So Disappointed

Just wanted to say that phase 2 has completely destroyed any hope i had for AOC . a number of reason but just to point a few out that concern me the most.

1. Steven you need to step away from this in terms of being involved in development and just be a company owner . do not get involved in any online discussions or drama like you have been. Your attitude and the way you react to criticism is that of a 12-year-old being told he can't do something. Unfortunately games will not suit everyone and ppl will criticise this does not mean your right or wrong it just means they have a difference of opinion to you. You need to respect that and not react when that opinion does not fit in line with your own. Since the Christmas break there seems to have been a huge change in your attitude and the way you have reacted to certain ppl in the community. Unfortunately this has had a negative impact on the game as far as i can see from actually being in the game and playing it. There is definitely a large drop-off in the player base although I'm 100% sure you guys will deny this.
2. Seems to me that phase 2 was full of false promises there is a huge and i mean huge lack of content for a phase you planned to last for 5 months. granted there will be updates and patches to add things in as we go but so much is already missing it is clearly evident that you did not have a lot of the content promised even ready and are probably still months behind . this was clearly evident in a comment you made regarding the timescale you are now expecting this game to hit launch . not more than 10 days ago did you suggest this was going to be ready in a year which you should never of said in the first place as for those of us who are experienced gamers can easily tell purely from the state of the game this was a huge overstatement. But now only a few days ago you backtracked and are now talking about another 2-3 years IE making yourself look like a complete fool and that there clearly is a communication breakdown between yourself and those working for you . as experienced players we know and can tell from testing your creation it is miles away yet we are not stupid and we do not appreciate the false promise's and over exaggerated comments dont try to pull the wool over our eyes you will gain much more respect from just being straight up honest and truthful with us. not just steven but as a company. as previously mentioned steven just needs to step away and let Margret do her job as a community lead and manage all the communication.
3.Lack of action against exploiters cheats and grief players. yeh i know your going to say such and such has been punished de leveled blah blah blah. but come on whole guild and i mean whole guilds are guilty of these things . Your golden boys Enveus are one of the worst for it . many of us have seen the screenshots videos of them in places we apparently should not be able to get to . using broken tiles in walls to pull mobs to where they cant get hit because they are in a wall and many others . sol deus , Havoc , and many more guilds I won't name here due to not wanting to cause drama who have had numerous members using the same exploits . why are these guilds still running around on your servers?? those of us with half a brain wont fall for the attempt of appeasing the mass's by selectively picking out a few named ppl those who may have a bit of a platform and punishing them or calling them out as an example. if your going to do it then do it consistently and properly to all those who have used these exploits / cheats . i would start by looking at every single person who was lvl 25 within 72 hours of phase 2 release because i can pretty much guarantee everyone of them used exploits to level. fi you do not commit to this and punish ppl correctly then your game is going to fail because all you will have come phase 3 is a server full of exploiters and cheats because all the genuine players will just not bother.
And btw de levelling is not really a punishment if you leave them with all the gear and gold they had and still able to use all their ability's / skills like i said do your job properly this was just a lazy quick attempt to try and appease the mass's pathetic really what you should of done was actually delete the char and all its assets and made them restart fresh with nothing. and then actually monitored their activity and levelling

Ok so yeh im going to get a load of backlash and shit from ppl for this post but u know what i dont know you in real you dont know me so i really couldn't give 2 monkeys. people will say show proof where the evidence Honestly if you haven't seen or know about all the exploits ect that certain guilds ppl have been using then your probably not a real genuine tester and have had your head under a rock or your one of those who will try to have a pop at my post because you yourself are one of those exploiters. either way as mentioned makes no odds to me

all the above is of course just my take and opinion on things some of you may agree or disagree and that's fine . but i do hope AOC gets itself sorted and back on track because i have followed this game for the last 5 years and put a good few quid into it and would hate to see it fail .

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SmileGurney

So instead of emotional charged arguments could you actually give factual assessment of what you feel you were cheated on?

Steven reaction to narc drama (which I assume you refer to) from my perspective was understandable, as narc was disingenuous with some of his comments, and made few potentially slanderous statements. His presentation of the desert biome, on the very unfinished edge of it, was also very dishonest. Narc has his own agenda, goals as "creator" and his own frustrations with Ashes. He made a bet years ago on Ashes, and tried to build his channel around it. In my "opinion" he has burnt out, he is clearly not satisfied with the pace of progress and frankly it feels like he holds a grudge at this point, instead of liking the project. Do you know what's funny? Despite all his declarations, he will be back in the game as soon as it gets to the point, he can no longer ignore it.

