So am I just supposed to hate the game?
I can't help but think you are effectively saying that the devs didn't really know what they were doing. That, like a broken clock that is still right twice a day, they got a few things right almost by accident, rather than by design (which they were completely ignorant of). I can find plenty of evidence to support this, at least in my own mind, but I am surprised to see a pseudo-redname state it, more or less, outright.
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To be honest, they were making it up as they went along. City of Heroes is practically unique among all MMOs before and since in its extremely cavalier foundational design decisions. No one would have the guts to make a game like City of Heroes deliberately today, because even with City of Heroes as a live example no one thinks it would work.
That's not to say that the devs didn't make deliberate decisions that worked out very well. The devs deliberately decided to create easily accessible travel powers because the devs felt that was fundamental to the superheroic genre, and that decision pays dividends to our players every single day, many of which play no other MMOs and have no idea just how amazing that is (and its better today than at launch). It was an explicit decision to separate what we look like from what we can do - i.e. eliminating nearly all appearance-altering gear. Seven years later that is still a rarity, but it works well for us.
But when it comes to how our powers work, and particularly how powersets were originally designed, and what effects we're allowed to have on critters, compared to most other MMOs our powers look like they were designed by a random number generator. And when it comes specifically to three things, the devs were literally guessing wildly. Those three things are accuracy and defense, passive regeneration, and recharge.
And the one thing they really didn't think about at all (not in the right way, anyway) that turned out to have the largest impact on the game? Cast times.
I will say this though: regeneration and healing seem to be a major blind spot with MMO designers; I believe because game designers tend not to have either a math or engineering background, and healing and regeneration require more than "D&D math" to make work. I'm playing a recently launched MMO which has *amazingly* complex formulas to describe how all of its stuff works, but I wonder if those formulas were just cobbled together because it takes nothing more complicated than a pencil and some long division to know that either healing is totally broken in that game, or the devs of that game decided that healers were supposed to be far more powerful than everything else just because.
Its always true. In every MMO I've played, healing classes and specifically healing classes are always ground zero for seeing where the game balance falls apart. Either they are worthless, or they are gods.
Ironically, except here.
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Haters gonna hate and people on internet forums gonna argue. It's the circle of life.
How right anyone is at a given point depends on the person, the situation, and mood.
In the room the women come and go
Talking of Michelangelo.
I find the occasional hate thread encouraging, actually. Those threads illustrate strong feelings about the game instead of meh responses. That this game can still generate strong reactions positive or negative points to an active and engaged player base (at least on the forums). If game changes updates or releases of content dropped to a resounding chorus of crickets, I would be more concerned for the health of CoH. Those threads are a fairly healthly way to vent without degrading the forums overall. So thumbs up for spleen, bile and vitriol venting. (hmm. Spleen, Bile and Vitriol. good name for a redside law firm?)
Eh, I hit that point with another nameless MMO. I hit that point where they changed way to many things from the core game, and I hated it. I haven't been here long enough to experience a change large enough to trigger that response in me yet. Now...if City of Heroes were to suddenly, say, take out the slotting and enhancing system and give you a choice to add some little effect as opposed to enhancing them out, then I might flip my wig.
"I have something to say! It's better to burn out then to fade away!"
Its always true. In every MMO I've played, healing classes and specifically healing classes are always ground zero for seeing where the game balance falls apart. Either they are worthless, or they are gods.
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That and I like that this game promotes extreme altitis rather than making it a massive timesink to maintain even one character.
actually, at present, people seem a bit happier with issue 22, seems to hit a good number of people(though obviously not everyone)'s wish lists. There has been an undercurrent of negativity as long as the forum existed, and it rises and falls. i find happiness is a full ignore list. and staying away from the forums, outside of a quick sewage dive for pertinent info, is a good way to not have the light stolen from your eyes.
There will always be negativity on the forums. On any forums, anywhere. It could be a Carebear forum, and people would be complaining that Hugs-a-lot has to much brown on him or something like that.
"I have something to say! It's better to burn out then to fade away!"
Goodbye may seem forever
Farewell is like the end
But in my heart's the memory
And there you'll always be
-- The Fox and the Hound
He looks like some kind of demented monkey.
@Redcap
![](http://i40.tinypic.com/259bvcg.jpg)
ANARCHY = A Society that does not need government
114. Ahrouns do not appreciate my particular brand of humour, so I should stop bleaching bulls-eyes in their fur.
But when it comes to how our powers work, and particularly how powersets were originally designed, and what effects we're allowed to have on critters, compared to most other MMOs our powers look like they were designed by a random number generator. And when it comes specifically to three things, the devs were literally guessing wildly. Those three things are accuracy and defense, passive regeneration, and recharge.
