Statesman speaks at serious games summit


2Negative

 

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Fact: writers/celebrities/etc. are real human beings. As such, they can have bad days, good days, off days, be taken the wrong way or just come across not how they want.


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Yeah, this kind of thing is transparently obvious.


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Individual, customizable rooms for EVERY member would go a long way toward making bases more palatable. When they were released, I told my sg that I hated them because it gave only 1 or 2 people access to the editor. Disgruntled people ravaging a base before they quit an sg is the biggest reason access to edit the entire base is restricted by an SGs leaders. There are many more reasons, but that is the dominant one. No SG related TFs, missions or trials via the super computer is severely disappointing.

The idea of the bases isn't rejected, the implementation of the bases is.


 

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A) Assuming Cryptic owes them more than it does. (Cryptic, by terms of service, only owes you access to the servers for your 15 bucks a month. Everything else was never guaranteed - it was merely something decided on as a way to entice customers. Yes, I would quit without that stuff - but that doesn't mean they *owe* it - it merely means its a good way to retain customers.)

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A very minor comment: I think it's NCSoft who takes our money for access to the servers. Cryptic takes our money (however indirectly) for access to their content. And it's kind of hazy on exactly what this "content" is, which I think is the reason for a lot of the ranting on the forums.

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I won't go into a long spiel about this again, but our $15/mo pays for more than server access. Who says that? Just the players? Nope, NCSoft says that if you check their Knowledge Base. And common sense. Content updates don't grow on trees that never need watering - somebody gets paid to make them.

People can inappropriately feel over-entitled to more content, but it's inherently impossible for them not to feel entitled to periodic content updates. Kellis is correct in that players are not guaranteed (and are sometimes confused by) specific content updates and fixes or specific timing of their release, but players have been promised some sort of content and fixes as part of the service and within a reasonable timeframe. To assert otherwise is cheerleading rationalizations that do nothing to encourage the maintenance or improvement of service.

I'm all for more realistic expectations (which is why the company's hype methodology boggles the mind), but lowering the bar to below sea level is just crazy talk.

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I stand corrected >.> I shall say "oops" in an official capacity! (I suppose my reason for that belief is that literally, every MMO I've played other than CoH and DDO has been well... their only content updates of any signifigance focused on retail expansions; some not much bigger than CoH Issues *recalls FFXI chains of Promathia* /em groan.)

Still my main point really was just people really do get ridiculous. They get the notion that they *deserve* all sorts of things - and a good many have made demands; often demands very much specific to their own personal wants and needs and ignoring... well everyone else.

That's what I was really aiming for right there. I just really *REALLY* hate baseless ranting and whining. Like I said >.> I'm all for constructive criticism. Just hate the irrational madness some people put up. "I demand X feature be implemented in the next issue (which is launching in a week and has been on test for a month) or I'm quitting and telling all my friends CoH is terrible! Blah blah customer service blah blah I demand, blah" etc...

<-.->; That's really what I was aiming for, though I admit, I was obviously incorrect on the point. <~_~>; Hehe, I get just a wee bit to into things when trying to discuss them <;_;> oops.


A Warrior's Friend: ID 335212 - Help Infernal save Valkyrie from Battle Maiden.
Above Mars Part 1: The Wellington: ID 159769 - Save Mars by destroying a monstrous battleship from the inside!
>.> My DA page, where I attempt to art.

 

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Individual, customizable rooms for EVERY member would go a long way toward making bases more palatable. When they were released, I told my sg that I hated them because it gave only 1 or 2 people access to the editor. Disgruntled people ravaging a base before they quit an sg is the biggest reason access to edit the entire base is restricted by an SGs leaders. There are many more reasons, but that is the dominant one. No SG related TFs, missions or trials via the super computer is severely disappointing.

The idea of the bases isn't rejected, the implementation of the bases is.

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Ya know... an interesting idea just came out of this; I don't think having individual customizable rooms within the 'base' base would work. (Ie: open at all intersections type rooms I mean)

But - what if there were elavators within the bases, that would take us to an upper/lower floor of the base wherein the heroes individual rooms would be? A dorm sort of.

