The negativity

What i'm reading here sometimes makes me wonder.... What does it take to make some gamers happy??

Some of the stuff i was able to read on this forum:

- Unplayable
- Didn't get what i paid for
- Lots of limitations
- Terrible this and that

The list could go on forever.

Maybe i'm older, i don't know about your age, but never forget that 20 years ago only, a single big ride of this game could not be running on the then average PC.

Sorry but i'm blown away by this game, the beauty of the graphics, the almost unlimited possibility to create everything you want, the way frontier listens to it's gamers base. To be honest it's more than i ever expected, i'm dreaming of a game like this forever and now i have it.

Is it perfect? Nothing is, but hey it's a videogame, remember? A videogame.

Is there something better out there? No.... Then it's the new level to reach for everybody else. How can something be the best in it's class and considered unplayable by some players?

Planet coaster is the best theme park sim ever made, and they work hard to make it even better.

This doesn't mean nobody can say something is wrong or could be better, but hey, a lot of you out there are going way to far, and i mean really really really way to far.
 
hmm.

i agree with many of your post. from my point of view, the overall forum culture here is anything but negative.

i know you didn't mean it in an overall context, but imho we have the pleasure to be part of a surprisingly friendly forum. i've been in multiple forums before, very different topics ( :D ) for sure. let me say it this way - an often seen "tone" was frightening and beyond.

i am quite sure that the game - the way it was produced - has a positive impact on the "tone" we have here. and the awesome moderation crew (all of you, please stay as you are. i know what kind of behaviour pitfall a forum is on your side. such a thankless task at times).

the "negativity" you may see, i guess it comes from several repeated critics. and in summary it feels like we (customers) put too much weight on Frontiers shoulders. especially if few guys suggestion rather smells like a specification sheet - than a suggestion. but still, it's Frontier who give us this opportunity to address our wishes for this game. so in this context, everything is fine.

alone this isn't awesome.

awesome in addition to this opportunity is the fact that this team listens and try to do their best for both sides - company and customers.

hope that makes sense to some :)
 
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Is there something better out there? No....

See that is the point with opinions. Without a doubt Planet Coaster is beautiful. But i think there is a game out there which is doing better in some points. Depends what you want.
A deeper management (without being too complicated), weather, billboards, breakrooms for staff, storage, delivery stations etc., etc. etc. And it is not the other game, because the one i am talking about is still in Alpha.
See negativity is a way to make Planet Coaster better. That's the point. It is called criticism. Without that no improvement.
It can be positive and negative. Both aspects are vital for a good company.

Currently i think if you want to build till you drop you are at the right place here. And i think it is not a problem that there are two games which fullfill different needs.
 
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hmm.

i agree with many of your post. from my point of view, the overall forum culture here is anything but negative.

i know you didn't mean it in an overall context, but imho we have the pleasure to be part of a surprisingly friendly forum. i've been in multiple forums before, very different topics ( :D ) for sure. let me say it this way - an often seen "tone" was frightening and beyond.

i am quite sure that the game - the way it was produced - has a positive impact on the "tone" we have here. and the awesome moderation crew (all of you, please stay as you are. i know what kind of behaviour pitfall a forum is on your side. such a thankless task at times).

the "negativity" you may see, i guess it comes from several repeated critics. and in summary it feels like we (customers) put too much weight on Frontiers shoulders. especially if few guys suggestion rather smells like a specification sheet - than a suggestion. but still, it's Frontier who give us this opportunity to address our wishes for this game. so in this context, everything is fine.

alone this isn't awesome.

awesome in addition to this opportunity is the fact that this team listens and try to do their best for both sides - company and customers.

hope that makes sense to some :)

Great response, makes perfect sense.