And the one thing they really didn't think about at all (not in the right way, anyway) that turned out to have the largest impact on the game? Cast times. |
NOR-RAD - 50 Rad/Rad/Elec Defender - Nikki Stryker - 50 DM/SR/Weap Scrapper - Iron Marauder - 50 Eng/Eng/Pow Blaster
Lion of Might - 50 SS/Inv/Eng Tanker - Darling Nikkee - 50 (+3) StJ/WP/Eng Brute - Ice Giant Kurg - 36 Ice/Storm Controller
It amazes me how many people think that good game design (and in particular, combat simulation systems) can somehow magically happen without a thorough grasp of math. *shakes head*
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Which is not to say that good math skills are sufficient. I believe they are necessary, but not sufficient, to make a good designer. A good designer uses artistic skills to aim at a good spot, and math skills to hit it once they fire. Without a good artistic vision, you're shooting wildly and randomly. Without good math skills, it doesn't matter what your artistic vision is, because you won't hit it.
When I was at the museum of glass in Seattle a few years ago, there was a sentence painted on the wall I really liked and occasionally quote. My recollection of it is:
There is no art without craftsmanship, and no craft without artistry.
Words to live by.
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I often feel like the OP, so he is definitely not alone.
A few months ago, I believe we were at the most negativity I'd seen on the fora since the dark days of late i4/i5, when the Global Defense Cut, then ED, were hovering over us. For those who were not around then, imagine if every thread were like the story-criticism threads that exist now, only dealing with mechanics.
As for why there's so much overblown and undeserved trashing of design decisions (like how things should be priced or what kinds of new features should be added) or dev competence (seen mainly in criticism of story, these days), I believe two causes exist.
First, many players are both fairly intelligent and enjoy minute observation of things. Those are exactly the sorts of people who are most likely to notice flaws of any kind. More importantly for why it generates negativity, those are also the sorts of people who tend to believe they can do things better than anyone else. This tends to generate a lot of unduly negative opinions. It's difficult for someone who's more or less just as capable and intelligent as a dev (I'm thinking mainly of story stuff here) to accept that that developer might do things in a different, but just as legitimate, way. For smart people, objective observation easily gets confused with personal opinion. The fact that the Broadcast Yourself age has given geekdom a strong support structure, including easily-linked lists of everything imaginable, for any opinion anyone wants to render, doesn't help matters here. (Here, I'm thinking of the fact that many story arguments seem to boil down to "I saw this opinion on tvtropes, where anyone can read and adopt it, so why didn't those lazy devs?")
This brings me to the second point. In the Broadcast Yourself age (note my choice of term here), it has somehow become accepted that everyone's opinion must not only be voiced, but voiced as loudly and stridently as possible. As you've seen in this thread alone, this is often justified by some variation on, "The squeaky wheel gets the grease," or, more precisely, "We only get what we want because we complained for it." (In my experience, neither is true, and a squeaky wheel often gets the entire cart junked rather than getting grease for itself, but that's another issue.) That both encourages people to be critical and gives them a sense of justification for doing so. As for why criticism tends to be so unduly hostile, I believe there's a deep-seated concern among some players that if they don't call decisions incompetent, claim they're being ignored, or blame everything on the Conspiracy of The Suits, that their opinions will be ignored. I think this operates at almost a subconscious level. The poster thinks, "I don't like [X feature], but if I only say 'I don't like it' in a beta thread, they'll just ignore me. I'd better post it everywhere I can and say '[X feature] is the worst thing ever.' Then the feedback will count for me." I also think that we habitues of this forum tend to labor under the delusion that its primary purpose is to give feedback for development and to influence the game's direction, while the OCR folks have been pretty clear over the years that it is meant more as a place for fans to recognize that there are other fans out there and to encourage each other in their fanishness.
So, all in all, I guess I don't have any answers on how anyone should feel, but those are my theories on why the fora read the way they do. Thanks for reading, those who got this far.
"Bombarding the CoH/V fora with verbosity since January, 2006"
Djinniman, level 50 inv/fire tanker, on Victory
-and 40 others on various servers
A CoH Comic: Kid Eros in "One Light"
So what I guess I'm trying to ask here is, would I really be doing anyone a favor by hating this game? Because I can't really see any benefit of continuing to play a game I hate.
