On Grants Tweets

"Cinebar;c-17006127" wrote:


Usage data trying to prove what Simmers like is a flawed system. They used it to determine if they should include toddlers in TS4 before release. Rachel stated they went by telemetry of no one was playing toddlers in TS3 that much. How'd that work out? It was the number one reason players would not buy TS4, (those who were even interested at all) and or why they would not buy any more packs for a few years until toddlers were added. Usage data can't tell them what players like, maybe players didn't like toddlers in TS3 as much as TS2 and didn't play them as often but that didn't mean they didn't want them in the next game like TS4. Rachel said it was the best decision she had made about TS4 not to include them all because of their telemetry of TS3. I would say they were totally wrong about that.

Vodo doll in TS4> telemetry showed them no one was playing with it that much in TS4...reasons? Telemetry couldn't tell them why. But the why was because it was lame, it was all happy, happy. People had expected there to be some evilness about it, and there was none. It shouldn't mean they just add it to other activities, but to fix it to work as it's intended like a dark object with more evil consequences.

Woohoo, sure there was a lot of woohoo because of that contest, but they should't use that to determine if players want more woohoo, most hate it in TS4 because of the high fives and the silliness of it instead of the romance. It showed a lot of woohoo but only because they were promised a free reward,DLC they wanted.

You can use telemetry to say anything you want and prove any number they want, but it will never replace just asking the gamers.

If they could, I am sure they would go back and change things differently based on community feedback and statistics, rarely game development studios have the time or the money for it though. When you have a development team of 200 developers pretty much any decision becomes a large financial investment which is why they often have to make hard decisions, do they add a feature that users have not used much in the past but people are very vocal about it? Or do they make something else based on other feedback and usage data?

Toddlers were probably one of those hard decisions they had to make, like many others they have probably done. I think it is very hard to justify an investment like payment for 200 developers for a year if they do not have some statistics to back it up.

I am not saying you are wrong, I think when there are so much money involved it is sadly very difficult to please everyone. I hope that the team gets a larger budget so they can be more free in their decisions. Given that the sims4 seems to have sold very well, while other franchises like Battlefield and Anthem have not. It could be possible that it could happen.