Spiral Knights - No. More. Event Levels.

No. More. Event Levels.

9 replies [Last post]

Thu, 10/23/2014 - 18:20

Stormersage

I've been playing Spiral Knights off and on for about two years. It used to be something great, and even the grinding didn't bother me that much.
But then came a time when those levels kinda lost their charm, you know? I felt the pain of the grind a bit more. Once you run through the same levels over and over, the challenge fades. Eventually, OOO decided to release some new levels. The problem?

THEY WERE EVENTS. A new part of the game, only accessible at certain points of the year.
I could see it with the Winterfest levels, as they're holiday themed.

But Shroud of the Aprocrea? March of the Tortodrones? Even Black Kats?
There is absolutely no reason for these not to be levels available at all times.

Also, do you know how long I--and everyone--has been at rank 10?
Will there EVER be new mission levels!?
You know Margrel? The Kat boss? Yeah, never fought him because you only get the chance to get the required item on ONE OCCASION PER YEAR.

OOO, my suggestion is simple. Stop making events, stop reskinning weapons and passing it off as new stuff, no more random prize boxes, and make some actual new content already!

[/rant]

Thu, 10/23/2014 - 18:43

Fehzor

Events and promotions are fine.

Lack of permanent content in favor of events isn't. Lack of communication doesn't help their cause.

Thu, 10/23/2014 - 19:18

Avihr

Void

what happen wiv zhe gunner updaet is what am wond-r-in nao, n' all dose things nick sed befor leevin... r dey all kill? :(

and dis dum ortogrephy ta piss u off.

Thu, 10/23/2014 - 20:03

Crazierz

Agreed

Yeah I didn't even get to play some of those events, MORE CONTENT AND NO EMPTY PROBLEMS!!!!

Fri, 10/24/2014 - 13:39

Fangel

Not a good suggestion.

You say stop doing something, then then say start doing something. Events and promos are content for the game, but not playable levels. That is what you want, playable levels or new enemies.

And new mission levels are going to be coming out when Three Rings releases them. There were some edits to old missions not too long ago.
Also the black kats have come more than once so far this year. Same with tortodrones. They both lasted around 2 weeks each if I recall correctly. That's already two months of content that can be recycled and bring players back every so often, which isn't a bad idea for their business.

Three Rings can keep making events, reskinning weapons, and continue to make promos. This is because otherwise, we would go weeks, months even without a single word or notice from them. They could be getting the exact same amount of work done, but instead of players being mad at the developers for not making content they're mad at the art team for making content.

Fri, 10/24/2014 - 14:40

Fehzor

@Fangel

I like to think of how the developers react to us as being akin to how a doctor listens to her patients. If a patient comes in and says "DOCTOR MY LEFT ARM HURTS IT IS BROKEN." then the doctor shouldn't just say "OK, you say it's broken, it MUST be!", but should rather actually test that the arm is broken and consider it as a symptom of some other disorder, applying what they know to determine what's correct. If a patient came in and contradicted herself without realizing it (e.g. my arm is broken, but doesn't hurt when you tap it, just in general), the doctor shouldn't just assume that the patient is a hypocrit and get rid of them.

Similarly, if players come on and say contradicting things that are overall negative about the game, it doesn't mean that they're just to be ignored. In this case, we have the contradicting statements-

"MORE CONTENT AND NO EMPTY PROBLEMS!!"
"Stop making events"
"no more random prize boxes"

My diagnosis is that the players believe the developers are working only on events and prize boxes. My cure is improved public relations, as well as focusing more on bite sized and permanent improvements to the game.

In other words, if every month the developers answered a few player questions or gave a rundown of what was going on and implemented a new daily mission, danger mission, variant of some level, danger room or two, anything, the players would likely feel much better about development, and would want to stick around and play more. Alternatively, they could publicly release their level editor+testing environment and accept a new level once a month off of the Steam Workshop.

This isn't an argument that any large number of players can lose either. If that happens, the large number collectively says "WELP. Spiral Knights is an awful money grab, just like all the other Free to Play games." If that happens, the development team, SEGA, the art team, the GMs, everyone of that nature loses. You can argue that it isn't a large number, and I can argue that assuming it to be a small group of players isn't worth the risk- especially when there is nothing to indicate otherwise.