As a person who paid attention, it was obvious to me before Phase 1, that the "game" won't be in a state for public consumption, yet some of you treat it as such. I did expect posts just like this one. I can understand frustration with game systems, client-server stability and performance issues, missing features, that is fine.

Everyone who paid attention knows that the game dev will take YEARS, I don't remember any citation from Steven that the game will be finished in a year. At this stage we only know that Alpha2 (there might be more Alpha stages) is supposed to last at LEAST 12 months. No one knows if this is the last round of Alpha. No one said that the beta stage of dev will start in 12 months.

Furthermore, everyone who paid attention also knew from dev streams that Phase2 will not start with all items listed as deliverables for it, available straight away. That content will trickle in, hopefully on schedule between Dec 2024 and May 2025. Delays are possible, its software dev, and with a size of this project unforeseen issues arise every Monday.

This is not my first niche MMO development journey, and many of those failed, simply by the complexity of those projects, funding issues, at times because of mis-management. If you cannot stomach the timeframes, the risk of failure, in-"game" issues and the uncertainty, then step away and come back in May. Maybe then you will see sufficient progress to reassure you that Intrepid is able to deliver.

bigassgun

Xzanobia wrote: »

1. Steven you need to step away from this in terms of being involved in development and just be a company owner . do not get involved in any online discussions or drama like you have been. Your attitude and the way you react to criticism is that of a 12-year-old being told he can't do something.

Its_Me

Xzanobia wrote: »

...........

This post comes across like another streamer minion simply regurgitating as you have not even taken the time to list the false promises and are bashing the dev for pointing out lies.

I do not remember Steven stating the game would be ready in a year, especially not in the last ten days. 😲Perhaps you misunderstood and he said something about alpha?

Many of us appreciate Steven's direct involvement (especially the Narc defamation which he had no choice but to address) and the positive feedback he has received on this (both his recent streams and in-game presence) demonstrates this. Of course you will have the tainted streamer minions voicing the opposite and parroting what their leader has said but not a lot anyone can do about that.

Steven has already stated they are working on the exploitation that took place when they left the servers up with a skeleton crew over the holidays. They should have just shut it down but I am sure you would have been here whining about that as well.

You were promised nothing. Like any alpha and beta, devs provide an outline of what they expect to test and as the outline warns, this is all subject to change. Please do not treat this as a game for just your personal entertainment, treat it like the tester you are. If you feel you do not have enough content in game to keep testing (I find new shit almost every day to report it seems), step away and come back later to 'test'.

SmileGurney

Its_Me wrote: »

Xzanobia wrote: »

...........

This post comes across like another streamer minion simply regurgitating as you have not even taken the time to list the false promises and are bashing the dev for pointing out lies.

Yeah, that boldy flaps his mouth, and some people take it as Gospel. Narc's content was enjoyable if you were bored and are fine with his eccentrism. Over time he has become more jaded with Ashes, and shown a side of himself I frankly don't want anything to do with.

Xzanobia

i can promise you one thing i do not watch streamers or content creators or fan boy over any one i may watch the occasional video from no one in particular but i never take anything any of these people do or say as gospel till ive seen or experienced it for myself then i make my own judgment and opinion. This is my own opinion as it clearly states at the end if you disagree then that's fine.

But please don't think im a fan boy of any steamer or content creator i make my own mind up and express my own opinion and im happy to read your responses and opinions without bias and without reacting by labelling you.

Also i agree steven did need to respond to alot of what was said but my problem is he responded in MY OPINION like a 12 year old who did not like what he was hearing. you feel different that's fine but don't think because you disagree with me it makes me a minion of some kind to some content creator your miles away from the truth there i cant stand them . their fickle and only loyal when things go how they want them to go . their opinions change on a weekly basis they think because they open their mouths everyone should listen so yeh your miles off it there with the "sounds like another streamer minion" comment.

you know there are some of us out there who can actually engage our brains and make our own opinions and decisions without influence.

Caww

There is a lot of frustration being expressed in the OP's comments which is also being mirrored throughout the AoC forums. It seems too early to completely condemn the project but it does need a serious amount of work to become the success most of us were willing to support with actual cash.

Its_Me

Xzanobia wrote: »

i can promise you one thing i do not watch streamers or content creators or fan boy over any one i may watch the occasional video from no one in particular but i never take anything any of these people do or say as gospel till ive seen or experienced it for myself then i make my own judgment and opinion. This is my own opinion as it clearly states at the end if you disagree then that's fine.

But please don't think im a fan boy of any steamer or content creator i make my own mind up and express my own opinion and im happy to read your responses and opinions without bias and without reacting by labelling you.