That way, once the SG purchases the Dormitory addon - members can customize (via influence) their own personal rooms within that upper area. Rooms would be accessible via permissions set by the occupant - so for instance if you have 10 people in an SG, and they all get along, but one is kind of quiet (or for RP reasons just doesn't want you in their room) they can close the room off to all but C - because C understands them.

Even with access to someone's room, you couldn't mess it up though.

>_< Sorry, I know it sounds silly but I think it would be fun and give the bases social angle more... well... purpose.


A Warrior's Friend: ID 335212 - Help Infernal save Valkyrie from Battle Maiden.
Above Mars Part 1: The Wellington: ID 159769 - Save Mars by destroying a monstrous battleship from the inside!
>.> My DA page, where I attempt to art.

 

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Bingo. Jack's comments are an example of a common syndrome I see among software developers (myself included); they confuse a lukewarm reception of a poor implementation with rejection of the underlying concept. The *concept* of customizable lairs is totally cool, but the implementation thus far has been flawed.

I have many alts and they all belong to SGs, but none of them are SG leaders, so my total experience with the base building tools is roughly zero. How can Jack expect the entire player population to be excited about the base building tools when only 5% (my guess) of the population ever gets to use them?

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I don't see the confusion here....isn't this exactly what he said? People don't like it because it doesn't allow them to express their individuality; only those top five percent get to actually build the base while everyone else just contributes prestige.

It doesn't sound to me like he's saying "Well, I guess they just hate bases, go figure"....he's got at least some inkling of WHY people don't like bases, or one of the reasons, at least, and that's a good start towards getting them fixed. I don't see anything indicating that he thinks the players are rejecting the underlying concept of bases.


 

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That's what the "new mantra" of "give the players what they want" really means: I've managed to let go of "my vision" and am now comfortable making it "our vision."

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Honestly, though, has there been much evidence of a concrete philosophical shift apparent in the game's development or in game changes? Perhaps it's the political skeptic in me, but I haven't seen that much of a shift. I have seen some spin and hype surrounding a shift, but I haven't really seen a lot of changes to reflect the shift. Maybe there'll be more evidence with after I8's out of the can.

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1) Happy birthday Clintonian!

2) I think we are starting to see the changes that reflect that change in dev mantra. The paid expansion got dropped and everything in it was / will be made "free" in later issues. Positron worked it so that wings came out earlier than I9 (which is when they will be fully available to all players). I8 is bringing a number of changes requested by heroes (and villains). Also, in the past few months we have seen a huge boost to the number of costume items availalbe to heroes and emotes have been added - sure, they are fluff, but they are frequently requested fluff.

However, I also think that changing direction within a MMOG is like steering an oil tanker - you might want to make that turn, but it's going to take a while to get the thing facing some other point on the compass.


 

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Still my main point really was just people really do get ridiculous.

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Agreed. There is some wiggle room between 0 and 'ALL THE WAY TO 11, BABY!' on the expectation scale, though. A lot of reasonable discussions here and in real life get off track with too much attention given to the extremes. It's tempting to tell an '11' person that they really should expect a '1' because it's frustrating to give a loony any credence to their fantasy and you want to shock them to reality, but these things tend to bite people in the [censored] later on. I have the marks to prove it, myself.


 

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Still my main point really was just people really do get ridiculous.

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Agreed. There is some wiggle room between 0 and 'ALL THE WAY TO 11, BABY!' on the expectation scale, though. A lot of reasonable discussions here and in real life get off track with too much attention given to the extremes. It's tempting to tell an '11' person that they really should expect a '1' because it's frustrating to give a loony any credence to their fantasy and you want to shock them to reality, but these things tend to bite people in the [censored] later on. I have the marks to prove it, myself.

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So true... <X_X> lol; /sigh

Like so many things in life - moderation is key, yet, at the same point, articulating the middle way is also the most difficult; since sadly topics can't use a handy numerical scale <,<b


A Warrior's Friend: ID 335212 - Help Infernal save Valkyrie from Battle Maiden.
Above Mars Part 1: The Wellington: ID 159769 - Save Mars by destroying a monstrous battleship from the inside!
>.> My DA page, where I attempt to art.

 

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I don't see the confusion here....isn't this exactly what he said? People don't like it because it doesn't allow them to express their individuality; only those top five percent get to actually build the base while everyone else just contributes prestige.