I also noticed the tone got a bit negative lately (but nothing special). This is probably because there are certain things the community has been asking for, and I am not talking about a completely redo of the path system or something, but rather relative simple things. Fixes to problems the has since the very first alpha release. When these requests keep being ignored people start to be more direct about their requests which may come across as negative. Especially now after the announcement of another major update where you expect people to be happy. You can be happy and disappointed at the same time. Happy there is an new awesome update, disappointing Frontier once again didn't address many of the issues the game has. And this isn't the first time this happened and every time the reactions will be stronger, thus also seeming more negative and rude.

And I bet those 'negative' people love the game, else they wouldn't care to come to these forums to voice their concerns and offer solutions.
 
I think the negative views/response is because Frontier Developments isn't responding to people/players and customers feedback as they wish for, I mean Frontier Developments have this forum for discussion, feedback, suggestions and bug reporting from their users/players and customers.
 
Bubbliplop, they do respond. they just don't do it in every topic and yes, they rather stay in the back when it comes to discussions.

in theory, they could be very active and could do more "babysitting". but in praxis, how should this work? politely replying to everyone's wishes/suggestions/questions with an honest answer? telling some "yes, we will add this, maybe we add that. and no, you won't get this because of..." ?

i bet the frustration factor would explode within a second.

imho, even if it's a bit like the blue or red pill question from Matrix, it's much better for all of us if wishes get surprisingly fulfilled (maybe, maybe not) than a communication strategy which would force members bearing a grudge at each other.
 
Bubbliplop, they do respond. they just don't do it in every topic and yes, they rather stay in the back when it comes to discussions.

in theory, they could be very active and could do more "babysitting". but in praxis, how should this work? politely replying to everyone's wishes/suggestions/questions with an honest answer? telling some "yes, we will add this, maybe we add that. and no, you won't get this because of..." ?

i bet the frustration factor would explode within a second.

imho, even if it's a bit like the blue or red pill question from Matrix, it's much better for all of us if wishes get surprisingly fulfilled (maybe, maybe not) than a communication strategy which would force members bearing a grudge at each other.

They don't have to respond to every suggestion, just acknowledge some of the problems the game where people have been begging for fixes/clarity since the alpha. And yes I do know they did respond in the past a few times (for glass windows and collision) and that is exactly the kind of communication people want.
 
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The wishes for this game are manifold, because it its very complex and has nearly unlimited things you could or wish to do.
I personally see the problem in the actual way they develope without seeing to have a direction. Bo said today that there are still no infos about DLC ... so why not ? You cant make decisions if you dont know where your goal is.

Also many companys do a bad job today, of course this is not Frontiers fault (they dont do), but this is a point which makes it easier to be frustrated, special if you recognize that many people paid a long time ago for "Theme Park Studio", which is today still not released and dead (but has "wonderful unplanneed VR-Support for less people, while sucks in controls and features), then they paid RCTW which was basicaly a nice game (first screenshots), which was a known company and a known series, and then finally paid for PC. If companies cheat, lie and are only interested in making "fast money" it does not wonder that people get faster angry if things turn out different, not as expected, or features are done with a "hot-needle". Again: I dont say that Frontier does this, but people get branded by these bad companies and things sound more harsh than wanted in some cases. Its a reason why people are gettring faster upset about a thing. I dont say this is right, its bad, but this is the result of unfairness and a system that protects cheater and criminals.

On the other hand: Without critics it cant be done. Without telling "about the world" many people should realize that is NOT good only to say "YES", "OK", "Its good", "i am fine with it".
Smart people knows / see where this ends.

For me :
I expected a fine basic game for the price of 60€ I have paid in EA. What I got is impressive, but I am not happy with it, why: Its getting too unbalanced.
You have soo much coasters now in the game, but still very less other track-rides.
For me it feels more like I have bought NoLimits2 ...

If you have more experience in game you know about controls, your experience tells you if they are wrong or not.
Watch on Youtube for "LGR", he did lots of games, all old ones too ... he knows where he talks about, and he still says that PC has "bad" control, and I have to agree with him, because they are bad.
If I palce a ride and get pushe back 1000 yards for unknown reasons, then this is frustrating. If I wanna move a ride and it picks up to the middle of the cusor and loses complete its origin position, than this is bad to handle.
Why the hell do you have to push a button for changing from move to rotate for items? Why wasting for this and not combining both actions into one gizmo.

