Engineers Why is Elite Failing (in my opinion)? Negative Feedback Loops - An Analysis

[-VR- Max Factor]

Nobody has any idea if the player numbers are healthy or not except FD themselves so people tend to have a guess based on their own experiences

I know, thats why the original post is pointless. In the last 2 weeks there have be around 80000 players on steam. We can roughly double that to get a guestimate of the actual numbers.
As far as I am concerned, numbers are looking healthy, and FDev have stated that numbers were very healthy for this type of game. I have no reason to believe they are lying.

The game is certainly not failing.

 

[Eera]

I know, thats why the original post is pointless. In the last 2 weeks there have be around 80000 players on steam. We can roughly double that to get a guestimate of the actual numbers.
As far as I am concerned, numbers are looking healthy, and FDev have stated that numbers were very healthy for this type of game. I have no reason to believe they are lying.

The game is certainly not failing.

Every update are like a blow cake. There is a hype during some weeks, but after what, the cake fall back.

 

[-VR- Max Factor]

Before the update the steam figures were around 70000. Still very healthy. The game is not failing.

 

[kalniel]

What do you want me to do .. post thousands upon thousand of lines of chat, personal back room chatter, private forum posts and other details? No its a breach of trust.

No because it still wouldn't help your case - none of us outside of the devs have the complete picture of what feedback the devs have and therefore we can't say whether they're ignoring it or not.

I'll give you a good example - I've seen plenty of players made into "ambassadors". As long as they are good role models and they tow the party line they are propped up, they have the ears of the devs. Kerrash (bless his soul he is a good chap) is a good example. All he was, was one of the streamers an a backer. He's privy to all sorts of stuff and probably has quite a bit of informal input he'd never admit to.

I don't follow how a playing being made into an ambassador is in anyway indicative of what feedback the devs have or listen too.

This is human nature. I have the ear of many developers in my trade. Because they value my opinion. I tell it like it is, I don't just say "ya thats awesome!" I'm sure they value his. But the sign of a good dev is to also value the opinions of people who are not "yes men". (I'm not calling Kerrash that).

Of course, but there's no reason to suspect that FD are doing anything other than that either.

 

[Kurdran]

Making something challenging does not mean making it tedious to obtain.

This! My thoughts exactly! FDev have turned ED into a really poor casino simulator.

 

[Darkfyre99]

Thanks for the thoughtful analysis, but one thing you're missing is that sometimes frustration or boredom can be caused not by bad design, but because the player comes into the game expecting it to be one genre of game, and instead it belongs to another genre entirely.

They are, to use a TVTropes term (link withheld to save sanity), Wrong Genre Savvy.

For example, let's take PvP in this game. While this game isn't hard coded to prevent PvP, neither was it designed around PvP. In fact, this game was designed around a PwF (play with friends) mindset. People who play this game only for the PvP will be dissatisfied by it, precisely because game design choices went one direction, as opposed to another. In PvP games, the "meta" seems to change daily at times, and as a result, PvP players expect to be able to make changes on the fly. The fact that they can't continually tweak their builds in Engineers to keep up with the "meta" is a source of frustration to them.

The same goes for players who prefer more linear gameplay, who bring a set of expectations which won't be met in a open world style game. They aren't told what to do, where to go, or how to do it, and that creates frustration for them. There isn't even a way to "win" this game. Even bigger ships and higher class equipment isn't necessarily progression, but potential tools for you to use. Acquiring larger ship isn't necessarily a good thing for you to do, nor is upgrading a module to class "A" necessarily a benefit.

Frontier has constantly said that they're making the game they want to play. This will frequently mean that what THEY consider a fun mechanic may not fit another's preferred play style.

Sometimes they may stumble (Powerplay). Sometimes they may prioritize things differently from what you'd prefer. And sometimes compromises may need to be made. But I Think for a lot of people, the source of their frustration is less bad game design, but different preferences in game design.

 

[Stratigamo]

Excellent research there, but I'm a confounded on a small bit of it.

How is the game "failing," and where did you get that information from?

The topic's name is excellent click bait, though.

 

[Eera]

This! My thoughts exactly! FDev have turned ED into a really poor casino simulator.