It doesn't sound to me like he's saying "Well, I guess they just hate bases, go figure"....he's got at least some inkling of WHY people don't like bases, or one of the reasons, at least, and that's a good start towards getting them fixed. I don't see anything indicating that he thinks the players are rejecting the underlying concept of bases.

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Well, some of the quotes still seem to throw the onus of the poor reception on the players, rather on the design. There's still a little undercurrent of players didn't play the way he wanted them to, which handicapped the awesomeness of bases. You can see that inkling as a ray of insight, but it also could be a smaller mea culpa rationalization to avoid addressing a bigger problem.

It still seems like he's conceding a point with bases, when the point isn't really his to concede. The conclusion isn't really his to decide. The facts speak for themselves. The bases are a flawed construct - especially so since they are still so buggy and so many at-launch promised features to them are still not there. If they were there, he'd have more reason to imply that players didn't appreciate bases, but those features and functionality are not there. So he sounds a little like someone who's a little out of touch with the reality on the ground. *

I think that's been pointed out pretty clearly by the detailed, and mostly respectful responses in this thread.


*(Then again, I don't recall Emmert being all that hands-on with base design prior or during CoV beta. A couple of red names thought to be hands-on with the original base feature design are no longer with the company. This is actually ties into an ongoing discussion in various places about whether it's good for MMOGs to have seminal creators move on to new projects after a year or two. These things are complicated beasts of code, and it's difficult to replace the kind of code/feature experience that comes from having built it in the first place.)


 

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1) Happy birthday Clintonian!

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Thank you. I still have over an hour to cling to my youth here in California at the moment.

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However, I also think that changing direction within a MMOG is like steering an oil tanker - you might want to make that turn, but it's going to take a while to get the thing facing some other point on the compass.

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Agreed. Just like with the conventional wisdom of the Dems retaking Congress this year, I think it's too early to cheer about a new day dawning yet - but I'm hopeful in my skepticism.

Remember: REAL HEROES VOTE on November 7th!

(...and real heroes insist on voting with paper provisional ballots if their electronic voting machines don't print voting receipts...)


 

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1) Happy birthday Clintonian!

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Thank you. I still have over an hour to cling to my youth here in California at the moment.

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However, I also think that changing direction within a MMOG is like steering an oil tanker - you might want to make that turn, but it's going to take a while to get the thing facing some other point on the compass.

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Agreed. Just like with the conventional wisdom of the Dems retaking Congress this year, I think it's too early to cheer about a new day dawning yet - but I'm hopeful in my skepticism.

Remember: REAL HEROES VOTE on November 7th!

(...and real heroes insist on voting with paper provisional ballots if their electronic voting machines don't print voting receipts...)

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/agree majorly


A Warrior's Friend: ID 335212 - Help Infernal save Valkyrie from Battle Maiden.
Above Mars Part 1: The Wellington: ID 159769 - Save Mars by destroying a monstrous battleship from the inside!
>.> My DA page, where I attempt to art.

 

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Jack.... Jack.... Not gonna say I didn't like him, he might nerf me :-D but from what I can tell, he's too involved in his company to know EVERYTHING we want. He should either hire someone to run the company and develop full time and get back in touch with his customers. That or he should just run the business and leave the developing completely to Matt and the others who are still regularly communicating with the player base. It really is an either or in my opinion.

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QFE. The day he started going off about the card game, the novels, the figures and all the other stuff that wasn't the game, I knew that he was going to get way too caught up in everything else to focus the way a Lead Designer should on a game that they created. I'm not saying he shouldn't oversee the overall image and franchise of the CoX universe, someone needs to, but as it came to pass, someone else HAD to focus solely on the game or else it would go to hell with his lack of focus on just it, so they boosted Matt to the Lead position. This is a very common occurrence within business since a business eventually grows and responsibilities grow as well and have to be divided up. That way contact with the customers isn't lost and their opinions aren't filtered through a bunch of different people and reports.

Personally I'd have one person in charge of just CoV design and one in charge of CoH design whom then reported to one overall CoX designer who worked on advancing the story and things common to both games. In essence you'd have the three heads making sure that both games got their fair share and at the same time matching up to where they need to cross and progress forward together.

The main story writer should collaborate with all three heads and there should be two teams, one for each side, working on their own stuff, but all in the same room so that each side can grab ideas from the other and constantly communicate what each one is adding.