But these shouldnt be bad, because they are the very basics of the game, the first thing you do after buying is mostly : Build a path, place a ride. And if you at that point struggle around with them, not getting it the way you want, you loose interest and it is boring.
There is still many basics missing, try to mark multiple items and copy them ... I tried it today and didnt got it ... you have to go over items to group them ... complicated and total unacceptable.
Copy and paste is a basic in many programs since ever, and here it is still missing. That makes people angry, specially when there is no response after such a long time after release.

Also there are many different wishes for the games, there are the hard-core-coster-builder, which want everything ...
Personally I think that this is no the game for this genre, for that you better buy NoLimits2, its specially made for coasters.
So I am frustrated, because in the summerupdate there are 5 new costers (as addition to the already many ones existing), but still many basic features missing.
I dont agree with that, on the other side: the existing coaster-editor is not good.
You cant do good coasters with it, because its implemented not optimal / wrong. I know there are many people now bashing onto me. If you had experience in other games, like ThemeParkStudio, or even RCTW, you would know that it could be much better. So the question is: Why has the best game out there the baddest coaster-editor? This is bad and make many feel sad, because it takes this wonderful game down.
People want a good game with many options and freedom, and not a half backed piece of bit*

For people who dont know what I am telling about: Watch some costers from NoLimits2, they are WONDERFULL smooth, and if you dont know what smoth means, learn about it before disagreeing to people wanting "basics", tweaking hours on a track for fixing bigger failures is not aceptable, dont blame them for wanting a good game.

[video=youtube;A5rzSGGd99U]https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=A5rzSGGd99U[/video]

[video=youtube;XxetkXaHEPM]https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XxetkXaHEPM[/video]

There you can also see what many want to have in PC, sliding tracks, elevators, photo-booths, ...
I am not thinking that there should be over 30 different coaster for free in the basic game, but I expect at least about 6 different types BUT that with a smoothless working editior.
If I want more coaster than I am willing to pay another money to get them, that is fair I think.

I agree with these wishes, I want them too, but it it not possible to add everything to game for free, Frontier will run out of money one day, thats the realism.
The actual way to build costers is maybe the wrong way, other games can it better (RCTW, TPS), this is also for paths

So there comes the next point why I am frustrated about the game: Why isnt there communication about the future ?
I am willing to pay another 120 € to get things done, and many here told that they are also willing to pay more, but there is no response from Frontier. They could do a kickstarter on things, and if enough money has been collected they start developing.

I not agree that there are so many different types of coaster in there. This is something which should be seperated into DLCs and not into the basic game, also like Water-Rides, Dark-Rides, Fireworks and other stuff.
Most negative here are not unfair, they are willing to pay more money to get things done, thats realistic and fair, but it is unfair to have many essential things undone while overwhelming the game with one-siided-stuff.
If you know whats comming in future, it is not a problem, but this is a problem, because we customer dont know anything about the future and the plans, its all hidden for unknown reasons, even now without a direct competior.

Feedbacks are very less, way too less.
Of course it is wrong to take much time of the developers, but for that reason there is a person like a "community-manager".
I know I get smashed again for my following words, but I am not splitting between man and women, I am not a raccist, so I say clear, that I feel these is not doing the job correctly in THAT specific way (all other is wonderful).
The mangers is here to take feedback to the devs, get small answers from the devs and communicate it with the forum, maybe I am wrong with it and it is only a person to keep a chair warm, dont know ....

I also dont like all these commercial talks .. "if you have any questions then write it in chat, we will answer later". People have many questions, but on most you wont get answers, like DLC again how today prooved, still no news ... so what sould we ask if everything is unanswerable, a secret or maybe still not decided by Frontier ... i feel bad about such phrases, it hurts ... (not to get bashed to ground again: I dont say somebody lies, I only say it makes wrong illusions, which can frustrate very much, even if it happens often).

