For devs - bad communication is hurting the project

[Darkpriest]

I have to ask myself where people like the OP live, or what they do for a living. As I write this, it is not quite 7am on a Monday morning in California where the devs live. The game was announced on a Friday, and no one could have anticipated the amazing response we have witnessed. The devs scrambled on Saturday to come up with some stretch plans, and you still expect more? C'mon people, they are human; they have families, they have things outside of work, do you expect then to work 24/7 and never have a "weekend"? Either you have never worked a day in your life, so weekends don't really mean much, or you are living on another planet...it's a game not a life saving procedure.

 

California--Weekend--Game just announced---give me a frikken break....

 

Okay, now get to work you guys.

I live in Europe, Czech Republic, thank you. And...

Do things properly, otherwise don't do them at all (or postpone them to better time when you are able to do them properly).

 

That's all I can say regarding the stretch goal UPDATE. Point of it all is that many people got pissed or confused by such a brief message which is asking for more of their money (It feels like promoting DLC and that's what everybody hates). If Obsidian had a free weekend and were unable to come up with more personal message then they should wait until Monday. Now they face damage control which is never a nice situaton.

 

I am quite sure that we would find people complaining about Obsidian not responding at all... I personally have no problem with the info update that took place... But I expect more dev involvement during the weekdays...

 

Kickstarter IS about a good communication between dev and customer (removing the needlessly costly publisher in between)

 

The project is also touching good memories and it is a test of faith for the company. It is not a blind faith, that is why we - customers should expect more forthcoming dev. team.

 

It is just pointless to complain within this short period of time, not even a one full business day has passed...

[C2B]

I have to ask myself where people like the OP live, or what they do for a living. As I write this, it is not quite 7am on a Monday morning in California where the devs live. The game was announced on a Friday, and no one could have anticipated the amazing response we have witnessed. The devs scrambled on Saturday to come up with some stretch plans, and you still expect more? C'mon people, they are human; they have families, they have things outside of work, do you expect then to work 24/7 and never have a "weekend"? Either you have never worked a day in your life, so weekends don't really mean much, or you are living on another planet...it's a game not a life saving procedure.

 

California--Weekend--Game just announced---give me a frikken break....

 

Okay, now get to work you guys.

I live in Europe, Czech Republic, thank you. And...

Do things properly, otherwise don't do them at all (or postpone them to better time when you are able to do them properly).

 

That's all I can say regarding the stretch goal UPDATE. Point of it all is that many people got pissed or confused by such a brief message which is asking for more of their money (It feels like promoting DLC and that's what everybody hates). If Obsidian had a free weekend and were unable to come up with more personal message then they should wait until Monday. Now they face damage control which is never a nice situaton.

 

Sorry, bull****.

 

Previously to the stretch goals coming out people DEMANDED stretch goals in the comments. The devs came into work later just to make them up. And they did say thank you. Both Adam Brennecke and Josh Sawyer. Josh even sung for us.

Edited September 17, 2012 by C2B

[Shadenuat]

Project is 3 days old. Complaining about communication at this point is premature.

 

Obsidian are business people. I don't believe they don't have a pack of design documents everywhere already. Or was it spontaneous decision to suddenly announce BG-sucessor after Bioware and other companies failing to deliver to their fans and success of other RPG titles like Wasteland at Kickstarter?

[C2B]

Obsidian are business people. I don't believe they don't have a pack of design documents everywhere already. Or was it spontaneous decision to suddenly announce BG-sucessor after Bioware and other companies failing to deliver to their fans and success of other RPG titles like Wasteland at Kickstarter?

 

Yes, and I don't believe whatever they have, they planned to release on a sunday.

 

A sunday.

Edited September 17, 2012 by C2B

[vattghern]

be that as it may, this is their DREAM project, wher they can do everything that publishers dont allow them to, and its their only chance so they should be 1000% behind this doing whatever they can to promote it and get more cash

 

so Im also surprised that there is not more activity from MCA and the crew d days after the KS went live

[C2B]

be that as it may, this is their DREAM project, wher they can do everything that publishers dont allow them to, and its their only chance so they should be 1000% behind this doing whatever they can to promote it and get more cash

 

so Im also surprised that there is not more activity from MCA and the crew d days after the KS went live

 

Sawyer has been answering questions the whole weekend, Feargus was in the Kickstarter comments.

