When you feel like hating on Devs....

[Lightspeed]

Read this: https://www.google.com.au/amp/kotaku.com/five-things-i-didn-t-get-about-making-video-games-unti-1687510871/amp?client=ms-android-optus-au

Games will rarely be what each gamer wants them to be, but that doesn't mean the Devs aren't trying. It's clear thatthe Devs have put a heap of work into GRW. They should get credit for it.

[Lightspeed]

And then listen to one of the Devs to understand the passion -

So when anyone says the Devs or Publishers don't care or are producing junk - you have no clue.

 

 

Edited February 6, 2017 by Lightspeed

[nyleken]

Now that I think about it, I may have been too harsh initially.

I'm still disappointed by some of the design decisions made but they aren't a sign of laziness either. They put effort into them.

[101459]

I'm not sorry, but this approach to argument is a non sequitur. Constructive criticism is not hatred of people. Hard work and passion don't make a thing good, what it's promised to be, or even adequate. Lots of people work hard, I work hard; but telling my clients I worked hard and am passionate wouldn't be adequate if I didn't deliver. Pick your least favorite politician; is the fact they worked hard and are passionate adequate to your forgiving them and liking the fruits of their efforts? Would you pay Bunny Wishful to do your brain surgery because he's 'passionate and works hard' even though he has no medical degree and everyone he has operated on has died?

These people, 'the devs' get paid for their hard work and passion, it's not a gift. Most of 'the devs' likely had very little input in the game's design, and Ubisoft is not paying you or me (to my knowledge) to play Wildlands. I've said it before, and I'll say it again because it's epistemologically important: what and who do you reward, what and who do you punish by soft pedaling valid criticism and inappropriate heaping of praise?  Apologism does no one any good, and egos so fragile they can't take criticism should not be producing anything that enters the public domain, especially as a commercial product. Without criticism nothing improves.

 

Edited February 6, 2017 by 101459

[Zeealex]

101's right. 

At the end of the day, the developers developed that game, they assume responsibility for it and its shortcomings, the same way a mother would to her child, the same way a surgeon would to their procedures. 

They dont get to develop the game then take no responsibility when it falls flat just because people worked hard on it. Sure, its perhaps not the modeller's fault nor the texture artists' fault, in fact they did a good job imho.

We see good actors look like high schoolers with no talent when put in bad movies. We know from seeing them in other movies, its not the actors fault, someone made it look that way.

There are people in that studio who do have responsibility for it falling flat. Its their job to sound passionate and exciting as they read an autocue about their game. no I dont thing they should be dragged out kicking and screaming and made a fool of because they missed a beat, but they should rightly stand up and say 'yeah, my bad' 

 

Its a little anecdotal and a TINY TINY idea of what its like but. I make head mods for arma 3, people come out and say they look scary and out of proportion, I dont get to shirk the responsibility just because i'm passionate and love what I do, I take the criticism, and make it better next time, because I am passionate and love what I do... You feel? 

 

Yes, these developers are people with feelings. No they do not deserve to be insulted or worse, but if a vast number of people are coming out with the SAME criticisms for the game, then they need to take that on board rather than have people talk about feelings. 

This isn't the time for special snowflake feelings, as 101 said, if you can't take the heat you shouldn't be there, the games industry is a harsh industry to be in. 

Bottom line is, people should not be made to feel afraid to disagree or provide criticism because it MIGHT hurt someone's feelings, that is how ###### can easily go North Korea. 

 

 

 

[Lightspeed]

I just see things in a different light as a result of mission making all these years. Experience shows that players will critcise all of the things that don't meet their expectation and nitpick on everything they don't like, and have nothing to say about any of the good things, least of all, acknowledging the fact that they have something at all to play.

And take note, the ones who criticise are tge same people who have never done anything around game development. The people that have, don't criticise because they know the deal.

Not only that but every player is looking for their own flavour. Take Arma 3, with so many possible variations it's impossible to please everyone. Does that mean the choices that the Dev made are a failure? You would think so at times. But they're just decisions made and they're justified.

The Publishers and Devs in GRW have also made choices which many of you don't agree with. Are they wrong? Do they deserve to be attacked? Do they deserve significant credit for what they have produced? 

 

[Lightspeed]

The point of the thread was really to consider that there is a lot more going in game development than one may be privy to. Easy to sit back and criticise from your gaming chairs.

[Zeealex]

I work for two game developers, one I can openly name, the other I am on NDA for, I have even created my own proof of concept game myself in unreal 4, with a full interface, inventory system, damage system, visuals, everything, you're saying I know nothing about 'the deal?' 101 has worked in the industry from what I gather too, with this flagrant disrespect and lack of hindsight you're well on your way to making some people very ######, lightspeed, and considering you yourself are the one who "doesn't like negativity" you don't half start a lot. you have no damn idea who the heck you are talking to on these forums, 101, for instance for all we know, could be a very well known former game dev, you just don't know, and if you are unsure, don't make a damn assumption about anyone!


