Are we OK with Frontier's gifts to our YouTubers?

[BarmyArmy70]

my point was, although I personally don't have a problem with them getting gifts, I am pretty sure it influences their decision. I mean, Astro (or down to earth with astronomy) has been very carful with his critique and has been mostly positive. Of course he was influenced by the gift.

I think you are presuming a bribe was given was a bribe was required.

I watched Astros round table live stream last night, with a bunch guest speakers - there were five people talking about stuff and astro doing the EDO equivilent of being a five year old running around with a saturn five model making wooshing noises, he was playing and obviously enjoying himself. At one point it was his turn to answer a question and he reply was 'hang on give me a second while I kill these guys .... and then he answered."

Astro didn't need bribing - tho he is rightly proud to have a station named after him. But he has an obvious enthusiasm for the game, it shows in the time he spends playing and making videos about playing.

Is he 100% happy with EDO and how frontier have handled it - probably not.

But it shows you can still enjoy playing with the most broken of toys.

 

[Koma Pahu]

Hard disagree. Youtubers are parasites at worst and guerilla marketers at best. Neither help the end user nearly as much as a simple easy to reference article on whatever you'd like to know would. Or god forbid an actually honest and informative official game website.

I personally think they're bad for new players. The genre strips gameplay to efficient grinding to make META ships. I know most do live stream gameplay, but people discover them looking for answers to problems they've found in-game and are often told what you're doing just isn't the best way to play.

 

[askavir]

I am confused by the in game advantage they have? They got a planetary base
named after them. Not sure it gives them any in game advantage. It's just a regular station like any other in the game.

They also got some nice physical gifts.

What, you mean DTEA and others aren't really inside a luxury office in their planetary port penthouse setting commodity prices, controlling factions and getting rich out of all the trading and servicing going on at the port?

 

[CMDR_LS]

I think you are presuming a bribe was given was a bribe was required.

not necessarily, I've been watching him as well and I know he is very passionate about Elite. I don't think he ever expected to get a gift. This is nothing against him.
I just think that when you do receive a gift from a company, even tho it is not required, it is expected of him to tone down his critique and try to paint the game in a positive way.

if he hadn't gotten the gift, he would have felt more comfortable to offer a more critical point of view - I think.

 

[Bdragon4]

it's a form of bribery. They get a POI named after them/their channel and a glass bowl with air plants and small 3D printed cobra. In exchange, the streamer is expected to "pretend" Odyssey is SO MUCH FUN, and recommend it to his viewers regardless of the state of the game.

do they get any unfair advantage? absolutely not!!!

Do I have a problem with that? personally no, because I can form my own opinion about Odyssey. I don't need a "compromised" streamer to tell me how "good" the game is.

If FDev is bribing the streamers, they're doing a terrible job lol.

 

[CMDR_LS]

If FDev is bribing the streamers, they're doing a terrible job lol.

honestly, besides Astro, I don't know who else got bribed
he did an unboxing video... but I haven't seen anyone else getting gifts. I am sure OA got one.
I am 100% sure Yamiks didn't hahah

not sure about CMDR exegeous. did he get bribed lol?

 

[Riverside]

Well this is a storm in a teacup.

 

[Good Death]

 

[Joe Akeem]

I'm perfectly fine with it. D2EA and Obsidian have provided me with a steady nice content for years. The least FD could do. If you have to ask If we're ok with someone getting praise for boosting morale of the playerbase then you're just seeking drama.

 

[Koma Pahu]

Well this is a storm in a teacup.

It's a nice distraction from "Odyssey is the worst thing that has ever happened"/"Odyssey is the greatest and runs perfectly on my computer. But no, I won't tell you my fps." argument.

Something new for people to froth at the mouth about.

 

[Just]

Soon, in ARX store.

Orbital stations
Planetary Outposts
Settlements

Buy 2, get 3rd one gratis !!!

 

[CMDR_LS]

Odyssey is the greatest and runs perfectly on my computer. But no, I won't tell you my fps.

was this a reference to Mr. Braben because he did say he played it on his old computer at home but failed to indicate FPS number

 

[mrxtheta]

I wasn't sure whether to post this or not for a few days - conflicted - and this is the least of our problems with the game right now.

In case you don't know, the release of Odyssey included gifts of planets, cities, bases, etc to our YouTubers. In my experience game companies make great efforts not to provide certain players with in-game advantage over other players but it seems that's not the case here? Until now I had thought of our YouTubers as /our/ YouTubers but try as I might I can't any more. They are now an "Elite" class of uber-commanders with access to resource that isn't available to the player base as a whole and that seems like a problem to me, or is it? Am I over-reacting? In my opinion our YouTubers provide us with valuable service (especially to new players) and they are worthy of reward - but from us - not from Frontier. By granting such magnificent and spectacular gifts to our YouTubers how can this not have influence over the content they produce? At the very least we mere mortals should rethink whether certain YouTubers need our continued donations and patreons since it seems clear now that Frontier will support them in ways we can't possibly hope to match.