 

And again weekend. Passionate as they may be, Weekend. Weekend after successful funding in 24 hours.

 

 

I'd rather they partied it up a bit for now and give us full force this week.

Edited September 17, 2012 by C2B

[Smejki]

Damn, I cannot Edit OP anymore. If moderator could do this for me, please add this text:

 

EDIT: It seems that I also lack some communication skills because some people misunderstood me :D

I am not calling for more details from the game. I am calling for more explanation everytime you ask for our money or when you present some new content/mechanics. Act like a person or group of persons talking to a person, not like a company making a press release.

 

I've edited the original strecht goal update so that you know exactly what I mean. New or edited original text is in yellow.

 

 

Hello people,

we hit our goal incredibly fast. This is far beyond our expections. Thank you!

However with this we got under a high pressure so we have quickly crafted some stretch goals for you which you (and we) can dream of during upcoming weekend.

Keep in mind that more details will be revealed next week. You caught us with our pant on the ground with such a rocket start.

 

You may wonder why there is so much of concrete content. To get to 1.1 million we had to shrink the game to a necessary minimum but with more money we are finally able to realize all ideas that came to our mind recently or years ago. Adding new race or companion, for example, is very time consuming task because with each the complexity is growing exponetially. If 3 races take, let's say, 4 months of writing, 3 months of designing and in the end 6 weeks of testing, the same system and world expanded with 2 more races takes 7 motnhs of writing, but 6 months of designing and 18 weeks of testing. Balance is a bitch.

 

With more money we will be able to develop Project Eternity to its full potential.

 

I would delete this sentence - We are excited to announce the first stretch goals for Project Eternity!

1.1 million, Base Goal

Edited September 17, 2012 by Smejki

[Troller]

Chill guys, info will come, they are just accessing the fans feedback, and discussing the project, they don't want to come up with stuff that will make people hate them.

[Kilroy_Was_Here]

The reason why the stretch goals are written as they are is because they were a last-minute addition (requested by us the fans) in response to the unprecendented response on kickstarter. If Obsidian et al expected this kind of support they would never have announced on a Friday. Personally I would have been fine with a longer wait for better clarification, but they wanted to strike while the iron was hot and I cannot fault their reasoning

[Merin]

Seriously?

 

This isn't DLC. The game isn't even made yet.

 

Seriously?

 

Stretch goals are part of Kickstarter. Look at other Kickstarter projects.

 

Initial amount asked for is - "here's the minimum we need to do this - please, if you want us to do this, donate and help us reach this goal."

 

Goal reached in a day. People still donating, wanting to be part of the project, to help, to support, or want the swag, whatever - money is rolling in.

 

What does the campaign do, tell people to STOP giving money? Just pocket the excess money with a sly grin? Secretly add more content but NOT tell anyone that they are doing it?

 

OR do they list "if we reach THIS amount of money, we can do this... and if we reach this higher amount, we'll add this"?

 

The latter, what they did, what the majority of Kickstarter Campaigns do, IS communicating. IS being open. And IS piling more work on themselves because they have more money coming to them.

 

Do a little research about how Kickstarter works. This isn't the same thing as DLC at all. Anytime anyone compares any part of Kickstarter to DLC they lose all credibility in my eyes.

 

*shakes his head*

Edited September 17, 2012 by Merin

[Smejki]

You still miss the point by several miles. "do a little research" and read the whole topic. And also the OP several times.

 

I am not comparing KS to DLC. I am comparing Obsidian's style of communication to the style of promoting DLCs by big publishers.

How can people ask for old-school RPG when they are unable to read a text and understand it properly?

 

*shakes his head much more than you*

Edited September 17, 2012 by Smejki

[JediMB]

Jeez, people are really missing the point of this thread. I agree with the OP that Obsidian's limited information may be hurting the project at the moment, although I do honestly believe that the people who felt offended will come back once the team has had the time to elaborate on the "whys" of the stretch goals.

 

Hopefully the issue has already come to their attention, so they know what to fix.

