Official Forums - the difference between being a Mythic customer and a GOA customer

[Nate]

This is direct from the newsletter:

When you become a part of the WAR Oracles team, you’ll earn increased interaction with developers

When you become a part of the Veterans team, you'll earn increased access to the Community Team

Nothing has changed from the daoc days Your great guys Magnus and Nic but this really shouldn't have been something to carry on from the old way it was handled. Mythic really don't seem to want much input in to their games from outside the borders of it's Country.

 

[Bluesky]

No, no, no Nate you're obviously not thinking of the same game... are you sure your monitor is turned on? We in Europe will be getting the same (if not better) service than our US friends... true story... I heard it on tha intarweb

I know this 100% for sure because i just read it on our official european forums which obviously opened at the same time as the US ones...

/facepalm of poon

 

[Xandax]

As if anybody actually believed the "no difference between EU and US" statements

 

[Raven]

Not for a second

 

[Gahn]

He strikes again!

 

[dee777]

As if anybody actually believed the "no difference between EU and US" statements

"Equal is not identical!"
><

 

[Jaberwocky]

Eu community communication and input was one area that Blizzard really improved on over the years, it's often a mistake American based developers tend to make in the end it just limits growth out side of their home market.

 

[Bugz]

The good thing is - the newsletters are always a great laugh to read and very full in content!

So props for that!

 

[Xandax]

"Equal is not identical!"
><

Equal has never been equal either.

 

[Ctuchik]

This is direct from the newsletter:





Nothing has changed from the daoc days Your great guys Magnus and Nic but this really shouldn't have been something to carry on from the old way it was handled. Mythic really don't seem to want much input in to their games from outside the borders of it's Country.

well, since GOA have no part in the development i cant see anything wrong with this.

all they can do (and they are) is to forward our concerns or suggestions to Mythic.

 

[Nate]

I haven't put my concerns to only GOA though, I don't know how they could have changed this themselves other then push Mythic to do it.

I just don't get it why Mythic Devs can't use two different forums, thats what they're doing now if not a hell of a lot more as when this comes in to effect they won't even have to look at sections other then what they've been told to post in.

 

[MagnusGOA]

Heyas!
Access to Mythic developers is obviously a key topic and both ourselves and Mythic are very much intent on giving European players as much attention as possible. Now, we're not trying to fool anyone here; Mythic devs will, naturally, be more visible on the US boards. This is so out of highly practical reasons. To start with, the devs are (duh..) busy developing the game and monitoring one forums is time consuming enough. Further though - and this is often conveniently left out of the debate by English speaking Europeans - the devs speak English and Mythic just don't have the resources to operate in five languages, whereas we do.

Now, it's often pointed out that many members of the non-English communities are capable of participating in the English community. Whereas this is certainly true to some extent, it's far from universal.

We're discussing different ways to meet these challenges with Mythic and we're determined to find the best solution for all our communities. One thing is certain though; the GOA Community Team will have close access to the Mythic devs via a dedicated section of the forums and there, we'll be able to ask direct questions, share feedback etc. That won't be the only contact point between European players and the devs though and we're tossing around a few ideas on how we could have a more direct contact. As an example, we'll be hosting dev chats, but that certainly won't be all.

I'm certain that there are some serious bumps in the road ahead, but I'm also positive and confident regarding this new and big step. There are challenges involved and compromises will need to be made, but we'll find ways to deal with them.



-Magnus

 

[Mr_Grumpy]

TBH if you REALLY think about it the only difference is that the yanks get to THINK they are being listened to , where as we know we arent.


Used to really bug me all this US/EU inequality but now i dont care. Devs never give a flying fook anyway and will always follow their own plan.

 

[MagnusGOA]

I just don't get it why Mythic Devs can't use two different forums, thats what they're doing now if not a hell of a lot more as when this comes in to effect they won't even have to look at sections other then what they've been told to post in.

Sure thing. However, could they cover six forums in five languages?

At the end of the day, the actual devs (as opposed to Mythic and GOA representatives) are responsible for doing a great job. To do this they need to take all sort of factors into account, player feedback being one of them. If they want to take time off their daily routines and personally browse forums, that's great.

