all on his own, and is trying to continue its development independently.  This is an accomplishment that many game designers can only dream of: the freedom to work for yourself, and do exactly what you want to create what you believe is the best game you can, without having to operate within the confines of a big corporate structure or team.  Notch has that dream within reach, he may become that one in a million game designer who is really able to be independent -- and a small, selfish group of individuals are trying to bring him down, just because as an independent developer he's not able to work as fast as they want him to?  Sickening.

The guys who are launching this attack have spent as much as anyone on Minecraft:  10 Euros (about US$13).  That's the cost of going to see a movie in the theatre ... less than you'd pay for a nice meal at a restaurant.  If they are that passionate about the game, then they've clearly already played it for many, many hours longer than a movie or a nice meal would have lasted.  There is no possible way they can justify their feeling of "entitlement" to more than they've already had.  They paid a very tiny price for days of enjoyment of an excellent game that they are well aware is still in alpha stage -- not even in beta.  This isn't the way to express their disappointment that updates aren't forthcoming as fast as they would want.  This is outright bullying, and it's inexcusable.  It's also illegal, and I hope they get their pathetic selves thrown in jail for it.

Acts like these make me lose faith in computer gamers.  :(



Edit to add: another great post on the topic, from @LivingWorlds.  In which he uses rather stronger language and discussion than I was comfortable using, but quite agree with.

Yay, Arixystix!

A co-worker of mine from SOE has just become a former co-worker, abandoning us to work full time at her real-life crafting.  She's an artist and has worked on a number of SOE's games over the years, most recently FreeRealms and Clone Wars, but she's been doing more and more "real life" crafting over the past couple of years and finally decided to try and make a full time business of it.  It's a big step, particularly in this economy, but she's already had some great publicity in the gaming press for her plushies based on the Plants vs. Zombies game, as well as other custom commission work including a Pocket God display for Comic-Con 2010.

Check out her blog here, her Etsy store here, and follow her on twitter @arixystix!  Best of luck Alix - though with all those adorable plushies, I'm sure luck won't even be needed.

Butter Tarts Recipe

Butter tarts are apparently a Canadian classic (though I had no idea till I left Canada and nobody had heard of them). They're delicious and easy to make, and I still have some former co-workers who drool at the memory and demand I make them when they visit.

So here's the recipe, in two parts (pastry, and filling).  Pastry can obviously be used for any kind of tart instead, also!



Short Pastry

This is an unsweetened shortbread-like pastry. You might be able to find pre-made short pastry in a supermarket; if so, you can be lazy, and skip straight to the filling section. It probably won't taste as good though, and this isn't hard to make, so here's how.

4 oz butter (softened, though not totally melted - leave it out of the fridge for a few hours, or microwave VERY briefly, maybe 5-10 seconds.)
8 oz plain flour
1/2 tsp salt

Put these into a bowl, use a knife to chop the butter up into small blocks about the size of a pea, then use your finger tips to mix the butter in completely.  The mixutre will look a bit like fine breadcrumbs at this point, depending a bit on how hot it is where you are. If it's a very hot day you may find the mixture is soft enough to stick together, in which case you can stop here.  Probably however it'll still be loose crumbs, so in this case add no more than 2 tablespoons of cold water and mix in, using the knife, adding only the minimum amount of water required to get it to stick together. (Note: flour + water = paste.  This is not tasty.  Flour + butter = shortbread.  This is yummy.  Therefore, the less water you add, the more tender and tasty your pastry will be.)

The pastry will still look fairly crumbly but can be carefully rolled out into a sheet, or just shaped by hand. For tarts I don't usually bother rolling out the pastry but just shape it to the baking dish - I used fancy little tart dishes here because these are for a dinner party, but you can use almost anything - muffin/cupcake tins work well for example.  Use your fingers to push the pastry smoothly into the dishes/muffin tin, and stick it in the fridge to wait while you make the filling.

Clockwise from top right:  pastry ready to be pressed into the dish; pastry ready for filling; pastry with walnuts; filled tart ready to bake.

There is no need to grease or spray the dishes before putting the pastry in, since it contains so much butter it should be easy to remove as long as the sugary insides didn't overflow and turn to sugar cement; and if that happens all the greasing in the world won't prevent them from welding themselves to the dish. If you have a little sugar overflow and are using something smooth edged like a muffin tin, try using a sharp knife to gently slide down the sides and ensure the tarts can spin slightly in place while they are still hot, which will make them much easier to remove when cool.

Butter Tart Filling

4 oz butter (softened, as above)
8 oz light brown sugar
1 tsp vanilla
1 tsp lemon juice
1 egg

chopped walnuts (optional)

Mix together in a bowl (don't need a mixer, just a spoon). Put into the pastry shells, fill them only about 2/3 full as the filling will expand a bit and bubble while cooking. Add some chopped walnuts into each tart if you like, this is optional.