Every day at the beginning or during lunch it should be mandatory that each person who works at Cryptic read the corresponding forum for their department for at least 30 minutes or so and take notes of the top issues/topics that are being discussed amongst the playerbase. The Community Manager could spend the week talking to a different department each day and communicating what their short term and long term goals are to the community at the end of the week or month, so that we all have an indication of what is being fixed, what they could use our help with and what they're not sure of.

Communication is always, ALWAYS what makes or breaks great ideas and success stories. Communicating with the people who actually play the game, with the people who make the game and the people who make the game able to exist are the basic three areas surrounding any kind of business.

In summary, the best quote for all of this is "Assumption is the mother of all [censored] ups."


 

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Unfortunately, one of the problems with the boards is that both sides of any argument forget that it's all raw bias. Those same people you think are being ridiculous are doubtless totally secure in the belief that they have a legitimate point. Unless one side or the other invokes some ultimate source of truth and decision that I've never personally encountered, it's just name-calling at various degrees of intensity.

~Gabriel


 

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Unfortunately, one of the problems with the boards is that both sides of any argument forget that it's all raw bias. Those same people you think are being ridiculous are doubtless totally secure in the belief that they have a legitimate point. Unless one side or the other invokes some ultimate source of truth and decision that I've never personally encountered, it's just name-calling at various degrees of intensity.

~Gabriel

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A call to reasoned discourse and constructive criticism is not namecalling.

One doesn't need any 'ultimate truth' to be able to ask for a some degree of politeness in making negative comments. And someone making unreasonable demands (and while no, I don't have any divine source to point to to tell me what unreasonable demands are - I think there's a little base-level logic one can employ to understand what's what in that regard) - making unreasonable demands is, indeed, ridiculous. It doesn't help the game, it doesn't help the players of that game, and it most assuredly doesn't incline the devs to listen any more intently to us when we have serious honest to goodness issues we want addressed.

I don't care how convinced someone is that they're correct - it doesn't change that they can, in fact, be wrong. (Yes, opinions can, in fact, be wrong - people can form all sorts of opinions, they can say, for instance that white is black - they're allowed that opinion, but they are indeed incorrect.) So if someone's opinion is, for example "the devs just want to ruin our fun" (an opinion I've seen repeatedly) - I have to question their ability to think critically.

Why on earth would a game developer intentionally lessen how much fun you have? They want you to stick around, you pay their salaries among other things (at least indirectly). They also want you to buy more products in the future (Cryptic having at least 2 more MMOs in the pipe so far; one we know nothing of, one is the Marvel MMO).

I've seen that charge leveled repeatedly - its an opinion, and, its a wrong one; because it doesn't pass any basic logical tests at all.

I'm not saying "Defend the devs at all costs" - that's silly; and in fact doesn't help them at all. They do NEED to know what we think of given features, positive or negative. I'm just asking people to kill the rhetoric and focus on the actual issues. Hate a change? Make it known, and do so clearly and concisely. Understand that some people may disagree with you on that; and in the end, this isn't a democracy - the devs will make the final decision based on their own experiences and reasoning. You have your say, you merely can't expect that say to be headed above all others.

That's exactly the kind of ridiculousness I'm talking about. There are plenty of people who are convinced they're correct above all others - and usually, they happen to be incorrect; that's why we have such a thing as reasoned discourse: To keep passion, and 'gut knowledge' from overriding empirical knowledge or - where empirical knowledge is impossible, to come up with acceptable compromise where possible. That applies of course to far more than the game.


A Warrior's Friend: ID 335212 - Help Infernal save Valkyrie from Battle Maiden.
Above Mars Part 1: The Wellington: ID 159769 - Save Mars by destroying a monstrous battleship from the inside!
>.> My DA page, where I attempt to art.

 

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But - what if there were elavators within the bases, that would take us to an upper/lower floor of the base wherein the heroes individual rooms would be? A dorm sort of.

That way, once the SG purchases the Dormitory addon - members can customize (via influence) their own personal rooms within that upper area. Rooms would be accessible via permissions set by the occupant - so for instance if you have 10 people in an SG, and they all get along, but one is kind of quiet (or for RP reasons just doesn't want you in their room) they can close the room off to all but C - because C understands them.