Still, we want some degree of dev interaction with our players and we'll make it so. Do not expect them to casually browse our forums though because they'll (thankfully) be busy developing.

 

[Jaberwocky]

Do not expect them to casually browse our forums though because they'll (thankfully) be busy developing.

If that was the case then obviously they wouldn't be posting on the US forums, they'd be far too busy dev'ing and errr making pod casts or twitter entries

In all honesty community feed back and is safer when it's left in the hands of the PR department or it's equivalent, the CM's are an excellent conduit to communicate feed back both ways. Wheeling out a dev once in a while to cover a major topic is a nice touch and is easily translated and reposted into 5-6 different languages in less than 48 hours ready for reposting for the different communities.

I hold up Mark as a classic example of when dev feed back should be conducted through people who have been safely mind wiped too deal with the unwashed masses.

 

[Nate]

Sure thing. However, could they cover six forums in five languages?

At the end of the day, the actual devs (as opposed to Mythic and GOA representatives) are responsible for doing a great job. To do this they need to take all sort of factors into account, player feedback being one of them. If they want to take time off their daily routines and personally browse forums, that's great.

Still, we want some degree of dev interaction with our players and we'll make it so. Do not expect them to casually browse our forums though because they'll (thankfully) be busy developing.

Or busy casually browsing Mythics Official Forums.

I was thinking about how GOA could facilitate the other languages, similar to how the Oracle thing Mythic will be doing, GOA could translate a thread in the veterans section for the devs, kind of like you have done with the game itself, the dev would post his reply, GOA would translate again. It seems complicated and you begin to see why Mythic don't want anything to do with Europe, but no one ever said bringing a game to markets which you don't speak the same language was going to be easy.

 

[ford prefect]

The good thing is - the newsletters are always a great laugh to read and very full in content!

So props for that!

I wouldn't know, my EU Newletters all come from noreplyATmailforge.orange.fr and as such end up either deleted on in my junk folder. Mythic ones at least come from mythic, but I assume the EU ones are similar-ish

 

[dub]

Sure thing. However, could they cover six forums in five languages?

At the end of the day, the actual devs (as opposed to Mythic and GOA representatives) are responsible for doing a great job. To do this they need to take all sort of factors into account, player feedback being one of them. If they want to take time off their daily routines and personally browse forums, that's great.

Still, we want some degree of dev interaction with our players and we'll make it so. Do not expect them to casually browse our forums though because they'll (thankfully) be busy developing.

how did it get to be 6 forums ?

anyhows you have players from all over europe , 2/3's of the europeans are not from germany france italy or spain and they seem to get by with the english forums , i have full faith in those 4 nations to be able to do the same.

bottomline is that it would still be easier with one forum , tag some sub forums on for whatever language you feel like and keep the devs in the english part , you would get the community and wouldnt have the delay in translating important stuff for language subforums as it would most likely be done allready by users by the time goa has it ready ( not insinuating you are slow at goa , just that users most likely would be faster due to superior f5 skills or whatever )

personally im not to bothered about the splitting of forums , just seems to be a weird move.

 

[Ormorof]

how did it get to be 6 forums ?

anyhows you have players from all over europe , 2/3's of the europeans are not from germany france italy or spain and they seem to get by with the english forums , i have full faith in those 4 nations to be able to do the same.

bottomline is that it would still be easier with one forum , tag some sub forums on for whatever language you feel like and keep the devs in the english part , you would get the community and wouldnt have the delay in translating important stuff for language subforums as it would most likely be done allready by users by the time goa has it ready ( not insinuating you are slow at goa , just that users most likely would be faster due to superior f5 skills or whatever )

personally im not to bothered about the splitting of forums , just seems to be a weird move.

six forums for five languages, US, UK, Spanish, French, Italian and German? (and its probably not commercially viable to offer support/gameplay in danish, swedish, norweigan, finnish, czech, slovakian, polish, romanian, bulgarian, hungarian, greek, turkish etc etc so many languages in europe chances are you speak one of the big 5 )

i dont really mind not talking to developers, they need to be kept in their cages and develop the game dammit not sit and chit chat with me!