Thing is, it doesn't work that way. yeah, perhaps the more shouty angry 10 year olds who are just saying it has bad graphics have no clue, but 101 and I provide critique from the perspective of someone who has worked in or is working in the games industry. we know, we have that knowledge, 101's criticisms come across as erudite, he knows what he's talking about, and he makes a point to fully understand what he's talking about before making that point.  

I know guys who helped create my favourite games of all time, saying that this game is unimpressive, uninspired and not structured well at all. 

I have already stated there are good points to this game, it is fun, it entertains, it is a game, I will probably pick it up if my friends do, these people you talk about have been made to do things they don't want to do by someone and that someone is responsible for the direction wildlands has been put into, I like the models, I like the textures, I like the procedural dirt system, from a modeller's perspective, they are top notch and just what I expected and I cannot get my head around why anyone would say the graphics are poor. i can see just how much work has gone into those models, and those textures (even though from my KNOWLEDGE AND EXPERIENCE they use Quixel megascans, substance painter and quixel suite where they can for best visual fidelity)  but the faces are a little uncanny valley for my liking, the eye colors are too strong, and things take far too long to load up and render, there are bugs out of the Wazoo that need fixing, I am entitled to make these points as someone who has played the game it is a BONUS that I have knowledge of their workflows and I have knowledge of just how long it takes to do this ###### from an artistic perspective, it is not a rite of passage to hold an opinion. 

But once again you are hearing things you don't like and are attempting to invalidate people's opinion on the matter and belittling them, conflating them as nothing more than lazy gamers who have no knowledge of the industry. 

no offense lightspeed, but you are a mission maker for Arma 3. you may have some knowledge of arma 3 mission making and just how harsh the modding community can be (a community whose harshness i have experienced myself) but that does not give you the right to tell us what we can and cannot say. 

[nyleken]

I can already see this thread devolving into a slapfight.

So, in summation:

• Hatred of game devs is not a good idea.
• Conflating honest, constructive criticism with "hatred" is also not a good idea.
• Apologism is counter-productive.
• Being passionate and putting hard work into something does not necessarily result in something good.

Don't really have much to add but I'd like to emphasize that constructive criticism is always, ALWAYS a good thing.

I wouldn't get caught up in the negativity too much, either. The community manager for Wildlands doesn't seem too perturbed by it, anyways.

[Lightspeed]

I didn't refer to anyone in particular princess, so no need to get precious, it was a general thread about giving Devs a hard time after they have put in effort. There is a way to give constructive feedback but too often it's just abuse.

Where did I say anything about you in the thread? Or 101? Who did I disrespect exactly? This is a thread about showing respect even when you may not like the final product.

 

[Zeealex]

6 minutes ago, Lightspeed said:

I didn't refer to anyone in particular princess, so no need to get precious

That patronising remark was enough for me to see just how much disrespect you have. 

 

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Easy to sit back and criticise from your gaming chairs.

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And take note, the ones who criticise are tge same people who have never done anything around game development. The people that have, don't criticise because they know the deal.

101 and I have been the most outspoken critics here, it's kinda hard to not make that assumption. 

but whateve, F this, I'm out of this forum, if it's just going to be populated with patronizing egotistical thought police doing mounted patrols on their high horses such as yourself i'd rather not be here at all. 

Edited February 7, 2017 by Zeealex

[Lightspeed]

Yes you have been outspoken critics, that doesn't mean this thread is about you. 

And while I've seen little to nothing of what you've produced snd zero from 101, I wouldn't sledge coz I know how much work is involved.

I've already seen you sledge the work from the CUP modders so I know you don't hold the same respect for modders or devs. I assume you think your work is God's gift.

[Zeealex]

you're on a slope and slipping, badly... call it a fallacy but it's actually quite amusing to watch you get in a hissy fit because you hear things you don't want to...
 

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 that doesn't mean this thread is about you. 

as I said, its kind of hard to not defend myself and 101 when for the past couple of weeks you've either been disrespecting him or myself (directly or not) because we've taken a more critical standpoint on the game, and frankly he was right on a number of things. 
 

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And while I've seen little to nothing of what you've produced

I have dedicated entire threads to it, the work can take months due to commitment, and no I don't put up a new thing every day because a simple bipod just took me 3 freaking days to make. and a lot of what I do is NDA, if you ACTUALLY WORKED in the industry, you'd know that one. I mean it's great you wouldn't sledge and all, fantastic bit of virtue signalling there, but how am I expected to grow as an artist if i don't get the occasional "it needs this" or "it's not great try again using this workflow"?