I cant see any negativ wave here. Many dont agree with things, because they thing that the developement is a way unbalanced, but even Frontiert shows that they dont have plans, otherwise they could tell more or start doing thing to push forward.
Get the game right back on track with a limit where everybody has it content in the game.

And now all PC-Fanboys, bash on to me ...
 
They are very secretive about their future plans for PC. They are very tight lipped about future updates and content until it gets closer to the time of the update. They might start working on the next update already after June 27, but not mention anything until September.
 
It's starting to feel like there's a lot of complaining about negativity more than there is actual negativity being said about the game.
 
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Lol. The negatively about the negatively is now attracting.... Negativity.

There's far too much use of words like unplayable.
Like somehow 10s of thousands of players are clearly only pretending to be playing...
 
What the hell is wrong with ones who constantly start a thread about the negativity about other?

Should I start licking asses because some of you are extreme fanboys without the little touch of criticism?

I supported the game as much as I can with VIP ticket, early access, headclub. I might get the right just to point out the problems that are still there. I prefer to criticize instead of "oh yeah, what a wonderful game, bla bla bla!

With the support I made I give my statement about the game to be worth it!

Omg omg omg
 
Negativity.....

Thank god I'm so positive minded.

Yes, there are more possibilities with the game then currently applied
And everybody has his right to speak up.

I don't mind that people give ideas and suggestions. It's democratic and fair, when everyone gives his opinion about a matter, positive or negative.
Actually, keep all the ideas coming.

But people don't need to get all grumpy and obsessive about it and act like the world is ending because people supposedly don't listen and have a different opinion or developers choose an other way.

And to go with the OP, yes, I think it is an age problem. Younger people nowadays just tend to be more demanding and want it all their way.
Older people at least learned to say "please" and have a little patience.

And that's my final comment about negativity because I hate it.
 
Long quote so this'll be a long reply, sorry for snipping much of it.

Bo said today that there are still no infos about DLC ... so why not ? You cant make decisions if you dont know where your goal is.
You misunderstand. Bo wasn't saying that they don't know what their direction is regarding DLC / expansion packs are, but that they aren't yet ready to release that information. These are big business decisions, and as Frontier are a listed company they are beholden to their shareholders to release information that might have a material effect on share price to the market first. If they state that they're going for a particular DLC model, or particular expansion model and it turns out that direction changes, they might find themselves in legal hot water. I can tell you that the developers *hate* having to sit on exciting information about the future of their games because they thrive on hype and positivity, but sometimes they simply can't tell you. That and we as a community tend to jump on them when they tell us something's going to happen and for whatever reason it doesn't (see: Security, Go Karts).

Also many companys do a bad job today [...]. Its a reason why people are gettring faster upset about a thing. I dont say this is right, its bad, but this is the result of unfairness and a system that protects cheater and criminals.
Sure, some companies do a poor job. We should be lauding those that don't, not tarring them with the same brush. We also have to be careful to distinguish between behaviour that is willfully bad and that which is well-intentioned but doesn't quite work out. For example, company X might release a game that's a cynical cash-grab where they've put the minimum resource and effort in (and the result is a terrible game) and company Y might be trying their hardest to make a game for the fans of the genre, but are still limited by the resource they can put in and might make some missteps along the way. If we lump both companies into the same bucket, company Y are less likely to want to continue doing what they're doing and we're the ones who ultimately suffer.

On the other hand: Without critics it cant be done. Without telling "about the world" many people should realize that is NOT good only to say "YES", "OK", "Its good", "i am fine with it".
Everyone is entitled to their opinion. No game is perfect. What some people see as a major issue, others will see as a minor one. *Both* sides of the debate need to understand that, and accept that. Sometimes the ones being critical see an opposition to their opinion as "white knighting" whereas it's actually just providing balance to the debate. Nobody likes to think that they're wrong, so when our opinions are challenged we tend to become defensive about them and that applies to everyone. We could *all* do with a dose of objectivity, but it's the hardest thing.

