Glorious Alpha Two Testers!
Alpha Two Realms are now unlocked for Phase II testing!
For our initial launch, testing will begin on Friday, December 20, 2024, at 10 AM Pacific and continue uninterrupted until Monday, January 6, 2025, at 10 AM Pacific. After January 6th, we’ll transition to a schedule of five-day-per-week access for the remainder of Phase II.
You can download the game launcher here and we encourage you to join us on our for the most up to date testing news.
Alpha Two Realms are now unlocked for Phase II testing!
For our initial launch, testing will begin on Friday, December 20, 2024, at 10 AM Pacific and continue uninterrupted until Monday, January 6, 2025, at 10 AM Pacific. After January 6th, we’ll transition to a schedule of five-day-per-week access for the remainder of Phase II.
You can download the game launcher here and we encourage you to join us on our for the most up to date testing news.
Comments
Please see “argument from incredulity”.
If I was as obsessed about the majority/minority argument, if it was my main point in this post, I'd have a poll in this forum by now. This argument is a red herring, and it has little relevance to the real issue. If you're obsessed about this unimportant fact, if it is that relevant to you, feel free to make the poll, and please share it here.
Wanna hear a funny? I say yes to all of these and said yes to several points from the OP. Because one person can hold both positions. If anything, it's the positions from this quote that make me hold the positions from the OP.
I want Intrepid to present their game in the best way possible, so that the "silent majority" can see a proper alpha for a proper great game. What we saw on stream was a jumbled mess that, for 80% of its runtime, didn't even represent the topic of the showcase. We saw a video with terrible sound. We saw devs trying to explain the abilities while also juggling gameplay, instead of a good presentation and explanation from the redone video.
All of this could be avoided if Margaret received the recording for the livestream a day before the livestream itself, instead of fucking minutes before it. Intrepid had to do their own job twice just to reply to the direct and majority feedback they received during the stream itself. They are literally shooting themselves in the foot before a marathon and yet here you are asking us "why are you saying this runner is stupid for shooting themselves in the foot?! Are yall entitled or smth? Do you not support this runner?"
Intrepid has proven that they can do better presentations, which set the bar for any of their future presentations. So why should we settle for an honestly poor showcase when we know for god damn sure that they can do better. Why should we be ok with them literally spending twice as much time on fixing a problem that shouldn't have been a problem in the first place? Why can't they plan their job (and streams are a part of their job. At least Margaret's) correctly and what does it say about the rest of the development, when making a video is waaaaay easier than creating a whole damn game.
I want Intrepid to be better for their own good. If that's somehow entitlement - so be it.
You're correct, your proof is not needed. The difference is, I won't obsess over whether you think I am the minority or the majority and dwell on that obsession for another 5 responses. It's not as relevant to the tread as you're trying to make.
The silent majority says it is very relevant to this thread.
Based on your response, I assume you're mainly disagreeing with my second point in OP.
I hope that they will get more efficient in time with how they introduce skills and demonstrate their use cases, the synergy between classes, and so on. I also agree that the second video was prepared much better, proving that with more effort on their part, these videos are sufficient for you.
However, that does not invalidate my point, that I think it is a form of entitlement for us to expect these 3 game developers and the creative director to spend more time than necessary on these showcases when they obviously have more prior responsibilities.
[/quote] "Why should we settle..." "Why should we be ok with them..." "Why can't they plan their job...".
Why do you have this sense of entitlement that they should give you something to settle? You're not entitled to any of this! Also, this is literally NOT their job.
Don't you get it that these game developers are hired to develop a game? They really have much more productive things to do. They owe you nothing!
Let us all remember that Steven has every right to say "alright folks, we will not be giving any more monthly updates for 3 months, because of blah blah ", and you would not have a single valid reason to complain. They offer us the ability to make our voices heard and contribute in a meaningful way. At what point you switched from offering suggestions and contribute meaningfully to demanding things and asking "why we should settle for less"? Do you see my point?