You can try to minimize the number of cases where people are saying "wrong" things, OR- you can enable them, so that the developers will see their number of players as being larger, and eventually come to the same conclusions that we do every time we talk about this. That's what happened with crystal energy, even after the players that talked about it were long gone.

Fri, 10/24/2014 - 14:55

Fangel

For sure.

People often don't know what they want, however they have a good grasp on what they don't want.

Players who don't pay money want to get things, and Three Rings is selling things to those with money. Those with money can then choose whether or not they want to buy what Three Rings is selling, whereas players without money are effectively missing out on this "new content". They then refuse to view these items as content, but see all these other players with things that they can't get and thus demand they get an equivalent, which they believe is to stop promotions so that those who are paying stop getting something they can't get.

It's selfish really.

"If I can't have it, no-one can!" is an argument I see far too often in different forms. It's childlike and doesn't fix anything. Hence, that is why I say "players want new gameplay levels or enemies". Helping people figure out why they are upset allows them to pinpoint and fix that reason.

And I agree that Three Rings being more transparent would help with the current problems. However, they would definitely get fire in another way, and more directly. Instead of players blaming "Three Rings", they would blame specific usernames, which is a no-go. I personally believe a monthly update on things that have been announced, or maybe a developer blog, would be great. Have a blog or monthly sticky in general discussion. The more we see Three Rings employees talking, the more we think they're doing.

Fri, 10/24/2014 - 16:13

Fehzor

Instead of players blaming "Three Rings", they would blame specific usernames.

This isn't about people getting blamed or taking fire, it's about the image that SEGA puts out through "Three Rings" on the whole and the effect that that image has on people.

The goal isn't to make SEGA feel good about itself so that it doesn't cry in its room because of the big bad bully, it's to better the game.

They then refuse to view these items as content, but see all these other players with things that they can't get and thus demand they get an equivalent.

I think that paid items are usually not the correct form of content desired by those players, and should not be, which is a different argument altogether.

Lets say that SEGA gave everyone prize boxes for free, expanding the costumes indefinitely for no real reason. Would it be seen as new content? I'd say no, that I'd get bored with it pretty quickly. I'd log in and be like "Ok, great, now I can look like a mecha knight. Why isn't this a new level?" Similarly, these players are also complaining about the various events that they are given 100% free of charge.

What does constitute the "correct form of content"? While everyone has their own idea of what they want and see in the game, there are going to be obvious trends revealed, in this case people seem to want things that are deeper than the superficial costumes that are released and more permanent content than the temporary events that are constantly being used as filler.

Fri, 10/24/2014 - 17:13

Fangel

Content is content.

I guess what I'm getting at is the incorrect use of the word "content". Not to pull a Batabii or anything, but costumes are technically content, as are levels and enemies. I would much rather players ask for "New levels" then describe the levels they want rather than "Stop new costumes". All that does is stop costumes and not make new levels show up any faster.

New costumes are only undesirable when players see something they want but can't get. For example, I really wanted a divine gun puppy helm. Am I upset that I didn't get one? Moderately, yes, but my personality is kind of an optimistic pushover by default so I let it go after a bit of moping around. However, I did buy boxes. Someone who does not have access to a credit/debit card or is barely making it by every month because of bills or loans and play this game might want that divine gun pup helm as well, but can't even gamble for it. They see others wearing it, and get jealous.

Essentially, I believe that players who want to stop promos in favor of new levels aren't really thinking about how a company works. A company can be doing several things at once, and for 8 hours a day everyone needs to be doing something. Three Rings doesn't have a retail store exactly, so sitting in place and waiting for a customer to show up doesn't help the company. Artists were hired to do art, and programmers to program. Sometimes they work on the same project, other times they work separately.

Mixmaster? That was the art department's project. "But it's new Fangel!" Yes, it is new. It acts different to other guns. But sometimes while programming debugging can drive you crazy and so programming a new gun can be your break to ease your mind. Or maybe the artists have some programming know-how. No reason they can't know more than just the art side.

Fri, 10/24/2014 - 18:23

Crazierz

Ehem

Auto Correct: Empty Promises

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No. More. Event Levels.