 

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I've already seen you sledge the work from the CUP modders

I said "ew CUP" 5 months ago, because it was porting A2 content (which I already thought looked bad) and there was a visually better alternative that wasn't as bogged down. if you must know I'm helping them out as of now, and at least two members of the team know exactly how I feel about the quality and they are working with me to improve it. I never said anything about them not working hard, I never said anything about them being lazy or not knowing what they're doing. I am entitled to hold that opinion as an observer the same way I can hold an opinion that some of ground branch's content is not up to scratch either, and I myself can work to improve that as a part of their team. 

The industry works the same, they want the best of whats available, it's why you're seeing artists fobbed off in favour of photogrammetry, because it's as close to life as possible, it's not anything bad on the artist's part it's just that a camera and a computer can do a better job after a little clean up. 

 

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 I assume you think your work is God's gift.

I don't think that at all actually, that's kind of a stupid, and again, very disrespectful thing to say.
 I'm constantly working to improve my work as I frankly think everything I make can be improved, I'm always on the look out for critiques because it helps me learn faster knowing what specifically i need, and having a KNOWLEDGEABLE input can help in that regard.
I actually have a lot of issues with self confidence and it takes me weeks to sum up the ability and trust in myself to release a new version through sheer anxiety, I've never thought my work was perfect, I normally release when I'm sick of seeing it. So no, frankly, I don't; I think quite the opposite. But thanks for that one again, it's you slipping down this slope, not me. 

for someone who just policed how much we should be able to criticize the devs and their work, you're not half a disrespectful piece of work when it comes to someone disagreeing with you. And this is after I showed you the courtesy and respect to entrust you with my UBI account so you could play Wildlands yourself thinking it might build bridges between the two of us but you've pretty much thrown it in my face so that's the last time i'm doing that for someone. 

You're antagonizing yourself more and more every time you come out with this. I will say it time and time again, we are entitled to our opinions and we do not deserve to be slated and disrespected with passive aggressive quips because you don't like that, policing how people think and what opinions people have is how dictatorships form in the real world. 

as Nyleken has said

Quote

I'd like to emphasize that constructive criticism is always, ALWAYS a good thing.

how are we expected to grow as people if we don't get the occasional "you're doing it wrong" 

I may have confidence issues, I may have anxiety, but confidence and hearing the odd occasional "it's a bit ######, you've approached the workflow wrong, here's a tutorial" helps me grow. sure it hurts at first, but I can either about it, or work to improve it. 

has our fear of making mistakes become so blatant and obvious that we now no longer want to hear when we have?

Edited February 7, 2017 by Zeealex

[Lightspeed]

Anyways, I'm done here.

[Rocky]

I think some people missed Lightspeeds point altogether.

Thanks for posting the link Lighty, I agree 100%. 

I do have an unfair advantage though, because I have spoken to them and can testify that they don't turn up to do a 9-5, they turn up with a passion to go home knowing they have improved the game. When us handful of fans stood infront of the collected devs and were handed a mic, those devs were absolutely hooked on what we had to say; if they didn't care, they wouldn't have gathered around. I think that's kind of what you were alluding to with that link, and I agree.

We even spoke to the developer who was affectionately called the "rock guy", yeh his job was the rocks you see in Wildlands, and he took it dead serious.

[Zeealex]

rocks are actually pretty hard to make...

[Rocky]

Sadly, I took an interest in the rocks during the beta, I like 'em. LOL.

I like a lot about most of the textures though, for the size of the game, it is impressive.

[Zeealex]

I think some of them are from Quixel Megascans, I recognized some pieces of foliage while I was roaming around, could be wrong, a leaf is a leaf!

[Rocky]

Geez don't you start, I already had to google some of those words that 101 used. 

My browser automatically loads up a dictionary when it sees a 101 post now.

[Zeealex]

haha, me too! I didn't know what erudite meant, now I do and I feel like a smarty pants. 

Megascans is models and textures from photos and laser scanning, ubisoft has all quixel licenses, so it wouldn't surprise me. I'm actually leading a class on photogrammetry this week. 

[Rocky]

2 minutes ago, Zeealex said:

 I'm actually leading a class on photogrammetry this week. 

I don't know what that means but I think I am impressed.

[Zeealex]

5 minutes ago, Zeealex said:

models and textures from photos and laser scanning

 

[Zeealex]

megascans is just a brand

it's pretty damn impressive though

[nyleken]

Welcome to Ghostrecon.net.

Come for the discussions on Ghost Recon, stay for the opportunity to expand your vocabulary. Oh, and the mods are a cool thing too I guess.

[Rocky]

LOL!