I've said this before elsewhere, but what's needed is both praise and criticism. Praise helps the developers because it validates the work that they've done: it buoys them and motivates them to continue. Criticism helps because it grounds them; it stops them from becoming complacent and gives them motivation to improve. What's unhelpful is if everything you say is critical, or if everything you say is appreciative. Try to find a middle ground. [This isn't aimed at anyone in particular, by the way, it's just a general observation]

You have soo much coasters now in the game, but still very less other track-rides.
If I were feeling sarcastic, I might say that the clue is in the name. But I'm not and I can see how there's a definite bias toward 'coasters and flat rides versus tracked rides. I suspect the reason for that is that the designers (Sam particularly) find coasters more exciting and challenging than other types of tracked rides, or that the coaster system allows new variants to be easily added so it's an easy win to add a few new variants in every release. If you want to see more tracked rides, I would suggest opening a suggestion thread (or contributing to an existing one) and list some examples of what you'd like to see and why you think that the game would benefit from them.

If you have more experience in game you know about controls, your experience tells you if they are wrong or not.
Watch on Youtube for "LGR", he did lots of games, all old ones too ... he knows where he talks about, and he still says that PC has "bad" control, and I have to agree with him, because they are bad.
On the other hand, Planet Coaster is supposed to also be accessible to those with little experience in the genre, so who's to say what's "bad" or "good"? The designers have come at their design from the point-of-view of someone who might never have played a game like this before, and tried to make it straightforward to make something that looks and feels good while being flexible enough to make more complex designs. I'm not saying that they've hit the mark completely on that; I'm sure that while they're happy with what they've produced there's *always* going to be something about it that they'd like to improve or change.

For what it's worth, I don't think that other games in the genre have hit the mark either. Some people love RCTW's spline-based builder, some people hate it. I'm not an experienced builder and I find it fiddly and unintuitive, whereas I find PC's a lot easier to achieve what I was aiming for. My opinion on this is no more or no less valid than yours; neither of us can objectively say that one is "better" than the other. It's all down to personal preference. Both companies have come at the same problem from a different perspective and each solution will sit better with some people than it will others.

For me the ideal situation would be for Frontier to release documentation about the blueprint format, and in particular how the various coasters are stored. Let the community write converters for coasters from (say) NL2 so they can be imported as blueprints to the game. That way those who want more advanced features (or even just a different editor interface) can use a tool they're more familiar with, and those who are happy with the existing editor need do nothing else.

But these shouldnt be bad, because they are the very basics of the game, the first thing you do after buying is mostly : Build a path, place a ride. And if you at that point struggle around with them, not getting it the way you want, you loose interest and it is boring.
I've personally never had any particular issue with building paths or placing rides.

There is still many basics missing, try to mark multiple items and copy them ... I tried it today and didnt got it ... you have to go over items to group them ... complicated and total unacceptable.
I would agree that the UX could be improved with respect to grouping items. However, I don't think it's a straightforward thing to achieve, certainly not if we want to make it accessible. I personally would like to see a hierarchical object grouping system that allows groups to be selectively turned on or off while still being linked to their parent. This would make building something intricate much easier as they could be built in-situ. A complete UX paradigm shift is required for that though, including drag-drop type behaviours, etc. It's not as easy as it sounds and the team have to weigh up whether this is worth it.

Again for me, an improvement on this would be for Frontier to document their OVL and blueprint file formats which might allow the community to put some effort into working on external tools.

Personally I think that this is no the game for this genre, for that you better buy NoLimits2, its specially made for coasters.
I think you have the genre confused. This is a park simulator, not a hardcore coaster builder. You're right about NL2 if you're only interested in making a realistic coaster. If you're solely interested in micromanagement, Parkitect might be your best bet. PC is intended to be played by those who want something of a balance. You want a game that is graphically nice, which has some management, building, coaster creation. But doesn't focus heavily on any one particular element. I think it hits that mark. It might not be for everyone, but as you mentioned there *are* alternatives.