Bake for about 15-20 minutes at 400 F. When the pastry is just starting to turn colour but not too brown, and the filling should have significantly darkened, they are good to go. (They can be taken out earlier, but this will leave a liquid filling in the center which is still tasty but more dangerous to eat!)  Let them cool to room temperature, or refrigerate them for about an hour, before eating them.

This recipe made exactly enough for 6 tarts this size.  It will make 8-10 using standard muffin tins, or even more using mini muffin tins (and these are very rich, so smaller may be better).
This is what they looked like directly after removing from the oven:

And this is what they look like when cool.

Depending on the size of the dishes or muffin pans you use, you may end up with either extra filling or extra pastry.  Both can be separately frozen in air tight containers and thawed to cook later.

Minecraft, Everybody's Doing It!

Sometimes, for reasons that we don't entirely understand (although Malcolm Gladwell took a look at some factors in his book "The Tipping Point"), an idea, or meme, or a product suddenly gains rapid popularity.  "Going viral" it's often called these days, meaning that it's no longer being spread by the owner advertising it, but it is spreading via other people, spreading infectiously, like a virus outbreak.  Sometimes it's just a silly internet video ("double rainbow!" was a recent one) but when it's a product, suddenly everybody is talking about it/buying it/using it.

This past week a small independent game called Minecraft seems to have hit that tipping point and gone viral.  I started seeing emails and links circulating at work early this week, then comments from non-work friends on Facebook, then tweets about it from people outside the game industry and outside the country.  It even got a mention on Penny Arcade towards the end of the week, which is surely a sign that a tiny independent game has "made it".  And the game isn't even out of alpha yet.

So what's the game?  Well, true to the name, it's strongly based on (a) mining and (b) crafting.  It's a fairly freeform sandbox type game, log in and you get a randomly generated world in extremely low-rez graphics.  You are (unless you try multiplayer mode) alone in the world, and must build yourself a safe haven and fend off enemies.  Enemies appear mostly in the form of undead critters:  skeletons and zombies who come out when the sun goes down and (mostly) vanish again at dawn.  A few spiders and leftover sun-resistant zombies keep the daytime interesting but are fairly rare.  You start naked with nothing, and have to make everything from scratch with your hands, slowly building up your secure fortress and your tools.  The graphics are extremely basic and the in-game help nonexistent so start off by watching some tutorial videos and then refer to the crafting wiki once you start playing.

From the minecraft wikipedia site:

Minecraft is a sandbox construction game created by Markus Persson and is currently in pre release alpha. Minecraft development started around the 10th of May 2009, pre-orders for the full game started being accepted on the 13th of June.

The game involves players creating and destroying various types of blocks in a three dimensional environment. The player takes an avatar that can destroy or create blocks, forming fantastic structures, creations and artwork across the various multiplayer servers in multiplegame modes.

As mentioned, the game is still in alpha, and payment received at present will go towards getting the game into beta and then launch.  But it's already a lot of fun; definitely one of those "just ONE more turn" games that turns into 6 hours passing without you even noticing. My boyfriend picked up the game on Thursday, and I stumbled out of bed at 1:30am that night to find his side of the bed still cold and empty, and him in the computer room hunched over his laptop saying "there's a spider out there, I'm scared to leave my fortress."  He then insisted on giving me (half asleep and without glasses on to even see) a tour of his fortress before I crawled back to bed.  When I went in to work on Friday, I found two co-workers obsessively playing it on their lunch break and discussing elaborate plans to build a sheltered valley under a glass dome for more secure livestock farming.

Whether you enjoy building massive fortresses to battle zombies, or whether you just enjoy building and decorating your home, or whether you find the somewhat unique style of crafting system more fascinating, as long as you're not a graphics junkie you'll probably find something to enjoy.  As one friend said to me, "it's sort of like playing with legos, but with zombies."  How can you go wrong there?  I found the crafting system particularly interesting.  Although it's fairly basic, many items you craft are created by actually "drawing" the item by the way you lay out the subcomponents.  For example, to make a pickaxe, "draw" the handle by laying two wooden staves end to end, then "draw" the blade by laying three blocks of ore across the top.  Simple, and fairly limited, but something I haven't seen done before and makes for some very easy mnemonics instead of just having to memorize a list of recipes "pickaxe = 2 staves and 3 ores."

Since the Penny Arcade link, the poor developer's site traffic has gone so crazy that the authentication server and purchasing page aren't even working, so the developer has announced that until he gets the servers back on track, Minecraft will be free to play for all who wish to try it.  No word exactly when this will be, so here's your chance to check it out now (and if you think it's good, do consider paying to support this independent developer once the payment servers are back on line!)

Remember, it is stilll very much alpha, so save often (by hitting escape to bring up the menu, this forces a save) and do check external sites for tutorials because there is really not a lot of help in game yet.  There's definitely still a lot more polish and content that needs to be added, but there's already lots of fun gameplay potential there and I'm really interested to see what will become of it in the long run.

