Developer Priorities

mpqr7

I'd be curious to see a breakdown of developer priorities. I can tell that the devs are doing a ton of work on this game. It just seems hard to tell because often it seems to be work that the players aren't necessarily looking for.

I see dev priorities as:

1) Creating 2-3 new characters per month. That's probably a ton of work, from licensing to ideas to coding to artwork.

2) Fixing random bugs and adding banners and screen shaking.


I feel that the audience would be more appreciative of changes such as:

1) Adding in new stories, content, game types and so forth. This would make the game more fun and interesting for us and give us more to do, other than stressing about not hitting pvp or pve goals.

2) Making the game easier to play. This includes changes such as an instant level-up button, ability to sell all 1*s with a single button, multiple level-up button or level with all available iso button. ie changes that help us finish the administrative work so that we can focus on actually playing the game. Also changes such as adding in the actual attack damage for variable math-based attacks (ie iceman green, oml red, 3*pun red etc) and showing all affected tiles for non-random tile-based attacks, such as gsbw green or gsbw red.


I'm not even talking about business-based decisions, such as giving us more ISO. I understand that would need additional levels of clearance to proceed. But it would be nice to tone down the dev work that we either don't like (too many new characters) or don't really appreciate (random bug fixes, adding banners and screen shake) and focus on the changes that we are actually clamoring for.

You already have all of the necessary resources in place. I think you could realign some of them to match the gamers' interests, and that would go a great way in improving the overall quality and experience of the game.

veny

There is only one priority - incresing the income.
I am sure new characters are bringing much more money than new features. Thats the reason why they came from 3*s to 4*s, and why they change ISO economy with small and careful steps.

It may sound weird, but this game is not meant to be funny, entertaining, or full of different features. Stereotype is what stops you from grinding and pushes you to pay.

Thats how i see it... mainly because we havent seen new feature for months (nope, i am not counting VIP system).

mpqr7

I totally understand what you are saying. The business model is to make as much money and not worry about players having fun. However as a player, I used to be completely obsessed with mpq, but now years later, I am changing to play khux, final fantasy exvius and other games, because they offer exactly what I'm looking for:

1) lots of stress-free non-timed content
2) shortcuts for leveling up characters, using either daily or weekly special events

Basically it feels much easier to progress with those other games. Maybe it's because I've only played them for a few weeks / months. But those games to me are now more fun and less stressful and repetitive. Yet those games I think are also still quite popular and offer tons of opportunities to pay for things if you want to go that route.

I don't think they should stop all new character releases. But even just toning back a tiny bit could give them the resources to do much more in other aspects of the game and give us more reasons to play other than simply the stress of keeping up.

PeterGibbons316

veny wrote:

There is only one priority - incresing the income.
I am sure new characters are bringing much more money than new features. Thats the reason why they came from 3*s to 4*s, and why they change ISO economy with small and careful steps.

It may sound weird, but this game is not meant to be funny, entertaining, or full of different features. Stereotype is what stops you from grinding and pushes you to pay.

Thats how i see it... mainly because we havent seen new feature for months (nope, i am not counting VIP system).

Exactly this. A new character every two weeks makes players spend HP on roster slots. People don't spend more as a result of new content. In fact, new content typically adds rewards, and more free rewards means less revenue. The development costs outweigh the revenue return and so it doesn't make sense.

an1979

Making the game easier to play. This includes changes such as an instant level-up button, ability to sell all 1*s with a single button, multiple level-up button or level with all available iso button.

Those features make "bling" that atract NEW players.
They must be captured, entertained and awed so they get addicted and stay...
Nobody in beancounter devision will aprove feature that is usefull to oldtimers only and not makes them spend

MarvelMan

An oversimplification is that there are two routes for making money:
1) As fast as you can (burn those whales out!)
2) Build the game for longevity

No, they arent mutually exclusive but it sure feels MPQ is heavily weighted, both in design and dev time, towards the first. Some of what you suggest would increase player engagement (and hopefully $ spent by the non-whale) while addressing retention as well as new player acquisition, but generally falls under 2).

Jarvind

mpqr7 wrote:

an instant level-up button, ability to sell all 1*s with a single button, multiple level-up button or level with all available iso button.

While it's not "instant," they did speed the leveling process from like 5-6 seconds per level to about one, so there's that.

veny

PeterGibbons316 wrote:

Exactly this. A new character every two weeks makes players spend HP on roster slots. People don't spend more as a result of new content. In fact, new content typically adds rewards, and more free rewards means less revenue. The development costs outweigh the revenue return and so it doesn't make sense.

Hm, i dont think HPs are the issue. With championing rewards and selling full champions, tons of potential free HPs were added.
On the other side, ISO price to max out new cover has been increased from approx. 120 000 (3* cover) to over 350 000 (4* cover).
Also its easier to have slots for 4*s than have ISO for upgrading them (me - 800 days, 1300 hours, 38 3*s championed, best 4* cover - Antman level 160).
Read trough the forum, posts complaining about lack of ISO are like 10 times more frequent than posts complaining about lack of HPs.

Meander

ISO is very much an issue, but HP (more importantly the cost of roster spots) comes up plenty. For example, in VIP discussions, I heard many people say they wanted free roster spots instead of HP, or at least enough HP to cover a roster spot. In new character threads, roster slots often is brought up. So to say it's not an issue kind of ignores the fact. Yes, ISO is a more pressing issue, but slot costs is still a problem.

veny

Meander wrote:

ISO is very much an issue, but HP (more importantly the cost of roster spots) comes up plenty. For example, in VIP discussions, I heard many people say they wanted free roster spots instead of HP, or at least enough HP to cover a roster spot. In new character threads, roster slots often is brought up. So to say it's not an issue kind of ignores the fact. Yes, ISO is a more pressing issue, but slot costs is still a problem.

