Open Letter To The Demiurge Development Team
As you are probably aware, discontent is growing amongst the user community at MPQ. Long time players are leaving, transitioning players are getting frustrated, vgeterans are tearing their hair out and the seemingly ill-considered changes that are constantly being made, and I dread to think how a new player addresses the game. There is a growing perception that the developers are isolated from the playing community and are pretty much out of touch. Some of these accusations may be a little unfair, but I think that there are a number of concerns that need addressing.
Demiurge’s Strategy & Vision Of The Future of MPQ
I think this is the main concern of the entire user community. There seems to be no roadmap on where the developers want the game to get to and where any of these isolated changes fit into that. If there was a vision of the future then I think most of us would buy into that, or at least provide constructive criticism on how we feel that would need to change. Instead we get a stream of knee-jerk reactions which don’t seem to have any forethought – mainly involving releasing a stream of new characters (more on that later), rebalancing them and continually messing with PvP and PvE. Don’t get me wrong – not all of the changes are bad, but very little planning seems to have gone into many of the changes, and there never appears to be an end-goal.
Catering To The Different Levels Of Player
To my mind there are 4 or 5 levels of player:
Total newbie,
2* roster with aspirations to move to 3*
Rounded 3* roster trying to pick up 4* covers
4* roster
Now there may be other smaller sub groups, but that seems to be the main classifications of the guys I play with and the people talk to.
I have a number of issues here with the way the game is currently structured.
1. When I joined 480 days ago, there seemed to be a clear path to get to 2* and a sense of achievement to go with it. Thor and Ares covers didn’t magically drop to you constantly in battles, so there was a sense of achievement in playing in a PVP and getting that 2*, or getting that cover from a token. Demiurge effectively killed this part of the game, meaning that 3+* covers are really the only meaningful rewards.
2. Why is MPQ structured in such a one-size-fits-all manner? Why is it so important to balance everything all the time? 4* rosters should have an easier time than 1* or 2* rosters in the same events, but why shoehorn everyone into the same events? There seems an obsession with having everyone compete in the same PvP and PvE structure all the time? Why? Introduce more events where there are more tiers, both in the difficulty of matchups and the rewards at the end. There was an experiment with elite PvP style events, but the cost to enter was HP and the rewards were ridiculous for the effort involved. Maybe if you gave the top tier players something worthwhile to play for then they wouldn’t be leaving in droves. Similarly, if you offered lower players some meaningful progression then they might feel they were getting some reward.
3. This is related to 2) but please look at the scaling. In what world should it make the game easier if I have a 3* character with 13 covers and I don’t level him up beyond 94? Surely, Levelling my character should make my current battles more achievable and unlock new doors, but the developers don’t seem to have grasped that.
The Constant Stream Of New Characters
It seems that the main method that the developers feel will progress the game is by releasing a never ending stream of characters – mostly 3*. Again, this seems to display a spectacular lack of vision. How having 50 or 100 3* characters makes the game better than 20 or 30 is beyond me. OK, you get to play your favourite characters, and if you like collecting covers then it increasingly expands the character list, but otherwise it means that you have an ever growing roster that you need to subsidise and covers that are harder and harder to acquire (purely due to volumes and decreased token draw rates). If there was any logic on how having all these 3* characters makes the game better then I’d love to hear it.
Additionally, the HP cost of roster spots is prohibitively high, considering the sheer volume of characters. I’m lucky in that I’ve been playing for nearly 500 days and that I’ve built my roster over time – meaning I can discard most 2*s and have enough HP to cope. I’ve no idea how a 2* roster is supposed to finance 20 1-cover 3* characters. Do they just sell the covers (which is entirely counter-productive) or shell out $$$ on roster slots?
Finally, what is it with trying to kill people with the 6 day PvE grind to get a new character? Seriously, I finished the PvE last night and within 10 minutes, the new PvE had appeared with yet another new character, that will no doubt be essential. You really are risking burnout.