My best tip: if you start on a snowy world, probably a good plan to just restart until you get one with a nicer climate.  The snow really cuts down visibility, which makes it far too easy to get lost while you're still trying to figure out the game.

UPDATE to add awesome fan-made video: YouTube Link!

Recent G.I.R.L. blogs

Some recent posts I've written for SOE's G.I.R.L. blog:

G.I.R.L. Talk with Lesly Irwin

Fan Faire: It's All About the People

Joe "Rystall" Shoopack also followed up with some of the previous G.I.R.L. scholarship winners in this Summer Art Internships post.

What do players want?

Some bits of nightly in-game feedback that caught my eye recently for being amusing, or unusual, or interesting, or just plain incomprehensible.

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Text:        I would like to see a house item called Doors. This way we can have doors in our houses. Floor item, position and grow to the desired size. These would save state so that they would not auto close. Also, I would like to see them have keys so only certain people can open certain doors - although that could be tricky to code.

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Text:        Can we get wigs.. as appearance slot headgear... that way erudites can have hair

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Text:        um, there are christmas lights on the mane of the arcande steed of the faithful.  Guess that goes together....

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Text:        I'm an armorer and a dark elf sk, not a pastry chef.

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Text:        Can we please start having game elevators automatically return to the "down" position after a couple of minutes? This expansion is full of elevators, and everybody always leaves them at the top, which forces me to call the elevator down, then sit and wait for it. There's no need for this. They should automatically return to the "down" position. Or, you can avoid this problem altogether and leave elevators out of zone design. I very much hate the way you have implemented elevators in this game.

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Text:        I think it would be really cool if you added a playable mermaid race, and an underwater city. But actual mermaids with full fins, and the place would actually look underwater. And all of the merpeople would get a spell that allows them to breathe on land for 2 hours at a time. Since they are aquatic they wouldnt be able to breathe on land without that spell. Or maybe you could just add actual mermaids instead of just sirens. Please consider the idea. =)

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Text:        Re: Game Experience May Change During Online Play

I always knew that these warning words had to be there for a good reason. Once upon a time I viewed them as a simple disclaimer; little did I realise that the game would change so very much that I would wake up one day and realise that I really didn't belong here any more.

The thing is: after many years of living hand-to-mouth in Norrath, I've somehow managed recently to acquire a long-term lease. I suspect it had something to do with a fast-talking erudite. So, here I am, with the whole of Norrath open to me, and yet... and yet, I feel very odd.

I think I need to expand and expound...

Once upon a time (as I think I mentioned), it made sense to maximise my intelligence. Wisdom meant nothing to me back then. And so, my character developed: I became a very smart (or so I believed) but really rather, well, foolish bard. And, yet, strangely, it seemed to fit. That was me: I felt right.

But now, I find that for some really bizarre reason, my intelligence is leaking away, and I feel a nurge to gain more of a trait I've never had before: something called... wisdom?. This trend worries me mightily: instead of a clueless bard who sometimes does do the right thing in spite of himself, this half-mended crystal ball here is suggesting a wise old bird who's thick as two short planks.

That's just not me.

/sigh

Ah, well.

Thanks for listening, anyway.

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Text:        FYI New Halas rocks! Hats off to the designers!

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Text:        Hi! There are a couple of things I'd like to suggest. One is quite big, I really don't like waking up on my doorstep if I haven't paid my rent. How about having it so that when you log-in, and you are in your home, and your rent is due, you get a dialogue box asking you to pay your rent, and if you don't THEN it chucks you out? That would be much nicer.

The second thing is quite small. I still live at the inn in Kelethin, and every time I leave, this idiot treant is telling me it needs a pruning. I wish I could give it a terminal pruning. Could you PLEASE shut the damned thing up?

Thank you!

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Text:        btw would like to say to soe did a great job on 90 is the most enjoyed level i've ever done since lvl 60 good work . and think about letting alts get cella update without running the zone im very busy thats ruff when got 5 myth alt's . 

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Text:        getting knocked unconsious but not killed is a reeeeally cool event, instead of making it like the last 1% perhaps it could be the last 3% so it happens 3 times as much ?

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Text:        Houseing in Paineel! Make it happen

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Text:        OK qeynos is good, freeport is evil.  dark elf shadow knights, crafters or not, do not "offer to share the baked fish with their new hua mein friends."  Unless, of course, they have the option of poisoning it first.

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Text:        Hello! [name removed] the gnome from the 'shire here! I was just in Gorowyn. You've changed it! I'd have to say, it was much more fun with all the elevators, but I suppose you made it simpler for people in a way? at least it shows you are listening to people!

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Any chance you might listen to me? It would be really nice to see the Baubbleshire get a little improvement! Even a travel through Norrath ability on the dock would be nice. Gnomes seem to be increasingly common in Norrath, it would be nice for them to have a home.

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Text:        For intentional raid wipes,  There should be an item added to the game that lets you commit suicide.  Like a poision potion or something.

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