Edited September 17, 2012 by JediMB

[Merin]

You still miss the point by several miles. "do a little research" and read the whole topic. And also the OP several times.

 

I am not comparing KS to DLC. I am comparing Obsidian's style of communication to the style of promoting DLCs by big publishers.

How can people ask for old-school RPG when they are unable to read a text and understand it properly?

 

*shakes his head much more than you*

 

It has struck me with uncovering the stretch goals. Writing just "if you give us $0.2 million more we will give you this content" is for a major part of people at the same level as saying "you have a unique chance to get ultra giga super DLC which cointains a key character for the whole universe. Just give us 15 bucks more."

 

To THOSE people I shake my head and say what I said above. That they don't understand Kickstarter, stretch goals, or how pledging to fund-raising drives works AT ALL.

 

The OP is asking Obsidian to cater to the ill-informed, ignorant and lazy who stumble upon the Kickstarter campaign and start mindlessly vomiting their anti-DLC hatred on something that has NOTHING TO DO WITH DLC. Catering to those people, even so much as to gently hold their hand and try to explain to each and every one of them who pops in the comment section to rant-on about how much they damn the man for DLC, is a waste of Obsidian's time.

 

Should they have to explain to all those people how Kickstarter's donation system works? How Amazon works? How you can use Paypal? That no funds are taking if the goal isn't reached?

 

No.

 

People who go to Kickstarter, look at a project, and want to donate money - it's their responsibility, if they want to know more about how it works, to do some research on Kickstarter. It MAY be the responsiblity of Kickstarter to explain it to potential donators, sure. But it is NOT the responsibility of each campaign to reiterate to all the potential pledgers how each part of the campaign works...

like

say

just off the top of my head

STRETCH GOALS.

 

No, I got the OP's point. It's inane.

[Smejki]

The only man focused on word DLC here is you. This thread is not about DLCs at all

 

A parallel for you:

I say: "Guys, remember how racism stuff was written in Fallout 3? It sucked and made no sense. Remeber the depth of racism in Arcanum? When you read about the orc's story in Tarant Library. This I would love in Fallout 4."

You say: "Are you out of your mind? I don't want any orcs in Fallout4!!!"

 

Man, you are still missing the point. Many people, many hesitating people, describe PE campaign as cold, too fabricated, sometime even as a fraud-ish (and I understand why). And these people, who would like to buy this game, don't want to support it now because it resembles (a little but it does), I don't know... did you see Al Lowe's campaign? It felt so much calculating.

[Zoma]

JE Sawyer on formspring

 

We don't just make updates independently. We have to coordinate with each other before putting information out. I wrote up things to talk about yesterday, sent them to the team last night, and we talked about it this morning. I'm writing an update after lunch and will be posting it later in the day.

 

We'll have another update later today.

[Merin]

The only man focused on word DLC here is you. This thread is not about DLCs at all

 

No, it's about people not understanding what Obsidian is trying to do with it's Kickstarter campaign, and the example given was people thinking that the stretch goals were like DLC and that Obsidian should communicate with people what their intent is.

 

I've watched (and donated to) many Kickstarter campaigns. Obsidian is off to a fine start. Maybe your opinion is different. We'll see here below...

 

 

A parallel for you:

I say: "Guys, remember how racism stuff was written in Fallout 3? It sucked and made no sense. Remeber the depth of racism in Arcanum? When you read about the orc's story in Tarant Library. This I would love in Fallout 4."

You say: "Are you out of your mind? I don't want any orcs in Fallout4!!!"

 

False analogy is false. You are straw manning my retort. I'm not focused on "this isn't DLC" - I'm focused on Obsidian doesn't have to handhold those who just come in out of the blue, not knowing anything, and start making wild accusations based on nothing.

 

Did I use DLC as the example? Yes. Why? Because the OP did. Q.E.D.

 

Man, you are still missing the point. Many people, many hesitating people, describe PE campaign as cold, too fabricated, sometime even as a fraud-ish (and I understand why). And these people, who would like to buy this game, don't want to support it now because it resembles (a little but it does), I don't know... did you see Al Lowe's campaign? It felt so much calculating.

 

Try very hard to correct me here -

 

OP is about "Obsidian isn't communicating enough - people are thinking crazy stuff"

 

Right?

