City of Heroes: Live Forum Archive

Designing Freedom and the Translat-O-Tron 5000

Benchpresser

By Benchpresser,
Posted on: 2011-06-23 22:05 in CoH and CoV General Discussions

 

Posted

Yes, once again, I have dragged the handy, dandy, right and randy Translat-O-Tron 5000 out of mothballs and plugged it in to a wall socket. Then, after resetting the circuit breakers, I fed it Positron's latest message to the masses.

Now... I want to reiterate here... this is nothing *I* wrote, Mister Matt Miller... sir... your honor... lordship... this is what the Translat-O-Tron 5000... a machine... not even built or programmed by me... your humble servant... this is what THAT came up with...

Not me. Translat-O-Tron 5000. Swear.

Here it is:

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Designing Freedom by Matt “Positron” Miller
Yes, that’s right! You owe your Freedom to me! The 4th of July is right around the corner… send presents!
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Over the past several months I have been keeping a secret, and now that it has been revealed to the world, I can finally share that secret with all of you:
I have been living a lie! My inner self’s name is Shirley and I refuse to hide her any longer!
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City of Heroes is undergoing a transformation.
And so am I apparently… no wait… oh… sorry, wrong secret. Ignore my last.
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Several times this past year I have been asked in interviews, "Is City of Heroes ever going to go Free to Play?"
I have also been asked where the punch and pie is that I promised for any interviewer who showed up… but that’s not important right now.
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Now, I know as well as you all do that an "I can't comment on that" will be taken as a 'yes' more times than not, so I have been very careful with my answers, and it has been an answer I still stick by today.
Now, you know as well as I do that no matter what I say the player base is only going to hear what they WANT to hear. I can say “ooby-gadooby erk, erk, erk” and some fool will say “Positron says we’re getting Pony Travel Power in the next issue!” … … Twits.
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If we were ever to go to this type of business model we will make sure that not only it fits the game, but the game fits the business model.
And for OUR model, we’ve decided to go with Heidi Klum… Rest assured that I’ll be making absolute sure that the “game” fits the “business” model.
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Going to the new "Hybrid" business model is not something we have taken lightly.
That’s right! Our business model now uses 40% less fuel than before! Ain’t Hybrids great?
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When we broke City of Heroes development into Strike Teams, I took on the role of Lead Designer to ensure that all the moving parts were talking to one another and that a consistent vision of how the Hybrid model is going to get applied worked across all the Strike Teams.
When we City of Heroes development into Strike Teams, I totally mistook what the term stood for… we’d already taken over a small 3rd world country before the memo explaining my error reached me. Boy… were MY cheeks red!
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One thing that I was making clear to everyone is that we needed to treat our subscribers, past as well as present, with the respect they deserve.
Okay… maybe not the respect they DESERVE… especially that Steelclaw jerk… but at least with a pre-determined structure and table of mathematically averaged respect so we can give the appearance of being “fair.”
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I have seen what happens when an MMO decides that it needs "new blood" and doesn't care who they have to lose in order to get it.
They also have to strictly explain what “new blood” means to their subordinates before beginning the process of acquiring it. I’ve seen Mayan religious ceremonies with less vitae flowing! Those Coders are blood-thirsty when they don’t get coffee regularly!
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All that does is show your new customers that you have the power to change the rules whenever you feel like it, and the veteran customers left out in the cold become a lobbying force against new people wanting to try your game. That was something we were consciously not doing with City of Heroes Freedom.
Even though Second Measure was trying really hard to go with the “change the rules whenever we feel like it” model. It got annoying. He kept sneaking up behind me and muttering “I can feel the hate SWELLING within you” and, quite frankly, the black cloak was creeping me out. Of COURSE he could feel something swelling inside me… but it wasn’t hate… Last time I let him pick the restaurant we go to for lunch.
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In fact, an impetus of "what more can we give our subscribers?" was the order of the day. We looked at what a subscriber was getting today and added things like exclusive rewards and the entirety of Going Rogue (if they hadn't already purchased it).
In fact, an impetus of “what the heck will shut the majority of them up?” was the order of the day. We looked at what a subscriber was getting today and realized our players were actually getting a better benefits package than we were working for NCSoft.
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We called our subscribers VIP because to us they are Very Important Persons.
We called our subscribers VIP because it was better than “life-sucking parasites”, our pet name for them around the office.
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We built the Paragon Rewards system around giving more and more perks to our subscribers, simply because we feel it is the right thing to do.
And because even the dumbest dog can learn how to play dead if you entice it with enough treats… or a large hammer… but we figured we’d try the treats first.