I would like to hear from Frontier on the policy with regards to these sorts of rewards and whether they will continue in the future. Will certain players get unique ships or modules inaccessible to the rest of us with the console release (for example?). Is there a list of the recipients of these gifts available? I don't have infinite patreon dollars to spread around so I would prefer to support creators who are not in debt to Frontier in this way - they need it more.

Who cares. Game is to dark and bright at once and it's performance... ech.

 

[Lone_star]

LOL come on......companies give away stuff as part of marking all the time.

You know how much free stuff we give people at tradeshows? LOL

 

[Milkman76]

Streamers are a plague on gaming, and are mostly influencers and brand managers -- shills -- for the companies who employ them. On top of that, a good number are stealthy military recruiters, who groom young kids and then pressure them into military service using video games as a prop.

Meanwhile a new, younger group of players think twitch/youtube streamers are ZOMG TOTES AMAZING and idolize them, then laugh at people with a little more experience than they do who see streamers for what they are.

 

[Milkman76]

But I guess when you have entire countries who allow legalized bribery at the highest levels, and governments run by the rich, for the rich, it makes sense that make people wont understand the problems with bribing reviewers. This just sounds normal in the brains of many people.

 

[Koma Pahu]

was this a reference to Mr. Braben because he did say he played it on his old computer at home but failed to indicate FPS number

Haha, I did notice that when I read his post...

No-one who's denying there's a problem seems to want to give their fps. I even had one telling me that 25fps is good enough for a game at release.

 

[aRJay]

I wasn't sure whether to post this or not for a few days - conflicted - and this is the least of our problems with the game right now.

In case you don't know, the release of Odyssey included gifts of planets, cities, bases, etc to our YouTubers. In my experience game companies make great efforts not to provide certain players with in-game advantage over other players but it seems that's not the case here? Until now I had thought of our YouTubers as /our/ YouTubers but try as I might I can't any more. They are now an "Elite" class of uber-commanders with access to resource that isn't available to the player base as a whole and that seems like a problem to me, or is it? Am I over-reacting? In my opinion our YouTubers provide us with valuable service (especially to new players) and they are worthy of reward - but from us - not from Frontier. By granting such magnificent and spectacular gifts to our YouTubers how can this not have influence over the content they produce? At the very least we mere mortals should rethink whether certain YouTubers need our continued donations and patreons since it seems clear now that Frontier will support them in ways we can't possibly hope to match.

I would like to hear from Frontier on the policy with regards to these sorts of rewards and whether they will continue in the future. Will certain players get unique ships or modules inaccessible to the rest of us with the console release (for example?). Is there a list of the recipients of these gifts available? I don't have infinite patreon dollars to spread around so I would prefer to support creators who are not in debt to Frontier in this way - they need it more.

A terrarium and a fancy laser etched glass block plus a facility somewhere with a name related to you are not an advantage.

Any ordinary player could get things named if they payed enough money in the Kickstarter, and there hae been several competitions since then where if you won you could name stuff.

OK the terrarium is an advantage to us as it will distract them from playing which will be in our favour.

I saw D2EA's video of the unboxing and my main complaint is that I am very jealous even of the hard case the stuff was in. The fact that I am sad has not escaped me.

 

[thistle]

It has been no secret that FDev has bought several of the streamers. The number of them shilling for FDev is fairly high.

lol

 

[Bladesteel]

my point was, although I personally don't have a problem with them getting gifts, I am pretty sure it influences their decision. I mean, Astro (or down to earth with astronomy) has been very carful with his critique and has been mostly positive. Of course he was influenced by the gift.

My point was that, unlike politicians, those youtubers have no more power over you than you choose to give them. If 51% percent of the population decides one youtuber can say nothing wrong when he praises FD it doesn't directly affect me. Otoh if 51% elect a bought politician it really does affect everyone.

As for the word "bribe" I'm pretty certain there was no "we'll give you this thing if you talk nicely about our game". I'm sure all FD was hoping was that "they'll make one more video where they talk about the cool thing they got".

BUT some of the youtubers might feel some kind of obligation, and other youtubers might feel that if they're just positive enough they might get in on the next round of cool stuff. That's unfortunate, especially when the launch is so problematic that any suggestion or appearance of something improper is damaging. FD would have been better off making it a raffle among all of their player base.