Release Of Changes To The Game
One of my biggest frustrations is the way Demiurge just release a massive change to the game with no warning, and often in mid-season. Do the developers really have no concept of how to release changes like this? How can we go through 3 fundamental changes in matchmaking in the first 3 events of a new season? It all smacks of knee-jerk reactions without any consideration to the player base. Also, there seems to be this rigid runaway train view where everything must be released in the strict PVP season cycle. Again, why? If matchmaking is so screwed that it needs a total overhaul, then stop the season for a few days! Is it that tricky? Or alternatively leave the season on the old logic, and introduce another PvP running alongside the event which does not contribute to the season, but with rewards where people would play and then give honest feedback? None of this is rocket science, but the developers seem limited by totally rigid thinking and don’t seem prepared to take a pause for even a minute. Surely it’s better to do something more slowly and do it right, rather than try to fit some self-imposed schedule and screw it up.
Do The Developers Really Play The Game?
Part of the alienation that we feel, is that we never feel that the changes or the direction of the game has really been tested properly or thought through. If the devs played the game properly, then many of feel that some of the changes made wouldn’t even be considered. Maybe there needs to be more active engagement of the user community before changes are made.
There are many other issues that we have here, but this list would grow forever. It would be lovely if we got some official response to some (any?) of these points, just to address our fears and concerns.
Demiurge’s Strategy & Vision Of The Future of MPQ
I think this is the main concern of the entire user community. There seems to be no roadmap on where the developers want the game to get to and where any of these isolated changes fit into that. If there was a vision of the future then I think most of us would buy into that, or at least provide constructive criticism on how we feel that would need to change. Instead we get a stream of knee-jerk reactions which don’t seem to have any forethought – mainly involving releasing a stream of new characters (more on that later), rebalancing them and continually messing with PvP and PvE. Don’t get me wrong – not all of the changes are bad, but very little planning seems to have gone into many of the changes, and there never appears to be an end-goal.
Catering To The Different Levels Of Player
To my mind there are 4 or 5 levels of player:
Total newbie,
2* roster with aspirations to move to 3*
Rounded 3* roster trying to pick up 4* covers
4* roster
Now there may be other smaller sub groups, but that seems to be the main classifications of the guys I play with and the people talk to.
I have a number of issues here with the way the game is currently structured.
1. When I joined 480 days ago, there seemed to be a clear path to get to 2* and a sense of achievement to go with it. Thor and Ares covers didn’t magically drop to you constantly in battles, so there was a sense of achievement in playing in a PVP and getting that 2*, or getting that cover from a token. Demiurge effectively killed this part of the game, meaning that 3+* covers are really the only meaningful rewards.
2. Why is MPQ structured in such a one-size-fits-all manner? Why is it so important to balance everything all the time? 4* rosters should have an easier time than 1* or 2* rosters in the same events, but why shoehorn everyone into the same events? There seems an obsession with having everyone compete in the same PvP and PvE structure all the time? Why? Introduce more events where there are more tiers, both in the difficulty of matchups and the rewards at the end. There was an experiment with elite PvP style events, but the cost to enter was HP and the rewards were ridiculous for the effort involved. Maybe if you gave the top tier players something worthwhile to play for then they wouldn’t be leaving in droves. Similarly, if you offered lower players some meaningful progression then they might feel they were getting some reward.
3. This is related to 2) but please look at the scaling. In what world should it make the game easier if I have a 3* character with 13 covers and I don’t level him up beyond 94? Surely, Levelling my character should make my current battles more achievable and unlock new doors, but the developers don’t seem to have grasped that.