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There's a difference between disliking PARTS of a game and disliking the game in its entirety.
And it's not a binary choice. For instance, I love most of the 1-50 game. The original shard-based incarnate stuff I was a little iffy on. And I'm coming to loathe the raid-based Incarnate portion.
Does this mean I'll stop playing?
HELL ****ING NO! I'm having fun in the game, even if some of the content isn't my particular cup of tea. And I'll continue to offer feedback (even if it is given in a tetchy manner) in the hopes of improving the game as a whole.
So I've been playing this game on and off since June of 2004. Why? Because I enjoy it. If I didn't enjoy it, I wouldn't be here, and if the game didn't continue to evolve in ways I enjoyed, I wouldn't keep playing. But there's a disturbing trend I've noticed over the last couple of years, in which many long term players have violently turned on the game, picking out each and every flaw they can find, all while acting like they're acting in the game's best interests by acting hyper-critical towards it. I'm not saying that criticism of any kind is bad, and a real fan should never point out flaws, but I've begun to feel like the City of Heroes community has fallen into that paradigm of cynicism=intelligence that plagues so many other fandoms.
But at the end of the day, I still find myself really enjoying this game! I like the community, I like the story, I like the design. Could they all be better? Yes, but I've never felt like ignoring the good parts of the game could improve my overall experience in any way. Granted, the increased criticism towards this game has caused me to notice some of the weaker parts of this game and become more critical, but I feel like I'm expected to play this game almost maliciously, looking for flaws at every turn. So what I guess I'm trying to ask here is, would I really be doing anyone a favor by hating this game? Because I can't really see any benefit of continuing to play a game I hate. |
#2. Criticism is not hate.
#3. Those who do not criticize something do not love that thing.
That being said most don't know what they are talking about, don't think their criticism out, and aren't criticizing. They are complaining. Or ********. Or ranting. There are vast differences in what it means to do each of those 4 but in today's culture or of generalization fools have lumped them together and don't listen to what is said regardless of how or why it's said if it's something negative about something they "faux love"
#3. Those who do not criticize something do not love that thing.
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![](http://3.bp.blogspot.com/_McA4jjZCOC4/S7qIXF4ORJI/AAAAAAAABJs/qCYGnlpweeU/s1600/head+tilt.jpg)
You love me, so you have to criticize me? But... why? I don't understand.
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In one little corner of the universe, there's nothing more irritating than a misfile...
(Please support the best webcomic about a cosmic universal realignment by impaired angelic interference resulting in identity crisis angst. Or I release the pigmy water thieves.)
She knows exactly how to avoid being banned while trolling half the threads on the forum. It's not impressive nor interesting but that's what ignore is for.
On topic, over the years I've defended developer decisions I've agreed with, railed against the decisions I've hated, but generally hung around because I enjoy the combat system. It's fun. It's relaxing. I've stopped giving them money when I felt my wallet should do the talking and given them money for silly things that I could have lived without. |
![Big Grin](images/smilies/biggrin.gif)
So I've been playing this game on and off since June of 2004. Why? Because I enjoy it. If I didn't enjoy it, I wouldn't be here, and if the game didn't continue to evolve in ways I enjoyed, I wouldn't keep playing. But there's a disturbing trend I've noticed over the last couple of years, in which many long term players have violently turned on the game, picking out each and every flaw they can find, all while acting like they're acting in the game's best interests by acting hyper-critical towards it. I'm not saying that criticism of any kind is bad, and a real fan should never point out flaws, but I've begun to feel like the City of Heroes community has fallen into that paradigm of cynicism=intelligence that plagues so many other fandoms.
But at the end of the day, I still find myself really enjoying this game! I like the community, I like the story, I like the design. Could they all be better? Yes, but I've never felt like ignoring the good parts of the game could improve my overall experience in any way. Granted, the increased criticism towards this game has caused me to notice some of the weaker parts of this game and become more critical, but I feel like I'm expected to play this game almost maliciously, looking for flaws at every turn. So what I guess I'm trying to ask here is, would I really be doing anyone a favor by hating this game? Because I can't really see any benefit of continuing to play a game I hate. |
![](http://www.fightersgeneration.com/characters/jontalbain-win3.gif)
![]() You love me, so you have to criticize me? But... why? I don't understand. |
Act like me. I'm pretty sure I've been on it a while.