Even with access to someone's room, you couldn't mess it up though.

>_< Sorry, I know it sounds silly but I think it would be fun and give the bases social angle more... well... purpose.

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This isn't in the least bit silly. Individualized apartments within the main base are one of the cool ideas that get suggested from time to time. Your personal take on it would work really well, I think. I’d love to see this.

But the devs have seen fit to not do this.

Other really excellent ideas have been offered that would have been easy to create, but have also been ignored. For example, “windows” to the outside world. They could come in a variety of sizes, and with different sets of pictures. One SG base might be way up in a building in Steel Canyon. Another might look out on the evil misty fogs of Dark Astoria. Or the surface of the Moon, or in near Earth orbit. Or a funky extradimensional space like the Shard. Such “windows” would be nothing more than wall decorations, and therefore relatively easy to make.

I wish the devs would do both.



That, and fix the bugs.


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Other really excellent ideas have been offered that would have been easy to create, but have also been ignored.

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I would not presume that any of our ideas are "easy". One thing I've learned from being a coder, most of the time you can't really tell how difficult something is until you know the legacy code.

I would not assume the devs are ignoring us. This is all a complex cost/benefit analysis. Remember, most of the game is not bases, so significant effort put into bases is benefiting a minority of the game. For example, if the choice comes down to adding some features to bases or making missions more dynamic, I'd choose the mission upgrades without question.


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Venture wrote:

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Since we're small everyone has base edit privs; if you need to go somewhere distant the pads aren't set for, sell back a beacon and buy the one you need. (For this reason I think the current telepad/beacon system is a joke; either don't let us sell the beacons back, or make them require salvage, or just change the telepad menu to let the user chose from all the zones the SG has badged and get rid of the beacons altogether.)

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Amen. I don't understand why the telepads have to be so convoluted. I can never remember which one goes to which two zones. The advantage of having them is almost negated by me running around the base clicking on different telepads until I find the one with the destination I need.

Allow them to have more than two beacons. Even if it requires additional salvage or prestige.

--NT


They all laughed at me when I said I wanted to be a comedian.
But I showed them, and nobody's laughing at me now!

If I became a red name, I would be all "and what would you mere mortals like to entertain me with today, mu hu ha ha ha!" ~Arcanaville

 

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Zubenelgenubi wrote

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This isn't in the least bit silly. Individualized apartments within the main base are one of the cool ideas that get suggested from time to time.

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One of the reasons I really like this idea is that there's really no way for another player (other than the info window) to see your exploits. They can see your badges and powers, but not your souvenirs, AVs you've defeated, and so on.

A personal trophy room would be awesome.

--NT


They all laughed at me when I said I wanted to be a comedian.
But I showed them, and nobody's laughing at me now!

If I became a red name, I would be all "and what would you mere mortals like to entertain me with today, mu hu ha ha ha!" ~Arcanaville

 

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Yeah, but he and posi arent gonna listen though, they think spending a crap load of prestige for a base that barley does anything is fun.


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There goes Mecha, contributing his deep and profound thoughts to this discussion as usual.

Hats off to ya!


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I think there's some misinterpretation here - or my speech wasn't clear.

Let's take a look at costume creation. It's been embraced beyond belief by players...we have in game costume contests and events organized by you the players...Some say it's the best part of the game. The single most requested item in CoH is to make the costume creator standalone...

Intestingly, costumes have no gameplay value. They don't boost damage. They don't boost resistance. They don't boost defense. They're only for show.

Now, let's take a look at bases. Take away the teleporters, take away anything game related.

As just a resource for expressing something unique, base creation is on par tech wise with costume creation. Admittedly, there's not quite the same amount of textures, colors, etc., but there's still a lot of versatility. And the layout possibilities are endless.

But what's clear from this thread - and from many, many posts - is that bases are "too expensive". To me, that's interesting (as it is to the Serious Games crowd). Costume changes come with a minimal cost that no one really complains about, but we complain about the costs of bases. Evidently, the costs exceed the perceived value of creating one's own HQ (btw, I confess that many other games have the notion of personal property, but aside from Second Life, I don't think they offer as much customizability as our bases).