 

[dub]

six forums for five languages, US, UK, Spanish, French, Italian and German? (and its probably not commercially viable to offer support/gameplay in danish, swedish, norweigan, finnish, czech, slovakian, polish, romanian, bulgarian, hungarian, greek, turkish etc etc so many languages in europe chances are you speak one of the big 5 )

i dont really mind not talking to developers, they need to be kept in their cages and develop the game dammit not sit and chit chat with me!

i was under the impression that UK and US people could communicate with each other without having to change the way they express themselves dramatically hence i only counted 5

 

[MagnusGOA]

Or busy casually browsing Mythics Official Forums.

I was thinking about how GOA could facilitate the other languages, similar to how the Oracle thing Mythic will be doing, GOA could translate a thread in the veterans section for the devs, kind of like you have done with the game itself, the dev would post his reply, GOA would translate again. It seems complicated and you begin to see why Mythic don't want anything to do with Europe, but no one ever said bringing a game to markets which you don't speak the same language was going to be easy.

I think you're spot on; this will not be easy and the notion that it would be easy holds only as long as the illusion that Europe is a mono-language territory.

There will be alot of translating back and forth, for sure. There's a few different ways in which this could be done. We could (and will) utilize our translation department to translate larger texts, either from developers or compiled player feedback. However, naturally, the Community Team will post questions and translate 'smaller' stuff.

Thinking of it, EU players will have read access to the Mythic devs on the US boards and gain extra attention over here..

 

[Nate]

Still though, it feels like England(the Country that created the language that Mythic is only able to use) and the English speaking part of Europe are being punished for living in the wrong area. The section Mythic speak of which the Oracles will have access to aren't going to be things that are visible to non-Oracles if I read it correctly.

I find it really terrible what you see leaked from the official forums Mythic have right now, they discuss all kinds of things about the game, on the pts, asking for feedback on specific things yet EU can't see any of it, and also aren't included in any feedback requests.

 

[Kami]

I'll be honest I see no benefit in having official forums but plenty of negatives:

1. Dilution of community, we have enough forums to use.
2. Strict control over anything not deemed appropriate, anything critical about GOA/Mythic being edited or removed.
3. Waste of GOA staff time.
4. We'll be paying for this - through our subs, I'd rather it went into support/servers.
5. Feedback will be pretty much as it is, useless from our end.
6. Suggestions, unless they're both cheap and easy to implement will be ignored by GOA. I can't blame them either, why do more than Mythic and complicate matters?

 

[Kami]

Still though, it feels like England(the Country that created the language that Mythic is only able to use) and the English speaking part of Europe are being punished for living in the wrong area. The section Mythic speak of which the Oracles will have access to aren't going to be things that are visible to non-Oracles if I read it correctly.

I find it really terrible what you see leaked from the official forums Mythic have right now, they discuss all kinds of things about the game, on the pts, asking for feedback on specific things yet EU can't see any of it, and also aren't included in any feedback requests.

Mythic employees aren't all english only speakers mate, however when 95%+ of their player base speaks or can write in english why should they support other languages when they're not being paid directly by those customers. Personally I don't see a valid argument.

 

[Mr_Grumpy]

Still though, it feels like England(the Country that created the language that Mythic is only able to use) and the English speaking part of Europe are being punished for living in the wrong area. The section Mythic speak of which the Oracles will have access to aren't going to be things that are visible to non-Oracles if I read it correctly.

I find it really terrible what you see leaked from the official forums Mythic have right now, they discuss all kinds of things about the game, on the pts, asking for feedback on specific things yet EU can't see any of it, and also aren't included in any feedback requests.

Didnt you mean it feels like the UK ?

Oh and to be really pedantic, English was actually an invention of the Germanic tribes, us Islanders spoke Celt before that

 

[Nate]

Who cares about facts?! England is all that matters, the Welsh, Irish, Scottish, Northerners, Isleofwighteins, Scillyans, Merseans can all stick it!

 

[eksdee]

and people from essex, they're not even human.

 

[Nate]

We're the next evolution

 

[Mr_Grumpy]

See thats the trouble with the English, theyre that dumb they dont even realise theyre Germans

 

[Roo Stercogburn]

See thats the trouble with the English, theyre that dumb they dont even realise theyre Germans

Or French.

Then again, there's no such thing as racial purity - only inbreeding, which is never good.