The problem is, many of the most vocal critics around here can't differentiate between these two things. I have often relied on criticism in my work and hobbies. Cynics are of less use, because if you take their words to heart every time, they/you will inevitably sabotage your work. If you manage to give them exactly what they want, you may then realize that you could have pleased a sizable and more reasonable audience much sooner anyway. Cynics are often confused for trolls because they put everyone around them in a mostly losing position. Trolls do this on purpose, while cynics genuinely put their hearts into it. Feeding either is bad for you.
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Criticism is pointing out errors.
They are not even in the same ball park, but are lumped together because Critics are or feign cynicism because that what is expected or what happens when you critique a lot of things because of experiences... Another thing is that it is a lot easier to say something is wrong and how to fix it than it is to say something is good and... that's it. There isn't much to say when things are good because it is good and when you do that you begin to gush often because critics (legitimate critics) often are so hard to please because of the breadth of their experience that when something does it's something consider incredible.
I mean most people in their life time have picked up and read...maybe 2-5 comics a month over 30 years...that's 720-1800 issues over 30 years. That person is going to have a lot different understanding and breadth of scale and experience to someone like me who has read somewhere in the range of 25,000 issues from Japan, Korea, America, etc... over roughly the same amount of time. The sense of what one likes and one doesn't... why this or that is good or bad becomes more understood with that understanding.
That person that has more experience in an area is going to be able to see what could be the reason behind things a bit more easier than someone who doesn't follow that stuff and the person who partakes in something to such an extent is more than likely going to love that thing so what that person sees via a filter of anger and expresses over the top often comes across as "why is this person destroying my love"
Taking it to an analogy... if you're a parent and you see an adult around your kid and your kid is crying you assume that that parent has negative intent and you go in angry and doing whatever you can to protect your child. It's the same emotions at work in a different way.
So cynicism is more a natural reaction to protect those things you love. When you are being critical then and need to write, that comes across. The problem is when it goes overboard, if the cynicism is all there is, or if the critical is focused on being destructive....
side tangent back to defining things...
Creative and Destructive Criticism...
Creative is when you are trying to inform, help, and entertain (to a degree).
Destructive is when you are simply trying to make a person look bad, not being fair, or bolster your own ego.
This get confusing to a degree when someone says "X is trash" that can be either or, but it matters why that person is saying that and whether that person can and will expand or not.
Another thing that appears destructive but isn't for some people is when a critic says "This is bad...get rid of it." I do this sometimes simply because i don't care to explain at that moment and/or i don't think someone is at the level to understand it or I don't know why i feel that way, but know it's right, which is the case a number of times. And in art there are a lot of things that there is no "reason" that we know of at the moment or that most artists won't know for why we like this or that way in general, but it's just something you "feel"...
For example, there was a line in a comic I am/was producing and I questioned the writer about it where there were 2 words that in the sentence that one it just didn't "flow" right and the other it's an uncommon word... We sat and we discuss for an hour or so about those two words and decided to change the first and keep the second. We figured that the first wasn't expressing clearly what was meant because the word definition was slightly different and the word itself didn't flow so when you said the sentence you would break there. The second word it was decided to keep because even though it was uncommon the word flowed and fit exactly what we meant.
Now when I talk about flow you have a general idea of what I'm talking about, but you don't know where that comes from more than likely or why it's like that. A lot of time people don't pick up on this flow consciously, but it's there subconsciously. We now know what causes this and roughly why, but I'm not going to explain synesthesia and then try to get someone to figure out how to figure how words work together as well as then teach music to a degree.
Speaking of which... music is the key to all good creative works, if you wanted to know...this has nothing to do with the overall thing but whatever... I say music, but that's just the most commonly used thing. It's also creative work where the construction is visible. If you are trying to see if something works one of the easiest ways to make something work is to get a song that feels the way you want something to feel and then imagine that scene to the beats of the song. There's a reason why there are time compression and expansion ideas in every creative medium ^.^
Durakken I deleted my post (oddly enough, because I thought it rang too cynical on a reread--yes, cynical about cynics! ), but now I'm glad that you caught it. I liked reading your thoughts. I really don't know what to think sometimes. There are some people that I'm starting to skip over their posts, because they so unfairly bludgeon the devs (and sometimes players) without really bothering to offer any constructive feedback. When asked about that--yes, I asked, on two occasions--I got back that it wasn't their job to tell the writers how to write well. Well, true, true, I can't argue with that! But...I never came to understand whether they were more interested in higher quality stories, or were simply getting their rocks off by trashing other peoples work. I have simply chosen not to give their posts much thought, not because I'm close-minded, but because there's not enough time in the day to try to figure out exactly what would satisfy these people (when there are other people offering actual constructive feedback).