Alleluia !

 

[xXR34P3RXx]

pure wisdom

Very well thought out OP and i totally agree, lets hope that fdev can see the wisdom in this through all the noise.

Unfortunately though it seems that the only way to get fdevs attention is to try and yell LOUDER then the fanboy brigade who think they're preforming damage control on fdevs behalf. Basically insuring well thought out threads such as this get subverted and buried. I see it all the time on these forums.

+REP

 

[Colonel Kenney]

I've only been playing a couple months, but already have a ton of hours in. Too many for the time I've been playing, but I enjoy the game. From what I see with some players, especially new ones, is that they expect to have great stuff after 10 hours of playing. This game doesn't work that way. If you want anything great ship wise or great engineered mods, you're going to have to put a ton of time in. That's how it is with everything in this game, you can't just play it for 40-50 hours and have everything.

I think that's why we are seeing the complaints about the engineers, some people expect to have all level 5 mods in one weekend of play. Sure, there are some things that can be better when it comes to drop rates and the RNG, but it's really not that bad. If everything was so easy to get right away, there's no way Elite will come close to being around for ten years like is planned.

I also don't understand the complaints still going on about the AI. It's way toned down from right after the update. Yeah, that first weekend was a bit over the top. I think too many people just sat at Nav beacons or haz RES sites, shooting fish in a barrel before the update, and got complacent with combat.

I do do think the interdictions were over the top, but the past couple days they've seemed to get a little less. I felt bad for new players trying to trade and make money, getting interdicted all the time by elite FDLs and Condas couldn't have been enjoyable when just learning the game. Some people play this game to explore and trade, they aren't so much into combat. That's totally fine, there's no right or wrong way to play ED, and no one should ever criticize anyone for the way they play. I just think for those people who want to explore and trade, they shouldn't have to put up with that amount of interdictions, especially from top notch AI doing the interdicting. There's plenty of places and ways that those who want that challenge, can get it, it shouldn't be shoved down anyone's throat.

Those are just my thoughts, I never tell anyone how to play, but anyone playing this game expecting to get everything nice with ease, or not much time and effort, well they are playing the wrong game.

I'm ok with putting time in. Its just that if you only get a couple hours a night you want some sort of reward for it.. and you want it to be fun. Not long and drawn out and frustrating. Or boring.

- - - - - Additional Content Posted / Auto Merge - - - - -

Look at their Design Team, make you own mind up if they are up to it.

The fans they should've listened to were part of the DDF.

The issue is they abandoned it - and went off into their own tangent. Instead of setting up a new DDF going forward. If you want the fans to be part of the growth of this game and vision you need to ask their opinion.

- - - - - Additional Content Posted / Auto Merge - - - - -

Before the update the steam figures were around 70000. Still very healthy. The game is not failing.

There peaks and valleys and many peaks take place when there are major updates. There was only a very small peak in players after this last patch and it dropped back to the normal "fanboy players" level pretty much immediately. It shows people didn't like the new build, they didn't stick around to play it. My point is that it may looks healthy but it is dwindling slowly instead of the game getting better and gaining more interest people are seeing the updates and dismissing/dispensing with it. The forums are proof of this.

Not to mention being between 70-90 on the top 100 games being played with very very poor titles AHEAD of ED is a real shame. ED has the potential to be a top 20 game.

 

[Colonel Kenney]

This article covers some good points but when I compared it to myself I couldn't find any true statement. I am not really affected by the lenght to the next goal. See I literally spend months grinding credits day after day to get a fully A-graded Corvette. If I have a goal I do my best to achieve it. What did bother me were the ways I had to do it. The utterly boring grind is present in ELite and there is no single alternative.

Take the frustration/boredom diagram. I am faaaaaar down the high skill - low challenge feeling part. I feel bored. NPCs are not a challenge at all, heck not even the majority of the players are regarding combat. There is no riddle, no quiz, no difficult question to answer to achieve something valueable. There are just a variety of incredible easy to do tasks that have a really low payout and have to be repeated. Since they are not challenging they are boring. I would rather try over and over again to complete an extrem mission and get a fat payout so I would first save alot of time doing the challenging tasks compared to the easy ones and secondly wouldn't fall asleep while hauling some palladium from A to B.