I agree. My point was there is no increased need for HP/slots, compared to previous years. Yeah, new characters are being released more and more often. But we also have more ways how to get HPs (championing, selling maxed covers etc.), but income of ISO increases slowly compared to increased need due to 4* or 5* covers.

If i could compare my HP and ISO gain/need now and year ago:
I get 100% or 200% more HPs than last year due to champions and selling maxed heroes. I also need twice as much HP thanks to the fact we are getting new champions way more often than year ago.

About ISO... except for double ISO events, championing (that actually gives same ISO value as if i sold the cover) or selling maxed covers (its not a ISO income, more like a recyclation - nothing gained, you only loose less) i dont see a single difference between my ISO income now and year ago. On the other side, the fact, that 4*s are being released instead of 3*s, increases to my potential (i would spend it if i had it) ISO outcome by 400-500%.

See? You can fairly get more HPs by upgrading champions or selling maxed ones, but ISO?
All features added only turn ISO into something else (championing), or recycle already wasted ISO (improved selling price of maxed champs). However, except for double ISO event, ISO income remains constant.

mpqr7

You are correct, veny. It's like squeezing ISO water out of a rock.

The needs have sextupled (changed from releasing two 3*s per month to two 4*s per month), but the daily resources have remained the exact same. So that's the major problem and frustration.

Bowgentle

mpqr7 wrote:

You are correct, veny. It's like squeezing ISO water out of a rock.

The needs have sextupled (changed from releasing two 3*s per month to two 4*s per month), but the daily resources have remained the exact same. So that's the major problem and frustration.

No, the daily resources have not remained the exact same.

Daily alliance ISO just went from 200 to 2000, 7 node prizes in PVE instead of 4.

Of course it's still not enough, but ISO income HAS increased.

fmftint

How did no one guess, tinker with boost levels?

PeterGibbons316

fmftint wrote:

How did no one guess, tinker with boost levels?

Fits what I have been saying - announcing such a minimal change to boost levels will have exactly zero impact on spending....so it gets communicated early.

veny

Bowgentle wrote:

mpqr7 wrote:

You are correct, veny. It's like squeezing ISO water out of a rock.

The needs have sextupled (changed from releasing two 3*s per month to two 4*s per month), but the daily resources have remained the exact same. So that's the major problem and frustration.

No, the daily resources have not remained the exact same.

Daily alliance ISO just went from 200 to 2000, 7 node prizes in PVE instead of 4.

Of course it's still not enough, but ISO income HAS increased.

Yeah ,i forgot about more prices and removal of 20ISO "reward". My bad...

Linkster79

I would imagine the highest priorities are new game modes, new stories and improving player enjoyment along with quality of life improvements, that level up button sure will does look sweet.

carrion_pigeons

Iso needs are more than they were two years ago, but it isn't nearly as extravagant a difference as people think. Since then, they reduced the cost to level a 3* to 120 by a ton, they added DDQ, they've made marginal increases to iso available in PvE, they introduced alliances with all the iso generated by them, and they've added more daily non-random rewards which are worth iso.

For the longterm casual player, iso needs have gone up by maybe 50% overall and iso flow has potentially quadrupled. For the kind of player who farms lightning rounds for pvp and grinds out PvE nodes for all the iso in them, iso flow has increased by a much smaller proportion, but even for them, their current iso deficit is only worse now in an absolute sense - they don't get that much further in the hole every week than they used to.

You can go back looking at old forum posts from before the 4* meta ever existed, and people were still complaining about being down by millions of iso. The iso flow rate is just not functionally that different from what it's always been.

Kaazz

The devs ought to focus on simply releasing a new version without introducing yet MORE BUGS. The last 3-4 releases have introduced new bugs each time, and this last release has bugs causing game crashes and match losses due to the crashes and due to the board reshuffle bug (which allows matched enemy tiles to stay on the board.) The level of QA with this game is abysmal. I'm a professional software engineer, and if I released a product this buggy every release I'd get canned!

Forget new content and new characters, give me a bug-free game experience! As it stand now, they can't generate any $$ from me because I CAN'T PLAY THE GAME DUE TO THE CRASHES. That's not a profitable plan, no matter how you slice it!

Nellobee

Well, until everything priorities shift, I have decided to spend a lot more time prioritizing capturing tiny monsters.
That said, MPQ has been getting better over time, and all the little tweaks have been a good step. I do not think they go far enough (changing the PvP system entirely would be a great start, as it is awful), but it is nice to see.

mpqr7

I honestly don't mind the bugs (other than ones that cause crashing and prevent you from playing the game). Sure a banner may be mis-labeled, or an enemy may die before the attack on them completes, but it's really not a big deal.

If they added some fascinating new content to the game that gave it some much-needed variety and allowed a way for 2-year+ vets to feel like all their endless grinding is somehow paying off by giving them access to advanced features and ways of earning ISO and CP faster, then I would be totally fine with all those minor bugs remaining for a while.

Plenty of companies have tiny QA departments. The suits upstairs see it as a great way to save money (even though of course it causes problems when there aren't enough resources for testing between each new release). So I'm used to that.