You cant do good coasters with it, because its implemented not optimal / wrong. I know there are many people now bashing onto me. If you had experience in other games, like ThemeParkStudio, or even RCTW, you would know that it could be much better. So the question is: Why has the best game out there the baddest coaster-editor? This is bad and make many feel sad, because it takes this wonderful game down.
See above. Not everyone shares your opinion of the coaster editor.

There you can also see what many want to have in PC, sliding tracks, elevators, photo-booths, ...
Things that may come with time. I can list hundreds of features that the game *could* have and that other games *do* have already, but who's to say that photo booths should be a higher priority than (say) midway games? Or that the effort should go into implementing elevators when there's a demand for fireworks or parades or...

The answer is that the developers will spend their time on what they think will appeal to most people and that can be achieved with the available resource. They look at the suggestions made on the forums, on Reddit, on social media, etc. and balance those against what *they* think the game should be and what they can feasibly achieve. That necessarily means that not everyone's suggestions will ever make it, that not everything will be as you like. It also means that some people simply won't enjoy the game at all as it'll never be what they wanted.

So there comes the next point why I am frustrated about the game: Why isnt there communication about the future ?
See above. There are good reasons why Frontier are closed about their future plans. You have to start accepting that they'll communicate what's coming in future when they're ready to do so. I know that it's frustrating -- I've been in exactly the same boat with their other games, but the only way anything is realistically going to change is if they delist from the public markets and they aren't in a position to do that as far as I know.

I am willing to pay another 120 € to get things done, and many here told that they are also willing to pay more, but there is no response from Frontier. They could do a kickstarter on things, and if enough money has been collected they start developing.
It won't happen. Frontier aren't interested in doing more crowdfunding, and it's a really poor model for funding computer games.

I not agree that there are so many different types of coaster in there. This is something which should be seperated into DLCs and not into the basic game, also like Water-Rides, Dark-Rides, Fireworks and other stuff.
And equally you'll find the other 50% of people who would complain that such things aren't in the basic game and would hate on the company for not adding them for free. What can they do?

Feedbacks are very less, way too less.
Of course it is wrong to take much time of the developers, but for that reason there is a person like a "community-manager".
But where do the community managers get their information from if not from the developers? The community team have a high-level view of what the game is and what's coming. They don't know in detail everything that's on the todo list, or when it might come. Only the game's project managers will know that and it's all subject to change. Sometimes the developers will come on the forums and answer particular questions, but I know for a fact they do it in their spare time because they care about the community.

I know I get smashed again for my following words, but I am not splitting between man and women, I am not a raccist, so I say clear, that I feel these is not doing the job correctly in THAT specific way (all other is wonderful).
The mangers is here to take feedback to the devs, get small answers from the devs and communicate it with the forum, maybe I am wrong with it and it is only a person to keep a chair warm, dont know ....
Until you've walked a mile in their shoes, I don't think you're in a position to criticise the job that anyone is doing here. You don't know what their jobs entail. I'm sure that if someone looking at your job from the outside in could be highly critical of what you do, and I'm equally sure that you'd find it unfair if they did. When you start being critical like this I think it's time to take a step back and reevaluate.

I also dont like all these commercial talks .. "if you have any questions then write it in chat, we will answer later". People have many questions, but on most you wont get answers, like DLC again how today prooved, still no news ... so what sould we ask if everything is unanswerable, a secret or maybe still not decided by Frontier ... i feel bad about such phrases, it hurts ... (not to get bashed to ground again: I dont say somebody lies, I only say it makes wrong illusions, which can frustrate very much, even if it happens often).
They answer what they're allowed to answer. If you're not happy with that, get in touch with someone higher up.

And now all PC-Fanboys, bash on to me ...
Being deliberately antagonistic by implying anyone with a differing opinion to your own is a "fanboy" is not going to result in a balanced debate (if that's what you're even after).
 
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