Let's turn to the idea of an architect. We foresaw that some people would feel alienated if they weren't the architect. That's why some things (Personal Items) can be "crafted" by individuals and placed in the base. But even if there's an architect: many super groups have a member who designed a single costume which all then use. In other words, they're more than willing to accept someone else's opinion in the group identity for their avatar appearance. Again, the primary difference is cost (I think).

That's what the point of the talk was. I completely agree with many of the suggestions raised in the Base Construction forum, as well as one's mentioned here, would improve Bases to some degree or another. Posi and I go through them at length; really, it's just a question of time & resources. Some things would take astronomically long to do - or perhaps there's something else even more requested or popular.


 

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Intestingly, costumes have no gameplay value. They don't boost damage. They don't boost resistance. They don't boost defense. They're only for show.

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Yes, and everyone can see them. You look at my character, you see my costume.

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Admittedly, there's not quite the same amount of textures, colors, etc., but there's still a lot of versatility. And the layout possibilities are endless.

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And they're hidden away, effectively in their own dimension. Other people can see my costume and go 'wow' simply by my flying past. To see my base, they have to be in a coalition with me, or on my team while we go there (and for that to happen, we need to have a reason for them to go, other than me saying 'come check out the base'). They can't simply happen across it and go 'wow!'

When something has substantial show value, you have to be able to show it off!


 

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Thanks, Jack.

As an attendee, his remarks on "what didn't work" wasn't comprehensive, but was given in the context of the rest of the presentation.

If I may: the problem with many personal items are they have a cost that's weighed against the base. They're not usually free decorations.
<ul type="square">[*] They take up prestige[*] They take up control (a tough thing to keep up with in a teleport-centric base)[*] They take up power (easier to manage in a small base[*] They take up space. They're not usually very small[/list]
Now, I don't have much of a supergroup, and I love my base, but I know that as the base architect, I'd be pretty darn pissed if someone else came in and placed stuff, redlining control, power, our bank, or taking up a huge hunk o space.


 

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Costume changes come with a minimal cost that no one really complains about, but we complain about the costs of bases.

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Obviously because the cost of bases is not 'minimal'

At any level in the game I can spend a few hours doing what comes naturally (playing the game) and have more than enough funds to change a costume. The same cannot be said for building a functional AND asthetically pleasing base. Even with an SG of thirty people in SG mode at all times it takes months to get a base that you feel is 'adequate'. Getting a downright spectacular base seems nearly unattainable.

Now, to get similar awe from the base building side, add a second floor to the base that does not allow functionality that uses the biggest plot size and decorative items only, and let us spend influence on them at a 1 to 1 ratio for prestige. Or something similar for player apartments, or whatever. You are right, the verstatility of the base editor is amazing and fun. I've played with these excellent legos many times when test was giving out 36 million prestige, and not once was I there for the functionality.

Also, you have to fix the bugs that kick coalition memebers and team mates from the bases. One of the reasons that costumes are so fun is that they are so easy to share. Sharing your base with others is... darn near impossible. Once this is fixed maybe you will start to see base building contests as well


 

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Intestingly, costumes have no gameplay value. They don't boost damage. They don't boost resistance. They don't boost defense. They're only for show.

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Yes, and everyone can see them. You look at my character, you see my costume.

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Admittedly, there's not quite the same amount of textures, colors, etc., but there's still a lot of versatility. And the layout possibilities are endless.

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And they're hidden away, effectively in their own dimension. Other people can see my costume and go 'wow' simply by my flying past. To see my base, they have to be in a coalition with me, or on my team while we go there (and for that to happen, we need to have a reason for them to go, other than me saying 'come check out the base'). They can't simply happen across it and go 'wow!'

When something has substantial show value, you have to be able to show it off!

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That's a very good point actually... I didn't think in those terms myself but yah... &lt;o.O&gt; Its hard to get people to check out the base because its squirreled away (hehe, I make teh funny) in a portal only accessible by allies and SG mates.

Not that we want strangers free-roaming the bases either... hrmm...

Ok so here's a question Lady_Sadako &gt;.&gt; I think you've got a good point here - but how do we make them more visible without running out of landscape nor having people in our bases when we don't want them there?


(&lt;@.@&gt;; and I think its awesome that States is reading this thread. I shouldn't be surprised at all mind you &gt;.&gt; but I am &lt;,&lt; &lt;. .&gt; ahem - "cool")


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