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We also looked closely at other games that have adopted similar business models before us and adapted our strategies to avoid some of the more glaring pitfalls we have perceived.
We looked at how other games had managed this sort of thing and thought “holy crud! We can do better than those brain damaged morons!”
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We closely followed forum threads that complained about "this" and "that" and did everything in our power to ensure that when City of Heroes Freedom launches, players will no longer have those things to complain about.
Freitag’s suggestion that we could accomplish the same end by “eliminating” players who complained was considered; but ultimately rejected due to the prohibitive cost of the project.
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Two examples I can give are the new VIP-Only server, where subscribers can play without non-paying players simply because we saw that as an oft-requested feature, and the ability to return as a Free player and create a brand new character, not be forced in reactivating (or worse deleting) old characters that are still on your account.
Two examples I can give are the new VIP-Only server, created so we can keep veteran DOOM criers and “I want one specific thing and will scream about it until I get it or my face turns purple” players away from our new, as yet uncorrupted free players. And the ability to return as a Free player… and thus be safe from the aforementioned Doomers and Whiners.
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Finally we recognized that there are a large number of returning players who have already invested some of their time and money into City of Heroes. We wanted to ensure that those players didn't feel like they were restarting from the ground floor, that their previous time with us was honored and worth something in the larger scheme of things.
There were some prisoners… er… customers… who somehow got over the wall… ummm… that is who have since cancelled their subscriptions. We want them to feel safe… uhh… encouraged to come back to us and that all their horrible transgressions against us have been forgiven.
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To this end, we modeled the Paragon Rewards program around our current Veteran Rewards program and this enabled us to give returning players perks for their previous time commitment, even if they are coming back as a Free player.
So we’re going to give returning players perks for coming back instead of the punishment… the horrible, terrible chastisement… they so richly deserve. Isn’t that nice of us?
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In addition, we ensured that everything they might have purchased previously, like character slots or Super-boosters, remained on their account, even if they stay as a Free player.
Black Pebble was really disappointed by this one. Marketing people don’t like to see money get away from them, even money that’s still only in the future. The chance of getting people to pay for the same service TWICE had him salivating. The company lawyers gave him a napkin and a dose of liability to clear the drooling right up.
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If you earned it or paid money for it, you can still get it.
And you thought you’d never have a reason to thank a lawyer.
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I am very happy with how things have turned out for City of Heroes over the past year.
I’m still employed!
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The team has never worked harder to bring you awesome content, we have a very solid plan for the future involving lots of cool story-lines and updates, and the team is super excited about what the new business model means to being able to deliver you content above and beyond what we have been doing in the past.
We’ve chained everyone to their cubicle walls and told them they can’t leave until all this gets done. On a completely unrelated matter, those of you wishing employment with Paragon Studios should check out our job postings for the new “Morale Officer” position. Please note that skills keeping a steady beat on a large drum and handling a whip and/or scourge will be given extra attention.
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We've used our own version of Ouroboros and peered into the future, and we have seen that the future is Freedom.
Because we’ve tracked the stock market and every sports game from high school lacrosse to the Super Bowl! We’re gonna be financially set for life, suckahs! Freedom at last!

My mind wanders so often you've probably seen its picture on milk cartons. - Me... the first person version of the third person Steelclaw

 

Posted

OMG I love Steelclaw posts. Always make me smile.

No one pays attention to me, cause I listen to the voices in my head.

 

Posted

Must stop... laughing.... cannot... breathe!!!!



"Well, there's going to be some light music and a short note of apology saying, 'The universe ended last week, we're really sorry, we don't know what you're doing here, didn't you get the message?'"- Steve Moffat

 

Posted

Hilarious! But two seconds after I surf to another page all I'm going to remember from this is...

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Originally Posted by Steelclaw View Post
we’re getting Pony Travel Power in the next issue!”
ELEVENTY!!!!!!!!

AE Arcs: #10482 N00b Rescue Duty, #164100 The Four Treasures of the Tuatha De Dannan

 

Posted

I wonder what would happen if Posi ever got a hold of Steelclaw's Translat-O-Tron 5000 and posted the translation instead of the original? Would the Translat-O-Tron translate the translated translation back into the original or a translated translation of the translation of the...um...what was I talking about?

There I was between a rock and a hard place. Then I thought, "What am I doing on this side of the rock?"