So my critique would probably be more related to the other article about "the flow".

This is why there needs to be scaling in effect. Or alternative things to do that are more challenging.

For example - where the hell are all the cap ship battles or station battles with an actual outcome? Where are the missions dedicated to being in a team launching to go destroy cap ship .. that would be uber fun and uber tough..

 

[foebits]

-----------------------

Was there a point to this or are you just wasting forum space?

 

[RustyLeg]

Excellent research there, but I'm a confounded on a small bit of it.

How is the game "failing," and where did you get that information from?

The topic's name is excellent click bait, though.

This, though it is only a sample of all players, is quite telling: http://steamcharts.com/app/359320#3m

After two weeks the player level is back down to what it was before 2.1. It will be interesting to see how it goes over the next week.

 

[tarragon]

I would add, that slotmachine is rigged and fdev even said so. Meaning, you will never get really good rolls and nobody cares, that you will never get really bad ones. One more thing that clearly fails as shown in your negative reward loop.

 

[Bacalao]

What do you want me to do .. post thousands upon thousand of lines of chat, personal back room chatter, private forum posts and other details? No its a breach of trust.

I'll give you a good example - I've seen plenty of players made into "ambassadors". As long as they are good role models and they tow the party line they are propped up, they have the ears of the devs. Kerrash (bless his soul he is a good chap) is a good example. All he was, was one of the streamers an a backer. He's privy to all sorts of stuff and probably has quite a bit of informal input he'd never admit to.

This is human nature. I have the ear of many developers in my trade. Because they value my opinion. I tell it like it is, I don't just say "ya thats awesome!" I'm sure they value his. But the sign of a good dev is to also value the opinions of people who are not "yes men". (I'm not calling Kerrash that).

Anyway this is off on a tangent - getting back on topic.

- - - - - Additional Content Posted / Auto Merge - - - - -




This is about hitting the sweet spot for every player. Being a yes man and a fanboy means = "everything is awesome!" and how dare you criticize or say they are doing anything wrong at all!

Advocating change in this game for the better benefits ALL players.

I'll give you another example .. Everquest 2 I believe initially was the first mmo that implemented an auto-scaling level feature so you could play with other people of a higher level or of a lower level. This is sort of the function they need to work on. Adding more feedback in the form of reward, and intrigue and or challenge.

I guess, first of all, I don't know of any of the regular forum posters that are "everything is awesome", they are "this is awesome because of this" or "no, it's not awful, it's actually pretty awesome if you look at it from this other totally valid view point" or "there are bigger fish to fry" and then you'll see them in another thread suggesting a change or ranting about something else or whatnot. People are not the monochromatic drones that just agree or disagree....and I know, I know that's not what you're saying, but it's the underlying concept your pushing to try to make a flimsy point. People become community leaders because they are community leaders, they tend to be moderate and conservative because all to often "telling it like it is" which is really "telling it the way my skewed perception of it thinks it is" ends up in rants/bashes/arguments/flaming/anger and generally non constructive pontificating about human nature and what devs think or don't think of their various anonymous forum users.
-
As far as hitting the sweet spot for every player...please don't tell me you're that naïve, go visit some other forums. It's all "this game is dying", "the devs don't listen", "it's so grindy", "fix the bugs". That, or just plain toxic that we thankfully keep to a minimum here.
-
Advocate all the change you want, but the things you are trying to change are not necessarily wrong in the first place. I, for instance, genuinely enjoy the engineer mechanic. It's fulfilling and fun and intriguing and very rewarding. I have no problem with it being a grind because it isn't one, I have no problem with the minor RNG aspects of it because they are very minor. I look at the tin and know what I'm about to get within a reasonable amount of error. But that's just me working in the highly, ridiculously, ludicrously, stringently regulated field of nuclear science and understanding that in any process there is an amount of error because it is a physical process you will never overcome so you just make sure you fall within the acceptable ranges. Gosh....that sounds familiar...