The Constant Stream Of New Characters
It seems that the main method that the developers feel will progress the game is by releasing a never ending stream of characters – mostly 3*. Again, this seems to display a spectacular lack of vision. How having 50 or 100 3* characters makes the game better than 20 or 30 is beyond me. OK, you get to play your favourite characters, and if you like collecting covers then it increasingly expands the character list, but otherwise it means that you have an ever growing roster that you need to subsidise and covers that are harder and harder to acquire (purely due to volumes and decreased token draw rates). If there was any logic on how having all these 3* characters makes the game better then I’d love to hear it.
Additionally, the HP cost of roster spots is prohibitively high, considering the sheer volume of characters. I’m lucky in that I’ve been playing for nearly 500 days and that I’ve built my roster over time – meaning I can discard most 2*s and have enough HP to cope. I’ve no idea how a 2* roster is supposed to finance 20 1-cover 3* characters. Do they just sell the covers (which is entirely counter-productive) or shell out $$$ on roster slots?
Finally, what is it with trying to kill people with the 6 day PvE grind to get a new character? Seriously, I finished the PvE last night and within 10 minutes, the new PvE had appeared with yet another new character, that will no doubt be essential. You really are risking burnout.
Release Of Changes To The Game
One of my biggest frustrations is the way Demiurge just release a massive change to the game with no warning, and often in mid-season. Do the developers really have no concept of how to release changes like this? How can we go through 3 fundamental changes in matchmaking in the first 3 events of a new season? It all smacks of knee-jerk reactions without any consideration to the player base. Also, there seems to be this rigid runaway train view where everything must be released in the strict PVP season cycle. Again, why? If matchmaking is so screwed that it needs a total overhaul, then stop the season for a few days! Is it that tricky? Or alternatively leave the season on the old logic, and introduce another PvP running alongside the event which does not contribute to the season, but with rewards where people would play and then give honest feedback? None of this is rocket science, but the developers seem limited by totally rigid thinking and don’t seem prepared to take a pause for even a minute. Surely it’s better to do something more slowly and do it right, rather than try to fit some self-imposed schedule and screw it up.
Do The Developers Really Play The Game?
Part of the alienation that we feel, is that we never feel that the changes or the direction of the game has really been tested properly or thought through. If the devs played the game properly, then many of feel that some of the changes made wouldn’t even be considered. Maybe there needs to be more active engagement of the user community before changes are made.
There are many other issues that we have here, but this list would grow forever. It would be lovely if we got some official response to some (any?) of these points, just to address our fears and concerns.
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Comments
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A well thought out letter that raises several good points. Would be really nice to get a D3/Demiurge response to this, although I'm not holding my breath for that.0
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One of the best changes they recently made to the overall health of the game was lowering the 2* random drop rate. When random cover drops first came out many seasons ago, everyone was excited, but it totally lessened the value of all the covers. Why fight hours for a 2* cover in PVP if you can just get one to drop randomly? The 2* drop rate was too high for a long time.0
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Forum users only account for 10% of the total user base.
Freemium games target users to generate cash revenue, not to please them.
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I think it is time to start posting reviews on itunes or googleplay. It seems feedback on here has no impact. By the way, anyone know anyone who writes for gaming review sites? Might be a good time to reach out to them.0
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First off, I love the heart that goes into these kinds of posts (re: OP). D3/Demiurge should be -- and I believe is -- grateful for people who are so much about their game.
I think kthunder has it right:Freemium games target users to generate cash revenue, not to please them.
Quite frankly we are all (players, publisher, devs) lucky to have a forum and a community for MPQ. But having a community and having a "voice" doesn't translate into the right to be heard. It's like any other commercially available product in a market economy -- vote with your dollars.
We don't know the politics of what's going on behind the scenes. Our fearless YouTube-interview posting devs may very well be pawns of the Marvel marketing machine. D3 may be enslaved to some Marvel licensing deal that says Marvel gets to force tie-ins, etc. onto the game. And maybe 90 cents of every dollar goes to Marvel. And maybe the reason the devs can't play the game is because they are making so little money at the end of the day that they have to go work 5 part-time jobs.