No, that's not an entitlement. How you are asking Intrepid to get there, is.
ahhh the classic - I dont need to prove anything to anyone, you go look up the proof and prove me wrong, cause I got nothing to prove my assessment.
There is offering feedback and voicing opinions on the development of a game... and then there are gems such as the quote from an earlier post below. There is a major difference between the two and needs to be pointed it out to the community. This individual thinks he deserves high-quality "professional" showcases from the game developers, he thinks it's in their job description...
One is highly desirable, the other one is highly entitled.
Again, voicing opinions... vs feeling entitled to better quality, "professional" videos from the game developers, an alpha 2 announcement, and that every feature they desire should be in the game.
I did encourage voicing opinions in my OP. I am highlighting the contrast.
I dont see anything wrong with that post nor do I sense it as entitlement.
you have someone in the role of "director of communication" and Marketing/PR
Wouldnt / shouldnt you want to showcase your best? to be clear in direction?
I get that aspect. But if you'd read the past 2 months, the Nov video, people have been asking to be a bit more polish. Don't need to go Corporate Thrones and Liberty polish but prepared and to drop the Dora the explorer persona.
Pretty much the question is this: CAN THEY DO BETTER? The answer is YES. Does better mean, go full Blizzard, NCsoft, SquareEnix Presentation? Nope.
The silent majority wishes for these things.
Really? Because your "letter" reads like a Greta Thunberg lecture. You think you can dictate what kind of feedback should be allowed or rejected according to your own opinions, because you're the self proclaimed speaker of this supposed "silent majority". You're no different than the other guy in my eyes. The yin and yang of entitlement.
In your opinion, what do you think these 2 positions imply? Is it "go program a mob to hit a player" or is it "think of a way to present our game in the best way possible"?
I know that Margaret does an unreasonable amount of work at Intrepid. Her saying "this is a cosmetic I designed" on pretty much every single dev stream is proof of that. But if her job title includes words like "marketing" and "communications", I'd assume that her main goal at the company should be to present Intrepid and Ashes to their potential target audience. And do that in the best way possible.
Now I'm not trying to blame Margaret for all Intrepid's sins. What I'm trying to say is that Steven, as the main boss of the whole enterprise, should let her do her job. And having a pretty shitty showcase (when they've done much better ones previously) reflects quite poorly on Margaret, because she's the face of communication between the company and its audience.
I'm sure they're all busy. I'm sure they have a ton of stuff to do that is more important than the stream. But I'm also sure that the game would be much better received if what they show came in a pretty package. That stream's showcase did not look pretty. I'm assuming that Margaret saw the immediate reaction to it from literally everyone and told Steven "we gotta redo this before we put it on YT". So ultimately she did her job well. But due to whatever circumstances, she was prevented from doing it well on the first try.
So all I'm asking is that Steven finds a way to let Margaret do her job as well as she can on the first try. If that require them to make the streams bimonthly - fine. If that requires them to make the videos shorter - fine. If it requires them to do whatever they need to do within the company's structure - I'd hope they do it.
Steven's attitude towards these showcases imply that he's trying to appeal to the broader audience outside of their 100k++ customers. And unless they're going down the road of "there's no such thing as bad PR" - their marketing should look better than what we got the first time.
And like I already said, these kinds of mishaps imply a potential bigger problem within Intrepid's management. If they can't find just a few hours out of a whole damn month to make a proper video, how are they supposed to make a super complex and intricate mmo in any reasonable time.
I enjoy op's message towards you entitled, obsessed and angry Jahlon mad hatters. I prescribe not only pausing to think more before you guys utter the very finest of trash delicacies as it may end up luckily being digestible but actually having a deep f'ing thought towards a game that's interesting enough to have 64 classes an a real world and you should be way less critical and more thoughtful towards the overall picture of that instead of so much lousy nit-picking.
You guys are meant to be the nerds of the genre yet you're in nappies and crying about VFX when "developer polish" and GAME GRAPHICS OPTIONS exist and how your tank mate is gonna be upset because the mechanics aren't as bland as from before 2010. You guys aren't growing up,
Blizzard should make a 'WoW Vintage" to milk the lot of you! Like bleedin zombies mun!