 

My response was -

"Campaign just started. People who don't understand Kickstarter or what Obsidian are doing shouldn't be coddled - they should do their own darn work on learning what's what."

 

Okay?

 

Straw man again if you like, and tell me once more what I don't get

 

I get it. That I don't agree with it doesn't mean I don't get it.

 

People who think Obsidian is running a scam can keep their money. Obsidian's project is already funded, second fasted computer game on Kickstarter... they don't have to bend over backwards for the crazies.

 

And yes I saw Larry returns. Donated to it, thank you very much. His videos were awkward in the way that someone who isn't an actor or comfortable in front of a camera and has not budget for such things looks. That was my take.

[TedFaster]

JE Sawyer on formspring

 

We don't just make updates independently. We have to coordinate with each other before putting information out. I wrote up things to talk about yesterday, sent them to the team last night, and we talked about it this morning. I'm writing an update after lunch and will be posting it later in the day.

 

We'll have another update later today.

 

It would be great if they could devote a line or two of the kickstarter-update where they explain that have to release information and what-not in orderly fashion and/or add a prominent link to this forum.

[Kaldurenik]

I would have to agree. They dont talk a lot with the community even if they do read the posts. I think they should talk more and start to share some more information. I have a few friends who are unsure if they should back this project or not due to the very very very limited information.

 

You could say that we know "it will return to old school", its party based, There is a concept for a map, isometric, (stretch goal information) and thats sadly about it. Im not saying that they should go into details or even ask them community if they should pick the colour blue or red for object Z. I just think they should should give some more information and communicate abit more with the entire community.

 

But its just my opinion.

 

Also i know it was over a weekend. But they should start doing it now and well yeah... its quiet =(

[Lexx]

Just chillax, man. The real problem is, that people spend too much time on the internet. This made them feel like the kickstarter is going on for two weeks already. Damn, Obsidian didn't talked to us since over two weeks already! They should work on their damn communication skills.

[rf5111918]

They should have just announced the whole Kickstarter thing on Monday.

[SummerDay]

They should have just announced the whole Kickstarter thing on Monday.

 

Hindsight is always 20/20, as they say. Maybe Obsidian should've announced on Monday, who can say for sure, but they didn't, and they were funded on Saturday. That was a wonderful thing to see, since my favorite games are theirs. I, personally, see nothing wrong in the communications.

[salty]

I think the OP is reasonable, excepting the DLC comparison, but at the same time I don't like catering to morons. It's obvious to me that the addition of a new character costs major $$$ and I'm pretty happy with what I know about the game and stretch goals so far. I also understand the $1.1 budget is really tiny when you have to pay everyone's salaries. I've been following the SA thread, though, so I've seen all of Sawyer's explanations.

 

You really can't satisfy everyone, especially the RPGCodex crowd. Everything has been written in clear and simple English so far and I'm sure they'll clarify everything soon. A work week runs Monday to Friday. I'm impressed they've responded at all after midnight on weekends.

[Gyges]

Too early for absolutely anything, this isnt even a suggestion forum.

I'm hoping they will keep a direct line with us, as we are the investors this time. Damn, it feels good saying that.

[Rink]

I love stretch goals and I see nothing wrong with the communication.

 

Of course it is a general problem that people don't really see expenses like taxes, kickstarter and amazon costs, production costs of boxes and prices, costs for programs and engines, hardware, rent, wages and social costs and even communications on the forums costs time and thus money. On the other hand, if people knew exactly how much of their money will go to such things they maybe will pay even less, because they want to fund the development directly and not collateral-costs

[HarTstaRx]

I think it won't hurt if they display the stretch goals in a more visual way like an infographic or a video with some art not necessarily related directly to the project.

The 2nd update was a little bit non-emphatic

 

For example, I really enjoyed the project progression and how the things were done in the communications aspect on the project annihilation kickstarter, one update every step of each stretch goal to keep the hype and the infographic was changing every met goal in an informative and emphatic way.

 

This is not about developing a game, but funding one together. Maybe I am being a little harsh about this. But it's a reality too this project had a greater start than Wasteland 2 and a bigger hype fall (source). If we want to make more than 3M maybe this is a way to improve our chances.