@Captain-Electric � Detective Marvel � The Sapien Spider � Moravec Man � The Old Norseman
Dark-Eyes � Doctor Serpentine � Stonecaster � Skymaiden � The Blue Jaguar
Guide to Altitis � A Comic for New Players � The Lore Project � Intro to extraterrestrials in CoH
Captain-Electric
I want to punch myself sometimes for the way I write on forums. Missing words, run on sentences, jumping around, and a lot missing because it is moderated free flow thought and often i'm not in the best typing environment or I'm half asleep or in pain or doing something else. I guess it's interesting as a look into how my brain works though...
But, anyways, I just wanted to point out that a famous author or philosopher... i forget who once said that the only way you know what you think is to write it down and see. I tend to like that idea, because writing to express an idea usually allows one to work through the problem and then be able to read it back to see where their thoughts lead and how... also a tactic for getting closure or over something... write a letter then just delete it... so my opinion is that if you have something to say, say it... people are going to be who they are regardless and whoever you are will eventually shine through so there is no sense in hiding it because people will hate or love you fanatically either way I find.
Captain-Electric
I want to punch myself sometimes for the way I write on forums. Missing words, run on sentences, jumping around, and a lot missing because it is moderated free flow thought and often i'm not in the best typing environment or I'm half asleep or in pain or doing something else. I guess it's interesting as a look into how my brain works though... |
Goodbye may seem forever
Farewell is like the end
But in my heart's the memory
And there you'll always be
-- The Fox and the Hound
It may not be of any consolation, but I find that you've gotten much more coherent.
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My flow of thought is usually linguistically hard to understand even if it is 100% grammatically correct, because I'm usually dealing with things on on a level which defies coherent non-abstract thought with many levels of "if x means y then z." That along with having to deal with people that don't understand that just because someone doesn't say "in my opinion..." all the time that person means that it's an absolute statement so I find myself saying "to a degree" a lot or "in my opinion" or some other indicator that there is much more going on.
Fun fact: when you see "...", it is where my brain usually went on a tangent about something and either I couldn't express it or it was something that wouldn't be allowed on the forums or it is neither, but it delves into something that is completely tangential and/or crazy (for normal people) or is full of rage and insults in the off chance someone has ticked me off. Or I use it as a break to indicate a tangent or a "I should probably mention this or someone will think I don't know about it and I'll spend the next several days trying to argue that I do know that or someone won't know to include this bit"
Not that any of this matters or anyone cares, just, I'm awake and my brain said to reply. You could have not read any of this at all and had a perfectly fulfilling life... probably the same as you are going to after reading it... I wasted your time on Earth so you should hate me ^.^ though, thinking about I should probably write a guide to reading my posts one day. That would be incredibly meta lol.
Not even once.
Cynicism is believing that the motives behind things are not what they appear and more often than not negative.
Criticism is pointing out errors. |
I'll add, though, that to not be somewhat cynical is to be naive. And to glorify (not that you're doing this, but it is done around here) naivete is disgusting to me.
Be well, people of CoH.
![](http://pages.suddenlink.net/dmweb/sig1.jpg)
I don't know how much of it is hate, or how much of it is, please fix xyz.
I've been playing since the 1 year anniversary of this game, and I still play. Not as much, but that is because of RL and I prefer not to solo anymore.
Are there things about the game that I don't like? Yeah, but that is true about any game. Nothing is perfect. I just prefer to sit back and enjoy what I do, which for me is the simple game I started playing.
Defcon 0 - (D4 lvl 50),DJ Shecky Cape Radio
@Shecky
Twitter: @DJ_Shecky, @siliconshecky, @thecaperadio
When you air your dirty laundry out on a clothesline above the street, everyone is allowed to snicker at the skid marks in your underoos. - Lemur_Lad
When your playerbase and your dev team are, to put it directly, that completely ignorant of what the game even is, its much more difficult to generate a lot of energy about what the devs got wrong. We couldn't even specifically articulate what they got right.
NOR-RAD - 50 Rad/Rad/Elec Defender - Nikki Stryker - 50 DM/SR/Weap Scrapper - Iron Marauder - 50 Eng/Eng/Pow Blaster
Lion of Might - 50 SS/Inv/Eng Tanker - Darling Nikkee - 50 (+3) StJ/WP/Eng Brute - Ice Giant Kurg - 36 Ice/Storm Controller