Or maybe the devs are just making bank off of every wallet warrior and laughing at us peasant-folk that grind away night and day with red circles on our thighs for a chance at that "New 4
Cover" (tm).
My point is we can rant and we can rave and we can throw money at the game and we can boycott and we can play and we can stop. Marvel doesn't care.
Which shouldn't stop us from voicing our opinion btw. But Marvel/D3 doesn't care. Demiurge probably cares but can do little about it. What I do think is cool is that even though people stop playing they want to remain part of the community (forum, Line group, etc).
There are many d-baggery ways this game can be made much much harder and milk people for health packs and boosters; I thank the pub/devs for not going down that route.
Oh and Stan Lee probably doesn't care either. When are we getting a cameo btw??0 -
First off, I'd agree that we're all lucky to have a forum like this, where we can voice our opinions and where we can exchange views with other knowledgeable gamers. I'd also say that one of the big attractions for MPQ is this forum and the community as a whole.
See, I don't think the Demiurge mean to come across as so out of touch. Part of the frustration is the fact that they do go to some effort to make the game better, but it's done in such a ham-fisted way. They get a lot of grief for not caring and being totally money grabbing, but if that was the case then they wouldn't bother tweaking characters or changing matchmaking. I'm sure there are 1000 outside pressures and a large % are commercial, but that isn't their sole aim. Sometimes, they make changes which have a real positive impact (such as choosing your own time-slice), but they seem to fall into the trap of having a 15 minute meeting to decide the next step and then programming immediately, blissfully unaware of the long term consequences.
If they actually sat back and gave some thought to a total player experience, then I think they could come up with a bunch more achievable landmarks in the game that would give every player a feeling of progression. Pretty much everything they do at the moment involves "balance", which is short-termist and a bit stupid to be honest. Instead they should be asking:
1) What is the experience of a player with an x* roster (insert your own number for x)
2) What is the motivation to improve that roster to the next tier
3) How do we make that progression a) achievable, b) desirable, c) profitable
Those points seem to have been lost. Currently, we play the same events and have the same challenges no matter which tier our roster is, and often trying to improve our roster just makes those same events more difficult. This just leads to frustration and disenchantment. If you address the simple points above then I think you engage players for longer and actually make more money as well.0 -
just bumping this so that more people can easily see it.
marc0 -
kthunder wrote:Forum users only account for 10% of the total user base.
Freemium games target users to generate cash revenue, not to please them.
That's true. But what seems lost on D3 is creating a game ppl want to play is the foundation. Without that, the game is a house of cards that can't survive. It won't be long until the revenue dries up.
No fun for us = no fun for them.0 -
Great post, bump!
It is a bit disheartening to have so much time invested in this game, & most vets have at least some money spent, only to have most of the changes turn the game into a crushing grind. Have to say I started the game several times today only to close it without playing after looking at my smash hit matches after seed teams are all max level teams worth 20ish points.
Also seeing prodigal sun on my screen, ick.0 -
As another poster has alluded to, I feel like D3 is being held hostage by Marvel's marketing plans for various tie-ins. Every time there's a new show or film coming out, we get events debutting related characters. The problem right now is that there are so many properties being rolled out for the summer, and I think the marketing folks aren't at all concerned about the MPQ player base. And D3 has to appease Marvel, or else risk losing the license when it's up for renewal. So I think D3 is between the proverbial rock and a hard place.
And I expect even more Ultron tie in character releases in the next few weeks.0 -
in fairness, it's not that they don't listen to us - there are many instances of game changes implemented because of forum feedback. it's just that other times they don't, and don't always tell us why.
the best part of this letter is the request to help us all understand where this game is going, so we can put changes in context, and at least have an idea why proposed changes are rejected. it won't make everyone happy, but i think it would help players understand why D3 does the things that it does.
on our part as players, i think we should all have reasonable expectations that we won't get everything we want. but yeah, more transparency would be nice.0
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