Also i agree steven did need to respond to alot of what was said but my problem is he responded in MY OPINION like a 12 year old who did not like what he was hearing. you feel different that's fine but don't think because you disagree with me it makes me a minion of some kind to some content creator your miles away from the truth there i cant stand them . their fickle and only loyal when things go how they want them to go . their opinions change on a weekly basis they think because they open their mouths everyone should listen so yeh your miles off it there with the "sounds like another streamer minion" comment.

you know there are some of us out there who can actually engage our brains and make our own opinions and decisions without influence.

Ok, so let's say it is pure coincidence that you quote a streamer verbatim and seemed to be spewing the exact same talking points, let's put that all aside.

In your initial post, you went on for an entire paragraph attacking the developer of this game. Your statements were vague but quite hostile. You were suggesting everything from Steven needed to step away to him not having respect for players, to him chasing away a large portion of players (love to see where you pulled this statistic from). You went on to declare that Steven had this huge change in attitude toward people since Christmas and stated that he acted like a 12 year old. All this vitriol and not one example of any action on Steven's part that warranted this paragraph long attack?

To make the situation even more confusing, in your last reply you stated that you agreed that Steven DID need to respond to remarks made by Narc but then repeated that he acted like a 12 year old while once again not providing any examples? And you wonder why people like myself might be questioning your intent and bias? 🤦‍♀️

Okay, I will make this easy for you... cite the stream and/or statements made by Steven that resulted in you taking a paragraph to bash the guy. No vague generics please, actually statements.

lukedawuke

op cant even embed a signature but wants to tell multimillionaire devs how their game should work

SmileGurney

Xzanobia wrote: »

Also i agree steven did need to respond to alot of what was said but my problem is he responded in MY OPINION like a 12 year old who did not like what he was hearing.

That 12 years old made more money than most of us ever sees in our lives and then poured most of it into a passion MMO project of his. Yes this one. He is taking quite a risk with Ashes. His reaction wasn't immature, in fact it was far more measured than I expected.

I also find it really funny that the 1st part of your argument is literally built around your personal reaction to a Steven's response to a criticism from a streamer, whose videos you apparently never watched? Very solid train of thought there, sir.

The 2nd part is built on a fallacy, as it was never officially stated the game will only take more 12 more months to develop. In fact it was stated multiple times that the next 12 months are the PREDICATED length of Alpha2 ALONE.

The 3rd part of your argument is actually a reasonable/understandable response to part of the playerbase behaviour, which actively exploits bugs and poorly thought out or unfinished game mechanics, and often uses that knowledge to grief other players. Intrepid took some action here, but in some cases myself I would like to see temp bans and perma bans for repeated offenders. The thing is those people who find creative ways to abuse the game systems are a solid source of information about exploits in the game, so at least for time being they are likely treated as necessary evil by Intrepid. Also they frankly do NOT have customer service people hired to deal with such issues atm, and most of actions against actual griefers and cheaters is taken by the dev team.

Gizban

lukedawuke wrote: »

op cant even embed a signature but wants to tell multimillionaire devs how their game should work

I thought you two were related...
Neither of you can find the period key on your keyboard.

Veeshan

Seems like a narc simp

Volgaris

Only point you make I agree with this the relaxed response to exploiters. I want them to do a stream of shame. as they delete characters. If they don't something people who don't cheat will likely leave or they'll start cheating too (If you can't beat them join em), then everyone starts cheating, then they start banning people, but the it's too late. The open recruiting to an exploit guild is a big red flag about the future of this game.

Ashes needs to respond to misleading youtube videos/streams. A professional and tactful response is best. Don't really see this as a problem.

I might have missed it but I never heard anyone say the game is 12months away. I'm pretty sure Alpha is planned for basically this whole year. I assume 2026 q3 or q4. 200 or 300 man team working 40 hours or more a week can get a lot done. The game will finish and it's probably close to being on track.

Solvryn

Who gives a shit about Narc. Dudes content has been dishonest for years, made his living riding Stevens name and company to fame and can't hack the industry otherwise.

galvon

I actually just bought the game because of the drama involved, no joke. I used to be a drama youtuber, so when this drama hit, I have a tendency of investigating and looking into both sides of a conflict. Based on what I'm seeing, from Asmondgold and Thor, it's that Narc is unfortunately misrepresenting what is going on in the game. Oddly enough, because I played old school WoW, the drama got me interested in this game because I loved that experience that this game now promises. So I guess... there can be a positive from this, and it looks like both Asmond and Thor are doing a good job to get the word out.

Lark Wyll

If your expectation was that during the holiday break where dev teams are on PTO that they'd be doing rampant ban waves in an alpha test you don't have a reasonable expectation.

They turned on the Alpha test to give people a taste, not to be a balanced game. Relax. This is not a game, of course they're going to exploit, give the devs time to correct things. This isn't a live service game.

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