- - - - - Additional Content Posted / Auto Merge - - - - -

I would add, that slotmachine is rigged and fdev even said so. Meaning, you will never get really good rolls and nobody cares, that you will never get really bad ones. One more thing that clearly fails as shown in your negative reward loop.

Ensuring a reward is reasonably positive and predictable is quite the opposite of negative feedback. If you remove those checks and balances than it becomes a failure every time you don't get pure positive results, players quickly get frustrated and anything that isn't purely positive is negative and discouraging.

 

[Ziggy Stardust]

So much to unpack ...

This is about hitting the sweet spot for every player.

Impossible, since every player wants something different out of this game

Being a yes man and a fanboy means = "everything is awesome!" and how dare you criticize or say they are doing anything wrong at all!

That's odd, I recall you called me a couple of those names, and I have a couple of quite spicy threads leveled at FD with regard to exploration.

Advocating change in this game for the better benefits ALL players.

Trouble is, what your idea of better is, is not everyone's idea of better.

The crux of the problem seems to lie in the delusion there is a magical sweet spot in a game, where everyone will be happy. And that the things that make you happy make everyone happy.

I'll give you another example .. Everquest 2 I believe initially was the first mmo that implemented an auto-scaling level feature so you could play with other people of a higher level or of a lower level. This is sort of the function they need to work on. Adding more feedback in the form of reward, and intrigue and or challenge.

As I said, the point you made in the OP has merit, although to be honest, it was confusing at times, so I didn't respond to it right off the bat, and looked to see where the thread was heading. And then you just had to talk about yes men and fanboys. And since you have referred to me as such, I thought I'd join in.

 

[VR Jay Le Chardon]

@Colonel Kenney +1 Rep for a very insightful and well thought out opening post. It was such a shame that the thread descended into anarchy and I lost interest by page 3,

...Sadly much of the player base isn't really interested in discovering how to bend the ED galaxy to their will, they'd rather try to bend FDEV to their will that results in a compliant ED galaxy.

Very True! +1 Rep

The problem is not repetition, it is repetition without variation.

Why do people play chess for 100's of games ? It is repetitive, but there is variation.
TicTacToe on the other hand is repetitive but has little variation. => once the small variations are explored, the game becomes boring.

The best definition of a "grind" for me is : putting a reward behind a repetitive action with no variation.

I totally agree with this especially the definition I've enlarged the text of. +1 Rep CMDR.

 

[Colonel Kenney]

So much to unpack ...
Trouble is, what your idea of better is, is not everyone's idea of better.

As I said, the point you made in the OP has merit, although to be honest, it was confusing at times, so I didn't respond to it right off the bat, and looked to see where the thread was heading. And then you just had to talk about yes men and fanboys. And since you have referred to me as such, I thought I'd join in.

I take my model of what is good - based on main stream games in the genre that have been personally enjoyable over the past 30 years or so. Absolutely the masses are not always right - example Call of Duty. I actually loved playing doom, quake, and Battlefield 1942, and the entire series of multiplayer shooters. Until Call of Duty came along and it became what it is. Its pathetic is what it is. So much so its now a MEME when you say a "call of duty player" did or said this you instantly laugh. So large sales does not necessarily mean it is a good game. It could just be an outlet for kiddies to get the competition out.

That being said having been playing computer game since PONG through the Vic 20, C=64, Amiga ages you can look BACK and have a wealth of experience in "what was good" and "what was not". There starts to be a pattern and psychology to what is the most effective and rewarding for a "gamer" to have in a game. This is my way of trying to show people how to make a good ENGAGING game. Grinding is not enjoyable for the majority of people. It is for some. Someone up there said they didn't think it was a grind.. (hilarious!) he is in the minority.

 

[Rado]

Good info OP.

This ties into the idea that people often cite, that FDEV do not actually "play" their own game. They wargame the game but don't partake in the actual RNG grind, if they did they would experience the negative feedback loops they create, and not implement so many.

For quite some time now, for ME and I would imagine many others, including some in FDEV, thinking about playing E: D is more fun than actually doing so. Thanks RNGesus.

 

[MadDogMurdock]

Ooh - Arrows!!

Jeez Kenney, just walk away if you hate it so much.