When has any one of us who has commented here complained about graphics? Or did I miss something? There are plenty of topics that are pointless to gripe about at this stage of development, such as polish and demand of a release date. But expecting quality showcases when promised them is not enitilement nor an unreasonable expectation. When I heard there was going to be a tank showcase, I expected what we got from the 2nd recording. The first was a failed presentation of their tank showcase. Nothing wrong with pointing that out. Nor is requesting someone more skilled and having a better understanding of the abilities in showcasing classes during dev discussions. I love Steven's enthusiasm and joy of being involved, and it has its place. However, the priority should be quality presentation of the dev streams topic. I will say people maliciously berating Steven for his skill at MMORPGs during showcases is unwarranted, though from what I can tell from witnessing in watch parties, most people just wish someone better suited would showcase it, without ill intent towards Steven, though I'm sure there are some who do.
( fires post gun toward Jahlon, his fan base and anyone else mighty critical about way too many things including the "scope creep" of active blocking and dodging, my god this game can barely contain itself!... it's gonna be Putin's secret weapon any moment run! )
You're wrong. At the livestream time there is NOTHING more important than what they're presenting and showing. This is literally the most important interaction with the outside world and their one moment a month where they're doing their biggest marketing. There is no "but they have better stuff to do".
These are developer updates on a game that is preparing for an alpha phase, guy... You're confusing it with an official game demo or a professional showcase. If the game developers and the creative director feel like sharing the gameplay of a new class they are designing, by all means, suggest that these videos can be better with some organization, just don't demand it... Voice your opinion but if they can not adhere to your suggestions, understand that its because there are a thousand more effective ways to use their time than recording the gameplay and then re-recording it... and then now, they are demanded by a few entitled to "plan and prepare" for this recording days before the recording session. These developer updates can be better, indeed... But "better" comes with a cost.
How did a video offered to you as a voluntary gift from the developers became "there's no such thing as a bad PR"? Why can't you take this as an attempt to show you the game-play of an MMORPG in development? When was the last gameplay (by developers) you've seen for a game that is highly polished and towards your highest professional expectations? You are demanding things that are not owed to you. Steven or the team does not need to do any of this. You can voice your opinion, sure... But if they won't shorten the video, redo every single time one of you are set off by it, or if its towards a larger audience that makes you unhappy, you can not start "demanding things", "won't settle for less", without being called "entitled". Because you are not entitled to any of it. It is a voluntary offer from the valuable times of Steven and the game developers, that is otherwise will be put to... well, game development.
Let us all consider at what stage this game is at, their funding for marketing at this early stage, and that these are updates that are meant to show us the early version of a game. We are not entitled to demanding polished, professional Blizzard-esqe videos or that the developer team (whose job definition does not include showcasing their new features to the gaming community) should be better prepared.
Agreed everyone is purposely missing the point to let out the frustration on you lol. While not saying anything about people saying devs don't respect their time because of a live stream delay.
If you have disagreements with my points in OP, rather than poorly attempting to offend me, by all means, point them out so we can continue a civil discussion.
I am arguing against any entitlement, I am for the "inexistence" of entitlement. There is no negative "entitlement" as in yin to "his yang". I don't see the analogy here.
More like I stand for pointing out the "entitlement mentality" and referencing some behavior that I find to be toxic in our community. Of course, it is a reaction to "the other guy", several other posts that keep demanding an alpha 2 announcement, and other things we are not entitled to.
We are graciously given an opportunity to voice our opinions, we are not entitled to demand things. How we voice these opinions are important. In no way, am I dictating what this entitled fraction of the community can or can not do. I aim to highlight the contrast and point to a blindspot some may have, though.
Yes, there are some "purposeful" attempts at distraction and twisting the main points. I don't mind their frustration or attempt at red herrings, either.
Disagreements are understandable, as long as we all are re-evaluating some of our behavior and approaches when suggesting or voicing our opinions, I achieved my goals.